The Soccer Sidelines

I've been talking about the fact that coaching is much more than understanding how to draw X's and O's on a drawing board or teaching kids how to kick a ball for a long time. The future of coaching in general is so much more than teaching a sport. It's about developing the whole child. In this article, I'm going to share my experience as a coach from earlier this week. I spent the day with The Aspen Institute and several thought leaders in the youth sports industry. What I heard there was promising and offers hope for parents, players and coaches that we can have more for our children than we have previously imagined. I'm talking about wins beyond the scoreboard! Stay with me as I explore the "Calls for Coaches" report and presentation. The GistTwo years ago, the Susan Crown Exchange commissioned The Aspen Institute to explore the role that sports can play in developing young people's social and emotional skills. In turn, the Aspen Institute's Sports and Society Program formed a partnership with the National Commission on Social, Emotional, and Academic Development and brought in experts from the EASEL Lab the the Harvard Graduate School of Education and produced a white paper titled Coaching Social and Emotional Skills in Youth Sports (see below). About a week before they were scheduled to release this brief, I got an email from one of my soccer moms (who also happens to be a child psychologist and a member of my Character Committee), suggesting that i might want to go to The Future of Coaching presentation. I registered immediately and showed up eager to hear what they had to say. They didn't disappoint. In a nutshell, they determined that it is possible for coaches to do the things we've been talking about on this show since it kicked off in 2017. I was thrilled to hear many of the same kinds of things reflected back as I sat in the audience. While I'm pretty sure none of these participants have ever listened to an episode of this show, they were up there on stage, backed by money and some Harvard intelligence, talking about exactly what you've been listening to on this show. They created a framework and even a simple checklist for those coaches wishing to put this into action. What a great sign of things to come, I thought. We're going to make a difference and we're going to make that difference in my lifetime!Calls for CoachesListed below are the seven Calls for Coaches. I encourage you to download the documents and read them for yourself to get more details about each of these calls. * Know Every Athlete's Story* Establish a Supportive Team Culture* Celebrate Effort* Focus on the Skills That Matter* Be a Role Model* Be Coachable* Join ForcesCan it get any better? Know Every Athletes StoryThe first point about knowing every athlete's story is really about getting to know every player. Coaches need to recognize that every player is an individual and things going on in their life affect their performance both on and off the pitch. This is accomplished through simple things like saying hello to them as they come out to play, talking with players and their families, asking questions, and allowing time for players to share. Listening is key for coaches and parents should be looking for coaches that can do this. Establish a Supportive Team CultureThe second point about establishing a supportive team culture is about creative a safe and supportive environment. I've talked about this in so many episodes from Episode #2 Entertainment vs Dev...

Play up and play down situations come up every season without fail. There are good reasons and bad reasons for doing this. Safety and development drive most of our decisions, but exceptions can be made. Let's talk about what these situations are, when they should be done, things to think about when they are done, and reasons to avoid play up or play down situations. What is a Play up or Play Down?First things first. What are we talking about? A play up situation is where a player is grouped with players who are older they he or she is in chronological age. Most clubs (particularly on travel or select teams) will use a birth-year system to group players - meaning all kids born in 2003 are grouped together and all kids born in 2004 are grouped together with their own age group. Some clubs use school year groupings, where all first graders play together, all second graders play together, etc.In school groupings, there tends to be more variety of ages, and the basis for decision making is informed by classmates who know one another and tend to move together through the system as they do in grades - moving up each Fall to the next level. It's pretty common to see one year difference on travel teams using birth year groupings. Kids born in 2004 may "play up" with kids born in 2003, for example. But age bands are more limited in competitive soccer. In recreation soccer, the rules generally relax a little, but still follow some safety guidelines I will describe in a few minutes. We might see three-year age bands, for example. a 10U might include 10 year olds, 9 year olds, and a sprinkling of 8 year olds playing up. Things get dicey the broader the age band gets - which I'll talk about later. Play down situations are where an older player is grouped with younger players. An 11 year old playing down with 10 and under players, for example. Play down situations are generally discouraged across the country and are a lot less common than play up situations. Kids who play down can be accused of being "ringers," tipping the balance of a game outcome in favor of the team with the older player. It can also restrict the older player from certain playing options and it can put smaller players at risk for being "run over" or otherwise hurt by the older player. Safety is Number OneAs with most everything in youth soccer, safety trumps everything. If an environment is not safe, then we fail. You've heard me talk about this many times before. Play up and play down situations are no different. As kids grow older, they generally get bigger and stronger. This is common sense, right? We might consider what would happen if we pit a smallish 8 year old against a larger 11 year old on a soccer field. Someone could get hurt. Before you say, "but my 8 year old has an 11 year old brother, they play all the time, and my 8 year old does fine against he and his friends" - things change in competition or when the children playing are not relatives or friends. In the world of youth soccer, a great deal of mental energy has been spent calibrating the environment to the various age groups. We adjust the ball size as legs grow stronger. We adjust field size as kids can run farther and see more over the field horizon. We adjust the relative ages to group kids with similar hormonal makeup and attention to emotional and environmental queues. The rules are adjusted to ensure we don't introduce head injuries to kids before their craniums are strong enough to manage the impact. If we took an 8 year old with a still yet unformed cranium - who is meant to play with a number 3 ball, and introduce them to 25 headers per week with a heavier number 4 ball, we're asking for trouble. Individuals MatterKids don't all develop exactly at the same rate. Some mature faster or slower. A given player can be anywhere along the maturity spectrum 1-3 years on either side of their chronological age.

