Speaking of Sports, SPS Has a Bad Pattern

By bad pattern, I mean SPS senior leadership has allowed suspect coaches and athletes to come in from outside the district and miraculously lead sports teams to championships, only to be gone the next year. It's just ridiculous AND SPS gets dinged by the state group overseeing high school athletics each time. 

Here's the latest about phenom Tyran Stokes, the nation's top high school basketball player, who transferred into Rainier Beach High School. This comes from J425, a substack journal on Washington state prep sports.  I note that J425 does not use the word "alleged" but I will for all their reporting printed here. 

The athletic eligibility of Tyran Stokes, the nation’s top high school basketball recruit, remains under scrutiny on the eve of the WIAA 3A State Tournament after numerous published reports say his transfer to a Seattle public school involved an eligibility review process that omitted multiple details — including a violent disciplinary record at his previous California high school.

Stokes, a 6-foot-7 forward and the consensus No. 1 prospect in the Class of 2026, enrolled at Rainier Beach High School on Nov. 13, just days before the basketball season began. Seattle Public Schools (SPS) and the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA) District 2 granted him immediate varsity eligibility, citing a “bona fide change of residence” prompted by his mother’s new job, a fiction contradicted by over 30 contemporaneous reports from local and national outlets.

An investigative report published by J425 confirmed that Stokes was actually forced to leave Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, CA, after a series of physical altercations with students – including a fight with a senior and a scuffle with a 14-year-old freshman.

If the nature of his transfer had been accurately documented by SPS, Stokes would not be eligible.

According to J425, SPS provided the WIAA with a registration packet that omitted all details of Stokes’ problems at Notre Dame and the reasons why he left. 

I'll await to see if KUOW and The Seattle Times covers this story. I recall when I first heard that the number one player in the nation was coming to RBHS, I looked him up. Most of the news stories about this move alluded to behavior issues at his last school, a private one.

Know what? I know it's exciting and fun when your high school wins a championship. But it's tarnished when you import talent, take away playing opportunities for actual students at the school, and then can't sustain any part of the win the next year.