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Coach told black ex-college baseball player he can’t play because his hair is too long
Posted
August 25, 2023
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1:01Now PlayingA Georgia college’s white baseball manager is under fire after allegedly telling a black player he couldn’t play on the team because his hair was too long and didn’t conform to the rules set by the coach.
Valdosta State University’s head baseball coach Greg Guilliams was secretly recorded by former player Asher Akridge during a meeting in the coach’s office, where Akridge questioned Guilliams’ reasoning for kicking him off the team based on his hair length.
In a video posted to TikTok by Akridge with the caption “Valdosta State University 2023 or 1945,” a player tells the coach he was always respectful and always complied with the strict hair policy.
“If you complied with what I said, you’d got your hair cut and I wouldn’t had to keep telling you about it,” the coach says, suggesting there were multiple times he told the player to chop off his long hair.
Although neither individual is identified in the video, a source told WALB that it was Akridge and Guilliams.
Guilliams, 61, then takes partial blame for not giving Akridge, 21, clear instructions on how to wear his hair on the baseball team, but is still adamant that he was correct in kicking the college student off the team.
“In all fairness to you, here’s where I failed, what I should’ve done from the very beginning and I didn’t do it, this is my fault and I could see how I gave you the wrong impression, so I’m not gonna totally blame you because it takes two with everything,” Guilliams says, according to the clip.
“What I should’ve said at the very beginning was, ‘This is what you’ve got to do with your hair and then once you do that, I will let you come out there’ and I didn’t do that.”
Akridge was first recruited by FIU in 2019 and played for Jacksonville State University during his freshman season in 2022 before he transferred to Valdosta State.
He attempts to point out “discrepancies” in Guilliams’ policy as other players also had long hair and weren’t kicked off the team, but the coach quickly shoots it down.
“We are not talking about other guys, I told you before on the phone, we are not going down that route, why would I go down this route again?” Guilliams asks.
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#valdostastateuniversity #asherakridge #greguilliams #georgia #baseball
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