I played softball in high school and our team was pretty talented. We had been playing well all season and we hadn’t lost a game yet. We had a really tough game coming up against our biggest rival, and they were also undefeated. Everyone on the team knew how important this game was and so we all committed to working hard and training specifically for this game. We gave 100% at every practice, we stayed after the coach left to work on our weaknesses, and we encouraged our teammates to push themselves. Things were going great at practice: we looked better than we ever had before and yet everyone was still having fun. We felt pretty good about the upcoming game,
When game day finally approached, we were all a little nervous but we felt confident with what we had done to prepare. And we looked great during the game: our pitcher was dead on, our outfielders didn’t miss a ball, and our infielders and catcher were making some great plays. We were doing a great job of preventing the other team from scoring, but they were holding us back as well. By the end of the eighth inning, neither team had scored a single run and everyone was getting restless. We were up to bat first: no dice. A ground ball, a strikeout, and a fly ball. We knew we would have to hold them to have any chance of winning and preserving our perfect record. First batter up, and a strikeout. One down. Second batter up and she nails it out of the park on the first swing. We were heartbroken: we had been so close to a victory here, but not close enough. We were all devastated, but our coach helped us realize that we had done everything we could have to prepare, and that we all played an amazing game. She told us it wasn’t any one person’s fault that we had lost: we win as a team and we lose as a team. This experience really helped me understand how important it is to play for your team, rather than just for yourself.
Kate Riley
Social Foundations of Coaching
ND 2012
Monday, December 19, 2011
Saturday, December 17, 2011
A Special Kind of Sport
Most young athletes dream of playing for their favorite college or professional team. Yet these dreams are often accompanied by the pressures of making them come true. For some these pressures can create passion and lead to success, but for many they transform a fun game into a stressful fixation.
What if we could take that pressure out of a sport? Then we would have rugby. There are no professional rugby players in the US, and the most competitive college teams do not have a single scholarship athlete. That is not to say that rugby is not competitive. Rugby will become an Olympic sport in 2016, and every year high school, college and senior teams travel all over the country to compete for national titles.
Ask any rugby player why they play and you will get the same answer. They play because it is fun. They love the sport and the incredible friendships they form with their teammates. At every level, in every city, rugby teams form a unique community that cannot be found anywhere else. It is hard to tell what makes rugby teams so special. Some people attribute it to the types of people who play rugby. You might have to be a little crazy to play an 80 minute, full contact game with little to no padding in every conceivable condition: from driving rain storms to 100 degree heat. Maybe it is that craziness that bonds us. However, I think there is something more. When I step out on the rugby field there are not 80,000 adoring fans, there is no money to be made and my coach’s livelihood does not depend on how I perform. Instead I get to spend my day playing the sport I love with 14 of my best friends; girls who just like me are playing for love of the game. I do not have to worry about where I will be in a few years or if I am good enough to play professionally. When I play rugby, I just get to have fun.
Margot DeBot
Notre Dame ‘12
Social Foundations of Coaching
What if we could take that pressure out of a sport? Then we would have rugby. There are no professional rugby players in the US, and the most competitive college teams do not have a single scholarship athlete. That is not to say that rugby is not competitive. Rugby will become an Olympic sport in 2016, and every year high school, college and senior teams travel all over the country to compete for national titles.
Ask any rugby player why they play and you will get the same answer. They play because it is fun. They love the sport and the incredible friendships they form with their teammates. At every level, in every city, rugby teams form a unique community that cannot be found anywhere else. It is hard to tell what makes rugby teams so special. Some people attribute it to the types of people who play rugby. You might have to be a little crazy to play an 80 minute, full contact game with little to no padding in every conceivable condition: from driving rain storms to 100 degree heat. Maybe it is that craziness that bonds us. However, I think there is something more. When I step out on the rugby field there are not 80,000 adoring fans, there is no money to be made and my coach’s livelihood does not depend on how I perform. Instead I get to spend my day playing the sport I love with 14 of my best friends; girls who just like me are playing for love of the game. I do not have to worry about where I will be in a few years or if I am good enough to play professionally. When I play rugby, I just get to have fun.
