Undefeated

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“You think football builds character…it does not. Football reveals character.”– Bill Courtney, turnaround coach of the Manassas Tigers

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUt349BSxZk&ob=av3e[/youtube]

Not to be confused with the Sarah Palin movie. This one isn’t about partisan politics. It’s not even about football. Football is merely the vessel carrying the spiritual nourishment. Sports is merely the microcosm for the battlefield which we call life, testing us; revealing what we are made of. It’s about having the character necessary to deal with failures and setbacks even when you’ve done everything right; it’s about looking at the bigger picture and not placing limitations upon yourself, feeling sorry for yourself, and becoming a victim of the negative circumstances that surrounds your life. Just because fate would have you born into poverty instead of privilege does not mean that you will be disadvantaged your whole life. Life is about making choices and there are good choices and bad choices to be made. There are things that are beyond our reach and control; and when we’ve made the right decisions and things still don’t go our way, how we respond to those setbacks is within our reach and control. We do have choices.

“Young men of character, discipline and commitment win in life”

Being a father, a mentor, importance of being part of a family and team, living to help others outside of your own skin and subsequently and consequently by so doing, helping yourself…

That’s what I got out of the film. It’s an amazing piece of documentary, captured and edited in a way that you could not teach a more relevant story for dealing with life’s adversity; especially for those growing up in inner city culture, surrounded by poverty, crime, and broken homes.

What’s equally amazing is that all of this is real. Hollywood could not have scripted better lines or created more larger-than-life characters than the very real coaches and players in this film.

Undefeated:

Directed by Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin, Undefeated is the real-life version of NBC’s acclaimed drama Friday Night Lights—albeit twice as poignant. The film chronicles the 2009 high-school football season of the Manassas Tigers, a ragtag bunch of inner-city black kids from a destitute section of Memphis that used to be the crime capital of America. Since its founding in 1899, the Manassas football team had never won a playoff game, and in recent years, even resorted to participating in “pay games” where their squad was bused to richer schools several hours away to get their asses kicked in exchange for a few thousand dollars, which would then be funneled back into the underfinanced Manassas football program.

In stepped Bill Courtney, who joined the school as coach in 2004, and immediately changed the culture. He starting Manrise, a booster club to help fund the football team, ending the embarrassing “pay games”; convinced a group of talented eighth-grade players to stay in town and play ball at Manassas; and mentored his troubled kids on and off the field. Coach Bill’s efforts finally paid off in 2009. His gifted eighth-grade recruits—led by O.C. Brown and overachiever Montrall “Money” Brown at the offensive-tackle positions—are now seniors, and Manassas has finally fielded a team with the potential to win the school’s first playoff game ever.

I found it refreshing that race and prayer weren’t made into a focal-point issue; religious expression was open and natural, and simply was:

and while their initial conceit was that of a Blind Side-esque saga tackling race, religion, class, and one star’s struggle to overcome a litany of obstacles, they eventually found that, despite allegations that the film recklessly ignores matters of race and religion levied by The Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, those hot-button issues didn’t play a big role at Manassas.

“We were like, ‘Why is O.C. living with Mike? What is his angle?’” said Martin. “We wanted to focus more time on that but it just wasn’t an issue. Same with Bill being a white coach at an African-American school.” Adds Lindsay, “We also asked Bill, ‘Isn’t it weird for people to be praying before games?’ And he said, ‘This is the South. If you tried to change it, you would be run out of town.’ It wasn’t an issue. If we had made it an issue it would have been irresponsible of us.”

During their first trip to Memphis, the filmmaker met Coach Bill as well as “Money,” and decided to broaden the scope of their film, picking individuals with the greatest potential for change, or those overcoming the biggest obstacles. They settled on O.C., “Money,” an undersized offensive tackle with a big heart boasting a 3.8 GPA who hopes to get a scholarship to attend college, and junior linebacker Chavis Daniels, who had just returned form serving 15 months in a youth penitentiary on account of his extreme anger issues. Still, Coach Bill had his reservations about turning the cameras on his team of resilient young men.

