A season-long controversy involving racial slurs and allegations of poor leadership has rocked Colorado youth football, leaving 770 young athletes from a prominent Denver league barred from competing for a state championship.
A grievance over an Aug. 15 game spiraled into an ongoing dispute fueled by a barrage of social media posts, culminating with the Colorado Football League terminating its relationship with The Nation Youth Football League and thus prohibiting its 28 teams from playing in the CFL’s state tournament that begins Oct. 31.
The Nation Youth Football League, which includes eight organizations across various age levels, is one of four conferences in the Colorado Football League. The Colorado Football League brings together top teams from The Nation Youth Football League, NoCo Football, Rocky Mountain Pop Warner and Pikes Peak Pop Warner to determine a state champion in each age division.
The most noteworthy organization in The Nation Youth Football League is the Park Hill Pirates, a powerhouse program founded in 1968 that has produced some of the state’s best football talent, including NFL stars Calais Campbell and LenDale White. The Pirates’ formal grievance to The Nation Youth Football League, based on events that occurred following a game in the season opener on Aug. 15, started the controversy.
On that day, the Pirates’ 13U team played the Denver Mustangs at the Pinnacle Athletic Complex in Thornton. Park Hill Pirates chairman Herman L. White said the Pirates were the subject of “racial and derogatory language, postgame hostility, confrontations… and circumstances that escalated to law-enforcement response.”
The situation spiraled out of control in the months that followed.
Another incident of racist language involving two players on the Denver Mustangs 13U team led the Colorado Football League leadership to call an emergency meeting, and Pirates and Mustangs leadership groups to meet to address the issues. Meanwhile, Facebook posts stoked the controversy, and on Wednesday, the Colorado Football League upheld The Nation Youth Football League’s ban from the state tournament.
Mikoyan Watson, president of The Nation Youth Football League, took accountability for the controversy, saying, “I have to attribute this situation to poor leadership.”
“That’s including myself, and taking responsibility for it,” Watson said. “Myself (and other Colorado Football League leadership in) Chris Lucas, Robbie Miner in particular, and the people in Colorado Springs, which is Michelle Quintana and Wesley Wright. What I mean by poor leadership at the top is there was an inability to communicate.”
What happened Aug. 15
In that Aug. 15 game, a competitive 19-13 Pirates win at Pinnacle Athletic Complex between two of the top middle school teams in the state, tensions boiled over in a postgame confrontation in the parking lot just outside the field’s gates.
Hellian Robinson — one of three security guards working that day at the complex — says a group of about six young adults sitting on the Mustangs’ side started a “(expletive) Park Hill” chant as fans from both teams filed out. Then, the group — which Robinson described as late high school-aged or possibly recent graduates — also started shouting the N-word at Park Hill fans.
Eventually, someone called the police, who arrived right as Robinson said the group of six young adults jumped into an SUV and sped off.
“It escalated badly from them continuing to chant, ‘(expletive) Park Hill,’” Robinson recalled. “We started pushing everyone out and when we got into the parking lot, those same six guys were trying to engage with one of my security. He tried to tell them to stop, but they didn’t care, and they started calling people the N-word.
“It was three of us security guards in a crowd of about 100 people, and we just tried to keep people separated. If security wasn’t there, I think there definitely would have been a fight.”
Robinson said some Park Hill fans shouted back at the group of instigators. Robinson said the group was operating independently of Mustangs coaches and players (who were still on the field at the time) and Mustangs parents.
The security guard’s account matches what Denver Mustangs 13U head coach Matt Hill and defensive coordinator Chris Driessen told The Denver Post about their own team’s account of what happened that day.
Hill and Driessen did not see the parking lot confrontation, but said the group was “teenagers who are relatives” of some Mustangs players.
“(Mustangs coaches) don’t even know who the kids are,” Hill said. “The kids that they’re related to were pretty embarrassed by their behavior. They were immediately banned from any and all future activities related to our team.”
Driessen said even though the instigators were not a part of the team, “we took the allegations very seriously” and addressed them internally with Mustangs players and families. Driessen said about 40% of players in the Mustangs program are minorities.
