Outcasts United: Chapter 9 Summary & Analysis

Luma’s hair rule sets off a debate among the Under Fifteen team. Prince refuses to cut his hair and doesn’t join the team, which upsets Mandela and Fornatee because they are his friends. Luma has a reason for the rule: long hairstyles imply gang affiliations, and her players had already been the target of abuse and hostility from gang members and opponents who abused them because of their accents and names.

Luma was already lenient with Prince during the previous season because of his talent. He skipped tutoring sessions and undermined Luma’s authority; soon, others followed suit and openly challenged her. Thus, she vowed not to let him break the rules again and kicks him off the team.

Fornatee is frustrated that he has to choose between his coach and his friends, but he knows he needs the Fugees. Earlier that summer, his father was in a car accident and was in the hospital for a month, and Fornatee came to depend on Luma. He trusts her and knows that “she’s more than a coach to [him].” But Fornatee is also loyal to Mandela and Prince, particularly because they are all Liberian.

Preseason practices start during late August in the sweltering heat, surrounded by the dust and grime of their field. But none of the Fugees complain about the shortcomings of their new field. Practices for all teams begin with twenty-five minutes of running laps, and if the boys misbehave Luma runs them to exhaustion. She then leads them through sit-ups, push-ups, leg lifts, and bicycle kicks, pushing on players backs so they can’t cheat.

After exercises, Luma leads drills, then ends the practice with a scrimmage. Finally able to play, the boys get a new surge of energy and sprint up and down the field. Luma expects her players to “work hard and take practice seriously, and above all, to obey her.” When one boy, Hussein, starts to goof off during practice, she shouts at him to go home.

As the Under Seventeens play their scrimmage, the Under Thirteens do their laps around the field. As soon as the younger boys pass outside of Luma’s field of vision, they start to walk instead of run, picking up speed as they return to her sight. She dismisses the Under Seventeens at the end of their game, but instead of starting drills with the younger team, she has them keep running.

The boys continue to run and run for forty minutes before they ask what they did wrong. Luma blows her whistle and tells them that they would no longer run laps around the track, but instead they would always stay in her direct line of sight as they ran. Luma comments later that because these boys face so many hardships, “they’re never going to be babied,” so she refuses to baby them.

The Under Fifteens also test Luma. Even though Prince no longer on the team, he stops by practices with friends, smoking on the edge of the field. This bothers Fornatee and Mandela, who start showing up late and talking back to Luma. Luma is unsure of what to do; she is frustrated by the disrespect, but also knows that Prince is only lurking around because he misses the team. Still, she refuses to budge on her hair rule.

Mandela doesn’t like thinking of himself as a refugee; he’s lived in the United States for seven years. At first, when Jeremiah joins the Fugees, he is hesitant to play on the team. He doesn’t want other people to think that he is poor. Though eventually he gives in and tried out for the team, he never seems truly comfortable there, as though he always wants to be someplace else.

Mandela had made friends on the Fugees and at school, but Beatrice worries that he is hanging out with the wrong crowd. She doesn’t like the way he dresses or acts, and she calls Luma when he stays out late or acts up, so she can enforce the rules and help to take care of her sons. Beatrice says that Luma is “really a sister to [her].” When Mandela acts out in practice, in turn, Luma appeals to Beatrice.

Beatrice constantly reminds Mandela, Darlington, and Jeremiah, of the life that they had in Liberia and their tough journey to America. She would remind them of the mud hut she built in the refugee camp, or that she would break a single biscuit into four pieces, or that even now she works ten-hour days at the Ritz-Carlton. Reminding them of these times helps cultivate their respect for her, which she hopes will keep them out of trouble.