Motivating Young Athletes: Punish or Perish?

Nothing pains a coach more to see a lack of effort in practice or on the playing field. How can coaches motivate athletes to put forth their best effort? A common answer is to teach them a lesson they’ll never forget, and a common form of teaching that lesson is to make them run and run and run some more. Last January, a Kentucky high school football coach was charged with reckless homicide when he had his player run some extra “gassers.” The “gassers” were ordered as a punishment for the lack of effort shown in practice on a day when the temperature hit 94 degrees. A fifteen year-old player died when his temperature reached 107 degrees. As it turned out, the gassers weren’t the only contributing factor. The young man who died hadn’t been feeling well that day. He was also taking a supplement, Creatine, and Adderall for ADD. The coach was acquitted by a jury on September 17.

Should coaches “punish” a lack of effort? There are two ways to look at this. From a backwards-looking perspective, one might ask whether the players deserved retribution for their lack of effort? Did the players do something wrong that merited the infliction of physical discomfort? When did a lack of effort in a game become a crime?

From a forward-looking perspective, the point of the punishment is not retribution but correction. Coaches make players run or engage in distasteful drills to teach them a lesson. The sprints and drills serve as a deterrent to discourage a future lack of effort. The problem with this kind of justification is that punishment avoidance has been repeatedly been shown to be the least effective form of discipline. Punishment motivates through fear, but what place should fear have in motivating athletes to play a sport?

The Associated Press reported that the county in which the player died now requires coaches to attend a seminar on using “positive reinforcement” with students. This is a step in the right direction, but perhaps not such a big step. Positive reinforcement is a more effective way of motivating behavior than negative reinforcement. But both positive and negative reinforcement are extrinsic forms of motivation. The use of extrinsic motivators implies that the play of the game is not intrinsically motivating.

Aren’t sports inherently fun? Shouldn’t the motivation to play a sport come from within? Everything we know about sports psychology and educational psychology tells us that athletes at all ages will be better off if coaches appeal to their inherent desire for mastery. The unmotivated athlete is a product of organized sports gone awry. The athlete doesn’t need “fixing,” the organization does.

Loyal Sons Author Donates Portion of Profits to PLC

Loyal Sons author Jim Lefebvre has graciously donated a portion of the proceeds from his book to Play Like A Champion Today™. Jim is currently a PLC Consultant and assisted the program in the areas of communication and development in the early years of our existence. His book was featured in the latest PLC Newsletter this Fall. For more information on Jim’s book, Loyal Sons, about the history of the 1924 ND football team led by Knute Rockne, visit http://www.ndfootballhistory.com/.

Thank you Jim!

A Punishment for Losing a Game?

“I was very disappointed in your performance at the soccer game on Thursday. You were sluggish, unfocused and not trying your hardest. That was the worst game we have had in three years! Everyone – we are running today at practice – get going around the field.”

Do you think these were the words of a collegiate level soccer coach? They were, in fact, words of a coach, but not at the collegiate level, not even a high school level coach. These were spoken by the coach of a third grade Catholic school soccer team.

Should a team be “punished” for losing a game?

Consider the added example of a freshman football coach whose team lost their game. In response, when the team returned to their school, the coach immediately sent the team to the practice field and had them engage in a full force tackle drill which had some of the players crying out in pain.

Play Like A Champion Today™ asserts that sports are games that are meant to be played by kids to have fun, to learn new skills and to grow – physically, emotionally, morally and spiritually. Do kids grow in sport when they are punished when they don’t have an optimal performance? Athletes may get stronger physically from punishment drills, but they will not grow emotionally, morally or spiritually through this type of punitive activity.

