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Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Heroes Behind the Scenes
Greater Louisville, KY
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By: Josh Cook
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Photo(s) By: Mike DeZarn
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Football scout teams do the hard work in practice to help the starters play their best.
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"They prepare the starters for what they will see on Friday night. They do a lot, pretend to be players from the other team, learn a new and different offense week to week and still get up for Friday night. --LaKunta Farmer, Doss Head Coach
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Cody Everett and Joe Hartlage could be starters at another school.
Brandon Wilson could be a starter if he was bigger.
Tyler Beckett could be a starter if not for a knee injury.
What do all these local football players have in common?
They are all members of their football squad's scout team.
Scout teams are usually comprised of second- or third-stringers who are good, but not quite good enough to start (although at smaller schools some scout teams are made up of starters). Or, they are younger players who are working their way up to the varsity.
They are guys who often don't get the recognition they deserve, but are very important in their team's game preparation. They are guys who might not get a lot of playing time on Friday nights, but who play key roles during the week.
"Scout teams are huge because they prepare us for what the other team is going to do," North Oldham coach Billy Martin says. "It also lets us evaluate the scout team players to see if they are ready to play on the varsity. The more they can simulate the other team’s strategies, the better our guys will adjust on Friday night."
"The scout team guys are invaluable to us," St. Xavier coach Mike Glaser adds. "Our success on both sides of the ball depends on the look we get from the scout teams."
Two of St. X's top scout team players are Everett and Hartlage, both seniors who would be starting for other schools, according to Glaser.
Everett is a 5-foot-8, 193-pounder, who plays middle linebacker for the Tigers' scout team, while Hartlage is a 5-11, 185-pounder who plays defensive end (both are starters on special teams).
"I love doing it, because I get to go up against the No. 1 team every day in practice," Everett says. "We push the other guys too, so when it comes to the games it's almost easier."
Everett, who fled Louisiana with his family after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, tries to make it as hard as he can on the Tigers' first-team offense.
"I just go in there and hit really hard," he says. "Sometimes coach pulls me out because he doesn't want me hurting anybody."
But in the end they are all on the same team playing for the same goal…
"To win a state championship, and we're doing everything we can to reach that goal," says Hartlage, who earlier this season forced a fumble on a kickoff return against duPont Manual.
Trinity senior Kurt Fultz was a member of the Shamrocks' scout team as a sophomore, and is now a backup linebacker as well as a special teams player.
"As a sophomore, that was my role to help the seniors and starting juniors to get better, so we could win another state championship," Fultz says. "(The scout team plays) a very big role. If they don't give us--the starters and second string--their all, they're not helping us prepare. If they work real hard, then we should be ready."
Brandon Wilson, a senior, is one of the hardest workers Fern Creek coach Curtis Higgins has, despite the fact that he's only 5-3, 164 pounds. Wilson is a linebacker on the scout team (he plays behind two other seniors at outside linebacker) and also starts on special teams.
"He is a very important part of our team even though he does not start on offense or defense," Higgins says. "Brandon is a very good player for his size and speed. He is too little to play on the line and too slow to play in the backfield. Last year, our weak side outside linebacker got hurt in the second quarter of the Moore game. Brandon came in and played the rest of the game with the starters and played very well. Kids like Brandon are the real student athletes."
Wilson, an honor roll student who peppers his responses with “Yes sir,” describes himself as a "reserved person" off the field, but knows he must be aggressive in practice.
"Even if we're not the real team the (coaches) still expect us to be competitive and not let the offense run all over us," says Wilson, who left the team late in the season in order to concentrate on getting an academic scholarship. "(Assistant) Coach (Bill) White always tells us if we go half (speed), or don't try our hardest, it's not going to help our offense any."
Over at Eastern, coach Ken Whalen has a couple of scout team standouts--Justin Davis and Tyler Beckett. Beckett is a former starter who is coming back from a knee injury.
"He, too, has plenty of energy and demands attention when he is at the nose guard position," Whalen says.
Some other standout scout team players in the area include Greg Dillman at DeSales, Eli McDowell at Butler, the Ballard duo of Warren Wenzel and Eric Holmes and the North Oldham trio of Davis Dudley, Zack Fisher and Ben Lowery.
"The scout team are honestly the most important members of the team," Doss coach LaKunta Farmer says. "They prepare the starters for what they will see on Friday night. They do a lot, pretend to be players from the other team, learn a new and different offense week to week and still get up for Friday night. The biggest thing is that you find really good players that can help the team. That's how Coach (Bob) Redman found me at Male. My game was at practice.
"The team is only as good as your scout team--go hard or go home."
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