Margot DeBot
Notre Dame ‘12
Social Foundations of Coaching
Friday, December 9, 2011
Flow in Sport
In our second meeting of our Social Foundations of Coaching class we discussed the article Flow in Sports by Susan A. Jackson and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. This article goes in depth into a state of mind that many athletes work and train to achieve in a time of competition. The authors describe the flow through nine different characteristics, challenge-skills balance, action-awareness merging, clear goals, unambiguous feedback, concentration on the task at hand, sense of control, loss of self-consciousness, transformation of time, and autotelic experience. These are the characteristics athletes have described experiencing while feeling as though they are in a state of flow during competition. To be in a state of flow an athlete does not have to experience all of these characteristics at once, because flow is different for every athlete, but often multiple forms of these characteristics are experienced by the athlete when in his or her own flow.
It is a goal of nearly all athletes to get themselves in a state of flow, groove, rhythm, or whatever they may refer to it as. But as the article explains it takes a nearly perfect set of circumstances to allow an athlete the opportunity to reach this level. The authors point out that a combination of challenges and skills need to be correct for the opportunity to exist. The area where the skills and challenges of the competition and athlete intersect must be opportune for flow to be achieved. If the challenge is too high or the skills of the athlete are too low in comparison to the opponent then the athlete will be unable to reach flow, because he or she will simply be out matched. Also, if the challenge is too low or the athlete is too far superior then flow will not be reached because the competition will not be enough to keep the focus of the player or athlete. However, when everything lines up and flow is achieved then that athlete will have been able to get to that ultimate level he or she has worked to reach.
Scott Martin, ND 2012
Social Foundations of Coaching
Notre Dame
It is a goal of nearly all athletes to get themselves in a state of flow, groove, rhythm, or whatever they may refer to it as. But as the article explains it takes a nearly perfect set of circumstances to allow an athlete the opportunity to reach this level. The authors point out that a combination of challenges and skills need to be correct for the opportunity to exist. The area where the skills and challenges of the competition and athlete intersect must be opportune for flow to be achieved. If the challenge is too high or the skills of the athlete are too low in comparison to the opponent then the athlete will be unable to reach flow, because he or she will simply be out matched. Also, if the challenge is too low or the athlete is too far superior then flow will not be reached because the competition will not be enough to keep the focus of the player or athlete. However, when everything lines up and flow is achieved then that athlete will have been able to get to that ultimate level he or she has worked to reach.
Scott Martin, ND 2012
Social Foundations of Coaching
Notre Dame
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Sport Injury - Lessons Learned
It was my senior year in high school, my last year playing soccer with my friends and my first playing with my brother who was a freshman. When winter rolled around, a fellow senior teammate and I had been declared captains. We decided that this year would be different. We were being moved up to a much more competitive division, and so we knew we need to work that much harder. We started conditioning workouts a month before pre-season workouts were scheduled to begin. It was the largest class of senior starters the school had ever had. We had one ambition, winning the state title. If we were going to win, leadership was going to be a major factor. The team had a meeting and we decided that this year was going to be different.
Personally, it was an important year for me. Not only was it my final season, but I had committed to play at the University of Notre Dame. My future coaches expected results. They expected me to have a very impressive senior season, to walk out on top. I had every intention of performing beyond any level I had previously. I was training and conditioning all winter for the spring season. I knew this was not only an important season for the team but for me as well. Because I played a primary role on the team, I knew that the quality of my season would fluctuate with the team’s success. I had to polish every aspect of my game before making the trip to South Bend later that year.
The season started, and the team was hot. We were winning at ease, dominating teams we should have and beating teams we weren’t expected to. It felt like “one of those years.”