We all know that running is an important activity for the overall development of an athlete. It helps kids build endurance, grow in coordination and get faster and stronger. However, when a coach makes running a punishment, does this encourage the young person to engage in this activity that is healthful and helpful for him/her as an athlete? In most cases, it does not. In fact, for many people, this will have the exact opposite effect and make them hate the activity that was assigned as punishment. Goals of Play Like A Champion Today™ coaches are to help their athletes love the game, to become better players and to grow as fuller Christian persons. Critical coaches who punish their athletes will not accomplish these ultimate goals in their totality. This is true not only for younger athletes, but also for high school age athletes and beyond.

Some may say, “Punishment is good for kids to toughen them up.” Play Like A Champion says, “Coaches should wisen-up.” No good will come out of punishing athletes when adults do not feel they have performed their best. In fact, it is often harmful. The Play Like A Champion approach is filled with effective techniques to be an “Life Coach” making a positive impact on young athlete’s lives.

Fall PLC Newsletter Released

The Fall PLC Newsletter was released today. You can find it and past newsletters at the PLC Newsletter page.

In this issue:

• 4th Annual PLC Leadership Conference
• Letter from the Director: Renewing the Vision of Bishop Sheil and the CYO
• Partner Profile: Fort Worth Christian Football League
• PLC Consultant's Book Loyal Sons Wins National Award
• Hot Issues in Sports: Preventing Post-Summer Vacation Injuries
• Upcoming Events: Cruise on the Chicago River

Preventing Post-Summer Vacation Injuries

By Dr. John Stavrakos, PLC Consultant and Sports Medicine Specialist

As we enter another school year, thousands of young athletes from grade school to high school are preparing for fall sports by participating in preseason workouts, and family doctors nationwide are swamped with filling out preparticipation sports physicals. This is a fun and exciting time of year for parents, coaches and students alike – but also a high time of year for sports related injuries. In this article, I wanted to touch on a few issues that invariably come up when kids go from vacation time fun to early school year training schedules, and how to best evaluate and treat them.

1) Strains, sprains & aches: It’s a safe bet that all sports doctors are going to see young athletes marching into their offices within the first three weeks of preseason camps from one of these. Most muscle strains and joint aches are a result of a rapid increase in demands on the musculoskeletal system – going from summer fun of getting a tan and throwing a frisbee around to two-a-day strength, speed and conditioning drills is going to produce some aches – so some of these pains are unavoidable. Teaching kids to keep with a summer conditioning program will usually lessen these issues. In children undergoing a growth spurt, keep in mind that that bones are growing faster than muscles, and this can lead to relative muscle weakness and inflexibility, as well as pain from traction of the muscle tendons at their insertion points on the bone, called an apophysitis. The 15 year old female track runner who had no problems last fall, for example, who now (one year later and 3 inches taller) is complaining of a sharp or achy pain in her anterior hips when running, may be suffering from this. Year round muscle conditioning (keep in mind that most active playtime activities are great conditioning) and stretching in growing kids can help to diminish these problems; if you have any questions or concerns, be sure and ask your physician.

2) Heat and overexposure: not long ago, the dangers of hyperthermia, or overheating, made national headlines when a college football player at a Division I school passed away in training camp from this condition. In humid areas of the country, the risk of hyperthermia is even greater, as humid air lessens the body’s ability to dissipate heat from the skin. Always keep in mind that children have a decreased tolerance to excessive heat and a diminished ability to cool off when compared to adults. If an athlete shows signs of listlessness, walking with a staggered gait, not focusing or not speaking intelligently, get them into shade/cool area, lay them down and elevate their legs and seek medical attention. Advise your athletes to drink well before and after practice (drinking until you’re no longer thirsty is a good rule of thumb), and to cool down afterwards. Drinking excessive amounts of water when exercising can be dangerous as well, and can lead to dilutional hyponatremia, an electrolyte imbalance where the sodium level in the blood gets “watered down” from too much water intake, and can present with symptoms similar to dehydration and hyperthermia. Kids should avoid caffeine (which causes dehydration), and most especially energy drinks – these beverages (e.g. Monster, Amp, Spike Shooter, etc.) not only carry much more caffeine than a 12 oz can of Coca Cola (up to 11 – 12.5 times more!), but have other substances in them that act as stimulants, which your kids don’t need in 90 degree heat when they’re running a 5K, doing push-ups and crunches or doing tackling drills.

