STrib: In the City, football is battling a decline

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Nice article.

It's a sad state of affairs but as someone who was in a very similar situation, growing up in the city and choosing a Catholic hs, I understand all the difficulties of such decisions. As much as I wish we could go back to the days of Johnson and Southwest being hockey powerhouses, and Washburn dominating the gridiron, that's just not how things are these days.
 

My main takeaway is that the Gophers have gotten 3 recruits out of Minneapolis in the last 15 years. Think about that. The largest city in the state, with 350,000 people, and 3 kids in 15 years? You would expect at least 3-5 D-1 players a year from a city that size.
 

John Galt said:
My main takeaway is that the Gophers have gotten 3 recruits out of Minneapolis in the last 15 years. Think about that. The largest city in the state, with 350,000 people, and 3 kids in 15 years? You would expect at least 3-5 D-1 players a year from a city that size.
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I am not doubting you at all, I am trying to think of players we got from a Minneapolis Public High School. Here is my list, feel free to add to it:
Rashede Hageman
Everett Pra... I am not going to try to spell his last name. He was a TE who finished out his career at UNI I think.
I seriously can't think of anyone else. There has to be more...
 

That is a major factor in the Gopher programs struggling these past few decades. Almost no contribution from
the state's largest city/school host city.....
 


Honestly, I don't have stats to back up my claim, but this seems to be a trend found throughout the Midwest's major inner-cities.
 

metrolax said:
That is a major factor in the Gopher programs struggling these past few decades. Almost no contribution from
the state's largest city/school host city.....
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No offense, but that's just not true. The Gopher football team has had almost no contribution from the public HS's from the state's largest city, but the city of MPLS has put out a lot of kids.

Just last season:
Kyle Henderson, Hageman, Pride, and I believe Kim Royston (he might be from BP) are all Mpls kids.
Isaac Hayes is a Mpls kid.

The plight of inner city schools is a big problem. However, I don't think it has hardly any ramifications on football. Those kids are still playing football growing up and they are still a pretty large part of our talent base. More and more of these kids are starting have suburban addresses (because the open enrollment stuff has been curbed, slightly). I just don't see how it affects the Gophers that Hageman went to Washburn compared to Henderson going to Armstrong. It seems like it's semantics (football wise). As someone else pointed out, this happens in a ton of cities throughout America. The inner cities simply do not have the funds, especially with no child left behind, to be competitive as a school with the private and suburban schools, and so the kids get on buses. I remember when Hoop Dreams came out and people were shocked about William Gates hopping a bus to suburban Chicago to play basketball, well, that's a really common story throughout the country with urban high school athletes.

So, I do believe it's a problem and it is bad for society. However, football/basketball wise....I don't think it has any impact.
 


There is a ton of football talent in the city conferences. One could easily fill a full Big Ten roster (if not two) with exclusively city conference players. The reason this doesn't happen is because the U is biased against city conference players in general, and black players from the city conferences specifically. Just ask Larry Fitzgerald - he'll tell you all about it.
 



MNfootballfan said:
I am not doubting you at all, I am trying to think of players we got from a Minneapolis Public High School. Here is my list, feel free to add to it:
Rashede Hageman
Everett Pra... I am not going to try to spell his last name. He was a TE who finished out his career at UNI I think.
I seriously can't think of anyone else. There has to be more...
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Everett Pedescleaux was from Armstrong, so definitely not a Mpls city school.

Go Gophers!!
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
No offense, but that's just not true. The Gopher football team has had almost no contribution from the public HS's from the state's largest city, but the city of MPLS has put out a lot of kids.

Just last season:
Kyle Henderson, Hageman, Pride, and I believe Kim Royston (he might be from BP) are all Mpls kids.
Isaac Hayes is a Mpls kid.

