Getting called fat shouldn’t earn you $145K (Opinion)

Call me old-school, but football coaches should be able to tell overweight players that they’ve gotten fat. It’s the tough love of competitive sports when it comes to coaching.

A lawsuit was settled recently for $145,000 to a high school football player who was “fat-shamed” by his coach in the Lacey Township School District.

The entire state and every school district in it would be dead broke if all of us from my generation sued every coach and or teacher for harsh criticism when we were growing up.

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We’re not doing this generation any favors by coddling them and awarding them hundreds of thousands of dollars because a coach called them fat. Yeah, too bad but I’m gonna say it.

When I was a kid gym teachers and coaches would do more than say harsh things. They would sometimes even get physical. It was part of growing up and learning how to progress and succeed.

I wish this kid all the best. He would be much richer in life lessons if he just learned to suck it up and deal with his issues rather than run to mommy and daddy and a lawyer and sue for money.

It’s shameful and pathetic. The temporary gain from his economic windfall might pay for a few years of a useless college degree but it won’t help in the long run in learning how to deal with adversity and gain from constructive criticism.

No matter how harsh the words were, learning how to deal with it and improve from it would be a much greater gain than money.

I sincerely wish the kid well, but let’s hope this doesn’t become a trend.

I know the coaches and teachers now have to watch every word they say to spare the feelings of our young people.

It doesn’t do the kids any good or society as a whole. We’ve gotten soft and, in the future, we will pay a much greater price for it.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Dennis Malloy only.

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