Coach Speak

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Many of us are familiar with the quote by Charles R. Swindol about our attitude in life, you know the one… “The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life… I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it.” But why is it repeated by people over and over in all walks of life? Is it to make us believe that we are really in control, or is it all actually true? Everyone that has gone through some form of higher-level sports has heard these catchy, often rhyming phrases that people seem to wrap themselves in, but did you ever notice a lot of successful people outside of sports use them too? “Can’t, never could!” “The harder you work, the luckier you get!”, “Why NOT us?”, “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the ONLY thing!”, “Lock the Gate!”, “I need 110% from all of you!” etc, etc. In my time in athletics I’ve heard them all. Every; Single; One! Strength and conditioning coaches are usually the leaders of these battle cries, the masterminds behind the encouragement and motivation to help athletes survive their torture, perhaps solely to get them to do it all over again tomorrow. ‘Start Fast’ was Monday’s mantra while my favorite work-outs were reserved for “BIG SQUAT WEDNESDAY” as we knew it. Although for me, when workouts got hard, and the only thing I wanted to do was quit and take a nap, having a short, encouraging mantra running through my head was what I needed. But what was even better was that I knew that same thought was running through all of my teammates heads simultaneously (they wanted a nap too!). So, is it possible to give 110%? Does the victorious warrior really win first; then go to battle?” Coach Speak; that’s what I’ve always known it as, and through the years some of it has truly struck a chord with me, and some; well some was just nonsense.

Coach Speak seems to be most effective for position groups that do more of the hitting or grunt work in sports (Of course, maybe this is because a short fragment of a sentence is easy to remember after three concussions). ‘O.L.P.’ is a Coach Speak term that every collegiate offensive lineman knows and for some reason… actually believes in. That’s O-Line Pride to the casual sports fan. Anyone that knows football knows that the work linemen do most of the time goes unappreciated yet it is often the deciding factor in a game. During practice, when QB’s are practicing throwing to wide receivers, which in turn, are practicing catching the ball, the O & D lines are working alone. These positions require more blood, sweat & tears teamwork within their ranks, so perhaps that’s why they like Coach Speak more. “The few, and the proud…” If a team doesn’t have belief in itself then it has nothing.” “Run blocking is all pride boys! All PRIDE!” It’s not… it has a lot to do with your first step, and then bringing your second foot through and up field with power while exploding your hands… you get it. I will never forget those words though, the words yelled at me every day of my final three years in college football. To me, Coach Speak is a nature vs. nurture debate, in other words, an unwinnable one. Some coaches keep the same motto their whole careers. Some change them as they go from school to school and from team to team, but the only people that can give those words meaning are the players; the doers. If the players don’t believe, then no one does. The only difficult conclusion to come to about Coach Speak is; does it have the desired affect?

A lot of successful sports teams seem to unify under some kind of creed or motto. For example, the Superbowl Champion Seattle Seahawks decided to “Leave No Doubt!” this season, while the New Orleans Saints 2009 Superbowl season was led with a simple “WHO DAT?” chant. The Mendota Aztecs say; “Aaaaah BOOM! These team mottos generally have little meaning to people outside the organizations, but to those on the inside, it can mean everything. However, it’s not only successful sports teams that use Coach Speak to keep unified and motivated. Marcus Luttrell, Navy SEAL and author of Lone Survivor said that the Navy’s motto “Honor, Courage, and Commitment” were the words he constantly found inspiration through during the hardest of times. Everyone knows the definitions of the words honor, courage, and commitment”, but only members of the U.S. Navy understand the true meaning of the motto as it applies to them. Strangely enough, perhaps the most successful sports team of all time, the 1992 USA Men’s Olympic “Dream Team” didn’t seem to have the need for a motto. Their worst game was still a victory by 32 points and they didn’t ever really seem to have the need to wrap themselves in a catchy phrase. Sure each of them had a quote they loved, or a motto they lived by, but the team wasn’t unified under a specific banner. However, to me, Michael Jordan has the best sports quote of all time, he said that “there’s no ‘I’ in team… but there is an ‘I’ in WIN.” And if it’s good enough for Mike, it’s good enough for me.