By Kim Dunning
Coach Shipp is a great man who has a single mission in life: to better our youths’ lives. Who is Coach Reginald Shipp? The answer is more complex than you might imagine.
Coach Shipp is a father of five. Two of his daughters attend college at Shaw University and Mountain View Stat Junior College. His other two daughters are in high school and he has one son, who is four. He is married to a wonderful woman who is his best friend and support network. She understands that what he does for others takes him away from his family, and has a purpose. This is the man behind the scenes.
What is amazing about Coach Shipp is that he is a humble person who doesn’t like to talk about himself. If you ask him questions about his mentoring he will talk your ear off, as mentoring today’s youth is his main focus. Coach Shipp is a mentor to young men who do not necessarily come from the best situations in life. These young men have been dealt a bad hand in life and Coach is there to help them find a way, even with adversity, to become better men. This is a cause that is near and dear to his heart.
Coach Shipp did not come from the best of backgrounds. He grew up in two rough neighborhoods and he fought every day to survive. His mother was a drug addict and his father did not come into his life until he was older.
When he was six-years old, he met another young man by the name of Ellery Lundy. Mr. Lundy is a big reason why Coach Shipp could make his life better. He attributes his life to him. Ellery introduced Coach Shipp to football.
Football became his saving grace and now he is paying that forward to the young men he coaches and mentors.
Mr. Lundy now has a foundation called Broken Men’s Foundation, which helps men build resumes and community service skills, among other opportunities.
According to Coach Shipp, if it wasn’t for Mr. Lundy, he may have ended up as just another statistic in the streets.
As a result of his background, he is a huge advocate of getting young men off the streets by getting them involved in football. This is Arena football and he is now the owner of the Capital City Reapers. Through the Reapers, he helps his players’ transition from outdoor football to indoor football.
Coach Shipp has an extensive resume. He has not only owned a team but he has played semi-pro football. He considers himself the Charles Woodson of his time. He played many positions: from wide receiver, defensive back, running back and quarterback. When asked, he said his bread and butter positions were running back and defensive back. He retired from playing at age 37 and became a community man. While he was invited to different camps, he never got any further than that. He did play in the European League.
On his coaching resume, he became a full-time coach in 2010. He has coached the York Capitals to a 2015 undefeated season that ended with a Championship win. The Capitals are out of York, Pennsylvania. More recently, besides coaching for the Reapers, he is the Defensive Assistant and Defensive Backs coach for the Virginia Titans semi-pro team, along with his friend Terry Haynes. The Titans, owned by Lavar Matthews, another great friend of Coach Shipps’. Mr. Matthews provides men with the same opportunities as the Reapers but they are an outdoor football team.
Earlier in his coaching career, he met a young woman by the name of Elle Locust out of Harrisonburg, Pennsylvania. As a result of working with her, he became an advocate for women in sports. Coach Shipp was impressed with Ms. Locusts’ knowledge and the way she handled the players. He has written her letters of recommendation for an internship with the NFL.
Most recently, Coach Shipp put out a call, on Facebook, for female coaches. This is a call Sports Elites’ own Tay Holloway answered.
Coach Shipp coaches young men from the ages of 19 to 27. His oldest player has indoor football experience, but had an injury and now plays with the Reapers to sharpen his skills to move back up into the next level. None of his players receive compensation. He has also coached a developmental team.
Out of the 30 players he had on his developmental team, eight of them went on to get paid positions and the team was able to send three of the young men to school.
Coach Shipp mentors men of all ages. He is involved with the We Care Organization, which was founded by Mr. C. J. Richardson. We care teaches life skills and teaches young men how to be humble no matter what their experience. We Care is also involved with helping out the homeless and sending kids to camp. Most recently, they had a block party to teach the children that all police officers aren’t bad and that there are bad seeds that happen to get the media attention.
When not coaching, playing or mentoring; Coach Shipp enjoys watching football, basketball, baseball and boxing. He is an avid Dallas Cowboys fan from back in the day when Danny White and Too Tall Jones played for them. He is a Lakers fan and a Washington Nationals fan. He loved boxing, but said it has become boring since Mayweather retired.
Coach Shipp is the humblest person I’ve ever had the pleasure of speaking with. I asked him if he had one person that he has mentored or coached that he was proud of. His response was, all of them. His goal is to mentor young men to become better men so they can be better to their wives, girlfriends and eventually their children. He is all about the pay-it-forward motto.
His goal in life is quite simple and something we should all live by. If you can improve someone’s life, then you have lived your life with a purpose.
Coach Shipp is an incredible man who has fulfilled and saved many young men from the streets. He is a man on a mission and has worked hard to continue to better not only his life, but everyone’s life he has touched.
season win. The passion in the garden was so evident that even Derrick Rose had to acknowledge it. Their was a playoff atmosphere in the air, and the Knicks didn’t disappoint. Let’s take a deeper look inside the numbers.
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