New tool for Ballard football

Geeky Swedes Ballard

When spring football practice starts on Monday, Ballard High School football coach John Bowers has a new tool for the team: an aerial camera.

With just one win last year, Coach Bowers hopes showing film will help the team. This new $5,000 stand will hoist a camera 31 feet up in the air, providing a bird’s eye view of practices and games. The plan, according to the videographer Mike Willis, is to shoot practices a couple days a week and show the film during that week. The game footage will be shown the following week.

Up until now, someone would stand outside the fence on 67th and shoot the field, which didn’t work very well, Coach Bowers tells us. He also says that most other teams in the league use one of these camera stands.

Reminder: The Parents Night Out wine tasting event and silent auction to raise money for new uniforms is June 13th.

Geeky Swedes

The founders of My Ballard

10 thoughts to “New tool for Ballard football”

  1. Wow. I know that school funding works in really complicated ways and probably the money to buy a $5000 camera-lifter-upper couldn't have been used to pay salaries. Or at least I assume that.

    But you'd think that they'd want to keep big-ticket spending kind of hush-hush right about the time 7 staff members are being laid off. Not so good for the PR.

  2. School funding isn't really that complicated, and this sort of spending isn't new.
    Wouldn't it be worse to keep spending hush hush? I would guess that the Ballard Athletic Booster Club was responsible for this sort of fundraising and spending. They seem to be very transparent in how and what they support in our local high school.

  3. This is BALLARD JR. FOOTBALL!!!

    This has NOTHING to do with the school system OR IT'S FUNDING!

    BJF is an independetly non-profit organization run by Ballard area parents and dedicated, hard working coaches that love these kids..
    Kinda like if the

    Ballard Jr. Football has helped A LOT of young men AND WOMEN keep focused, involved and out of trouble. It is a fun filled & grueling program that teaches the kids respect, hard work, physical fitness and time management.

    ALL the money for the uniforms, helmets, paying for the fields, referies, tall camera poles and everything else is raised by the fund raising sweat of the players and parents' brows!
    SHEESH!!!!!!

  4. I thought Coach Bowers worked for SPS.
    I know that the fundraising event mentioned on the 13th is for the HS football teams jerseys/

  5. PS Please note the parents night out fundraiser listed at the end of the article..a perfect example of where this money comes from..that and the chuck wagon..and car washes…etc…etc..

  6. Where in the article is mentioned anything about Junior football? This talks about Coach Bowers, who I believe coaches for Ballard High, yes? I guess he wears more than one hat — I just assumed this camera was something for use in BHS games and practice.

    At any rate, like I said, I'm sure the revenue streams are completely separate and it's not like the camera /bothers/ me, it's just terrible PR — assuming that it does have something to do with the BHS football team.

  8. this sounds like a big, fat waste of money.

    it's obvious from last year's record that this team could use some help, but I really don't think a better angle in the video footage will help players improve their skills.

  9. How about they just drop the Football team at Ballard High? That way we don't have bozos running around a field knocking each others' teeth out, and as a bonus, we don't have reckless 5 grand spending for a failing team in a time of economic need. And then they can sack the cheerleading team, as well, so we don't have impressionable teenage girls shaking their butts to the latest rap song and sexually objectifying themselves to please said football team.

    They should have given that $5K to the Office Max woman, if nothing else. Jesus Christ, what a waste of money.

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