Coaching is About Personality

[MartinC]

Although you were referring to knowing what you are talking about, I also think you can't be who you aren't.

That's true as well. You have to be yourself, if you try tp play a part or role that's not really you players will again see right through you and will lose all credibility.

[Loyal2Washington]

Coaching is about leadership, always has been. There are different types of leadership as some have pointed out but ultimately if the 53 men on the roster and coaching staff don't buy into the vision of the head coach and do not trust him the team will suffer and not be a winner.

[Oldfan]

...Just as an aside. I wonder if coaches like Landry, Walsh and Belicheck don't also delegate the dishing of emotional tirades to the position coaches. From the head coaching aspect, it seems to make more sense. As the head coach, you continue to look at the bigger picture. And since the position coaches work much more closely with the players the delivery of the butt chewing can have more of an impact to produce expected results.

just a thought, but it makes sense to me.

It makes sense to me too. The position coach knows which players need to be prodded and which don't. Some people are self-motivated. Chewing them out only pisses them off with nothing gained.

[Skinsinparadise]

I think personality is a factor in preparation, overcome obstacles, staying focused, etc -- some people are more driven and that is usually a personality factor and it often pays off.

But as far as being a colorful/emotional sideline type, I could give plenty of examples that are over the map. We had coaches like Herm Edwards, Mike Singletary -- emotional pep talk type of coaches who arguably haven't been successful. We all know Gregg Williams is a ball of energy, he wasn't that hot as head coach of the Bills. Heck you can even argue using Joe Bugel -- a kick in the butt type but lovable coach at least according to some of his players -- didn't seem to translate to being a winner as head coach.

I've seen the career "wired" retrospective special on Belichick, it was on NFL Network recently -- listening to him was worse than watching paint dry, boring, with little personality. Andy Reid miked up isn't entertaining either.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

The HBO documentary on Lombardi was interesting in a lot of ways, but I particularly liked the story of how - as a high school coach - he took over the basketball team and won the state championship, despite the fact that all his knowledge about basketball came from book written by a coach in the 1910s - back when there was still a jump ball after every made basket.

I don't think anyone really ever called Lombardi an innovator. The Packer Sweep is one of the most basic plays you could ever hope to run. What made him different was a) the fact that he forced his team to perfect simple concepts and the way he was able to motivate his team to actually want to perfect these simple concepts. Most players would not want to practice the same sweep for hours a day. His did.

I think too many coaches think that Lombardi just gave great locker room speeches and that's what they try to do - Herm Edwards comes to mind. I don't think that works with professional athletes. I have a feeling that most of his players like Singletary, but ultimately thought he was full of ****. I doubt any of Rex's players feel that way - even though he can act like a total buffoon.

And - yea - the last word to describe Gibbs in the 80s is "medium." He was insane and it cost him his health and probably would have cost him his family in most marriages. Most wives would not accept their husbands literally living in their offices for half the year and having them tape dinner conversations.

One thing I don't understand is why so many fans seem to want their coaches to be a screamer. If you worked for someone like Tom Coughlin, wouldn't you eventually quit? Most of the great coaches who had reputations for being *******s (Parcells comes to mind) were really only *******s to certain designated whipping boys. And those whipping boys were usually people who were identified as being able to take such abuse. Apparently Parcells never really yelled at LT, because LT could not emotionally handle it. (Most coked-up statutory rapists are a little emotionally unstable).

[MartinC]

I think too many coaches think that Lombardi just gave great locker room speeches and that's what they try to do - Herm Edwards comes to mind. I don't think that works with professional athletes.

Your right big rah rah speeches rarely make much impact. I used to just tune them out personally - all the work is done during the week, normally a pre game was just a few low key reminders of key things we had practised and normally something like ' trust your ability and enjoy it'

Now if we had a bad first half the half time could get interesting ......

[Darth Tater]

I don't think anyone really ever called Lombardi an innovator. The Packer Sweep is one of the most basic plays you could ever hope to run. What made him different was a) the fact that he forced his team to perfect simple concepts and the way he was able to motivate his team to actually want to perfect these simple concepts. Most players would not want to practice the same sweep for hours a day. His did.

Um, Lombardi is considered one of the greatest innovators in the football. He's probably just a step lower than Shaugnessy and Brown (the two most important innovators in NFL history). The Packer power sweep (actually should be called the Giant power sweep since that's were Lombardi developed it) is considered one of the most innovative plays in football because it was the introduction of a ZBS to the NFL. It was also why Landry (also one of the most important innovators in NFL history) developed what became known as the "Doomsday Defense".

[Kindred]

The closest equivalent to the best coach is to what makes the best Generals. Charisma, leadership, intelligence, knowledge, wisdom, strategist, confidence, inspirational, motivational, commands respect, obedience, admiration, fear, the knowledge that with him in command you will succeed.