Reserve Lessons

January 26, 2018

Nothing prepared me for coaching more than the time I spent sitting on the bench. I hated it. And when I started coaching, I couldn’t forget how much I disliked sitting on the bench, and I did everything I could do to get every player in a game every week on some level – 9th grade, JV or varsity.

So I get it. Not starting hurts. Not playing stinks. And while many coaches are brilliant in their tactics to share playing time, some coaches do a miserable job of getting reserves into games.

But having said all that, I must add that too many people undervalue the importance of reserves, of the practice players who work hard to make the regulars better. Many champion wrestlers and tennis players earned their titles because of practice partners who pushed them to be better day-in and day-out. Many championship teams achieved their success through arduous daily competition in practice all season long. Many times it has been a so-called “backup” player, who worked hard in practices and who was often worked into games by caring coaches, who steps in after a starter is injured and saves the season.

There is much to be learned as a reserve, including what it means to be a loyal teammate ... a team player ... and what teamwork and sacrifice and loyalty and dedication really mean.

I have said often in speeches that it’s my wish that every student would have the opportunity to be a starter in one sport and a substitute in another because the lessons to be learned from each are different and so vital to developing the whole person.

It is a shame that students have somehow gotten the message that it’s a waste of their time to be a part of a team where they aren’t a starter or even the star. They get this message from adults ... sometimes it’s coaches, but more often it’s parents who criticize coaches and/or transfer their children to schools where they have a greater chance for athletic success.

As the benches get shorter on our school sports teams, the lessons learned get fewer.

The Top Task

April 17, 2018

I’ve said and written many times before that the task of an athletic administrator is not merely event management, it is also – and more importantly – message management. It is defining and defending educational athletics. Doing so every day, in every way. Forcing our constituents, from top to bottom and both young and old, to ask and answer ...

“What is educational athletics?”
and
“What is the meaning of success in school sports?”
and
“How do we deliver the message every day?”

This is why I’ve blogged twice a week for nine years. Eighty percent of those postings have been intended to help define and defend educational athletics.

This is why the MHSAA publishes benchmarks – the only issues-focused high school association magazine in the US.

This is why we have a Student Advisory Council, a Scholar-Athlete Award, a Battle of the Fans, Captains Clinics and Sportsmanship Summits.

This is why we take our coaches education – the Coaches Advancement Program – face to face, week after week, to every corner of our state.

This is why we have a Task Force on Multi-Sport Participation.

This is why we have a radio network and waive fees for local stations which use our great public service announcements that define and defend educational athletics ... many of which conclude with the phrase, “Promoting the value and values of educational athletics.”

All of this, and much more, is about defining and defending educational athletics ... the top task of athletic administrators from top to bottom of our exciting enterprise.