Pregame motivational speeches: Skip just one for the Gipper

The pregame speech by the head coach: To call it a ritual is to cover up what it really is: a superstition.

From peewee to the pros, coaches believe they cannot send their players out on the field of battle without giving some kind of "motivational" speech.

The problem is, they so rarely have anything motivational to say. How could they? A dozen, two dozen, three dozen times a year, the coach is supposed to get up and say something to stir teamwork and togetherness in the hearts of the players?

Nope. In my experience, most motivational speeches are more like this pastiche of loudly mumbled clichés, to an audience of players who have heard it so many times they seem not to be hearing it at all.

See here.

The only coaches who don't give motivational speeches are baseball managers. (Even golf coaches give the goddamn things when they have the chance; witness all the bogus motivational hocus pocus surrounding the Ryder Cup and its honorary captain.)

Baseball managers ("manager" is such a cool, down-to-earth title  in the first place) realize it's impossible to give 162 annual motivational speeches to the same audience in a year. Why can't football and basketball coaches realize they don't have two dozen in their bag, either?

For a long time, I allowed that maybe that the players needed these talks, however clumsy, and that there was some emotional need for this ritual that only a player can understand. So I once asked a player of a team I was covering: "Do you guys really like to listen to those speeches, or do you sometimes wish the fucker would just shut up so you could get out on the field and play."

"Oh, yeah."

That's what I thought.

But the speeches will go on, until one coach—and coaches being the most conservative creatures on the planet, it will likely be awhile—utterly eschews the pregame speech for a whole season, and wins a championship.

Now, I know what every coach who's reading this is saying right now: That's impossible.

No, Coach, it's not. You can do it! You've just got to dig down deep inside yourself ...

Comments

[Rueben]

I know there is a stereotype of athletes not always being the sharpest tools in the shed, but do players in a team sport really need to be reminded before every game that it is a team sport? Surely even the thickest among them will have figured that part out on their own.

Of course, your advice will probably just lead to a new trend of coaches who start giving speeches that begin with "I know I'm supposed to give you some sort of motivational speech now. But the truth is you don't need that from me. What you need to do is just go out there and..."

[Peter Faur]

Love the video! It's hard to play basketball with your hands all bunched up in fists. Maybe that's why Kansas is still in the NCAA tournament and Illinois is out.

[David Murray]

So I got this football coach pal, and after reading this he makes three points:

1. Yes, the pregame speech is a ritual. But that doesn't mean it's a worthless ritual. "It's a step in the process of the pregame ritual."

2. Yes, he does it partly because everybody else does. "Imagine what your players would say if you skipped this component of the ritual."

3. It has some function: A last chance to "echo reminders," and a chance to get players focused.

4. It's hard to come up with the speech every week, but it's important psychologically--partly, for the coach! "Personally, it is one of my favorite parts of the pregame ritual. I love looking to the players' eyes and seeing them ready to go to work."

So who cares if the speeches have a few clichés. The editor of Vital Speeches of the Day does--but this coach doesn't, and I don't think he thinks his players do, either.

[baker]

Does your football coach pal's last name begin with K?

[David Murray]

Nobody likes a snoop, Baker.

[K Bosch]

don't be ridiculous. you will never get rid of the pregame speech, and that's how it should be. end of story.

[manolo blahnik]

Good stuff as per usual, thanks. I do hope this kind of thing gets more exposure.