There probably aren’t any Arkansas high school football coaches who would argue against protecting kids from dangerous heat.
That’s not really the argument that is currently ongoing.
The argument some coaches and school administrators are making privately is whether the Arkansas Activities Association’s Wet Bulb Globe Temperature guidelines have gone too far — and whether everybody is actually playing by the same rules.
ArkansasVarsity.com has spoken off the record with multiple coaches and administrators who believe Arkansas’ WBGT restrictions are too strict when it comes to football practices. They have questioned how a team can be told conditions are too dangerous to practice normally, yet those same players can be allowed to line up and play a football game in similar heat.
That’s a fair question, but there’s another side to this thing, too.
Lakeside High School athletic trainer Benjamin Lewis resigned this week after 10 years at the school, alleging coaches and administrators repeatedly disregarded medical decisions and student-athlete safety protocols — including WBGT requirements. Lakeside Superintendent Bruce Orr disputes Lewis’ characterization of what happened.
Now the Arkansas Athletic Trainers’ Association has gotten involved, saying it has concerns about whether established safety requirements are being followed consistently around the state.
Put all of that together, and Arkansas high school athletics has a conversation that probably needs to happen.
Not next year. Not after something bad happens. It needs to happen now.
What coaches are saying privately
WBGT isn’t simply the temperature you see when you open the weather app on your phone. It takes several environmental factors into consideration to determine the amount of heat stress being placed on an athlete.
The AAA uses those readings to determine what teams can and cannot do during outdoor practices.
As the reading climbs, restrictions increase.
Nobody I have spoken with is saying coaches should be able to drag kids outside in dangerous conditions, deny them water and run them until they fall over.
Those days need to stay in the past.
What I am hearing instead is that some coaches believe the rules have become so restrictive that they’re making it harder to properly prepare football players for the conditions they’re eventually going to face.
This is Arkansas.It’s hot in August. It’s usually hot in September. Humidity can make an 85-degree afternoon feel downright miserable.
And football season isn’t moving to November.
Coaches have questioned whether limiting what players can do during practice actually prepares them to play when Friday night rolls around and the conditions aren’t much different.
That practice-versus-game distinction has been a particular source of frustration.
If it’s too dangerous to practice football at a certain WBGT reading on Thursday, coaches want to know why it can suddenly be acceptable to play football under similar conditions on Friday.
There’s also the matter of pushing practices later and later into the evening waiting for the reading to drop.
That affects coaches. It affects players. It affects parents who have to pick those players up. It affects kids who still have homework to do and have to be back at school the next morning.
Those aren’t reasons to ignore legitimate medical dangers. They are reasons to have a discussion about whether the current rules are accomplishing exactly what they’re intended to accomplish.
Then there’s the enforcement problem
This is where the conversation gets complicated.
Some coaches and administrators have also told ArkansasVarsity.com they don’t believe AAA rules and guidelines are consistently enforced the way they’re written.
Their argument is pretty simple: If School A follows every rule to the letter while School B doesn’t, School A shouldn’t be punished for doing the right thing.
Interestingly enough, athletic trainers are now saying something pretty similar.
They’re just coming at it from the other direction.
The Arkansas Athletic Trainers’ Association said it is increasingly concerned about reports from athletic trainers and others across the state involving inconsistent adherence to established safety requirements. The organization specifically said schools and health care professionals following the requirements could feel disadvantaged when the same standards aren’t being followed elsewhere.
That’s important.
Because before anybody decides whether the rules are too strict, we probably need to know whether the rules we already have are being followed equally.
If one school is shutting down or changing practice because its WBGT reading requires it while another school down the road keeps rolling along, we’ve got a problem.
And if that’s happening, writing another rule in the handbook isn’t going to fix it. Enforcement will.
Lakeside situation brings issue into the open
Until this week, much of what I have heard about WBGT regulations came during private conversations.
Lewis’ resignation changed that.
Lewis alleged football coaches at Lakeside recently disregarded WBGT requirements and bypassed medical clearance decisions made by athletic trainers or physicians. He further alleged that after reporting those concerns, he was told WBGT requirements would no longer be strictly enforced and that he shouldn’t confront coaches who bypassed his medical decisions.
Those are Lewis’ allegations, and they shouldn’t be presented as established fact.
Orr has disputed Lewis’ characterization of the events.
“While I respect his right to share his perspective, I do not agree with his characterization of the events and circumstances described in his public resignation letter,” Orr said.
Lewis also said policies established at Lakeside in 2018 gave sports medicine personnel, working under the direction of team physicians, final authority over whether athletes could participate. He alleged some of those medical decisions had been overruled by administrators.
The Arkansas Athletic Trainers’ Association didn’t comment specifically on Lewis’ employment situation, but its statement left little doubt about where it stands on medical authority.
“Coaches should make coaching decisions. Healthcare professionals should make healthcare decisions,” the association said.
That’s pretty hard to argue with.
A football coach shouldn’t be diagnosing a concussion.
A superintendent shouldn’t be deciding whether an injured knee is ready for contact.
And an athletic trainer shouldn’t be calling plays on 3rd-and-7.
Everybody has a job, and they should stick to that job.
Maybe both sides have a point
That’s what could get lost if this turns into another argument where everybody picks a side and starts yelling.
Two things can be true.
Arkansas’ WBGT guidelines can be overly restrictive in some situations and still serve an important purpose.
Coaches can legitimately question those restrictions while athletic trainers can legitimately demand that the rules currently on the books be followed until they’re changed.
And there is a big difference between saying a rule needs to be changed and simply deciding not to follow it.
If coaches and administrators believe the WBGT guidelines aren’t practical, take that argument to the AAA. Put together the information. Talk to doctors and athletic trainers. Get coaches involved. Look at how Arkansas kids acclimate to Arkansas weather. Then decide whether something needs to change.
But until it changes, everybody needs to be playing by the same rules.
That’s really the heart of this entire issue.
Coaches deserve reasonable rules that allow them to prepare their teams.
Athletic trainers deserve the authority to do the medical job they’re trained and licensed to do.
Most importantly, kids deserve to know the adults making these decisions are putting their safety ahead of winning a football game.
The answer probably isn’t getting rid of heat guidelines.
It also shouldn’t be treating every question about those guidelines as though somebody doesn’t care about player safety.
Arkansas needs to take a good hard look at the rules, decide whether they make sense and then make darn sure everybody follows whatever rules we decide to have.
That seems like a pretty reasonable place to start.