day #27 Time Flies

Wow, Okay lots of things to get caught up on. First things first, we played and won our first game of the season (33-6.) As you can probably guess I am a little upset that my defense gave up six points. I wish I was only joking, but I'm not totally joking. Having that one negative play, can really mess with you. I will on the other hand look past this one poor play we had. It really was just one play. We outplayed them on both sides of the ball. However our special teams turned it over twice and really put my defense in a tough situation, which they handled extremely well. I am very proud of how it went. We of course could not avoid the drama that comes with parents. We had an incident where a mother had a problem with being told their child couldn't wear something while playing. This is not our rule, it is a Pop Warner rule. The rule is designed to protect the kids from having equipment slide or move while playing. Which could be a potential injury hazard. This of course is the last thing we would want for any of the kids. Apparently parents are more concerned about other things to care about injuries to children. Who knew? There were a lot of other things that happened and I wish I cared enough to write about them, but I don't only because if I did care I would have wrote about them over the past week.
I should give an update on my own child. He plays defensive end (#10) for me and had a solid game. He accounted for 3 tackles and a forced fumble (we didn't recover.) He did his job well and I have to say we need that from him for every game. I don't feel like I am asking any kids to do more than they can, but I still need them to understand their jobs and do them correctly.
One more thing, tonight we will be watching game footage. This has always been interesting and usually the best way for me to learn. I get a lot out of it. The film doesn't lie, and it can be the best tool you have to teach from. This is why NFL coaches sleep in their offices. They spend countless hours watching film. We are not NFL coaches, but man is it cool to see how our big defensive play (interception) was actually from a defender out of position. He played man when he was supposed to be in a zone.  Oh by the way my wife is the one who is recording our games this year. That is why I have already watched the film (twice.) I should get out more.

"Coach" Nathan

day #15 Sleep Deprived

Quick update: the child who quit before my last blog has had a change of heart and is now back and playing and looking more enthused. I am happy for him and hope he can improve.
 I had to text our head coach today and ask him if it was normal to be having issues sleeping during football season. I am not the type of person to ever have any trouble sleeping. My head hits the pillow and I am out cold. Lately though I can't get my mind to relax or slow down. I am actually going over conversations and thoughts I want to express to the kids and the other coaches who are helping me to run the defense or even just running the drills. This is crazy, one I am having restless nights because of friggin' 10 year old kids and they aren't even my actual children. Second, to have this much control over not just kids, but adults who are older than I am and to get them all to listen. I have been in this spot before in my life and blew it. An old job where I was promoted to a supervisor after a month on the job and I was trying to get adults twice my age (18) to listen and respond to me as a boss. I guess this is where that year in my life will come in handy. I learned how to talk to adults that were older and get them to do what I need them to do. I never ever thought that this would ever come in to play, but here it is almost 15 years later and I am actually thinking of that time in my life and trying to figure out how to use it to my advantage. I blew that opportunity. I AM NOT BLOWING THIS ONE!
 So that text to the head coach, his response was with a joke about how he likes a certain type of alcohol to put himself to sleep. Not the answer I was looking for being a non-drinker, but effective because it relaxed me a bit. He then called me and we had a discussion about how I was as a whole. He was actually happy that I am losing sleep, because he believes I am taking it seriously enough to where it is bothering my regular routine. He then assured me that he and the other coaches had no problem trusting me with what I am doing and my leadership with the kids. At this point I was wondering if he remembers I have one year of coaching football and no experience actually playing as a child. Needless to say he would have just scoffed at my attempt to bring up this subject. In this short discussion he not only got me feeling confident, but also competent of what I am doing and what I am going to attempt to do and I am grateful. Now let's hope this can get my sleep back to where it usually is, because my lazy ass needs some sleep!


"Coach" Nathan

day #12 Quitting

We have gone through two full weeks of football now and have had two people quit. Not a good percentage if you ask me. I can not even fathom letting any of my kids quit anything after the season has started. If they don't want to participate before the season begins that is okay with me. I guess that is just the way I was raised.
As of now we have a few kids who need to lose weight to stay on our team. We play in a league where weight and age matter. I hope that we do not lose any of these kids. I think all of them will make weight, but it is weird having kids lose weight to play. I don't even have my wrestlers lose weight, and that is half of what wrestling is as a sport.
This whole week we as coaches have been deciding who deserves a chance to play where. This can be and usually is a hard week for the parents. They start to see where their kids go and what they will be doing. Tonight was the first night we really separated them and ran them through their jobs. I made sure to tell my defense that this is what they have earned so far, but it is all subject to change. I want them to understand that this is always a try-out. I make sure to watch everything and they will learn that soon enough. Hey if I sat my own kid last year no one is safe!