I’ll fast forward 3 games into the season. We were playing our rival high school, Maryville. Twenty minutes into the game, we found ourselves sitting in a 0-2 hole. We came out flat, and lacked the intensity that we needed to make this a great game. In the 25th minute one of my shots found its way to the back of the net, 2-1. We went into halftime with momentum. We were pumped because we knew the game would end with us being the victors. Both teams came out of the locker rooms ready to play. It was one of the most intense, dirty, and fought for games I had ever played in. In the 78th minute I ran onto a beautiful through ball played by the other co-captain. I go to strike the ball to tie the game up. The next thing I hear is a pop. I had been slide tackled by the goalie. The first thing I though was, “that’s a penalty kick.” I was screaming at the referee. I tried to get up and then I felt an enormous amount of pain as I tried to put pressure on my left leg. It was agonizing. I screamed for the trainer. I remembered the pop that I heard and I saw flashes of my career at Notre Dame coming to an end before they had gotten started.
The trainer runs over and asks what hurt. I yelled, “obviously the leg I’m clutching!!” She examines it on the field and made the diagnosis that it is most likely a bone bruise. Hearing the great news I try to get up to continue on with the game. Again I feel the pain and sit back down. My coach demands that I sit out for the rest of the game.
As my dad and school minister walk me to the sideline, I look to see that my brother was cursing at the referee for not giving the goalie a red card. My brother therefore receives a yellow card for dissent. He is emotionally distressed to see that I am in serious pain and to not know the proper diagnosis of the injury. Once at the sideline a parent doctor from the other team runs to the sideline to examine my leg. He too feels it is only a bone bruise but recommends that I go get an x-ray to be sure. The game ends with us losing 3-2. The team was devastated, but they were much more concerned with my leg. Our rival school knew of my future at Notre Dame. After the game they were screaming at their own goalie for injuring me. They all came over to shake my hand and wish me the best. The pop was still resonating in my mind.
We go to the hospital to find that I indeed fractured my tibia all the way through the bone. I was to be put in a cast up to my hip for 3 months, which went past the time I was to report at Notre Dame. I received countless texts and emails containing prayers and sympathy. It didn’t matter to me. My whole season was shot and maybe even my future career. Fortunately I recovered. It took a lot of hard work, but I made it back.
The point of this story is that speed bumps are put in the way of our ultimate goal, but they can be overcome. They may slow us down a bit, but we can still reach our destination.
Luke Mishu
ND Soccer
Social Foundations of Coaching
Personally, it was an important year for me. Not only was it my final season, but I had committed to play at the University of Notre Dame. My future coaches expected results. They expected me to have a very impressive senior season, to walk out on top. I had every intention of performing beyond any level I had previously. I was training and conditioning all winter for the spring season. I knew this was not only an important season for the team but for me as well. Because I played a primary role on the team, I knew that the quality of my season would fluctuate with the team’s success. I had to polish every aspect of my game before making the trip to South Bend later that year.
The season started, and the team was hot. We were winning at ease, dominating teams we should have and beating teams we weren’t expected to. It felt like “one of those years.”
I’ll fast forward 3 games into the season. We were playing our rival high school, Maryville. Twenty minutes into the game, we found ourselves sitting in a 0-2 hole. We came out flat, and lacked the intensity that we needed to make this a great game. In the 25th minute one of my shots found its way to the back of the net, 2-1. We went into halftime with momentum. We were pumped because we knew the game would end with us being the victors. Both teams came out of the locker rooms ready to play. It was one of the most intense, dirty, and fought for games I had ever played in. In the 78th minute I ran onto a beautiful through ball played by the other co-captain. I go to strike the ball to tie the game up. The next thing I hear is a pop. I had been slide tackled by the goalie. The first thing I though was, “that’s a penalty kick.” I was screaming at the referee. I tried to get up and then I felt an enormous amount of pain as I tried to put pressure on my left leg. It was agonizing. I screamed for the trainer. I remembered the pop that I heard and I saw flashes of my career at Notre Dame coming to an end before they had gotten started.
The trainer runs over and asks what hurt. I yelled, “obviously the leg I’m clutching!!” She examines it on the field and made the diagnosis that it is most likely a bone bruise. Hearing the great news I try to get up to continue on with the game. Again I feel the pain and sit back down. My coach demands that I sit out for the rest of the game.