Supporting kids in our soccer clubs is more than coaching or being the snack parent. Volunteer jobs that support kids range from cleanup to marketing, to managing awards to organizing BBQ's. Community Clubs are powered by volunteers of all kinds!

There isn't a polo shirt, a certification, or a hat with a badge that make someone into a good coach. Whether you're trying your hand at coaching yourself or you're a parent looking to find a good coach for your child to follow, here are 10 things that separate good coaches from bad ones. 

Safety is a Coach's Primary Job

Before we get into any of the more nuanced or sophisticated things that make up a good coach, we have to acknowledge a youth coach's primary role. All other things can be mastered, but if we fail to provide a safe environment, we fail.

The safety envelope includes safety from sexual predation, safety from bullying, safety from environmental factors like weather or metal stakes poking up from the ground, emotional safety, and even safety from negligence. A soccer coach, for example, has a responsibility to get educated about header rules, ball sizes, concussion awareness and protocol, youth protection, first aid, and age appropriate activities. Coaches need to come prepared with parent phone numbers in their clipboard and an ability to activate emergency medial services and authorize care if a player gets hurt. Clubs should have medical treatment waivers signed and on file. Coaches should carry these in their clipboards or otherwise have them handy (like in the car). 

At no time should a coach knowingly expose a child to risk. This means not leaving them at the field alone when mom or dad is late for pickup. It means ensuring two adults are around for youth protection purposes and kids don't wander off to porta-potties or off the filed without a buddy or responsible adult who remains within visual range. 

Coaches should be required to have background investigations on file, and a minimal education in coaching fundamentals, concussions, and youth protection. And they should be expected to keep their training up to date on an annual basis. 

Clubs should be enforcing safety rules and parents should be paying attention to club policies, helping out where necessary (as in when two adults should be present) and holding coaches accountable for keeping safety at the top of their priorities. 

Care About Your Players

This one may seem obvious, but unfortunately, it's not always. First, when someone is new to coaching, there is a lot to think about. Session planning, work/life balance, how and when to use the various pieces of equipment, etc. It can be overwhelming. Coaches must remind themselves often - especially in the beginning - that they are there to support and develop players and their families. 

Caring about players means remembering to say hello when they come on the field and say goodbye when they leave. It means asking how they are doing and getting to know a little about the off-field lives they lead. It means making an effort to get to know the parents and understanding the dynamic that forged each young player's spirit. It means taking an interest in their lives. 

