Even for Florida, this is wild.

According to the Herald-Tribune, a high school football coach was recently fired for liking a tweet from one of his players suggesting that an opposing coach “uses spray tan to obtain his skin color.”

The subject of that tweet was Braden City coach Curt Bradley, who is multi-racial. The fired coach was Venice’s John Peacock.

And yes, the two schools are rivals. Both of their respective programs were among the best in 7A in the state of Florida (the second-highest class distinction). They apparently have a bit of a history, too.

Here’s a screen shot of the tweet that Peacock liked regarding Bradley:

As the Herald-Tribune outlined, officials at Venice were made aware of Peacock’s “like” after none other than Bradley himself alerted them of it with a letter. Bradley wrote the letter to Peacock and CC’d officials from both schools (via the Herald-Tribune).

Coach Peacock,

As a fellow educator and football coach, I feel it necessary to address some deep concerns that live within your program and within how you shape our young adults of tomorrow. I am all for healthy rivalry and competition, however, as educators and adults who are very influential in the development of young minds, we must be extremely careful to not cross lines.

Encouraging racial jokes and racism among your players, and acknowledging them to be appropriate by publicly or privately “liking” them, is definitely a line in which someone in your position should not tread. Your locker-room comments of “how Coach Bradley uses spray tan to obtain his skin color” had come to my attention a while ago. Although this has been a running joke of yours for some time, it concerns me to see your players use your words on social media, and then you “liking” their post. In case you are unsure as to the tweet I am referring to, please see the attached screen shots of your twitter feed below from the evening of Tuesday 4/17/18.

Because you are so curious, I come from a multi-racial background and am extremely proud of this. My grandparents were on the front line of the Civil Rights Movement. Sadly, they, as well as my parents, lived through many injustices dealt to them from ignorance. I am proud that as a nation we have made great progress in terms of prejudice and intolerance to those different than us, nevertheless I feel it my duty to not remain silent when someone tries to make light of this.

As educators we ethically have a responsibility to first and foremost teach children acceptance, of all people. We also have to acknowledge when we are wrong. I take full responsibility for things I did incorrectly, and by no means is this being addressed due to recent actions. Although we may inevitably disagree as to the appropriate and professional way to handle things, I think we can all agree to the code of ethics that we vow to as educators. In the end, if this email and awareness makes you a better coach and educator, then I have done my job reaching out and helping as many kids as I can. I do hope you ask yourself “when exactly have I taken the sport of football and winning too far?”

It is my understanding that you had been instructed to remove these tweets days ago. While thankfully those have been deleted from social media, it is disturbing to know they will never be erased from the minds of your players and those who read your social media.

Best wishes for your spring season,

 Curt Bradley

Braden River High School

Physical Education Teacher

Head Football Coach

Peacock was then fired on Wednesday and said in a statement he was “appalled” that Bradley would “attempt to exploit today’s racial tension to distract from the disgrace he has brought to his program.”

Here was that statement in its entirety (the Indians are the school mascot):

I “liked” a tweet that one of my players put on social media about Braden River Head Coach Curt Bradley and a spray tan bottle. I thought this to be a joke about him using spray tan, I had no clue he was multi–racial. I did not come out publicly to defend myself when this occurred because I was asked not to. Nothing was intended to be racist.

I’m appalled at Coach Bradley desperate attempt to exploit today’s racial tension to distract from the disgrace he has brought to his program. This has happened because I was the coach that finally stood up and exposed Coach Bradley for cheating in order to protect the integrity of high school football. I knew this could be an outcome of that decision, and I was willing to accept that. As sad and unfortunate as it is, it was the right thing to do and I would do it again.

I would like to thank all the past and current players, coaches, parents and proud supporters of Venice High Football. Venice HS administration will find a solid replacement for this position, as Venice is one of the premier programs in the state of Florida. Once again, thank you to everyone who has been involved. I will always be an Indian!

Bizarre, to say the least.