As my dad and school minister walk me to the sideline, I look to see that my brother was cursing at the referee for not giving the goalie a red card. My brother therefore receives a yellow card for dissent. He is emotionally distressed to see that I am in serious pain and to not know the proper diagnosis of the injury. Once at the sideline a parent doctor from the other team runs to the sideline to examine my leg. He too feels it is only a bone bruise but recommends that I go get an x-ray to be sure. The game ends with us losing 3-2. The team was devastated, but they were much more concerned with my leg. Our rival school knew of my future at Notre Dame. After the game they were screaming at their own goalie for injuring me. They all came over to shake my hand and wish me the best. The pop was still resonating in my mind.
We go to the hospital to find that I indeed fractured my tibia all the way through the bone. I was to be put in a cast up to my hip for 3 months, which went past the time I was to report at Notre Dame. I received countless texts and emails containing prayers and sympathy. It didn’t matter to me. My whole season was shot and maybe even my future career. Fortunately I recovered. It took a lot of hard work, but I made it back.
The point of this story is that speed bumps are put in the way of our ultimate goal, but they can be overcome. They may slow us down a bit, but we can still reach our destination.
Luke Mishu
ND Soccer
Social Foundations of Coaching
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Soccer - an analysis of the system
Soccer, the most popular sport in the entire world, is in a state of disarray. A large majority of the teams in the Barclays Premier League, Europe’s most profitable league soccer league, are in over $75 million of debt. Currently only 4 of the 20 teams in England’s top tier of football are making a profit, and this figure is projected to get worse with the current market. Some teams are in such a terrible state that even if the team had no expenses they would be still be unable to pay off their debts for 3 to 5 years. With teams being so uninterested in addressing their financial issues, how are they going to continue to operate with their current expenses?
One of the main reasons why so many clubs are in debt is player transfers. European football does not trade players in the same way teams in the United States do. They rarely make trades or have free agents to buy. For the most part teams buy and sell players. In this buying market the clubs with larger revenues buy and the ones with smaller revenues sell. This results in the top teams buying established players for large sums of money and the smaller teams having to sell their star players and find younger players to be able to afford running their club. This creates a huge gulf in skill between the historically great teams and the newly established teams.
This system creates a never-ending cycle of teams needing to win to afford the players to continue to win and increase their revenues. The best teams in Europe (the top 4 in England) play in the European Champions League with additional revenues of around $40 million for just taking part in the competition. This large amount of money is very attractive and spurs the best teams to continue winning. For the worse teams, motivation comes in another form. If a team falls to one of the bottom three places in the league, they get relegated from their current league into the one below them. This league drop comes at a cost of nearly $50 million in revenue due to sponsorship, television revenue, and ticket sale losses. Therefore every team must stay competitive; otherwise they will have to sell off their best players because they will be unable to afford their high wages. No team wants to find itself in that situation so they are compelled to continually reinvest, even if they don’t have the means to do so.
This is where the problem lies. For a team to be competitive they must have a significant payroll, but if they are not good enough and get relegated they are trapped in a financial model that they cannot sustain. Their profits shrink while still have to pay for their players, usually resulting in significant debt. Therefore, to avoid this fate, owners choose to invest in their teams with both cash and loans. The problem with that is that they have been priced out of the market. A few ultra rich owners have come out with their own cash and significantly changed the wage structure and the money it costs to buy players. Their insane spending habits have let to an inflated transfer market and players expecting wages that are unrealistic. Both Chelsea and Manchester City of the Barclays Premier League are spending roughly $40 million per year on player transfers with this number looking to rise substantially because of the rising market value of players. Keep in mind these enormous sums do not include player salaries. These spending splurges make it difficult for other clubs to compete when they don’t have an owner who has a personal net worth of over $7 billion. The result is that lesser teams choose to take out loans to afford the players to make them competitive, resulting in the debt problems throughout soccer.
Manchester City is the perfect example of a team to show the flaws of the current system. They have an owner who has invested over $500 million over the past 2 years. They have players costing over $35 million that ride the bench and never play for the team. When the team doesn’t win, they just throw money at new players who they believe can play even better. They have a wage bill that exceeds the total revenue they bring in. Their seemingly unlimited spending has also driven up player costs for other perspective teams. In short, Manchester City is the definition of a team that is not at all sustainable and is also ruining the game. This past year they spent over $60 million for a single player.