3) Stress Fractures: another potential problem of ramping up activity level beyond what the bones can handle. Stress fractures (also called insufficiency fractures) are micro fractures, or “cracks” in the architecture of bones that happen when the forces exceed the shock absorbing ability of the bone and surrounding tissues, and overcome the bone’s ability to heal. Stress fractures tend to occur most commonly in the shins (“shin splints” are an early stage stress fracture) and in the midfoot (just past the ankle), and are more common in girls than boys. Typically they present as a achy pain that occurs with impact activity at a bony weight bearing area (foot, shin, hip, etc.), that is worse with impact and gets better with rest, and may progress to hurting with every day activities such as walking. These are most common when young athletes go to ‘the next level’ – i.e. 8th grade to high school, high school to a competitive college program. They usually require an xray and possibly further imaging, such as a CT or MRI, if the clinical suspicion is high, because many stress fractures do not show up on plain xrays. If your young athlete has a pain that will not go away when doing their sport, even with rest, and especially if it is present even when not in sport, you should seek medical attention.

Sports are an important and enjoyable aspect of returning to school, but as with every activity, as responsible adults who love and care for the children we are responsible for, we need to be vigilant for conditions that can adversely affect them. May all your young athletes have a healthy, successful season!

What Outliers Can Teach about Developing All-Stars

The five lessons below are taken from the book Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcom Gladwell. In this book Gladwell reveals how people become successful by looking at individuals that appear to be Outliers, abnormally successful people. These five lessons substitute the lessons about outliers with lessons about all-stars in sport.

1. Coaches choose all-stars. In Chapter 1 of his book, Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell points out that on elite 16-18 year old hockey teams the majority of players were born in the months of January, February or March. How could such a strange phenomenon occur? The cut-off date for Canadian hockey leagues is January 1st. When children try-out for hockey teams at early ages, a December-born player and a January-born player are compared to one another even though one is nearly a year older than the other. Coaches select the January – March players thinking they are more “gifted,” “skilled,” or “talented” when at this age they just happen to be older and more physically developed. These “talented” older players end up on select teams, practice more often, and play at a higher competitive level and are made into all-stars.

2. All-stars have to want to play and work hard. Teams win championships by working hard in practice. How do you get players to want to work hard in practice? Some coaches try to force it upon their players with fear and punishments. However, research does not show that this is effective. Players get better when they like practicing and when they love the sport. They would spend hours in the driveway shooting hoops. This is the edge they have over other players of similar gifts and talent.

3. All-stars are given opportunity to work hard. Not only are all-stars willing to work hard, but they are given the opportunity to learn and work hard in their sports. Children and adolescents, especially those living in cities with few fields and gyms, need the opportunity to play. It is the only way they can get better.

4. Effort is connected to reward. All-stars, like the outliers in Gladwell’s book, feel that there is a connection between their effort and a reward. For some all-stars this means winning, but winning is not directly connected to effort. No matter how hard you work are, the other team may be better, there may be some missed calls, the weather may not cooperate, etc. If winning is the only reward for effort, then players will not be as motivated to succeed nor will they want to work as hard as if they were intrinsically motivated (see lesson #2). This is connected to setting goals in PLC’s GROW Approach.

5. All-stars feel Autonomy. All-stars, like Outliers, become successful when they feel that they have some say in the direction of their lives. This is the third component of the GROW Approach: Ownership. Give athletes ownership over their play and they will take up the responsibility to succeed on their own. If coaches take away that autonomy, then athletes will feel that pleasing the coach is more important than playing the game well.

Malcom Gladwell hopes to convince his readers that Outliers aren’t really outliers at all. Coaches should be convinced that all-stars aren’t really all-stars at all. Or better yet, as a coach you determine who will become an all-star. Give everyone a chance.