What's Up with TYFA

Pop Warner vs TYFA!!

When did this battle start. Pop Warner has been in Spring Hill for as long as I can remember. Now along comes TYFA. It appears a group of outsiders, Williamson County residents, have decided to take over the local youth football program. Even one "official" fron New Orleans with no children in the program is running SHYFA.

Don't local people know what they are doing? It has always been this way ever since Saturn came in. Locals do not know how to run our own business.

Just a rant. I'm just getting tired of giving control of everything over to people who have barely lived in our community, yet they know what is best.

I am unsure who posted the original message, as they did not use their name, but it appears to be someone disgruntled with progress. And, I do not mean the progressive growth of business; I only speak of progressive growth of youth athletics in our area.

The Pop Warner organization in Spring Hill had grown long in the tooth and needed to grow, but it appears to have been hampered by the Pop Warner organization itself. The new Spring Hill Raiders of the TYFA league has been formed to help progress youth football and athletics in the area, which is established in Williamson County as well as Maury County.

My son was a member of the Franklin Cowboys last year, because we had heard nothing positive about the Pop Warner team in town. Whether those statements were true, I do not know first hand. However, the members of that organization broke away from Pop Warner, citing the issues I had heard about as the basis for breaking away. I can therefore assume those statements to be true.

After last year's season was over, a group of TYFA based parents, myself included, that live in Spring Hill were looking to found a TYFA team in Spring Hill. We discovered that the former Pop Warner organization, now known as the Spring Hill Youth Football Association was trying to join TYFA themselves. Rather than work separately on the issue, we joined together. With the aid of everyone involved, we were accepted into TYFA in January of this year. We will be playing in TYFA this fall.

We seem to have been well accepted by most of the community, as we just completed our first camp with approximately 300 kids in attendance. According to the parents, in attendance, we did a great job. We are looking to start out our first year as one of the largest communities , if not the largest, in TYFA. Our organization has dedicated itself to being as proactive as it can be to ensure we only grow as a community.

Everyone that is part of the board is a resident of Spring Hill, both in Maury and Williamson Counties. We are welcoming kids from all over, not just parts of Spring Hill, to participate in our program. We would invite anyone who thinks we are doing something wrong for the community to come and give us a try before passing judgment on us.

Thank you.

I have no idea why Cumberland Furnace,TN is appearing under my name to the left. I am a Spring Hill resident.

I have to laugh when I see a post such as this. It does much to reinforce the narrow minded short sighted opinions that exist in this city. I have a big news flash for you, Spring Hill is as much in Williamson county as it is in Maury county. The people that you refer to in your post are involved in this program for two reasons.#1 FOR THE KIDS. Last time I checked that is what this all about kids, not egos.#2 Because no one else was willing to accept the responsibility, or put forth the effort to improve what was at best a second rate program that was treated as such by Pop Warner. Clearly you did not attend the recent camp that SHYFA hosted. It was a fantastic program that focused on teaching and building enthusiasm among the kids. Over 300 children attended and the response from both children and parents was excellent. Again, I point out 300 kids were there, how many kids played Pop Warner last year? Lastly, the person you refer to from New Orleans coached my son last year, and I can say with all honesty he was one of the best coaches I have seen in any youth sport in Spring Hill or elsewhere. He was fair, unbiased, and focused on teaching the kids the game on all levels. As far as I'm concerned, Coach Mark can coach my kids anytime, anyplace. I encourage you to put your money where you mouth is, step up, get involved. If your not willing to do that, then SHUT UP and crawl back under whatever rock you came from.

PS: Try using spell check in the future, "fron" is not word.

I am the president of SHYFA. I also am the son of a Derryberry. That makes me a member of the first family in Spring Hill and Maury county. So the football league is certainly not being run by people who have barely lived in the community. my family helped to build the community. I have had the pleasure of getting to know some wonderful people trough SHYFA. this league was changed from a program that wasn't allowed to grow by Pop Warner in Columbia to one that is treated as an equal by all of te members of TYFA. As part of Tyfa we get an equal vote just like everyone else in the league. As for our cajun friend, the guy is a good friend, a great coach, and a good role model for the kids of Spring Hill. It is a shame that someone gets on the internet and says things that aren't true, and doesn't even have the guts to post his name on the blog.

i would also like to say that we had a huge mix of maury and williamson county kids at camp, and i never heard a word from them, their parents, or any of the coaches about where anyone lived.

the kids that came to our camp were such a joy to work with. it really gives me hope for the future. i enjoyed every minute of camp, and although worn out, i hated going to work instead of camp monday morning.

in closing, let me say to the blogger who is so upset, you need to move on with your life. this organization is providing a safe, fun place for kids to play football and cheer. there can't be anything wrong with that. and please keep the comments about outsiders to yourself. since i was born and raised here, i don't think you have a leg to stand on in that respect.

