This story is about a Coach that wasn’t just a Coach.  Miami High football coach Corey Smith was a Father to Corey Smith, Jr. and Tacora Smith, Husband to Amina Smith, and Teacher of the students at Henry E.S. Elementary and Charles Drew K-8 as well.

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It must have been a pleasure to be a head football coach. Being a head football coach takes pride, leadership, and responsibility. Coach Corey Smith had those 3 traits not only as a coach but as a person too.

Coach Corey made sure that his team had everything that they needed to start the season. If someone had problems trying to sign a paper or trying to find out where to turn a physical in, he would let you know either at the moment or the next day. He loved to get special shirts and jerseys for the players from NFL players such as T.Y. Hilton to make his team look stylish and presentable.

He was always trying to help someone whether it was on the field at in a football game or off the field in the school house.   He would sometimes crack jokes, calling kids “knuckleheads”, just trying to make kids feel like they were in a great place. He would always crack jokes on me as well, and all I could do was laugh, but at the end of the day, it was all love for him and he knew that as well.

I met Coach when I was 5 years old. He was my P.E. Teacher at Henry E.S. Reeves Elementary. He knew my Mom and Grandma so it was like he was closely related to me. He was a very funny guy. Every time I had P.E. I seemed to laugh at the end because of his funny jokes towards other students.

I know for a fact it took a lot to be a great head coach. Coach Corey may not have been a perfect Head Coach  but he was a hard working head coach. He always wanted to encourage players to be great and to do great things such as try to pass this quarter with at least A’s and B’s or try to get at least 3 offers this year.

If he yelled at you because you made a mistake, he was only trying to encourage you to not make that same mistake again. He loved football very much so anything that he had to do that involved football he was all over it such as getting involved in 7 on 7 or signing up for football camps.

Coach Corey had one trait that made him a great head coach, and that was encouragement.  He would always tell kids, “Believe in yourself”, “C’mon, man, you can do it,” or just giving players his advice and help, building great chemistry with them.

Coach Corey had big expectations as a head coach. I know one of his expectations for this year’s upcoming season was to be my head coach for my freshmen year. Unfortunately, that was not able to happen.

However, I believe that Coach completed one of his expectations and that was to win a Super Bowl/Championship.  When I went to view his body, I could see a ring on his finger that appeared to be a Super Bowl ring. When I saw this I knew that he won a championship before in his career as a head coach.

As a head coach, I know the expectations are above the roof. Everyone who supports the team (fans, students of the school and others) expects to at least make the playoffs, nothing less.

As a football player, I can infer that there are a lot of challenges to face when you are a head coach and trust me there are a lot of responsibilities. You have outsiders nagging you about that one loss, people on media sources raging, blaming you for losing.

Coach Corey faced these challenges as a head coach. Yeah, he may have made some mistakes, yeah he may have made some bad calls, but we are HUMAN. We all make mistakes, but the important thing is that we learn from them, and I am certain Coach Corey learned from his mistakes. That’s why a lot of players who played under him or coaches he coached with or students who had him as a teacher, including me, say that he was a great person and a hard worker.

Man, oh man, it would have been great to see you, Coach.  I really miss you, man. I really do. I will never forget how much you did for the community. FOREVER LONG LIVE COACH COREY SMITH.