Great Day. Very Physical.

                    Mike- 16 Years Old- At Jesse James' West Coast Choppers
         -          Long Beach, CA.   
    

Today is Monday.  We had a really nice practice this morning in the boiling weather.  Not only was it hot, but the rain yesterday caused the humidity to go off the charts.  It really was like practicing in a sauna.  To top it all off, the ground water caused the mosquitoes (our State Bird) to come calling.  GREAT.  Now all we need is for the damn Love Bugs to start hatching.  Tell me again why I am coaching? 

Today's practice was pretty good...much better day for the offense.  All of us were pretty focused on our corrections from Saturday's scrimmage.  I noticed that all of the coaches had specific drills designed to correct the mistakes a player may have made.  Luckily, we had some great video of the entire scrimmage, so we picked up on about everything.  I do not think the players like video too much, because as Coach Bethel says: The Eye In The Sky Don't Lie!"  It's hard for a player to defend himself when the mistake is burned into a video disc forever.  This is when the jobs are won and lost, so the competition is really heating up; consequently, video helps the coaches to make the decision easier.

Here is something that is important to making sense of the following story.  Our school colors were Green and Gold.  Our football helmets were originally painted GOLD with a green Spartan emblem on the side.  We got some new helmets, and they were painted GREEN with a gold emblem on the side.  Unfortunately, there was not enough money to supply all new helmets, so the competition was pretty intense to get one of the new GREEN helmets.  The starters always got a new GREEN helmet  and everyone else had to wear the old GOLD helmets. 

When I played, our coaches once had a stupid practice of earning a spot on the 1st team.  Somehow,  they came up with the idea of having a "challenge" period to earn a GREEN helmet.  If a second team player (who wore a Gold helmet) wanted a GREEN helmet, he had to challenge a starter for his helmet.  A challenge went like this...it had nothing to do with football skills:  The other players on the team formed a big circle.  The two players battling for a Green helmet would face off in the middle of the circle... and basically just beat the hell out of each other.  We would throw punches, kick, gouge, throw dirt, and use our heads like a big hammer to beat the other player down until the coach blew the whistle and declared a winner.  Then, right then and there (if a starter lost his helmet in this stupid drill) he would remove his helmet and turn it over to the winner. The winner was expected to wear this helmet regardless of whether it fit or not.  The winner was moved into the starting position and the cycle started over....sometimes day after day.  The "Challenge" period was a brutal, nasty (and stupid) practice which completely destroyed team unity.  This period had absolutely NOTHING to do with football skills, and all of us hated it.  In today's world, every coach on the staff would be fired for pulling a stunt like this...and rightfully so. But, it was a different time, and people just did not challenge a football coach....good or bad.  Luckily, the Head Coach was later replaced....because he was an ass. This is one of those "Lessons in Life" which has helped me be a better football coach today. 

I'm out! 

GZ

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