The plight of inner city schools is a big problem. However, I don't think it has hardly any ramifications on football. Those kids are still playing football growing up and they are still a pretty large part of our talent base. More and more of these kids are starting have suburban addresses (because the open enrollment stuff has been curbed, slightly). I just don't see how it affects the Gophers that Hageman went to Washburn compared to Henderson going to Armstrong. It seems like it's semantics (football wise). As someone else pointed out, this happens in a ton of cities throughout America. The inner cities simply do not have the funds, especially with no child left behind, to be competitive as a school with the private and suburban schools, and so the kids get on buses. I remember when Hoop Dreams came out and people were shocked about William Gates hopping a bus to suburban Chicago to play basketball, well, that's a really common story throughout the country with urban high school athletes.

So, I do believe it's a problem and it is bad for society. However, football/basketball wise....I don't think it has any impact.
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Bob, I had the same thoughts and agree with most of this, with one caveate: I have to believe there are many big, strong, athletic kids in Minneapolis and St. Paul who are not playing football -- or not reaching their full potential -- because of the current lack of competitiveness in those areas. Not everybody can or wants to go to a private school just for sports. Growing up in Richfield (when Richfield was a football power), I remember being in third grade and I couldn't wait to play football on an organized team and in high school. Kids who go to South, Edison, etc., just don't have that. I think we're missing out on a lot of potentially good football players who are playing other sports or no sports because they're not seeing older brothers or other kids in their neighborhoods doing it and seeing success from it.
 

BleedGopher said:
Everett Pedescleaux was from Armstrong, so definitely not a Mpls city school.

Go Gophers!!
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I stand corrected, thank you!

Follow up question for you Bleed, before Hageman who was our last MPLS Public HS recruit?
 




dpodoll68 said:
There is a ton of football talent in the city conferences. One could easily fill a full Big Ten roster (if not two) with exclusively city conference players. The reason this doesn't happen is because the U is biased against city conference players in general, and black players from the city conferences specifically. Just ask Larry Fitzgerald - he'll tell you all about it.
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Are you talking about all city conference players (from other states as well?). Because there is no way there are two Big Ten rosters full of guys from this state playing in the cities. As for the U being biased towards them I have no idea but I have not seen a lot of guys coming out of the city schools and staring at other BCS football programs around the country.
 

David Gilreath was a city kid.
 

It's not that the city doesn't produce talent, the talented players choose to go to school in the suburbs. Players see the the scholarship offers are going to players from the suburban schools, and think that's the path to a scholarship offer. But these players might well have gotten a scholarship offer had they stayed at the school in their neighborhood.
 

If the city school programs had some teeth to them, a lot of these kids would play. However, when they see run down and inadequate facilities and support, they choose not to.
 

It's not just Minneapolis. I'm shocked by how little talent comes out of the public school system down here in Kansas City. Between KCMO and KCK the population is about 600,000. There are only a handfull of players that move on to play DI football. The inner city school athletic system is in sad shape. The public schools have lost their accreditation and truancy and dropout rates are out of control. I attended an inner city game (at a very large school) not to long ago and the average weight of the offensive line was about 160 pounds. It seems the kids that probably have the potential to become amazing collegiate athletes get caught up the trend of skipping or dropping out and have no chance of becomming eligible to play sports.

I've been away from Minnesota for a couple years now. Perhaps this is the trend as well.
 

It's seems like they write this article every 10 years or so. The problem has many facets. There's no money, there are no solid feeder programs in the elementary and middle schools, demographic changes, and to top it off if any kid who shows any promise he gets gobbled up by CDH. Minneapolis high school football is pretty haphazardly run. For any kid to come out of the city conference he has to be a freak of nature like Hageman. And anyone who does stand out is going to be a project.
 

I question whether this concern is really isolated to Mpls public schools. How many does Wisky sign from Milwaukee (city proper) public school programs? U Mich from Detroit publics? IU/PD/ND from Indianapolis? Or even Chicago, on a per capita basis? (Bear in mind that Chicago Public Schools has an enrollment of > 400K, over 10x the enrollment of Mpls schools and larger than the entire population of Minneapolis)?

Edit: out of interest searched Chicago, IL prospects on Rivals.com. There are about 15 listed from Chicago public schools, about 8 with actual Rivals ratings and only 1 so far committed to a BCS school (Gregory and Jordan Diamond will be the others). Simeon is pretty much the main talent-producing program.