“There were multiple conversations had with our team as a whole and with our players — not condoning the behavior, not condoning the language, not condoning all those things,” Driessen said. “And also with our parents, we had an all-hands meeting saying that we will not stand behind this. And anybody that chooses to not honor that, they will no longer be able to be a part of this team.”
Hill served a one-game suspension as punishment from NoCo Football following the incident. Driessen explained, “We didn’t have purview into what was happening with (The Nation Youth Football League) and Park Hill’s concerns at that time.”
“And to us, that was the end of it,” Driessen said.
Lack of league response
In reality, the issue was just beginning to fester.
On Aug. 28, White sent a formal grievance to Watson and Lucas, who runs NoCo Football and co-founded the Colorado Football League with Watson in 2023.
The grievance raised the Pirates-Mustangs game on Aug. 15 and asked for a response within a week. Watson says he communicated the urgency to Colorado Football League decision-makers, including Lucas, Miner, Quintana and Wright (the Pikes Peak Pop Warner leadership), and Mike Webster (the Rocky Mountain Pop Warner representative).
“We went into a meeting and I’m saying to them, ‘We need to immediately release a statement that says racism isn’t tolerated. We need to get this out to the entire CFL,’” Watson said. “Robbie agreed, but nothing happened after that.
“I was reaching out for a couple weeks thereafter asking, ‘Are we going to release a statement? I can’t release that statement. It has to come from (the Colorado Football League) because the Mustangs are not a (The Nation Youth Football League) team.”
Lucas, Quintana, Wright and Webster did not respond to The Denver Post’s requests for comment. Miner emailed The Post back but did not grant an interview request.
While Watson said he pressed his fellow Colorado Football League leaders for action, White and the Park Hill Pirates grew frustrated by the lack of a response from Watson and Lucas. The requested week-long response deadline to their grievance passed, adding to the time since White said the Park Hill Pirates first reported the issue the evening of the game.
“No one from those levels of (Colorado Football League) leadership has meaningfully contacted me to ask what happened, what I personally experienced, what our coaches and families experienced, what evidence exists, what safety concerns resulted, or what corrective action may be appropriate,” White wrote in his Aug. 28 grievance.
“In our opinion, that is unacceptable. When an organization reports racial slurs, threats, aggressive confrontation, safety concerns, and conduct capable of escalating toward physical violence, leadership should not require the harmed organization to continually pursue acknowledgment.”
White said Watson responded to the Pirates’ grievance on Sept. 8. White said The Nation Youth Football League’s response stated “that punishment and corrective action had occurred, but it did not clearly identify the specific sanctions imposed, their duration, the individuals or organizations disciplined, the precise policies violated, or the full corrective measures implemented.”
A couple days later, White said the Pirates “responded to The Nation Youth Football League’s communication with additional questions regarding what had been investigated, what had been substantiated, what discipline had been imposed, who held authority, and what corrective measures had been implemented.” Then on Sept. 13, White said Watson initiated a text thread between those two and Lucas “in an effort to resolve outstanding issues and facilitate direct engagement with broader (Colorado Football League) leadership.”
The Pirates, Watson, and Lucas set a meeting for Sept. 17, but White and Watson both said it didn’t happen, and Lucas didn’t give them a reason.
The next day, White took the battle public, and a slew of Facebook posts followed.
“It’s unfortunate that the only way to get people to respond is when their names are in lights,” White said. “We tried to be diplomatic, tried to be professional, tried to give them time to respond. It fell on deaf ears. At that point, (going public) was the next step.”
Another racism issue arises
During this same time period, another racial issue surfaced, again involving the 13U Denver Mustangs team.
In a Sept. 25 Facebook post addressing the situation, the Denver Mustangs acknowledged “two of our players used racially offensive language in a private group text with former teammates.” Those text messages then spread and were eventually posted on social media with the players’ names attached.
In the statement, the Mustangs said those two players “apologized to their teammates, coaches and families, and offered to apologize directly to those affected.” According to the Mustangs, the text thread shared online was “one small piece of a much longer thread between several MINORITY former teammates.”