Initially I had no intention of responding to this blog as I felt it really did not merit a response, however after additional thought I feel like I must respond. First off thank you to the people who have posted such nice comments about me, I consider it an honor to be a part of this program and to teach and guide the future of this city. To the original author I only have this say; you clearly know not of what you speak. It is always easy to sit back and make comments about something that you know very little about. I ask you the following questions. How can you refer to anyone in this community as an outsider when clearly most of the residents of Spring Hill are transplants (Tommy excluded of course). Does this make them any less dedicated to the program? Does this make the tremendous amount of effort put forth by John D, Greg B, Shelby J, David & Lisa W, etc any less valuable? Where were you last year when this program was 10K in debt? Did you go to the community to solicit funds to save this program? Where were you when we needed practice fields? Did you spent 14 hours on Saturday last year at Independence High so that the children in Pop Warner could have their first home football game in 20 years? Did you go before the Board of Mayor & Alderman to request help with practice fields? Where were you in the countless meetings between us, Mr. Gordon, and Spring Hill Parks and Rec? Did you go out there to work on those 52 acres of land that was donated? Where were you during our camp last week? Did you dedicate a week off of work to teach those 300 children skills, sportsmanship, and leadership?
You are correct I was not born or raised here, I moved here from New Orleans. Nor do I have a child playing in this program; I believe I have 300+ children in this program. My dedication is to the children of Maury and Williamson County that choose to play football in Spring Hill. This program has been my passion since I became a part of it last year that is the reason we surveyed over 100 Pop Warner parents last year before deciding to make the change to TYFA. You are most welcome to review those handwritten survey results to see that 95% of the parents supported this change. In addition I encourage you to come to our board meetings and voice your frustrations in person. Our meetings are open to anyone who wishes to address our group, of course I can only assume since you did not put your name on your letter that you prefer to stand in the background and criticize what you do not know or understand.

Who are you to say I'm not local? I was born and raised here!Now we can end this right now.Parents that want to let their kids play for an organization that says kids that are over weight can only practice not play on Saturday's game go to POP Warner.Now Parents that want their kids to practice and play on Saturday's games go to SHYFA.It is sad to see a child practice all week not to get to play in the game all because POP Warner says he is to fat.I saw this first hand last year and it made me mad!!That is why we are SHYFA!! So you know who I am Why don't you come out?Maybe it's because you are the one thats not from here!! I can back my self up!Bethesda Ele. Page Middle, and a Page High Grad.Now if you are man or woman enough let me know your thoughts on this!!!!!!!!!!

I just thought I should add a little comment to this topic. I'm a parent of one of the children that "will" be playing for SHYFA this fall and I'm also a wife of a future coach with SHYFA. I can only say I feel honored and proud to see TYFA come to Spring Hill, Tennessee. You see, my son, my husband and I, we were all born here in "Middle Tennessee." We love this area, we wouldn't want to live anywhere else. More importantly, my husband and I remember the days that "Williamson County" only had teams to play against other "Williamson County" teams. All played in Franklin. These teams were put together by some very "proud" fathers and devoted citizens of Franklin. There were businesses in Franklin that contributed greatly to this program. Then after much hardwork, sweat, and many tears the football program was about to come to an end. My father, Buck Rogers, who at the time had not one child playing football, but had the love of the game AND for children of all ages, decided to keep the program going strong. He sought help from many people and thus "THE FRANKLIN COWBOYS" became part of Franklin history. I must say this program was bigger and better than ever!!! The cowboys were then part of the Mid-State football program. The growth in Williamson County started to boom. As with all programs that center around children things change, needs change, and the foundation that begins such a program continues with the "solid rock" of who is the program for anyway? We all can agree its NOT about the adults but the children and the love of the sport. We are here at the turning point of what is going to be one of the best programs in Middle Tennessee. Anyone who lives in Spring Hill can testify that the growth here is NOT stopping and is growing by leaps and bounds. I can only say, THANKS to Mark Woodworth and his gang (my husband too, who I adore) for continuing what IS best for Spring Hill. As I sat with my father (who has one leg now, and drove 80 miles to watch his grandson at football camp) in a very hot van, I saw the look on my father's face, I now know how excited we (my husband and I) will be when we see how much farther this program will grow and change in the next 30 years. I look forward to change, changes are good for the mind, body and soul and they'll be WELCOME here in Spring Hill with the "majority" of all that call Spring Hill home. Regardless if you are "from" Tennessee or Ten-Buck-Two, who cares, we're all family at SHYFA and we'll all be family. THANKS everyone at SHYFA for helping make my father one "HAPPY" man on Monday. THANKS for letting my husband be a part of it all. BUT, the most important thing ever, thanks for letting my son be one of the first kids to play on a FIRST RATE PROGRAM!!!!!!!!!! For all of this, I only hope that everyone can see this is ALL ABOUT THE KIDS, which is where our future is!!!! God bless you all!!!!!