I imagine it is a combination of lower academic performance (= smaller pool of NCAA-qualifying kids) and lack of athletic resources, combined with open enrollment driving the talented kids to suburban schools for better football exposure and a better education. And hence it is probably not unique to Minneapolis.
 

Catechol said:
I question whether this concern is really isolated to Mpls public schools. How many does Wisky sign from Milwaukee (city proper) public school programs? U Mich from Detroit publics? IU/PD/ND from Indianapolis? Or even Chicago, on a per capita basis? (Bear in mind that Chicago Public Schools has an enrollment of > 400K, over 10x the enrollment of Mpls schools and larger than the entire population of Minneapolis)?

I imagine it is a combination of lower academic performance (= smaller pool of NCAA-qualifying kids) and lack of athletic resources, combined with open enrollment driving the talented kids to suburban schools for better football exposure and a better education. And hence it is probably not unique to Minneapolis.
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I'd say it's also very cultural. We have huge (if not the highest) recent immigrant and "transient" populations in both cities, and there is not much emphasis on "melting into the pot," which includes HS sports. Back in the early to mid 20th century, that was how immigrant and relocated kids fit in. Most inner city schools can hardly even fill out 2 deeps in football. It will take time as the city culture evolves, but it may be too late for football to survive.
 

It isn't isolated to MPLS or the sport of football. Urban kids from across the country are going to schools in the suburbs or private schools, largely for sports.

There is a long list of college athletes who are from Minneapolis and Saint Paul, who did not go to MPLS or SP public high school.
 

Hates Monikers said:
Bob, I had the same thoughts and agree with most of this, with one caveate: I have to believe there are many big, strong, athletic kids in Minneapolis and St. Paul who are not playing football -- or not reaching their full potential -- because of the current lack of competitiveness in those areas. Not everybody can or wants to go to a private school just for sports. Growing up in Richfield (when Richfield was a football power), I remember being in third grade and I couldn't wait to play football on an organized team and in high school. Kids who go to South, Edison, etc., just don't have that. I think we're missing out on a lot of potentially good football players who are playing other sports or no sports because they're not seeing older brothers or other kids in their neighborhoods doing it and seeing success from it.
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That's a good point, but i'm not sure how realistic it is. What I mean is that this has been going on forever in HS basketball and football in MN and hasn't seemed to slow down the process of those areas producing a lot of athletes. For instance, there are three kids from MPLS on the Gopher basketball team. Not one of them went to Mpls public school (Coleman - Hopkins, Ingram - transitions, Williams - Cooper). Royce White and Marcus Williams are from Mpls, etc. There are just a lot of kids in these sports from those cities who go to the suburban / private school and excel.

I think with the younger kids looking up to these guys, they realize that is the road. It's just a common part of life for them. I'm not saying it's right, you'd think at some time the idea would be to fix the public school system in inner cities. But I think the city of Mpls has been putting out it's most basketball players in a long time, they just often go to Hopkins.
 


Nice article......

If this was 1994....

Seriously they are 15-20 years late with this breaking news.
 


MNfootballfan said:
No, he went to Robbinsdale Armstrong also.
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Aren't we talking about what the environment is that develops a kids talent, give's him oppertunities to play football, and in Gilreath case play in the pro's, I'm not sure it had anything to do with Armstrong, he played his final year at Armstrong but that was about it.
 

Gilreath is a city kid. He played varsity football at Washburn from his freshman year through his junior year. He left after his junior year to play his senior year at Armstrong, presumably to play against better competition and gain increased exposure.
 


MNVCGUY said:
Are you talking about all city conference players (from other states as well?). Because there is no way there are two Big Ten rosters full of guys from this state playing in the cities. As for the U being biased towards them I have no idea but I have not seen a lot of guys coming out of the city schools and staring at other BCS football programs around the country.
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He was being sarcastic. Fitzgerald has written before that he thinks the U is biased against city kids which is ridiculous.
 

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