Blame Me Coach
Something you rarely hear, but something good coaches look for in a leader. It is the ability to take responsibility for failure. Is blame a taught trait? Let’s take a look at it in this post!
Can you blame anyone for not wanting to be the reason for failure? The easiest thing to do after a loss is to blame the officials, your teammates, or your coach. Heck, just kick your poor dog and blame him.
Human nature is to sin or do what feels right, so blaming yourself for not doing your best or for making a mistake goes against what feels good. The norm has become “It’s our right to do anything we feel like doing”, so why would we want to blame ourselves for doing the wrong thing?
When I blamed or whined to my dad about my coach or teammates, my dad was quick to let me know that it was my responsibility to find a solution and to own up to my own mistakes. He would say work harder, become the leader, and change things then. Start with changing you! He told me that you want the coach to get on you when things go wrong, because he knows you can take it and more importantly he trusts you to fix it. When you learn that, you will gain favor from him and from above.
I personally believe there are two big influences that have changed the way kids think these days. One is the decrease in Christianity and the values that go along with the word of God. This includes the attack on the home with divorce being at an all-time high and also fewer fathers in kids’ lives. This has made coaching possibly the most important profession in America!
Two is the decrease in the values of respect and authority that are taught in the military. Unlike in sports, if you make a mistake or coward to responsibility on the battlefield, you won’t be blaming anyone because you won’t be alive to do so. My Grampa was one of the original navy seals (UDE) and my father was in the national guard. I definitely saw the influence the military had on my father.
I am not a fan of all the antics that Bobby Knight used, but coaches like Knight and Coach K definitely have been successful partially because of the discipline and techniques of instilling discipline and values that they learned from their military backgrounds. My college coach was a military man as well and I also saw directly the positive things that came from his background. I try to avoid comparing sports to real battle, because the real heroes are those who fight for our freedom, but on the smallest of scale sports is about learning how to win battles.
Times have changed. Split homes and helicopter parents, who coach from the front row, are the norm. Parents are paying trainers, summer coaches, and often think they can buy success instead of teaching their child to work hard and own up to their mistakes or lazy habits. These days, when kids tell their parents it’s their coach or teammates fault, they tend to take what I call the grandparent route of spoiling their kids by responding with “It’s ok buddy, it’s not your fault.”
One of the biggest things I look for and visit with parents about in my recruiting process is if the parents are going to trust me with their kids. Will they allow me to push and praise them to another level by teaching them to work harder, while I expose every weakness I can find. Once an athlete owns up to a weakness or mistake, they can then fix it and improve. What most athletes do is live off their strengths and hide their weaknesses, which results in lowering their potential and ceiling, ultimately handicapping them.
Let’s look at a simple example. Whose fault is it when a pass does not get from point A to point B? Sadly, (these are my guesstimated numbers) 30% of players could care less if they turn the ball over. They are so used to blaming others, that they are numb to mistakes. 35% of players will blame their teammate saying something like “why didn’t you cut” or “I’m not throwing them the ball again”.
It’s the rare 5% that coaches love. Many are point guards or quarterbacks. Sometimes referred to as field generals or coaches on the floor. I worked for Point Guard College (PGC) and the whole design of their amazing camp is to focus on the little things that Nobody else looks at to separate you from the other 95%. I currently work for Northwest Basketball (NBC) Camps and their design is centered around Biblical Principles, hard work and the little things that few do right. Coaches are looking for that rare group of athletes that have been taught to blame themselves! By doing so, they become in full control of their future. They now control where they are going and when they will arrive both individually and more importantly as a team.
Let’s flip this to real life! Where are you going and are you going to arrive at your dream destination? Heaven should ultimately be at the top of your list, but the Bible calls us to dream and pursue glorifying God through the gifts he has given us. Where do you start? Might be smart to blame the person in the mirror instead of others. The next step is easy, just ask forgiveness if sin is part of any mistakes you have made, then ask our Heavenly Father to join you on that journey!
Photo by Ben Hershey on Unsplash