I would just like to say it was a pleasure having all the fine people of Spring Hill visit us in Smyrna a few weeks ago. Everyone was very kind and respectful toward our community. Smyrna, as a community has only been associated with TYFA for about five years now. I'm glad the past board members of Smyrna decided to join TYFA.It has been a very pleasant league to play youth football in. Let me end by saying, I wouldn't let comments like the first comment get my blood boiling too much. It is very apparent this individual is not part of your program.

http://tyfafootball.blogspot.com

I am very disapointed with our season this fall with the Springhill Raiders and I'm not the only one!! Having a junior pee-wee son we thought this would be a great, fun experience instead we were stuck in this crappy league that unless you were a coach you child might play 2 or 3 minutes if lucky and bench warmed the rest of the time feeling sad and hurt!! Oh I tried to get involved but with 7 coaches with any title they could through on them there was little room to get involved so my son could actually play.3 nights a week of practice for what to drive 40 minutes away and watch your kid do nothing. The worst is a friend of mine who had a 7 year old son and when she asked the coach why her soon never got to play he said because he couldn't tackle//she said wasn't his job to teach him and the coach said he didn't have the TIME..with 7 coaches per team standing around no one could spend 10 minutes with this kid? These guys just figured if they coached there kid would play and that's the most efforet they would put it it! PATHETIC..that goes for about every team in the league if you can't weasel your way in and coach you might as well save your time and money for your son!! I know we won't be back as well as others have expressed the same to me. I will say that the Franklin Cowboys will be getting more people this fall as obviously a well run league wouldn't let this happen even after we talked to the coach and president of the league he infact sided with the coach saying that even his own sons played very little their first year..I guess that makes him a fool too!!

As a member of the Spring Hill Youth Football Association's Board, I would like to address this with a few comments.

I assume you are speaking of the Raiders in the TYFA league and not the Raiders in the Pop Warner league (I base that assumption on the mention of the Franklin Cowboys, who are in TYFA, and the naming of the teams).

I have searched our records and found no father in our league with your name, so I will also assume you are using a false name. It may just be a case that your information is not in our database, somehow.

As a member who helped start this organization, I can say that I am truly sorry if your experience in our league was as you say it was. I can assure you, and everyone, that this is not the typical experience. We understand that these situations may and will occur and we do try to take steps to prevent them from happening. Each year (2009 will only be our 3rd), we try to address known issues from the previous years and put ideas into play that we hope will prevent them from happening again.

We know that we are not the perfect organization, but there really is no perfect organization. This is because everyone that enters a league will have their own expectations and those expectations are not always met. Sometimes those expectations are perfectly justified and other times they are completely unreasonable. I am not sure what your expectations were this past year, but they must not have been met for you to post such a message.

This post is not meant as a defensive statement against you. There may be individuals that have put you in this position, but I would ask that you not attack they league as a whole. We work very hard, all year round, for the kids. I say 'we', because it is a community effort, but there will always be individuals within that collective 'we' and sometimes they don't stand 100% for what 'we' stand for.

I would be willing to personally talk with you about any issues you had last year, so please feel free to send me an e-mail. My address can be found at our website, under the 'Board' link.

Thank you,

John Durham
Spring Hill Youth Football Association

Well I am not sure where to begin with this post!

