KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The father of the only Black player on the Olathe North baseball team posted Friday on social media that the school’s baseball coach used a racial slur while speaking to his son before a game.
When the player had rap music playing on a speaker connected to his phone during pregame warmups Thursday before a game with rival Olathe South, Eagles baseball coach Pete Flood confronted the player and said the team doesn’t “play that (racial slur) music,” according to the parent’s post.
41 Action News is not naming the parent or player at this time in an effort to respect their privacy.
Flood told the player “country and rock music” were the only acceptable types of pregame music.
The Olathe Public Schools Administration announced Friday that Flood "has been placed on administrative leave and a recommendation for immediate termination."
After investigating the situation, the district said it is "appalled" by Flood's remark and said "the comments made are absolutely unacceptable."
We are appalled by the remarks made by the Olathe North head baseball coach and have thoroughly investigated the situation. The staff member has been placed on administrative leave and a recommendation for immediate termination has been submitted to the Board of Education. The comments made are absolutely unacceptable. In the Olathe Public Schools, our priority is the well-being of ALL our students. Racist and derogatory statements will never be tolerated. This is not who we are in Olathe. Our focus now is on the support and care of our students.
The Olathe Board of Education will have a special meeting Monday morning to discuss Flood's future in an executive session.
The district said Olathe North’s game scheduled for Friday afternoon at Shawnee Mission South has been canceled “out of an abundance of caution for our student-athletes,” a district spokeswoman said.
41 Action News spoke to the parent of the athlete following the incident.
"We didn't find out until after the game, after he made it home from the game," the parent said. "He (the coach) did it in the open, until this point he hasn't denied it." "I think the fair thing and the right thing for my son and for the kids in the Olathe School District is for this guy to be banned."
Flood was the head football coach at Olathe North from 2006-11,leading the Eagles to the 2009 Class 6A state championship.
Before that, he’d been an assistant with the Olathe North and Olathe South football teams.
Flood worked as an assistant baseball and football coach at St. Thomas Aquinas from 2013 to 2018 before returning to Olathe North in the fall of 2018 as the head baseball coach and an assistant football coach.