Hill and Driessen said the text thread posted online on Sept. 17 — two days before the game against the Thoroughbreds, a fellow NoCo Football opponent — was several weeks old by then. The coaches learned about the thread on social media Thursday around 2 p.m., and within a couple of hours they were on the phone with the Thoroughbreds’ coaches to address the issue.
Mustangs coaches then made an “accountability plan” for those players. The football punishment for both players was a half-game suspension. Additionally, Hill said he offered to address the Thoroughbreds’ parents before kickoff that Saturday, but NoCo Football canceled the game because of safety concerns related to online threats.
The Mustangs also held a team meeting to address the matter, and the Facebook statement said the team “used this difficult situation as an opportunity to educate all of our players about racial insensitivity, why certain words are hurtful, and the responsibility we all have to treat others with respect.”
“As coaches and parents, we have a responsibility to hold young people accountable when they make mistakes while also giving them the opportunity to learn, grow and do better,” the statement said. “We also have a responsibility to protect them. In recent days, the situation has escalated online, including threats directed toward minors and threats of violence at games. Law enforcement has been made aware.
“Whatever disagreements exist, threats against children have no place in youth sports. Racism is wrong. The language used was wrong. And threatening children is wrong.”
Hill said the two players continue to receive online threats related to the text thread.
“As recently as (Wednesday), I filed a report with the Aurora Police Department that there were threats made that these kids were going to get jumped and beat up,” Hill said.
Park Hill Pirates, Denver Mustangs meet
Because of multiple incidents involving the Denver Mustangs, other teams began boycotting the NoCo Football team. White initially publicly supported the boycott.
For three consecutive weeks, the Mustangs did not play their scheduled opponent. That streak began with the Sept. 19 game against fellow NoCo Football foe Thoroughbreds, followed by forfeits by the DC Defenders (Sept. 26) and Loveland Cobras (Oct. 3). Per league rules, a forfeit results in a $500 fine for the forfeiting team.
On Sept. 28, the Colorado Football League sent out a statement to league administrators and head coaches via TeamPass. The message didn’t mention the Aug. 15 postgame incident, but acknowledged the second racial issue involving the Mustangs. It said that “racism and discrimination have no place in our league. Period.” And it went on to explain that “we expect the adults in our community to lead by example. We have already taken appropriate action to ban individuals from our events for policy violations.”
In between the Defenders and Cobras boycotts, the leadership of the Denver Mustangs and Park Hill Pirates met on Sept. 29.
“To us, these were two totally separate and unrelated events,” Driessen said. “But Park Hill, just like we didn’t know what was happening with them, they didn’t know what was happening with us. They’re looking at it and saying, ‘Wait a second. Is there a pattern here? What’s going on with these guys?’
“That’s when the boycott took flight, and that’s when we reached out to the Park Hill leadership and said, ‘Hey, let’s meet and talk about this face-to-face.’”
In a Facebook statement, the Pirates called the meeting “difficult, honest, necessary, and ultimately productive.”
“The Mustangs Leadership came into the conversation openly, willingly, and with earnest intent to understand — not simply to be understood. We, the Park Hill Pirates, approached the conversation with that same willingness to listen and engage,” part of the statement read. “We gained a better understanding of the origins of the Mustangs organization, their families, their concerns, the dynamics surrounding their teams, and the challenges their leadership faced as they worked to determine the right way to respond to the behavior, misconduct, and harm experienced.”
“… Through our conversation, we learned that corrective actions, education, and accountability had been initiated proactively by their organization without direction from the league. Unfortunately, those actions were never clearly communicated to the Park Hill Pirates through the league process, which contributed significantly to the belief that our concerns were not being addressed appropriately and were being dismissed and left unaddressed, much like our formal grievance.”
In their Sept. 30 Facebook statement about the meeting, the Denver Mustangs, represented at the meeting by coaches Hill and Driessen, wrote that they “sincerely apologized for the racial language used by members of our community following our game earlier this season (on Aug. 15).”