The typing and attention to detail speaks volumes.

My child played for this very same coach and I have friends that playedd for him the year before and that is why we chose Spring Hill over Franklin. It was a very good decision as I was thoroughly impressed by our head coach. He very rarely coached his own son and left that up to other coaches, he had one assistant coach assigned to make sure everyone saw playing time and not to mention taught many 5 year olds how to play football from scratch taking this group to the playoffs.
This very same "pathetic league" saw fit to elect him to the Vice President Spot, as well they should with anyone that puts in this much time with the kids. They also went on to plan and host the best sports camp I and several other family and friends have yet to witness. I have to believe this very same JR Pee Wee Coach and Vice President had something to do with that.
Having said that, Mr McGreggor, we wish you well in Franklin as you are the kind we do not need in Spring Hill Youth Sports.
-M

Does anyone want to ask about the wake of debt that SHYFA is leaving in it's path? I think they are on the fourth of fifth sports store because they can't and don't intend to payoff what they owe. Or how about the fact that Franklin Cowboys want nothing to do with the Spring Hill team because of the embarrassment they have brought down on the whole football league. Way to be roll models for the kids!! How about when they lost my child's reg form last year and forgot to call us for practice. When we called to find out where to be, they explained that they had misplaced the paperwork and that practice had already started a week before and too bad for us it was too late to start. They wouldn't even refund the money we paid to play. It was apparently our fault they lost the forms and they have a "no refund" policy!! With this mentality, it's only a matter of time before self destruction occurs.....

Okay...so somebody explain to me the pros/cons of both leagues. I was planning on setting my 5 yr up for pee wee this weekend with Pop Warner until I read here about this other league, SHYFA.

I checked out the web site for SHYFA and it appears they have already started so I guess my decision is made. Pop warner for us. But still would like to know the pros/cons. If the only difference is that Pop wont let your fat kid play, I guess I don't have a problem. If there are other reasons, could you list please.

It's nice to know I have options.

You can still sign up for SHYFA. You can sign up tonight at the practice field. I believe a map of the practice field is on the website.

So far I'm not impressed with SHYFA. The website offers little information on registration. In fact nothing on registration. They have a camp going on right now but when I drove by the practice field where they are suppose to be having camp(Evans Park) I only saw baseball players. I stayed around for 30 minutes and saw no football. I can't even find a phone number or email address for contacting someone. I get email addresses for board members but nothing for general info. Sounds like SHYFA has a lot of things yet to work out.

the information below is from the SHYFA website www.springhillfootball.com ...it was very helpful and informative...our email questions about camp got answered very quickly...so far the camp seems to have been very well done

2009 SEASON REGISTRATION NEWS
We will resume our Registrations at our Blocking Camp, starting July 6th at 6pm. Our Blocking Camp and Registrations will take place at our practice fields off of Jim Warren Rd (map), which is the same place we have practiced the last two years and will practice this year.

We will also be setup for Registrations at our Pancake Breakfast at Applebee's of Spring Hill, on Saturday, July 11th, from 7am-9am.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If your child has not played or cheered for the Raiders, they will need a copy of their birth certificate before they will be allowed to register.

SpringHillDad wrote:

the information below is from the SHYFA website www.springhillfootball.com ...it was very helpful and informative...our email questions about camp got answered very quickly...so far the camp seems to have been very well done
2009 SEASON REGISTRATION NEWS
We will resume our Registrations at our Blocking Camp, starting July 6th at 6pm. Our Blocking Camp and Registrations will take place at our practice fields off of Jim Warren Rd (map), which is the same place we have practiced the last two years and will practice this year.
We will also be setup for Registrations at our Pancake Breakfast at Applebee's of Spring Hill, on Saturday, July 11th, from 7am-9am.
IMPORTANT NOTE: If your child has not played or cheered for the Raiders, they will need a copy of their birth certificate before they will be allowed to register.

Thanks for the info.

Mr funny stuff.
Are you serious?
Wake of debt? What are you talking about?
Have you any clue? As a member of the current sponsor I assure you that we are very proud to be a spoonsor for SHYFA. The sponsorship agreements are typically one year. The teams use our locations to give out equipment. The fact is that they are only in their third year of existance and we are very pround to only be their second sponsor and hope to continue. There is no borrowing involved in a sponsorship agreement.
Please do more homework before speaking an our behalf.
-Sponsor