Brinson Excited to Get Back on the Football Field

Football is the sport of choice for Floridians. Locals talk, eat, and sleep football daily throughout the year.

But with the NFL stuck in a labor if not legal quagmire and college football four all too long months away, it's easy to see how some get excited that high school spring football practice began this week.

Count Antez Brinson among those pumped up. The first-year Boca Ciega coach was in his element this week at practice, his first head coaching job of his career.

When, overseeing the offense in practice, Diquez Henderson lapped up a loose fumble and took off running for a touchdown, Brinson sprinted after him, his giant straw hat bouncing along for the ride.

No, Brinson was not mad; he was happy for Henderson and happy to be back on a football field.

"He scooped and scored!" Brinson said after practice. "I was just trying to get the kids excited. I was just trying to show the kids I may be fat and out of shape, but I can still run."

While his Pirates are far from regular season-ready to play, Brinson is basking in his first job and genuinely pleased with how his players have responded to him.

"They are getting used to my demands and my expectations which may be a little bit different than they are used to in the past," Brinson said. "We are practicing at a pace and a tempo that they are still in the process of getting used to. There has been a little bit of sloppiness and a little bit of lag here and there and that is understandable, but they understand my expectations are not going to change."

"I know it is a learning and growing process for them but we have an end point where we want to get to. If you don't work hard and push to get better every day, we will have a lot of sad faces at the end of the day."

In fact, Brinson lauded his players’ ability to adjust to their new coaching staff.

"They are doing a really good job of buying into the program and doing pretty much whatever we ask them to do," Brinson said. "It's a great, great group of kids. It is a learning process. I would be worried if we were perfect today. I would be seriously worried if we were perfect. I want them to peak at the right time and I am pretty certain that we will." 

"We want to play in Week 11 and Week 12 and Week 13 and Week 14 and Week 15, not just be satisfied with the 10 games everybody gets."