A Coach's Diary

  CHOICES “A man reaps what he sows.” Antonio Neves was a walk-on track athlete at a D1 school in Michigan. Being a walk-on is a tough position to be in because you are good enough to be on the team, but you haven't proven yourself enough for the coach to invest money in your education. So, you have to work every day to prove yourself and earn your spot. Antonio said that one day his coach told him something that changed his life. There were two All-Americans on the team, and Antonio's coach asked him why he never CHOSE  to spend time with or train with them. Antonio said that those two guys were different from the rest of the team. They CHOSE to train differently, they CHOSE to eat differently, and they CHOSE to study differently. To hang out with them meant that he had to make a CHOICE to live differently and make different CHOICES. In Galatians 6, the Bible says that a man reaps what he sows. If we make good CHOICES , good things happen. Every CHOICE that we make either get...

There are two types of people: thieves and allies. Thieves steal your time, energy, joy, and dreams. Allies are people who fill you up and make you better. Look at the people that you spend most of your time with. Do you spend more time with thieves or allies? Do the people you hang around have the same goals as you? Are they good role models? Do they make you better? Antonio Neves is an author and speaker, and he told a story about his time as a walk-on college track athlete at Western Michigan. Being a walk-on can be tough. You aren't guaranteed a spot on the team, you don't have a scholarship, and you can be cut at any moment. Every single day, you have to show up ready to work, give your best, and bring value to the team to earn your stay. He said that one conversation with his head coach completely changed his life. The coach said to him, "Antonio, you are doing horrible. In the two years that you have been on the team, not once have I seen you spend any time with ou...

  ANTIFRAGILE “I can do all things through God who strengthens me.” What does it mean to be ANTIFRAGILE ? Something that is fragile is easily broken breaks when it faces any kind of stress. Fragile things break easily.  Being ANTIFRAGILE means that you are able to get stronger because of the same stress, challenge, pressure, and adversity that might break other people. You can’t light a candle in the wind because the wind blows it right out, but when that same wind hits a larger fire, it makes the fire bigger and stronger. The same concept can be applied to weight training and conditioning. The first days in the weight room or running are hard as it breaks your body down. But your body is ANTIFRAGILE because it comes back stronger. Our bodies are built to be antifragile and to come back stronger than before. Knowing this, think about your mindset and how you mentally approach problems and adversity. Does a challenge break you down, or does it make you stronger? Someone or some...

A leader in our district shared a story about a local football program and talked about the impact that it made on him, the impact that it is making on his kid, and how that impact is having a ripple effect on his teams and athletes. The Highland Park High School football program is one of the best and most consistent football programs in the state of Texas. They have won 6 state championships, and they have produced NFL talent like Doak Walker and Matthew Stafford. When a coach from Highland Park was asked about some of the things that separate them from other programs, the coach said that one of the things that all of their athletes are taught is to go to their coaches after every practice, to shake their hands, and to tell them, "Thank you for coaching me today." When a coach is at practice, they are sacrificing time away from their family to be with the team. They are giving time, energy, and resources to others, and many coaches don't get paid to do so. The simple ac...

A connected team is a more committed team. The more connected you are to each other, and the more committed you are to each other, the more you will fight for each other and not with each other. There is a great quote that says, "Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard." There is another great quote that says, "Teams beat talent when talent isn't a team." One thing that every coach and every athlete, especially the leaders of the team, can do is work hard to connect with their teammates. The best teams are connected and work together. The best teams become a family. I often say that you have to catch the fish before you can clean it. This means that you have to connect with and build relationships with your teammates before you can lead them. Connection doesn't happen by accident. You have to connect on purpose. You have to invest in relationships and team building, and you have to invest in it every day. Think about how you talk to your tea...

ADVERSITY Nobody likes to lose. Adversity is when you go through something hard, difficult, to challenging. Adversity can be hard to deal with. Growth happens when we are uncomfortable, but being uncomfortable is ... uncomfortable . Sports are filled with storms. Life is filled with storms. Things don't always go the way that we want them to. Sometimes things are great - we are making all of our shots, we are rolling defensively, and every decision we make is the right decision. But sometimes we find ourselves in the middle of a storm where we can't buy a basket, we can't stop anybody, and every decision seems like the wrong decision. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy." When the storms hit and when hardships do come our way, how do we respond? God once sent a storm on the Sea of Galilea to teach Jesus' discipl...

Chris Brickey is one of the go-to trainers in basketball. The list of guys who he has trained is the ultimate 'who's who' list of NBA superstars. You can read more about how he got his start training NBA players and his process here. The video below is a workout that he did with JR Smith a couple of years ago. It's always good to get a glimpse of the work that the best of the best put in so that you can see what it looks like from a rep and intensity standpoint. What I love most about Brickey's process is his work ethic, his commitment to learning, and his commitment to relationships. He said that his film sessions are routinely 5-6 hours, as he is committed to learning as much as he can about his athletes.

One of the things that I always tell myself going into big games or tournaments is that "It is okay if we lose." It isn't okay, but it really is. I do that to take the pressure off and to focus on the process and what our long-term goals are. Our long-term goals are to compete, to have fun, and to become the best players and people that we can be while having the best experience that we can have. Fortunately, we have won a lot more than we have lost. It is always more enjoyable learning lessons through wins. They say that winning is the best cure for a struggling team. But if we lose, it will be okay. It will hurt. We might cry. But we will pick ourselves up, we will learn from our mistakes and shortcomings, and we will come back better than we were.

HOPE “Something good is going to happen to me and through me.” Read the Zero Week Devotional on Endurance by clicking here . What is HOPE ? HOPE is expecting that something good is going to happen to you. It is the belief that the future will be better than the present, along with the belief that you have the power to make it so. Hope is a positive attitude and a positive mindset that can push you through and past the tough times. When we start a new season, or a new team, or a new week, or a new practice, it would help our performance, mentally and physically, if we had high levels of HOPE and believed that great things are going to happen to us and through us. Tell yourself, daily, “Something good is going to happen to me and through me.” HOPE doesn’t mean that we won’t face obstacles, adversity, and difficult moments. The Bible is filled with stories of people facing difficult trials and overcoming them. One of my favorite Bible stories is the story of Joseph. Joseph was the father...