Lessons from a Little Green Guy, Part 1

There are really very few barriers to beginning your volunteer coaching career. Yes, it does help to know a little about the sport you're coaching... But even more important than that, you'll need tons of patience. There are hundreds of websites which can explain the rules, strategy, and give coaching tips and techniques for any sport - you're on one right now. But, I'm not aware of anyplace where you can get more patience, or learn patience. Trust me, it will either be there or not when you run that first practice, or step on to the field for the first game.

This is where the "Little Green Guy" comes in. To be an effective youth coach, you must tap your inner Jedi. As a huge Star Wars fan, I can quote many lines - the best of which come from Yoda, the 900 year old Jedi Master. To harness the power of the Force, a young Jedi must learn control and have patience. In this case, you will not be fighting Darth Vader (probably), but frankly there's nothing you can do about it if a 5 year-old isn't interested in a dribbling or agility drill. The best plan for these situations is to be flexible. For practices, always have more planned than you can do in case you need to switch things up. For games, make a substitution or call a quick time out. Redirection works well, as does moving quickly through practice and drills to avoid downtime.

Along with patience comes that control mentioned above. This means being in control of both yourself and the kids. I always start each season with a few rules - when the coach talks, no one else does, and there's no fiddling with equipment either. If either happens, I stop, look, and wait. If it takes more than a few seconds, saying the child's name usually gets things moving.

All of this sounds great, right? Then you find out that practice is tonight after a horrible day at work. You're hungry, it's hot out, and that little kid who's always screwing around starts yanking other kids' flags off and flinging the flags as far as he can... Assuming you're dealing with youngsters who are just beginning their sports careers, gather your thoughts and redirect to a different drill - or even suggest a quick break.

By age 8 or 9, your options increase. They are now old enough to "run lines" until behavior improves :) But until then, when coaching gets more serious, have some ideas to keep things moving along without stressing you out. ..."anger, fear, aggression... the Dark Side are they..."

May the Force Be With You.

Drill of the Day: "Monkey in the Middle"

From time to time I'll share drills or practice activities which I've found to be successful... I'll mainly focus on drills for the littler kids, but I'm sure there's ways to adapt any drill to various ages.

"Monkey in the Middle" is very popular with the 6-7 year old crowd, and it is effective at teaching both defensive and passing skills in soccer and basketball. This is a great thing to do when practice isn't going that well, no one is paying attention, and you're getting frustrated.

The drill: Have all team members stand around in a circle - this works best with 6-10 kids. Designate a "monkey" to go in the middle of the circle and steal or at least alter the path of the ball as it is passed to the members in the circle. When the monkey makes a steal (or deflects the pass for younger kids), they replace the passer on the outside of the circle, and the passer becomes the new Monkey. No passes to the person right next to you on the circle, and if you throw a pass someone has to run to get, you're in the middle... If a child holds the ball too long, warn them to keep it moving, or move them into the middle.

This will seem a little chaotic, but the kids really like it. This is a great drill for stressing fakes, quick decisions, and accuracy for the passers, and defensive skills (blocking passing lanes, watching the ball, etc) for the Monkey.

Why?!

This is my first entry in my first blog.

I have never been one to keep a diary or take a lot of notes. I don't really even like writing all that much. That said, I think now is the right time and youth sports / coaching kids / volunteering is the right topic. Why? I love coaching and inspiring kids through sports, teamwork, and sportsmanship. I like teaching, and I like seeing them "get it". I've been coaching my son, Alex for almost 4 years now through many sports, and have begun my first season of coaching my daughter, Nikki. I was also involved in coaching younger kids when I was growing up. During that time, I have seen a lot of bad coaches. I have seen TERRIBLE coaches. I have seen marginal coaches, and I have encountered some very excellent coaches. I have also met many parents - some just happy to have their kids involved. Some wanting to coach (or assist) but not knowing how. Some wonderful, some obnoxious. If you are interested in any of these topics, then maybe this blog is for you.

I hope to share everything from little stories to drill ideas. Some topics may be "from the archives", while others might be fresh that day. I will cover basketball, baseball, football, and soccer - not sure my knowledge is the same depth and breadth across all of those, but I'm sure you'll quickly find how I feel about each...

Your comments will always be welcome. I would prefer welcome, thoughtful comments - but I realize this is the Internet...

Happy coaching!