Caring about players means doing everything possible to make yourself the best coach you can be.It means embracing the idea that they deserve the best version of yourself. In pursuing the best version of yourself, you're giving them a powerful example to follow - so they will pursue the best version of themselves as well. I'll talk more about this later,

We're in trouble. Diseases related to obesity are riding into our communities at an alarming rate. Cardiovascular disease, diabetes, osteoarthritis, breast cancer, ovarian cancer, prostate cancer, liver cancer, colon cancer... all on the backs of fat cells. Last Monday, the American Cancer Society released a report on a study published in The Lancet Public Health that examined 12 obesity related cancers between 1995 and 2014. They found a disturbing trend in adults between the ages of 24 to 49. Obesity related cancers - cancers that usually affect older adults in their 60's and 70's, are hitting Millennials to such a degree, that it's actually outpacing the medical progress we're making against those cancers. In other words, we're losing the battle. They found that the risk for colorectal, endometrial, pancreatic, and gallbladder cancers was about double the rate that baby boomers had at the same age. A CNN article titled For Millennials, cancers fueled by obesity are on the rise, study says explains "Millennials are on their way to being one of the heaviest generations on record.""Obesity during childhood actually is a major predictor of adult obesity"Dr. George ChangOncology Surgeon, MD Anderson Cancer CenterConclusion: recently published articles and trends are sending us a dire warning:  Get kids off the couch. Get them from out from in front of video games. Give them a fun reason to put down their cell phone and start interacting with the physical world and other humans around them. Let's take a look at the arguments.What's Going On?In short, we're getting fat. We're also getting sick and spending a lot of money because of it. The source cited is the 2007 Forbes article "World's Fattest Countries", written by Lauren Streib and dated February 8, 2007, using 2007 data from the World Health Organization Author: Mike HaltermanWhat's Causing This?The World Health Organization says very simply:"The fundamental cause of obesity and overweight is an energy imbalance between calories consumed and calories expended. Globally, there has been:* an increased intake of energy-dense foods that are high in fat; and* an increase in physical inactivity due to the increasingly sedentary nature of many forms of work, changing modes of transportation, and increasing urbanization.Changes in dietary and physical activity patterns are often the result of environmental and societal changes associated with development and lack of supportive policies in sectors such as health, agriculture, transport, urban planning, environment, food processing, distribution, marketing, and education."I won't go into all the reasons why we're struggling with obesity, but the usual round of suspects are featured all over the internet and in the news. Poor nutrition, environmental concerns (bad stuff getting into our food supply), and lack of exercise are the main villains. Basically, our kids are spending more time on the couch, head's down on their phones, and not eating well. The antidote seems pretty simple: get out and play! But instead of seeing more kids getting involved in youth sports, we're seeing fewer. Participation Rates in Youth Sports Are FallingI'd like to call out a recent article published in Forbes magazine by Seth Everett on December 25, 2018 titled Youth Soccer Facing New Challenges in Battle For Kids' Waning Attention. Seth references a study by the Sports and Fitness Industry Association. They revealed a 14% decline in the percentage of kids from 6-12 years old who are playing soccer. Tom Farrey, the Executive Director of the Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program t...

