25) Martin "Coach Jake" Jacobson, Part I - Coach, Martin Luther King Jr., High School

Martin Jacobson, known to many as “Coach Jake”, is the Coach of the Martin Luther King Jr., High School in Manhattan, the most successful team in New York City history and one of the top ranked programs in the country. The team consists of highly talented kids from underprivileged inner-city areas and immigrants mostly from West Africa, Caribbean, and South America. Coach Jake took charge of MLK, or “Horror High” as some tabloids called it at the time, in 1994 and started to discover talent among students who had recently arrived to the country. He is as known for his off the field work as he is for winning titles, 16 NYC championships in the past 20 something years and counting, he is relentless in his pursuit to create a better life for “his kids” - goes above and beyond to help them and do what he can to make sure they have the most necessary needs, food on the table, a place to live, immigration status in order, and general support.There have been many stories and profile pieces on Coach Jake throughout the years, from the cover of the New York Times to 60 Minutes, with the most recent, a full length documentary, “Coach Jake”, premiering at the Urbanworld Film Festival in NYC on September 21, 2017. 
Join us as we discuss his journey, starting from Long Beach, NY, as a second generation immigrant, to going through years of drug addiction, crime, and personal tragedies, to becoming one of the most well-respected, successful, and beloved coaches on the NYC football scene. We touch on his upbringing, being arrested for the first time at 10 years old, learning football from a Holocaust survivor, his secrets of spotting talent, immigration, hippie trips out west, selling LSD to the Ford Motor Company assembly line workers, heroin addiction, facing 20 years in prison, the moment that became his turning point, and much more.   To FollowThe Coach Jake Foundation http://www.thecoachjakefoundation.org/Coach Jake documentary, info & trailer https://www.coachjakedoc.com/ Facebook @CoachJakeNYCInstagram coachjakenyc

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