"Coach" Nathan

day #7 UH-OH

We are about a week in now, and I am in full panic mode. We have had two days in pads now and we as a coaching staff had a poor practice today. Our communication was bad and I didn't get certain things across to the kids that I should have. The last thing I want to do is let any of the kids down by not doing my job. I want to do a good job so the kids can in turn do a good job. I can't do a good job if I have doubts as to what I am supposed to go over. I also need to make sure I am clear with the other coaches as to what I am doing. In short I need to communicate better. This is key between coaches, players, and even the parents. At this point in time my confidence is shot and I am nervous. Last thing I need is for everyone to figure out that I am a fraud of a football coach. Remember this is year two for me and I never played organized football. So I have a lot working against me, which is mostly me. I know it is just one day, but I didn't have any of these days last year. Maybe I was lucky or maybe I was just oblivious. I think it was the latter.
I am also having another problem I didn't have last year. My son is doing weird things. He is basically running with a limp. He claims to all that have asked (which is everybody) that he is not in pain. This can not be the case though because he has been running like he was shot in the hip. This has been going on for two days! So since we have put on the pads he has been running like this. We thought it may be the cleats, but he would have run like this during endurance week when he first started wearing the cleats. He did not run like this. I am at a loss. I can't stand seeing him doing this. I don't want him hurt and I don't want him to compound it, by not saying what is going on. I just want the truth and I am not getting it from him. To sum it up this was not a good day and I hope tomorrow is better. I don't think it could be worse.


"Coach" Nathan

day #2 Power of Will

For those who don't know me that well, I recently started reading comics again. I read them when I was young and wanted to start over while DC Comics started their story lines over last year. I have since caught up on a lot of things I missed over the years. From comics between my absence to comics before I started reading when I was young. One of these comics is Green Lantern. He is basically an intergalactic cop. His power comes from a ring that takes the power of will and makes constructs of anything he can think of. Sounds simple right? Well the biggest nemesis of his has the same power types except they usually draw from the power of fear. Fear is very powerful against us all. Especially kids, because they sometimes don't know how to recognize that they are even afraid to begin with. Some kids try to hide behind cockiness. Others try to be the "funny" guy or just "quiet." Then you find those few who very are sure of themselves. These are the kids you try to find and build a team around. Even if they aren't as talented as the rest. They have that "it" factor. Coaches have a hard time describing what that "it" is, but I think it may just be their power of will. The ones that won't let themselves fail. That fail may be minor, like letting one kid get past them on a lap or do more sit-ups/push-ups then they can. I like these kids the most. They aren't always the easiest to pick out. As I said before they usually aren't the most talented, but eventually and hopefully before it is too late they start to shine.
Looking past the fear of failure is a hard thing to do. All people have something holding them back in life at some point. Usually it is just themselves and not recognizing that they are afraid, because they didn't get that life lesson as a child. I do not know how to teach this! I have all the cliche' lines any coach does, but does that really help the kid understand? If I could give each of these kids a ring to draw will power from I would, but alas this is just in comics. I have to find some will power of my own so I can teach these kids that failing is not the end of the world as it is in so many of the comics I have read. I have to get them to understand that fear can be their friend. They need to learn that if they have fear it's because they expect themselves to do well. Which usually comes from them having been successful before in a similar situation. I want them to draw from that success. To the point where it is a consistent thing. This way they can take their will power and turn it into greatness.

p.s. It came just like I said it would see day #1
"Coach" Nathan

day #1 Smasher of Dreams

                                          What a fantastic day to kick off our season.
On the first day of practicing you can't get too much accomplished. Our rules state you have to have 10 hours of conditioning without pads on and 10 hours with pads on before you can have any contact. So, as you can guess it is a lot of running and a lot of judging. Now as you can see I have named day #1 as the "Smasher of Dreams." Which is a line from a song by Metallica named Master of Puppets. I happened to listen to this song earlier in the day and was struck by the fact my mind went to thinking that i could actually ruin kids dreams. What kid playing any sport hasn't thought they could be so and so from a professional team and dream that they could win the big game and make it to the majors. I can tell you what kid...ME! My father was very truthful about the percentage of kids who could go all the way to the pros. I never held it against him. I respected his honesty and didn't mind it being on front street. Don't think I didn't dream I could win the big game or match to help the team win. Heck I day dream at work that my sons could be the kid that has his moment! OK enough of that back to the song. The line that hit me from the song goes as such "Master of Puppets I'm pulling your strings. Twisting your minds and smashing your dreams." If I have learned anything from coaching it is that we as coaches can have as much to do with these kids lives as their parents, teachers, and even friends. This also means we could be the ones who have to tell the kid he/she is just not good enough to be a starter or a major contributor to the team. Which isn't hard if you don't think about it, but lately I have thought nothing but this when dealing with the kids. Having the responsibility of leading the defense and probably making decisions on who plays and how much has given me pause. Let's take my son for example. Two months ago or so I asked him what position he is striving to play and he said corner back. I said without hesitation "as your defensive coach there is no way you are playing corner." See if you don't know corner you need speed which is something he lacks. Slowest skinny kid I have ever seen. Mentally he may be the fastest, but the kid is not fast. He is however quick, which is what I could use on the d-line. So I told him as much. He did not seem excited or amused. This made me think he was having those dreams I mentioned earlier about being the man. I felt horrible...for maybe 3 seconds. Like my father before me I had to tell him the truth and make sure he knew I still needed and wanted him on my defense. Which brings me to all the rest of these kids that I have say over. I hope this doesn't get to brutal with the parents. They usually take it harder than the kids. I will tackle that bridge when it comes and IT WILL COME!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z-hEyVQDRA
"Coach" Nathan

p.s. I hope I CAN make a couple of kids dream even bigger than they already are, because I know they are all dreaming after day #1
p.p.s. The song Master of Puppets is about addiction and has no real connection to youth sports