What is fair?

Ive played and coached at many different levels of athletics.  In that time I’ve said and heard the phrase “it’s not fair” more times than I can count. The interesting thing is,  “fair” seems to mean something different depending on who you ask.  I’ll give two examples.  

Ex1. a Highschool coach makes a starting lineup based on who gives their team the best chance to win.  It turns out that every single player they started played club and the back ups had not.  They found this out because a parent approached them very upset and said “I didn’t realize that my son would only get to play, if I paid for them to play AAU! How is that fair?!?”.  

Ex2. Similar scenario to example one, a parent goes to a coach with a concern about the starting lineup.  However, this parent has a different view.  This parent says “ so I guess my kid played AAU so they could sit on the bench, how is that fair?!?!”.


The parents in both examples think the coach has been unfair.  However, the concerns of parent 1 directly contradict the concerns of parent 2.  Which begs the question, which one is right?  The answer is neither, and both depending on who you ask. See they are looking at things from their perspective only, I can’t fault them for that because it’s the only one they have. The reason they’re upset is because they love their kid, and I can’t fault them for that either.  I understand this because I love all my players.  I look at every situation through each of their perspectives before I make a decision.  I know when the decision I make is going to upset one of my players, and it upsets me too.  That’s the burden a good coach carries.  However, because I love all my players equally, I cannot make any decision based off how it will impact any 1 member of my team.  To be a good coach, I need to be willing to make the best decision for the team as a whole.  This means accepting that    I’m going to upset someone no matter what decision I make, so I should at least make the right one. To me “Fair” means always making the best decision for the team as a whole, and supporting those who it upsets to the best of my ability. 



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