Earlier today, the other shoe may have dropped in one of the most disgraceful incidents ever witnessed on a high school football field. Two players from a San Antonio high school deliberately went after an official late in a game. The two players have since claimed that they did so on orders from an assistant coach. Now ESPN reports that the assistant coach admitted to ordering the hit in retaliation for bad calls and supposed racial slurs from the official.
ESPN’s John Barr obtained a signed statement from Robert Harris, principal of John Jay High School, detailing two conversations he had with head football coach Gary Gutierrez over the weekend of September 4 and 5. According to the statement, Gutierrez called Harris several times on his cell phone on the way back from John Jay’s game with Marble Falls High School near Austin to tell him that safeties Michael Moreno and Victor Rojas had deliberately hit official Robert Watts late in the game. For those who missed it, Rojas blasted Watts from behind. While Watts was still on the ground, Moreno barreled into him while leading with his helmet.
Gutierrez met with Harris in the John Jay parking lot after the team arrived early on the morning of September 5, and told him that defensive backs coach Mack Breed, who was Moreno and Rojas’ position coach, had asked him what would happen to the players. When Gutierrez told Breed that Moreno and Rojas were going to be kicked off the team, Harris said that Gutierrez told him that Breed admitted that he “directed the players to take out the referee.” Breed is black; Moreno and Rojas are Latinos.
At 6 p.m. that night, Harris met with Gutierrez and Breed in his office. Breed then admitted that he ordered Moreno and Rojas to go after Watts “to make the referee pay for his racial comments and calls.” According to Harris, Breed wanted to “take full responsibility for his actions” and admit what he did. Soon afterward, Breed was placed on administrative leave. After reading this, I’m wondering why Harris didn’t fire Breed and have him arrested on the spot. Take your pick–felonious assault, criminal solicitation, contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Moreno and Rojas already face the prospect of criminal charges for their actions, but frankly I’m surprised that Breed isn’t already in jail.
According to KENS in San Antonio, Moreno and Rojas will not be coming back to John Jay, though it remains to be seen whether they will stay at the Northside Independent School District’s alternative high school or have been expelled from the system. They, along with Breed, Gutierrez, and several others, will appear at a Thursday hearing before the executive committee of the University Interscholastic League, the governing body for high school sports in Texas. Ominously, a UIL spokeswoman told the San Antonio Express-News that the UIL has not ruled out canceling the remainder of John Jay’s season.
If you’re reading this, Mack, ask yourself–was it worth it? Are you proud of yourself? No thanks to you, two players have been kicked out of their high school, will almost certainly be banned from ever playing high school sports in Texas again, and could potentially face criminal charges. Additionally, your team could potentially lose the rest of its season. With apologies to Keith Olbermann, you are the Worst Person in the World, hands down.
Northside ISD is taking the claims that Watts used racial slurs very seriously, and is in the process of filing a formal complaint about Watts’ alleged actions. However, what Breed did here is flat-out inexcusable. It will be a travesty if Breed isn’t fired, banned from ever coaching in Texas again, and sentenced to serious jail time. We in the black community have a name for guys like Breed–“disgrace to the race.”