For many players, playing soccer for their college is a dream. This article is about how to get there.              Below you're going to find a collection of video and linked resources that will get you well on your way to:* Understanding the process* Getting your plan together* Keeping you and your athlete safe from ego and from predators who would love to use that take your money Get to Know the NCAAWhether you're interested in soccer, football, swimming, basketball, or some other sport, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a good place to start. There are plenty of paid services that would happily insert themselves (for a fee) between you and the NCAA, but why use a middle man? The NCAA publishes the rules for how and when colleges can make contact with athletes, it has guidance for coaches, it's realistic about the academic and athletic requirements an athlete must meet in order to be eligible, and it even offers a checklist and an elligibility center to help you navigate the process. Get to Know the ProcessThe more you know about the process that get's an athlete selected (or rejected), the better prepared you are to navigate it. Just as i would never recommend jumping on a rubber raft and trying to run the Colorado river without a map and some careful preparation, I would not recommend putting in to the river of athletes trying to get a spot on a college team. The odds do not favor the unprepared. You need to know, for example:* What life is like for the coach you want to go play for. How many days per week does he or she get 100+ emails from students just like you who want to play on the team? What is likely to get the coach's attention in a positive way? * What are the rules for contacting colleges or for colleges to contact you? How often and how can you legally communicate?* What kind of academic and athletic performance is expected at the schools(s) you want to go to? Hint: you can be the greatest athlete, but if you don't have the grades that meet the school standards, then your chances of being cut just went up!* What are legitimately helpful services and those that just take your money?* How do you make yourself look good on paper and on film? * What is a highlight video? The down selection process is meant to reduce huge numbers (tens or hundreds of thousands of candidates) down to a handful of final picks. It's meant to be brutal. If you're not familiar with the rules, but your competitor is, who do you think is going to have a better shot at surviving that? If there are two slots available on a team you're interested in and there are 1,000 applicants, your chances of getting one of those spots starts at 2/1,000 or .2%. Not 2%. 2% - like less than 1%! Your mission, should you chose to accept it, is to do everything you can do from your sophomore year through your senior year to improve those odds. You need to know that schools are going to be looking carefully at some key points:* Ability - do you have the athletic and academic ability the school needs? Athletics aren't just about kicking a ball into the net. They include composure, ethics, leadership, attitude, and perseverance. Academics need to be at or above school standards or buy bye...* Do they have a spot on the roster? If you're the best keeper in the world and the team needs a striker, you're out. If the team needs a box-to-box midfielders #8 and you're lightning fast on the wing but can't keep it up for more than 20 seconds, you're out. Schools will be looking to fill their needs. * How well can you complete your questionnaire? If you're in the running, you'll likely be getting a questionnaire about half-way throu...

Competition is a natural ingredient in the process of strengthening hearts, minds, and bodies. Without competition and struggle, we miss out on valuable opportunities. The question in this episode is: Why do we compete? What's the end game? Is it to play on the world stage or is it to create stronger healthier adults? In this show, I discuss two valid perspectives: youth sport as a way to compete globally, and youth sport as a way to create strong adults in whatever field they chose. In the end, the answer you like best is up to you.

Life without Struggle Makes us Weak

Struggle is sometimes seen as a bad thing. The reality is: without struggle, we would all be weak. We struggle against gravity every day - perhaps the simplest and most obvious form of struggle imaginable. Astronauts deprived of this simple form of struggle lose bone mass and become weaker. When they return to earth, they have a hard time even standing up and walking around. 

Competition in youth sports creates a struggle in a controlled environment. Kids of similar size and skill compete against one another. They're strengthening one another at an important time in life. They're strengthening their bodies, their minds, and their hearts. If they're allowed to struggle and compete in a safe environment, they come out winners no matter what the scoreboard says. 

What's Your Reason for the Struggle?

I think we each answer this question in a unique way. For me, I don't suspect I'm going to push many of my players onto the world stage to compete in the World Cup. If it happens, it'll be a great twist of fate and a stroke of luck. But it's not my real why. For me, strengthening kids to become solid good citizen adults is the end game for most. As one who grew up in the business and work world, I know how valuable people who understand teamwork, sportsmanship, respect and empathy are. I know many who have a good grasp of these characteristics got them from competition as kids in youth sports. 

It's a fun mental game to ask and answer the question for yourself: why youth sports? To have fun is great, but is it enough to have fun or is there something more to it? 

Progress over Perfection

I frankly don't care if my players win every game or win any game. As long as they make progress and come away from the sports experience understanding how to make progress in life, then I think we've done our job. Self discipline, perseverance, a drive to succeed, an understanding of the power a team can bring to problem solving... all of these are worthy pursuits in the youth sports environment. 

Daniel Workman's Podcast - Soccer Works

I've linked to the podcast that Daniel Workman has produced below. He has strong opinions about the purpose of you soccer. His reason is tightly coupled to our ability as a nation to compete on the world stage. I don't disagree with Daniel and I recommend listening to his thoughts about US Soccer. 

I also think that if he's right, it's more important than ever to be clear about why we're doing what we're doing. If we're doing what we're doing with these kids to produce World Cup players, then we may need to change our focus to work more on the national structure issues. If, like me, you see value in what we're doing despite the fact that most kids aren't going to get to play in the World Cup, then be clear about that too. 

I recommend you have a listen to Daniel's show and form your own opinion. Share your opinion with me, of course at [email protected]. I'd love to hear it!

