Support Coach Rafferty

I only had the pleasure of playing for Coach Raff for one season unfortunately. However what I learned in that one season will stay with me for as long as I live. Raff was one of the best coaches I have ever had in any sport. He did what all coaches are supposed to do, but most fail to do, and that is helping to teach their players life lessons and help make each person better as individuals through playing a sport. That really is coach Rafferty's specialty, and it helped our entire team get through some tough adversity we went through this season. Anybody that has had him as a coach can vouch for his character and leadership. I think it's a huge mistake for this program to get rid of Coach Raff. There aren't a lot of people out there who can make a bunch of adolescent high school teenagers into a group of men, and prepare them for not only Friday nights, but for the real world that lies beyond high school and beyond football. I have nothing but good things to say about the man.
One thing I've noticed in less than a year at North Andover High School is that we take a lot of pride in our sports teams. Football is probably the biggest sport out of all of them (no offense, it's just a fact football is the most popular sport in the country) and I like to think the community takes a lot of pride in this team. While we might not have had the best record this year compared to years past, the community of North Andover can still be proud of this team because we never quit even with all the things that didn't go our way. We lost a lot of close games that could've broken this team apart, but we stuck together. We lost our captain and probably our best player with an injury early in the season, but we didn't let that break us apart. This really defines who we were as a team, a tough, scrappy group of guys who just would not quit. And it all starts with a coach when you're playing a team sport, especially football, and Coach Raff was the biggest reason this team stayed together all year. His toughness and mental fortitude really rubbed off on all of the players and helped us get through tough situations. Football is more than a game, it's a test of mental toughness and strength. Football is a lot like life in general, not everything is going to go your way, but it's how you battle back that defines your character. Coach Rafferty instilled this in all his players, and made us all better people because of that.
I hope the administration realizes that his impact went far beyond the field for all of his players he has coached.
I don't know if this decision is the administration at the school trying to make a change with the football schemes or if it's just a personal vendetta someone has with Raff. I can't really justify the move that's been made because I just don't understand it. Raff is truly class act, a smart coach, tough disciplinarian, and above all, he instilled his fundamental core values in young men that help them in every aspect of life. That is something that will be very difficult to replace.