“When these Southern California guys first showed up wearing goofy socks and straight-legged jeans, you kind of took it with a grain of salt,” Coach Bill told The Daily Beast. “But when they moved here, it became pretty evident they were serious about telling our story.”

The ending on the field may not be the one we were cheering to have happen, but it is perfect and it is real: It makes the movie’s message resonate about character and about how we man-up to failure.

The ending off the field is the one that gave me emotional tears; and it was the one that left me spiritually fulfilled and satisfied.



“the character of a man is not measured in how he handles his wins but what he does with his failures.”
– Coach Bill Courtney

Team Photo of The Manassas Tigers on the verge of victory in Dan Lindsay and TJ Martin's film "Undefeated"., Courtesy of The Weinstein Company
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Uh … don’t you mean “football doesn’t BUILD character, it REVEALS character.”

Your quote makes no sense as written.

Reality, is perhaps a word that has lost relevancy, and with good reason; for if Americans awoke to the plastic programmed world that surrounds them, the powers that are in control, would no longer have control. It is to their advantage to impose an artificial circumstance around us; otherwise, bilking the wealth from the most prosperous nation in the world would be impossible. Even our so-called reality shows are inane and false characterizations of life and stress, meant to help the individual lose himself in the meaningless trivia of supposition.

Thank you for bringing this to us Word, but more importantly, we should offer thanks to this coach and his players, who had the courage and conviction to rise above their expectations and society’s expectations. They have accomplished what is frowned upon by our leaders, they fought back against the artificial restraints of culture, a culture that is cultivated and manipulated by our politicians and education system. Well done my heroes, well done.

Thanks for that quite excellent review. I wasn’t the biggest fan of The Blind Side, but this does appear to be something quite different. It’s not yet out on Neflix, but I’ll look for it on cable. – Larry W/HB

Sounds good. I also didn’t like The Blind Side not being a fan of Ms.Bullock’s acting.
I witnessed a different but exciting turn around story here in Orange County Ca.
Living and working in well to do Laguna Beach in the early 80’s I’d go to watch Artists football games.
Painfull.They’d consistantly get out toughed and outscored The kids were surfers and volleyball
players.They hadn’t been in a football playoff game in at least 20 years.

Into town moves Cedrick Hardman an all pro def.end with the Niners in the 70’s and wearing a Super Bowl ring earned playing with the Raiders in 81. A smart,tough good guy.He volunteered to help coach and took over as head coach in 83. Got the kids into the weight room,instilled confidence and got the parents believing as well.This African American coach from Texas,playing with the great John Brodie in S.F. took a group of spoiled surfers and in 3 years had them believing and winning the league championship.

He is my best friend to this day.I’ve seen the parents of his players come to him and say “YOU MADE MY SON A MAN” Leadership, inspiration and hard work turned those kids into winners.

Great story, Rich. And, in case some didn’t notice, the Laguna Beach HS football team’s nickname of “The Artists” doesn’t exactly inspire gladiatorial confidence or fear in the hearts of the opponents. Not even “The Fighting Artists” would do that. But the nickname does plug the town’s annual “Festival of the Arts” and is a nod to its famous artists’ colony. – LW/HB

Thanks Larry They’re now ‘The Breakers” as in surf not arms. Gotta be better than “The Artists”.
I now live in San Clemente (Tritons) which had a legendary season going to the final in Southern Cal’s top division after losing it’s coach of 15 years one week before the first game.
A.D. John Hamro stepped in and won O.C. Coach of the Year.Gotta love H.S.football.

Hi Rich, I do love HS football. It’s sort of a “mobile app” version of college football, pageantry and performance-wise — and much more affordable and accessible. Both of my kids went to Marina HS — regrettably, the Vikings have not been all that competitive with the likes of Edison and Los Alamitos, over the years (but then, again, few Orange County public school teams have been competitive, over the years, with the likes of those two). – LW/HB

FUNNY HOW THE TRUTH REPEAT ITSELF ON AND ON AND ON,
which is; there is always someone special behind the success of a successful person,
or a group, or a scientific find. or a caracter correction of a bad person.