Spring Football Starts Monday! Coach Thompson Ready

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Ronnie Thompson and a photographer from the Port Arthur News were actually in the same place one day last week, but it was hardly an "on the job" picture you'd envision for the new Memorial High football coach.

Thompson was surrounded by policemen and principals at Tuesday's baseball game at the school district's athletic complex. They were there to guard against a repeat of the gang shooting that occurred March 30 in the ballpark parking lot.

Since Thompson was hired six weeks ago to be Memorial's second head football coach and athletic director, a lot has gone on in the Port Arthur school district. Very little of it has had anything to do with football.

"If you want a photo of me that shows what I've been up to, this is what you need," Thompson said early last week.

Then he pretended to hold a telephone to his ear.

That was after Thompson was interviewed for the job with one temporary superintendent, recommended for it by a second fill-in superintendent and fired a soccer coach for alleged UIL roster violations.

And after increased campus security enforcing a media lockout chased off a newspaper photographer assigned to take a "happy-news" photo of Thompson and some of his players.

But it was before the school board eliminated the athletic coordinator's job and the softball coach resigned.

This week, though, Thompson's routine should get a big change.

Spring football practice begins at Memorial Monday at 3 p.m. and will continue through a spring game May 9. The Titans, who won just two times last year in their fourth and final season under Dean Colbert, have a lot of holes to fill and a new offense to learn.

But the new coach, who hasn't led a for-real practice since the 2001 season when he retired after nine years as head coach at South Garland, likes what he has found in Port Arthur, both in the players and the coaches he inherited.

"They're very enthusiastic, all of them," Thompson said of the players. "There's a lot of hustle and they move really well. They're flat covering some ground out there."

The Titans' work until now has been limited to 45 minutes a day in their fourth-period athletics PE class.

"And the good ones come in after school," for weightlifting, Thompson adds.

In the athletics class, Thompson and the assistant coaches have been working to instill the basics of a wide-open passing offense that resembles the Run-and-Shoot used 20 years ago by the USFL's Houston Gamblers and, later, the University of Houston.

Among the players who have caught the coach's eye early on are free safety Anthony Cockrell and defensive linemen Darius Leviege and Charles Jacobs. Freddie King was atop the wide receiver bunch, Ronald DeJohn the most impressive offensive lineman and Davon Lewis showing he's recovered from preseason knee surgery that kept him from being the Titans' starting quarterback last year.

Of course, Lewis was the player who spoke out against Thompson's hiring at the Feb. 16 school board meeting and promised to skip spring training and this summer's 7-on-7 competition. But he and Thompson patched things up overnight.

"Lewis is really far out in front," at quarterback, the coach says.

So's the Titan defense.

"Really and truly, our defense is making all their adjustments to what they're doing from what they did," Thompson said. "They're ahead of the offense because they've got a base to go back to. They're still playing the same technique, the same holes."

And the offense?

"We've got to stay healthy, but Lewis will have a chance to throw the ball, and he will put it where it needs to be. The question is if we'll catch it.

"This has not been a throwing club. It's been a power running club. That's to be expected, not accepted."

Thompson's "my way or the highway" brand of thinking extends to his assistant coaches.

"I've found some pretty good people here," he said of the assistants hired by Colbert. "They're hard workers. The main thing (for an assistant coach) is 'Are you able to change philosophy? Or are you stuck in what you're doing?' "

The head coach said he has been impressed by the coaches. After Colbert's January resignation, offensive coordinator Kenny Harrison and defensive coordinator T.K. Harrison (no relation) were asked by then-superintendent Willis Mackey to run an off-season program strong on weight training and football skills.

"When I got in here, they had them going pretty good," Thompson said. "They do a lot of things right. They get a lot of things covered."

Because of restrictions on teaching contracts -- having to match coaching hires with teaching vacancies -- wholesale change of coaching staffs when a new head coach is hired -- doesn't happen today like it did when Thompson coached at Port Arthur Thomas Jefferson from 1978-81, leading the Yellow Jackets to the 1980 state title game.

But change is expected. Some current coaches could wind up reunited with Colbert at Humble Atascocita. Others could go elsewhere.

Thompson won't comment on any changes he may be planning. He says he will use spring training to help him make decisions regarding his coaching staff.

"In spring training, I'm going to try hard to evaluate, evaluate, evaluate," he said.

Under UIL rules, Class 5A and 4A teams are allowed to practice after school in the spring for 15 workouts over a 30-day period. Ideally, Thompson would like his spring practice to include workouts Monday, Tuesday and Thursday with a scrimmage Friday.

"We need Wednesday off to teach, to look at the (video) tapes and see what we're doing wrong and correct it," the coach said.

Unfortunately, that option is available only during the fourth of the five weeks of spring training.

This week, for instance, the team is taking off for Good Friday, meaning three days straight of practice with a scrimmage Thursday. Next week the team will work out only on Monday because of TAKS testing. The week after that, the regional track meet curtails Friday practice.

"I'm finding out that our coaches are all over," Thompson said. "They all teach on different campuses all over town and it's hard for them to get to fourth period. I want to get that fixed for next year. And most of them are busy after school with a spring sport. A lot of them are involved with track."

Thompson says spectators are not only welcome, but encouraged, to come to Titan practices, which are scheduled from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.

"Every kid's daddy is welcome," he said. "When kids' daddies are here, they work a lot harder. I hope they line the sidelines."

Now it's up to Ronnie Thompson the athletic director to make sure Ronnie Thompson the football coach gets to practice on time.

"Being AD," he acknowledges, "is going to take up a chunk of time."