Resources

* Workman, Daniel. Danielworkman.com, www.danielworkman.com/soccer-works/. Podcast Program

There is so much more to watching a soccer game than watching the player with the ball. Come along with me as we explore some of the history, the formations, the styles, and the 99% of the game that is played without the ball. Come away with a better sense of the game and how you can appreciate watching your kids play the biggest sport in the world.Chances Are You're Missing OutSoccer is much more than kicking a ball. It's about shapes, coordinated movement, positions on the field, timing, cultures and history. In this episode, I take you on a high level walk through history, the role that culture plays,  into formations or "system's of play," and how we might either assemble a strategy or appreciate a strategy when we see one. The resources included in this episode make good reads. Technical and historical accounts of the game will help you to appreciate the world you step into when you play or watch the game of soccer. Resources* Link, Daniel, and Martin Hoernig. “Individual Ball Possession in Soccer.” PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0179953.* Wilson, Jonathan. Inverting the Pyramid: the History of Football Tactics. Orion Books, 2018.

Many mammals cooperate, but most stick to cooperating with relatives. Human beings are different in that we have learned to cooperate with people we don't know. This has made all the difference in our evolution. We're genetically wired for cooperation, but our ability to cooperate is weakening. Some of the essential ingredients we need in order to cooperate are disappearing. Where we used to rely on one another to learn skills and pass on knowledge, we now have Youtube. Where we used to make friends face to face and suffers ups and downs of relationships, we now click from one group of friends to another. Loose connections are replacing deeper connections and as a species, we are becoming isolated from one another. In order for humans to be motivated to cooperate, we need to need one another. With our basic needs being met or institutionalized, we simply don't need one another so much. That is showing itself in lack of volunteerism, people loosing patience, loyalties becoming extinct, and our diminished ability to take on real problems. Whether we're talking politics or local projects, when humans loose our ability (or desire) to cooperate, our effectiveness drops and our problems grow. The Age of Monkey MenI'm not trying to be sexist here. I just like the way "Monkey Men" goes together. I'm referring to our Pliocene ancestors. Once upon a time, some scientists argue, we lived in trees. Trees provided safety from predators. This kept us alive, but in order to get the fruits (literally) of ground living, we would need to learn how to solve the predator problem. We our humanoid ancestors learned how to cooperate, there was virtually nothing we could not do. Those ancestors of ours could take down a mastodon. Out ability to cooperate has served us well ever since.Technology is Replacing Our Need to Need One AnotherMy dad taught me to sweat pipes, put up drywall, and do basic electrical work. I looked forward to teaching my kids these skills. In fact, I filled my head with all kinds of skills I looked forward to passing down. Then came Youtube. The harsh reality is that my kids don't need me to teach them this stuff anymore. 30 minutes with YouTube and they could learn just about anything they want to learn. Our traditions of passing on knowledge from one generation to the next is evolving. I'm not saying the old ways are dead. There are still things - particularly in the way that we behave and the way we love one another - that can't yet be learned from Youtube, but a lot of the old standbys: how to change a tire, how to fix a toilet... it's all a click away. Bonds are WeakeningThe truth is, we still need one another to solve big problems. When your school redraws the district lines or something in your community becomes a hazard, we need to come together. Groups still solve problems better than individuals. I'm not referring to bigger groups being bullies. I'm referring to bigger groups having more intellectual capital, more resources, and more ideas. Maybe more people to click on Youtube videos and learn stuff. The problem is, we're not learning the art of coming together the way we used to before Facebook "likes", Twitter retweets, and other clicking behaviors. If I agreed with you, that could be a big deal. It might require a real sacrifice instead of clicking a forward button or the like switch. It might mean getting messy and being there for you at a time that's awkward or inconvenient. I couldn't simply "unfriend" you if I no longer like your message. Breaking bond - the bond we need in order to cooperate with one another, is becoming very easy. Some Problems are Too Big"Objects in this mirror are closer than they appear." The saying illustrates an optical illusion that happens when we look through a mirror that is angled to show us a wider image that we would normally see with our own eyes. Technology lets us see a ton of things that humans before us could nev...