Reading the posts in Bill Gates thread about what to do with the coach at his son's high school got me thinking. So I'm starting this thread because I don't want to hijack that one and some things that have happened to me got me thinking.......
Do you have to like your coach in order for them to be considered good? Or because you don't like your coach they can't be any good?
Waaaay back in the day I played football in high school for a guy that was hard on us. He would scream at us, yell at us, berate us, humilitate us and pretty much anything negative you could think of to us. Honestly, I really didn't like him and most of my buddies didn't either. But he knew his stuff and that was never in question. Obviously guys who don't know their stuff are in a category of their own but guys like this need to be discussed.
I know I was on the receiving end of several tongue lashings. I remember one time we had worked on a special formation all week where I was an extra lineman. Coach sends me in and the guy I'm supposed to take out wouldn't leave. So we got 12 guys in the huddle and the play clock is running. I make the decision to leave the huddle and go back to the sideline so we can try to avoid a delay of game penalty. Coach sees me coming back and he goes ballistic. Calls timeout and meets me halfway between the huddle and sideline. He grabs me by my facemask and almost drags me to the huddle. In the process he's thrashing me and the other guy who wouldn't come out. It's there in front of the whole crowd. I think it's safe to say that everyone on here is going to say this was going too far.
My dad didn't. He told me a few years later that when it happened someone asked him in the stands what he was going to do about me being treated this way. He said noting because I probably done something wrong. My dad was basically the same way as my coach - if I screwed up then I heard about it. But they also had something else in common - when I (or other players) did good we heard about it too in a good way. To illustrate my point one time our quarterback threw an interception and since I pulled to lead the QB on the outside I was basically the only person between this guy and the endzone. I took the right angle and tackled this guy before he got to the endzone. Coach couldn't pat me on the head and hug me enough for making this play.
So we got this guy who will celebrate success but will absolutely thrash you when you mess up - is he a good coach or a bad coach? Some parents thought the world of him and others hated him (a dad of one of my buddies got into a fist fight with coach after a basketball game one time).
Now that I've been out of high school for going onto 19 years I have a new appreciatation of him. He joined facebook and asked to be my friend. I acccepted because I always had a respect for him although I really didn't like him. We've traded emails and stuff because he was named the head coach of a new school that is going to consolidate my old high school with 3 other schools.
I have a new appreciation for him because I'm a coach / teacher now. I see how tough it is to get young people to do things the right way in football and baseball and the classroom. I also think I coach like him without going to the extremes - when my guys do good I let them know but when they mess up I let them know. But like my coach I also teach the game. I know there are parents who respect / like me and I know there are parents who don't respect / like me - same with players. But I now see how he helped shape me into who I am as well as my buddies I grew up with.
So my question is - a guy like my coach who knows the game, who has won (my HS under him has two runner ups and a state championship), sent players to college and all kinds of other things but was really hard on players to the point we didn't really like him......is he any good?
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