Hail to the Future Chief
- Updated: November 20, 2019
Munford sophomore Holland has a keen interest in politics, coach is convinced he’ll be President one day
By Al Muskewitz
East Alabama Sports Today
TALLADEGA – While the rest of the country is trying to figure out who the next leader of the free world should be, Munford basketball coach Michael Easley already knows who he’s endorsing come the 2040 presidential election.
His choice may not be on the political landscape right now – heck, the guy’s not even old enough to vote yet – but Easley is convinced Caderio Holland will be 51st President of the United States in 2040. So much so he made a pitch to be his sophomore post’s campaign manager when the time comes.
“I told him I was going to bring him so he could make an early start on his presidential run because I’ve been telling everybody he’s going to be the President of the United States in 20 years,” Easley said during the Lions’ session in Tuesday’s fifth annual Talladega County Basketball Media Day. “And I’m going to vote for him.”
Easley’s projection is based on Holland’s level-headed approach to and analysis of the issues, and it doesn’t take long to discover the player carries a lot more maturity than there seems to be on the political landscape these days.
“He can look at stuff and decipher what’s what,” the first-year coach said. “There’s a lot of fake stuff in the media nowadays with politics and he can look beyond the crap and see the truth in life.”
Holland developed his interest in politics simply through conversations with one of his teachers. He even talks it up with Easley and his coaches, one time on Senior Night during the football season right up to the moment they had to go back out on the field for the game.
“I talk to most of my teachers because not that many of my friends are really into politics,” Holland said. “I never realized how fun it really is until my history teacher (Blake Snider) started breaking all that stuff down for us in class one day and then I really felt like I’d like to actually study that. Once I started doing that it was like second nature and I really loved it.”
Unlike much of the discourse of the day, Holland listens to all perspectives, but identifies as a Republican because, he says, his beliefs most closely align with GOP policies, and he makes no apologies for it. His affiliation makes him a rare bird in Alabama, where black voters make up about 70 percent of the state’s Democratic Party, but he doesn’t believe his choice will create “too much commotion” within the local electorate.
“I get all perspectives that way I can break it down and keep it the right way because I’m on the side of right,” he said.
The natural progression would be start a campaign for class office, but he hasn’t thrown his hat into the ring for any of that yet. There are plenty of stories around the nation of teens or young adults holding positions of local government; more than 800 millennials ran for state legislative seats in 2018, 275 won.
As a newcomer on the political scene Holland would be a ballot underdog, but not one to be dismissed as he’s proven on the basketball court. At 5-11 he should be a guard, but has to play in the post because the Lions have no size and no choice.
He gets through by being where he should be on the floor and giving the effort Easley seeks as he works to change the culture of the program. Holland had five points and five rebounds in the Lions’ season-opening 51-33 win over Weaver.
From the perspective of a 16-year-old President-in-waiting, the real problem in this country is it’s just too thin-skinned.
“Right now I’d have to say that insensitivity of how everybody cannot take constructive criticism,” he said. “You sit up here and you like to tell the truth but when it comes down to it that person doesn’t want to hear that because they don’t agree with it and act like that’s a necessary threat to them because they disapprove of it.”
As the political drama continues to unfold inside the Beltway, much of the angst is created simply by one side patently opposed to what the other is selling. The daily tweets from the President doesn’t make it any easier. Holland believes if people would focus on what is actually getting done and dismiss the chatter the world would be a lot saner.
“Our current president, Donald Trump, our economic system is booming under him,” Holland said. “Now, back to what I said earlier about the sensitivity level of how people go about things, that needs to get narrowed down just a little bit because of how far they go with things.
“Just because he does it a certain way you shouldn’t always make that be the main objective why you don’t like him or why you go against something or situations (that get done). At the end of the day as long as he gets the job done and he’s protecting our country and he’s standing up for it and he’s making our country a better place I see no problem with that.”
While the idea of sitting in the Oval Office was an intriguing notion to talk about during Media Day, Holland said it really wasn’t something he was thinking about at this time. But like any savvy politician he didn’t actually dismiss the idea of running.
“That’s just kind of something he threw out there one day,” he said. “I thought about it, but it’s really not on my radar right now. If it comes down to it and it’s something I can even possibly be doing, I’ll try to do it.”
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