“There is no circumstance in which racial slurs are acceptable,” part of the statement read. “Racism is real, its impact is real, and we recognize that words can cause harm far beyond the moment in which they are spoken.”
“… We also discussed the public attention surrounding screenshots from a private text conversation involving minors. We appreciate Park Hill’s acknowledgment that, while their organization did not create or originate those screenshots, their public advocacy became part of a larger conversation that brought additional attention and criticism to the young people involved.”
Colorado Football League terminates relationship
The Mustangs thought the boycott would end after the meeting, but it hasn’t, as two more forfeits followed.
Meanwhile, the conflict between The Nation Youth Football League and the Colorado Football League escalated.
On Oct. 1, Watson sent a formal request to Lucas and the Colorado Football League “for an explanation regarding the decision to remove the Nation Youth Football League (TNYFL) from any and all future Colorado Football League scheduling.”
The next day, the Colorado Football League — in a letter signed by Lucas, Quintana, Wright, Webster and Miner — emailed Watson to terminate its relationship with The Nation Youth Football League, effective immediately. The Colorado Football League wrote that its leadership board made the decision “because of a sustained lack of leadership, accountability, and communication from the TNYFL under Mike Watson.”
The Colorado Football League cited four factors — Watson’s failure to attend leadership meetings, Watson’s conduct at the emergency Colorado Football League meeting on Sept. 24, online attacks on The Nation Youth Football League’s Facebook page, and a failure to uphold the suspension of a coach — as their reasoning for ending the coalition between the two leagues.
Watson disputed those factors.
He said he had serious family/personal matters that caused him to miss meetings, and that others missed meetings as well; that he did swear on the Sept. 24 call, but that the categorization of his conduct as “personal attacks and violent language” is false; and that he was not going to restrict the freedom of speech by censoring others’ posts on The Nation Youth Football League’s Facebook page. He said the “failure to discipline” allegation stemmed from Watson suspending a Park Hill coach after the season-opener against the Mustangs, but the coach still showed up on the sideline for the game despite the suspension.
In sum, Watson claims the Colorado Football League, which posts a rulebook on its site but has no clear organizational bylaws, lacks the power to kick out the The Nation Youth Football League or ban its teams from the state tournament. The Colorado Football League rules list a social media policy, noting “there is zero tolerance for any negative posts referencing any other teams,” and outlines disciplinary action for ejections.
But Watson believes the Colorado Football League’s decision to kick out The Nation Youth Football League and ban its teams from the state tournament was personal, driven by the conflict between Watson and the rest of the Colorado Football League leadership, as well as attacks on the league on Facebook.
“Their decision took it out on those kids, who had nothing to do with any of this,” Watson said. “The lies they put out in this letter, they’re defaming my character now.
“(The Colorado Football League) took no action against (the Denver Mustangs), but they ignored my feelings and emotions about the racism being shown … I stand 10 toes down on how I handled this situation (with the CFL) because I did it the best I could with the best intention for everybody involved. And that’s (CFL leadership) too. I try to mitigate this circumstance. I try to protect them. I try to protect the league just so we can make sure that we give these kids a good experience.”
After the Colorado Football League sent Watson its termination letter, White sent a letter to the Park Hill Pirates community outlining the ban and the events that led to it.
The letter detailed issues this season and in prior ones, including “members of our administrative staff, coaching staff, and supporters being subjected to or drawn into physical confrontations after games, our cheerleaders being called ‘monkeys,’ our players being called racial slurs, and our community being disrespected by ‘F* Park Hill’ chants from the crowd.’”
Call for decision-making transparency
In a lengthy email to Lucas on Monday, The Nation Youth Football League parent Kel Wyatt demanded answers from the Colorado Football League about the state tournament ban and got to the heart of the issue.
“Over the past several weeks, I have watched an increasingly serious dispute unfold involving The Nation Youth Football League, the Colorado Football League, and multiple organizations operating within the broader Colorado youth football community,” Wyatt wrote. “… At this point, however, the most urgent issue is no longer simply who was right or wrong in each individual disagreement.
