Little league coaches in every sport are odd people. Odd in the sense that we common (and uncaring) people have a hard time understanding how youth sports can infuse so much passion and fervor in a person when most of us can’t wait for the season to be over. Seriously, who wants to spend hundreds of volunteer hours standing in every category of weather known to man and God and explain the Wishbone to a group of teens who are more interested in texting, playing Halo and hot Cheetos?
Because they are volunteer’s I have a hard time drawing the treacherous delineation between good and bad coaches because honestly, if you’re brave enough to match wits with rabid fans and vexatious, demeaning parents you are a good person even if you can’t call an audible when your opponent is showing blitz on third-and-one. Sadly, just as there are inept teachers, lawyers, doctors and politicians, the same can be said of coaches. A good man or woman does not necessarily make an excellent coach. I would also venture far out on the proverbial limb to say that even coaches with mountains of talent, charisma and sporting acumen can be the worst coach of them all.
There are a myriad of definitions and opinions on what makes a good coach. Years ago I had the blessing and opportunity to work with a group of guys who had the foresight and the fortitude to simultaneously teach young people about life at the same time that they encouraged their team to tackle, run and block and to do it with zeal. When my family moved away from that community, we hardly imagined that we would ever have that experience again in our new environment 30-something miles to the south in Lehi, Utah. I’m happy to say that I was wrong and I’m extracting my foot from my mouth as I type this letter because I’ve found truly exceptional examples of what a coach should be in this fine community.
In my mind, there is only one thing worse than being an under-appreciated, under-valued and abused coach who is deserving of accolades and admiration: an unappreciated mother (I score points with my wife for that endorsement), but that’s a story and a headline for another day.
Coaches are like teachers in the sense that when you are tutoring young minds it is important to understand that if your understudies don’t learn a single thing from you; you have failed in your job. One of my favorite quotes is, “A good teacher is like a candle - it consumes itself to light the way for others.” In many ways, a coach is much like that candle. He must set aside his own ambitions, his reservations and his self-diagnosed inadequacies and in some cases his sanity to replace them with all the things that will make him the best possible mentor, authority and tutor in a child’s sporting life.
In my home, my wife and I have just one stringent rule about the men who teach our sons about sports: don’t suck. To expound on that point, I would say that the primary characteristics in a coach that matters most to us as parents are: honor, integrity, dedication, honesty and the ability nurture young minds. You can yell and scream; cry and fuss but without the bulk of these qualities it would be difficult to impress and direct young people effectively.
Regrettably, it is not uncharacteristic that we found most of the coaches for our sons this season with some of those traits while dipping far below the “suckage scale” on others. Many believe that this is the inherent characteristic of the coaching profession. Does coaching require an inability to show empathy or a lack of consistency and concise execution of both theory and practice? Hardly! On the contrary there should be more than an ample supply of all these things and more. There were, thankfully, a number of coaches who gave us a sense of pride and an unassailable assurance that good things are happening in Lehi football and in the community at large.
There are young, talented players in the ranks who are the future of Lehi Pioneer football, but there are coaches like Jason Christensen, Marini Selu, Stan Raass, Christopher Dodge, Jeremy Taeoalii, Cole Cooper, Sean Gallagher, Art Cox, Bryan Holdbrook, Heeth Harding and Jeromy Nielsen who live up to the coaching creed of legendary UCLA coach John Wooden who inspired his own teams by saying, “You can't live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you.”
These coaches and others exemplify the patience and persistence that cannot be separated nor ignored when working with young talent, particularly when faced with the adversity of developing pride and faith in a program that has been lackluster and uninspiring.
I commend Lehi’s youth football coaches for their efforts and I’m encouraged by their commitment and fervency in promoting and instilling a love for sports in our youths. Though many may object to the notion that coaches should not be looked upon as mentors and an extension of parents, I balk at the idea because coaches are in fact assisting families and communities by shaping the societal aptitude and a sense of pride in our community through their civic service. These men forgo time with their own families to help us raise ours.
There is work yet to do in Lehi football, but it is comforting to know that there are men of upstanding character in our community. Quoting Wooden again, I sincerely believe that these men follow this thoughtfully and with necessity, “Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.”
Go Pioneers!
6 years ago
