$#*! my coach said

The termination hearing for Poplar Bluff's track coach on Thursday took me back to my high school days on the track team.

Way back in the last century -- the mid-1990s -- there was a coach who yelled things not suitable for print, broadcast TV or within ear-shot of a church at times. Slacking off one day, my "skinny butt" was slowing down everybody else, he noted in practice.

At the time it made me mad. Looking back, it made me better.

Lance Bell asked for a hearing after being put on administrative leave in April for using profanity while coaching the Mules track team. He was suspended as an assistant football coach last fall for dropping an F-bomb during a review of game tapes. In a track practice, Bell used the GD phrase.

To be clear, Bell was never my coach but I have covered his teams for the past five years.

In the hearing, Bell apologized and said his teaching and coaching contracts should be considered separate, noting that none of the complaints were from the classroom.

The school has recommended the Board fire Bell as a coach and health teacher for not communicating with students in a "professional and positive manner" and insubordination.

A decision by the Board is expected within 20 days.

Losing a good coach over a bad choice of words seems counterproductive for a school that has seen its fair share of coaching changes.

Over the last decade there have been nearly 30 head coaching moves for different reasons in all sports but one. The longest-tenured coach at Poplar Bluff is Kirk Chronister, who is the only girls' basketball coach the school has ever had. He can reach win No. 700 this upcoming season and the program has won the last four district titles.

Longtime coaches like Dutch Wyatt, E.T. Peters and Jim Lohr -- who were a combined 222-126 coaching football over 39 years -- are a thing of the past. Over the last 33 seasons the football team has had 10 different head coaches and 14 winning seasons.

Poplar Bluff is not alone. The longest-tenured football coaches in the SEMO North are heading into their fifth and sixth seasons.

Winning, naturally, helps coaches keep their job longer.

Bell's suspension came less than a year after coaching the Mules to a fourth-place finish at the state track meet. After he was suspended as defensive coordinator, the Mules lost their final six games by allowing an average of 50 points.

Students, fellow coaches and members of the community lined up Thursday to defend Bell.

It was noted in the hearing that coaches are role models that need to conduct themselves professionally.

Poplar Bluff is setting an awfully high standard for its coaches if it deems Bell unprofessional.

A swear jar or bar of soap on the tongue seems more fitting a punishment.

Even the once taboo "seven dirty words" are now commonplace in society, the internet, entertainment -- the F-word is even in the title of a best-selling book about parenting.

"$#*! My Dad Says" star William Shatner had a great line in the movie "Star Trek IV" in which Spock notes Kirk's use of colorful metaphors when the two travel back in time to 1986.

"Well that's simply the way they talk here," Kirk says. "Nobody pays any attention to you unless you swear every other word."

An August 2010 memo made it clear that the administration does not want inappropriate language used by coaches as "part of your coaching philosophy."

My old coach probably falls into that mold -- along with many others -- but that didn't make him a bad coach or a bad person.

He just had a limited vocabulary.

Brian Rosener is the sports editor of the Daily American Republic. Contact him at sports@darnews.com.