“The most urgent issue is this: How did an adult leadership dispute ultimately result in an entire league of children losing the opportunity to participate in a statewide postseason structure approximately one week before (league) playoffs? That question deserves a clear answer.”
Wyatt questioned why the situation continued to deteriorate after the Park Hill Pirates and Denver Mustangs leadership groups met on Sept. 29.
“If two organizations directly involved in one of the most emotionally charged incidents could find common ground through conversation, why was the broader CFL/TNYFL dispute allowed to escalate to the point of terminating an entire alliance immediately before postseason competition?” Wyatt wrote.
“The October 2 termination letter is largely framed around allegations concerning Mr. Watson’s leadership and conduct. If Mr. Watson violated rules, then address Mr. Watson… But a blanket consequence affecting children across an entire league requires a much stronger explanation.”
Wyatt also asked for clarification on the Colorado Football League’s decision-making structure, noting that “families should not have to piece together league governance from Facebook comment sections.” She asked for transparency from the Colorado Football League in addressing “the appearance of retaliation” against The Nation Youth Football League for bringing instances of racism to light. And Wyatt called for “separate adult accountability for the opportunities earned by children.”
Plus, Wyatt questioned the contradictory language in the Colorado Football League’s termination letter, which noted “the CFL’s member programs and registered players are not affected by this decision and remain in good standing with the CFL” — while also stating that “the CFL will no longer take part in jointly sanctioned games, tournaments, or events” with The Nation Youth Football League.
Watson says Lucas told him that The Nation Youth Football League teams were “out” from the state tournament, and that the Colorado Football League removed The Nation Youth Football League teams from TeamPass, where schedules and records are posted.
Brandon Pryor, co-founder of The Nation Youth Football League, echoed Wyatt’s sentiment, saying the Colorado Football League’s decision to ban The Nation Youth Football League is “discrimination and retaliation.”
“It’s a failure to address the racism,” Pryor said. “This is a safe-to-play state. Look at Senate Bill 24-113 that talks about youth sports and the safe environment that is required. The failure to address this issue that happened in August… that’s not creating a safe environment for all of our parties.”
While Pryor said that “when we’re talking about leadership and decision-making, nobody is batting a thousand” — including Watson — he dismissed the Colorado Football League’s reasons for terminating its relationship with The Nation Youth Football League.
“The fact that they would cancel games for kids is because either they’re racist, and are upholders of racism, or because of adult differences where they don’t like Mike,” Pryor said. “Neither one is justification for canceling games for 770 kids.”
Melissa Leach, a regional vice chairwoman for American Youth Football, vouched for Watson amid the controversy.
She notes Watson — an American Youth Football Hall of Famer and regional ambassador for the Taking The Sideline Back Committee aimed at curbing negative parent and coach behavior — has a decades-long track record volunteering his time for Denver youth football. She believes that if he is defending his teams and his league with the Colorado Football League board, it’s for good reason.
“Mike has no problem suspending teams, and he has no problem suspending coaches, if there’s wrongdoings or they’re not meeting the standard of the league,” Leach said. “I’ve sat in on multiple of those meetings. So I can’t help but to think the decision (by the Colorado Football League) is more personal and emotional than about finding a solution.”
With the state tournament on the horizon on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1, there’s no solution in sight to mend the chasm between the two leagues.
White called the situation “disheartening” and said that he thinks the Colorado Football League’s decisions “are being made in a silo and unilaterally.” Meanwhile, the Mustangs’ Driessen says the Park Hill Pirates and other The Nation Youth Football League teams should be able to play in the state tournament.
Colorado Football League leadership also saw a shakeup Thursday night, when Miner announced his resignation. He wrote on Facebook that “recent personal attacks and threats made against me and my family have made it impossible for me to continue volunteering in any capacity.”
The Pirates’ goals remain to reinstate The Nation Youth Football League into the Colorado Football League and review the process that led to the ban.
“We’re prepared to take whatever legal action is necessary to remedy this problem,” Pryor said.
Want more sports news? Sign up for the Sports Omelette to get all our analysis on Denver’s teams.
Source: www.denverpost.com
