By Scott Nickerson
Elmore Autauga News
Sitting in the Stanhope Elmore High School gymnasium during Coach Jimmy Foshee’s funeral and listening to Pastor Andrew Gilder speak about the legendary coach’s impact on his life, I realized some foundational issues in my life were seeds planted by Coach Foshee.
Preparedness, work ethic, and random humorous comments were all things that were modeled by one of the only men in my life as a teenager.
Pastor Gilder spoke about how Coach Foshee’s teams were always prepared when he played in the 80’s. It was the same when I was on the team from 1996 – 1998. Every week, each player was provided with a scouting report that was several pages long. Each scouting report listed the number, height, weight, and position of the other team’s players. We always knew who our opponents were by sight, and if they outweighed us or were taller than us. And the film? We watched hours and hours of film every week that would show us how skilled our opponents were and what types of plays they ran or how they excelled. I never once went into a game and felt like I wasn’t prepared to face the other team.
That level of preparation is something I prided myself on when I moved far away from home and got a job in law enforcement. All the people that were successful in the job excelled at preparation, and that is a trait that I can trace back to fall afternoons in the Mustang field house watching film and going over scouting reports.
The second trait that Coach Foshee exemplified was a strong work ethic. The last football practice of my high school career was on Thanksgiving Day 1998. We had a Class 5A semi-final game the next day in Pritchard against Blount, the two-time defending champs. Everyone showed up to practice on Thursday morning, before Thanksgiving lunch or dinner, got through with our practice, and went home.
We lost to Blount the following day, but after the game, it took much longer than usual to leave. The team found out later that Coach Foshee had suffered a stroke shortly after the game. The following week (or maybe two), Coach Foshee showed up to school to work like normal. Half of his face was still paralyzed at the time from the stroke. Our season was lost in heartbreaking fashion and the team that beat us won the state championship. And, the large senior class had no other reason to be there. But Coach Foshee was there, with half of his face unmoving, and went through film, analyzing what happened play by play. It was one of the best examples of work ethic I’ve ever seen in my life.
And finally, Coach Foshee wasn’t a big jokester, but sometimes, he would say or do things that made 60 or 70 teenage boys howl with laughter. For example, I specifically remember a player on the team that was always loud and boisterous. Always telling people how great he was, which was true because he was really good. I honestly don’t remember his name anymore, but I remember what happened the afternoon we watched film. It just so happened that during one play this particular player got absolutely flattened by someone on the opposing team. When the film got to the play, Coach Foshee played the tape in slow-motion, paused at the exact moment the player hit the ground, and then rewound the tape to the moment the hit started.
The room was quiet when Coach Foshee said, “Oh big man…what happened here?” as he proceeded to resume the tape in slow motion. The players all simultaneously burst out in laughter that went non-stop for at least a minute as Coach continued to rewind and play the tape over and over. The player in question laughed harder than everyone else, as Coach Foshee knew he would. That day remains one of my favorite memories with Coach.
Scott Nickerson is a sportswriter for the Elmore Autauga News.