On the other hand, Arsenal is a club in the Barclays Premier League that tries to do things right. They are the only team who consistently makes the European Champions League, has a wage bill less than one third of their total revenue, and has posted consecutive years of net profit. Their team strategy is one of youth. They buy the best young players when they are inexperienced and give them the opportunity to play every week, a rare occurrence for other top teams.
This strategy has been chided, mostly from those critics who believe that they will never win a trophy because their team lacks the experience and leadership needed to win. This has been true for the past 6 years in which Arsenal have failed to a trophy. The fans see these shortcomings and plead for a reinvestment of those earnings. The fans feel they need to pay for players with experience and leadership because Arsenal needs to start winning it all. Their manager went into the transfer market this summer to try to find those key players who he believed would put Arsenal over the edge. To his dismay, he found the market to be overpriced and unrealistic for a financially responsible club, returning with a few players under 20 years of age and a few former stars, with a history of injuries. This did little to comfort the fans, especially after players like up and coming midfield starlet Samir Nasri held the club for ransom and refused to sign a new contract. (He ended up at Manchester City for what was reported as double the salary Arsenal offered)
Arsenal’s fans, however, must be realistic. Every team cannot afford to spend the $80, $65, and $55 million Manchester City, Chelsea, and Manchester United respectively can and did this off-season. They are in a position to be both competitive and fiscally responsible, a situation most clubs would love to have. Spending an average of $1.5 million a year on transfers is much more respectable and impressive considering the $15 million other clubs in the top four of the Barclays Premier League choose to spend every year.
This large financial gap is why Arsenal consistently finds themselves punching above their weight. A team whose opening day lineup had 2 players over the age of 24 simply cannot compete with proven superstars in their prime. The past 6 years have shown that although they can be competitive, they just don’t have the resources to win it all. Despite their lack of league titles, I stand by Arsenal and their insistence to not be bullied into pouring money into an inflated and ridiculous transfer market. By creating a model that allows them to compete and be fiscally responsible, their approach is to be admired even if they do struggle to put together a championship team consistently.
Soccer needs to find a way to make their teams more accountable and create a certain element of equity in their league. If this continues, only be a handful of teams will be in competition for the title, and most of those teams will be unable to pay their bills. I am aware that UEFA (Union of European Football Associations) is starting to make a stand with financial fair play regulations, but it will not stop teams like Manchester City finding ways around the rules. They will find ways to put their owners money onto the playing field, and no team will be able to compete without incurring large amounts of debt. To remedy this, an independent accounting firm should be employed to access their accounts and ensure that teams aren’t spending money that they’re not making or going to make in the very near future. Otherwise, the soccer landscape will soon be filled with teams incurring insurmountable amounts of debt with no true way to address the issue.
Matthew Cirillo
Social Foundations of Coaching Class
University of Notre Dame Class of 2012
One of the main reasons why so many clubs are in debt is player transfers. European football does not trade players in the same way teams in the United States do. They rarely make trades or have free agents to buy. For the most part teams buy and sell players. In this buying market the clubs with larger revenues buy and the ones with smaller revenues sell. This results in the top teams buying established players for large sums of money and the smaller teams having to sell their star players and find younger players to be able to afford running their club. This creates a huge gulf in skill between the historically great teams and the newly established teams.
This system creates a never-ending cycle of teams needing to win to afford the players to continue to win and increase their revenues. The best teams in Europe (the top 4 in England) play in the European Champions League with additional revenues of around $40 million for just taking part in the competition. This large amount of money is very attractive and spurs the best teams to continue winning. For the worse teams, motivation comes in another form. If a team falls to one of the bottom three places in the league, they get relegated from their current league into the one below them. This league drop comes at a cost of nearly $50 million in revenue due to sponsorship, television revenue, and ticket sale losses. Therefore every team must stay competitive; otherwise they will have to sell off their best players because they will be unable to afford their high wages. No team wants to find itself in that situation so they are compelled to continually reinvest, even if they don’t have the means to do so.
