Football offseason busier than normal
The recent hire of Tyler Kelley as Verbena’s head football coach means that half of the six schools in the county will have new leaders of their football programs in the fall.
Kelley joins Tal Morrison at Chilton County High School and Daryl Davis at Thorsby as recent hires.
Both Kelley and Davis are replacing coaches that had held the lead role at their respective schools for over or nearly the past decade.
Until this year’s surge of hires, Chilton County had only been averaging one new coach each of the past three years and it had been several years since more than two coaches had been introduced in the same offseason.
Coaching changes are not at all uncommon, especially at the high school level where many factors come into play during the decision-making process.
The sudden influx of change brings out an uncertainty heading into the 2017 season.
All three coaches look to clear up any uncertainty that exists as the summer months carry on.
Having met and been around each coach at times since being hired, there is an apparent confidence and belief from both the coaches and the fan bases. That is not something that is always exists with a new coaching hire.
Davis and Kelley are homegrown products that grew up in their areas of the county and graduated from the schools that they are now coaching at.
Morrison comes with pedigree after spending the past nine seasons as an assistant coach at Benjamin Russell under hall of famer Danny Horn.
Anytime there is a coaching change, expectations should be met with the same wait-and-see approach, no matter the program or the coach.
Does a busy offseason mean a crazy and wild regular season? Only time will tell.