Thursday, May 15, 2008

Another Reason Nebraska is No Hot Bed For Soccer


That, as the caption indicates, is Sanford Kaplan of Lincoln Nebraska. And he's got a problem.

He's actually got two of them now: one legal, and the other sexual, the latter being the cause of the former as Kaplan was arrested Wednesday.

From the local Omaha news:

57-year-old Sanford Kaplan was arrested Wednesday following complaints that numerous young boys were bound, blindfolded, gagged and suspended from the rafters of Kaplan's garage at 14647 Country Lane... Court affidavits show testimony from teens who says he used duct tape and rope. When they were blindfolded, they also say they heard him masturbating.


No Paul Jewell, so what's this got to do with soccer? Well, Kaplan was a local soccer coach. The article is a little vague over whether he coached at Lincoln Northeast High School or if that's just where the reporter went to get a quote—predictably the kid says that he had no idea.

Kaplan did coach for the Capital Soccer Association as well as teach geology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He also kept a gimp in his basement.

Okay, that last one is a blatant fabrication.

But really, if you care about soccer in this country and want to instruct kids to help them become better players, you probably ought not to be the sort of person that's got a harness for teens in your garage. In fact, you probably ought not to be that sort of person at all.

Unless by "teens" you restrict it to "eighteen." Even then, it's still creepy even if it is legal.

1 comment:

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Arsene Wenger doesn't see what the big deal is with this story.