As mentioned previously, Michael hung up his soccer cleats and gave tackle football a shot. He worked really hard, and he loved it. When he asked to sign up for it during spring 2022, Brian and I came up with a contract for him to sign. Some of the stipulations were that he had to keep his grades up and go to every practice (unless health prohibited it). He loved being a part of a team, and we surprisingly loved being a part of this unique community. He is a little bit obsessed about this sport. He follows his favorite teams and players, and he's always trying to get someone to head outside to throw a football with him.
Learning how to play football was challenging--very different than soccer, but he worked really hard and earned more playing time as the season went on. His coach praised him for his efforts in one of the practices. Michael made sure to get a copy of the playbook so he could learn the plays.
Michael made one of Lone Peak's B Teams for his grade (they had 2 A teams and 2 B teams.) They only won one game in the regular season, and then got to play that same team for a consolation game when they didn't make the playoffs. Michael's team won that game as well. There were a couple of teams that traveled over from Vernal or Unita to play in our league, and they really should have been playing against our A teams because they were so much bigger and better than our players. During one game against one of those teams, boys on our team kept getting hurt. One had to go to the urgent care because he got a concussion. Our coach finally surrendered the game to keep our boys from getting hurt, and I was so glad that he was willing to do that to protect our sons. A lot of people were upset with that these teams were put in our league, so here's hoping that next year will be better!
Michael loved these pictures that I took for him on his last game, the consolation game against American Fork. It's probably the most excited he's ever been about pictures I've taken.
At half time of every game, some of the moms made a banner for them to run through. Sometimes, they even had smoke bombs! So much pomp for this game!
I had to laugh when, after a few days, the coach reached out wondering if everyone could get the photo since their iPhones didn't quite do the job they wanted. I never heard back after I sent it out though.
We are very proud of this guy!
Here's hoping next year is just as fun, of not better!
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