Odds and Sods

The Michigan High School Athletics Association will pay $7.4 million in fines and legal fees, after being rejected once again in a Federal Court ruling over a Title IX violation.

A group of Grand Rapids women filed the original lawsuit in 1998, claiming, rightly, that the MHSAA unfairly discriminated against girls basketball and volleyball players, by forcing them to play in a different season than in every other state to facilitate scheduling.

Title IX, passed in 1972, prohibits discrimination based on sex in any educational related activity.

“We are not going to offer any comment for at least the next week to 10 days,” the unfortunately named MHSAA spokesman John Johnson told AP.

The bulk of the assessed amount stems from legal fees and numerous appeals.

This is now $15.8 million in needless legal fees to protect idiocy, which could have gone to the children of the economically depressed state.