Is Winning An Excuse For Yelling?
April 22, 2009 by Barry
Filed under Positive Coaching Alliance, SDL Blog
Here is an interesting case study from The Positive Coaching Alliance. What are your thoughts?
Coach Coates is a yeller. He yells constantly during practices and games. He yells at his players and criticizes them when they do things wrong.
He even yells when they seem to be doing things right. His teams consistently have winning records, and as far as you can tell, the players seem to handle the yelling without getting down on themselves or each other.
• Is Coach Coates a good coach? Why or why not?
• Would you want your child to play for this coach?
• Does his winning record excuse his yelling?
• Would your answer change depending on the age of the athletes?
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No, I do not think this coach is a positive role model.
And I would not want my boy to play for him.
Today, I believe positive encouragement goes a long way and makes a better impact on the player.
He is not a good coach at all. Anyone can yell & have your players scared of you, but will that make you a good coach? Maybe he has great players that you & I can coach to win. My Son & Daughters HS Coach yells, but pulls the athlete over to tell them what they did wrong instead of screaming. These are encouraging words, explaining what not to do–but what should have been done. A Sports Psychologist out of Pitt –did a state survey of Coaches / Players in College / HS / MS and 98% said that their Coach is a Positive influence on their lives. You can ask yourself why Bobby Knight is not coaching anymore & it is not just his age…..
I do not agree with the style of this type of coaching. I have been a softball and basketball coach for both girls and boys for over 10 years and have never seen yelling work for any team. Positive comments and constructive criticism are the best techniques to use when trying to improve a player’s fundamentals and for helping them become a confident, responsible person.
Oh, there’s nothing wrong with yelling and screaming. It’s only volume.
How we know this is true is because we can yell out in happiness and scream for joy as well as in frustration or anger.
It’s the “words” behind the volume that matter. Hateful, hurtful words can be whispered just as effectively as yelled at the top of ones lungs.
To yell out, “Get in there and do it right!” or to softly and calmly state, “You are a complete and worthless moron,” – which is better?
Besides, I never trust those “quiet” types.
A softball player threw a fly ball into an occupied dugout between innings from 1st base. The ball just missed my head but managed to break my thumb on contact. The ball could have easily hit another player on the bench. I yelled to the player to go to left field (while in immense pain) and repositioned the infield. There was no remorse by the child. At the conclusion of the game the players mother demanded an apology from me to her daughter and to herself for yelling and berating the child. What’s wrong with this picture? By the way I did call the mother at home after the game. She told me that “What do you know about pain…I’ve gone through child birth!” -The Softball Commissioner.