This is where the problem lies. For a team to be competitive they must have a significant payroll, but if they are not good enough and get relegated they are trapped in a financial model that they cannot sustain. Their profits shrink while still have to pay for their players, usually resulting in significant debt. Therefore, to avoid this fate, owners choose to invest in their teams with both cash and loans. The problem with that is that they have been priced out of the market. A few ultra rich owners have come out with their own cash and significantly changed the wage structure and the money it costs to buy players. Their insane spending habits have let to an inflated transfer market and players expecting wages that are unrealistic. Both Chelsea and Manchester City of the Barclays Premier League are spending roughly $40 million per year on player transfers with this number looking to rise substantially because of the rising market value of players. Keep in mind these enormous sums do not include player salaries. These spending splurges make it difficult for other clubs to compete when they don’t have an owner who has a personal net worth of over $7 billion. The result is that lesser teams choose to take out loans to afford the players to make them competitive, resulting in the debt problems throughout soccer.
Manchester City is the perfect example of a team to show the flaws of the current system. They have an owner who has invested over $500 million over the past 2 years. They have players costing over $35 million that ride the bench and never play for the team. When the team doesn’t win, they just throw money at new players who they believe can play even better. They have a wage bill that exceeds the total revenue they bring in. Their seemingly unlimited spending has also driven up player costs for other perspective teams. In short, Manchester City is the definition of a team that is not at all sustainable and is also ruining the game. This past year they spent over $60 million for a single player.
On the other hand, Arsenal is a club in the Barclays Premier League that tries to do things right. They are the only team who consistently makes the European Champions League, has a wage bill less than one third of their total revenue, and has posted consecutive years of net profit. Their team strategy is one of youth. They buy the best young players when they are inexperienced and give them the opportunity to play every week, a rare occurrence for other top teams.
This strategy has been chided, mostly from those critics who believe that they will never win a trophy because their team lacks the experience and leadership needed to win. This has been true for the past 6 years in which Arsenal have failed to a trophy. The fans see these shortcomings and plead for a reinvestment of those earnings. The fans feel they need to pay for players with experience and leadership because Arsenal needs to start winning it all. Their manager went into the transfer market this summer to try to find those key players who he believed would put Arsenal over the edge. To his dismay, he found the market to be overpriced and unrealistic for a financially responsible club, returning with a few players under 20 years of age and a few former stars, with a history of injuries. This did little to comfort the fans, especially after players like up and coming midfield starlet Samir Nasri held the club for ransom and refused to sign a new contract. (He ended up at Manchester City for what was reported as double the salary Arsenal offered)
Arsenal’s fans, however, must be realistic. Every team cannot afford to spend the $80, $65, and $55 million Manchester City, Chelsea, and Manchester United respectively can and did this off-season. They are in a position to be both competitive and fiscally responsible, a situation most clubs would love to have. Spending an average of $1.5 million a year on transfers is much more respectable and impressive considering the $15 million other clubs in the top four of the Barclays Premier League choose to spend every year.
This large financial gap is why Arsenal consistently finds themselves punching above their weight. A team whose opening day lineup had 2 players over the age of 24 simply cannot compete with proven superstars in their prime. The past 6 years have shown that although they can be competitive, they just don’t have the resources to win it all. Despite their lack of league titles, I stand by Arsenal and their insistence to not be bullied into pouring money into an inflated and ridiculous transfer market. By creating a model that allows them to compete and be fiscally responsible, their approach is to be admired even if they do struggle to put together a championship team consistently.
Soccer needs to find a way to make their teams more accountable and create a certain element of equity in their league. If this continues, only be a handful of teams will be in competition for the title, and most of those teams will be unable to pay their bills. I am aware that UEFA (Union of European Football Associations) is starting to make a stand with financial fair play regulations, but it will not stop teams like Manchester City finding ways around the rules. They will find ways to put their owners money onto the playing field, and no team will be able to compete without incurring large amounts of debt. To remedy this, an independent accounting firm should be employed to access their accounts and ensure that teams aren’t spending money that they’re not making or going to make in the very near future. Otherwise, the soccer landscape will soon be filled with teams incurring insurmountable amounts of debt with no true way to address the issue.
Matthew Cirillo
Social Foundations of Coaching Class
University of Notre Dame Class of 2012
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