Why do parents put up with bad coaching?

[BaldNBeautiful]

Pat Summitt Is a very winning coach, who is known for dressing her players down, when they need it. Not everyone can take it, but the ones that do succeed on the basketball court. The players love her and she loves them. It is give and take. Most volunteer coaches don't have that, nor the knowledge of what it takes to build young ladies up. Read Pat's autobiography. It is great.

One of the highlights of my coaching career was to meet and talk with Coach Summitt at a UT Clinic a few years ago. She was hard on her players, but the clear message to them was "I am hard on you because I CARE about YOU and I want YOU to succeed. The fact that she would take the time do more than take a picture with me and actually TALK to a MS coach is something I will never forget.

 

[cmustangsfp]

You are all men I presume, coaching girls. You can't do this stuff in public schools, rec centers or anything related to government. It would be discrimination. There are coed gym class, lots of mixed sports and sports classes for young kids, and everyone is looking for everything to be in compliance with Title IX. You have to teach all the same, bring the same lesson plan for all. No one needs babying and what works for girls, works just as well for boys. And no one needs a hard a-- either to get the most out of the kids. That's giving boys the short end of the stick if you ask me.

And there are plenty of hard a-- female coaches, especially in college. Seen plenty of chairs thrown by the famous womens basketball coach at my college while they went for many titles. But that's not for kids.

The parents will be in your office, or the AD, school board or mayor's office, in a second.

Has anyone taken coaching courses because they teach for it to be the same? And how can you teach girls when you have such little regard of their motivation, wow. Again, that attitude would not be tolerated if found out about. If I knew who you were and knew you were my kid's coach, I would be looking into this. How do you know if your lack of respect (kids can sense it) isn't what is causing the eye rolling.

So in PE class when the women are allowed to do "women" push ups while the boys have to do "regular" pushups, there is a case for discrimination? In the FBI, when they have different qualifications for male agents versus female agents, that too is discrimination?

Different standards for males and females do happen in schools and in government, don't pretend that it doesn't.

 

[chinamigarden]

You are all men I presume, coaching girls. You can't do this stuff in public schools, rec centers or anything related to government. It would be discrimination. There are coed gym class, lots of mixed sports and sports classes for young kids, and everyone is looking for everything to be in compliance with Title IX. You have to teach all the same, bring the same lesson plan for all. No one needs babying and what works for girls, works just as well for boys. And no one needs a hard a-- either to get the most out of the kids. That's giving boys the short end of the stick if you ask me.

And there are plenty of hard a-- female coaches, especially in college. Seen plenty of chairs thrown by the famous womens basketball coach at my college while they went for many titles. But that's not for kids.

The parents will be in your office, or the AD, school board or mayor's office, in a second.

Has anyone taken coaching courses because they teach for it to be the same? And how can you teach girls when you have such little regard of their motivation, wow. Again, that attitude would not be tolerated if found out about. If I knew who you were and knew you were my kid's coach, I would be looking into this. How do you know if your lack of respect (kids can sense it) isn't what is causing the eye rolling.

First of all Title IX is not about making everyone treated the same. Its about equal opportunity and access. You can't tell me that having the softball coach treat the players different then the baseball coach treats his players is a title IX issue. Because its not. My dd has volleyball, basketball and softball coaches and because they are all different people, they tend to have different ways of treating the players on their teams. Is one of them in violation of title IX because he treats one team different then another coach treats his/her team? Of course not, it all comes down to personality.

 

[FP26]

It is true that most of my coaching has come with girls, but I did coach a co-ed basketball team a few years ago. I can tell you from that experience that there were some definite differences between the girls and boys, at least on that particular team. It ended up being a very enjoyable season and I feel that I learned a lot from the experience. I do not feel that saying things a bit differently to the two groups is sexist or "pick your term". I am not talking about extremes here. There are things I say to my 14u TB team that I would have never said to my 8u rec team. Sorry, but I don't feel that is age discrimination either....

FYI - I agree with EricF completely. Although it may have been an isolated incident, it sounded like the OP's example was of a coach that accepted none of the blame. It was all on the players.

 

[Easton33]

Different kids have different different personalities, and as a group it is completely wrong to assume or proclaim that girls should be coached different as a whole. You find the same differences in boys. Some have softer, more gentle personalities and respond better to less aggressive coaching styles. I have had girls that if you chew their butts a little they get refocused and play lights out and I have had the girls that if you same their name in a certain "tone" they would fall apart. In school ball you need to have a more nuetral coaching style but in TB, you should only get girls that respond to how you coach. Aggressive or passive, if that is possible.
My dd cried at her last tournament, (she made back to back errors) I asked what her coach said to her. Her response was, "NOTHING". She was more upset she didn't get chewed a little than anything else. Different kids respond differently, they are a product of their environment. My dd watched me coach football and baseball, she was around aggressive coaching. Raise a kid on milk and cookies, they are gonna want milk and cookies. Raise a kid on steak and potatoes and that is what they will want. Just my opinion and yes I will probably get blasted, so what.
BTW, colleges get to choose their athletes just like TB. Do you think Pat was successful because she chose kids that didn't fit her coaching style and played them?

 

[Elk Grove Hurricane]

Not blasting you at all, Easton, your experience may be very different than what I've seen. But my philosophy is in line with this guy:
Anthony DiCicco, coach, USA Women's World Soccer Team: Winning Relationships
I read this back before my DD's were born and have never forgotten it. Dicicco's success speaks for itself, and his methods have been taught for years.

 

[Slappers]

Some of my parents say that I am not hard enough on the girls. That isn't my style. They know when they make a mistake and what mistake they made. I ask them to explain what they should have done to make sure they really know. My team got blasted in our first two tournaments with the exception of one game. The scores are indicative of where we are as a team (much to my disappointment) but not due to ability but mainly between the ears. There is an organization that is widely known around my parts and when there was the chance that we might play them in the first tournament, the team flipped. They were literally scared. It wasn't until we lost our last game in tourney 2 by 1 to a team that destroyed the big scary organization that we seemed to turn a corner. We played C level after that but the confidence level was different.

Back on point, in my speech after the loss on Sunday, I explained how much fun I had at the tournaments, what I saw we as a team needed to work on and what I needed to work on as a coach. I thanked the parents for getting the girls everywhere they needed to be and gave them a quick rundown of how proud I was of the girls and how they played.

I am going to be emailing a summary of what we are going to be working on over the winter, how I am going to do it, and what I am going to be working on as a coach. I know which girls I can be firmer with and which ones need a different type of motivation. The only downfall there is the girls that don't like being yelled at don't like me yelling at the girls that do. I also make it a point that each player is there own person and have different means of motivation. Just because I'm not yelling at you doesn't mean that I am investing in her more.

 

[softball88]

I went from coaching boys to girls....I struggled. I took a yr off and sat and watched how to coach girls. I watched other coaches and their tendencies. I learned a lot, and it made me a better coach. I struggled as a parent too.

I coach my new 8U team the way I want too...maybe soft to some...but the girls love to play and I can't wait to coach them. I help with my oldest team...somethings I don't like but our coach does a great a job teaching. I think I'm more of the motivator for that team.

Here's a question. Do you think your coach can be influenced by certain parents to act that way? I think so...I'm happier at games without certain parents chirping at you. I'm not saying it was the parents fault for some of my actions but it's a lot easier without them.

 

[Easton33]

That is the point Elk Grove. That is your philosophy, your method, and the girls that perform best for you are the ones that identify with your philosophy. I read the link, and what he is saying is absolutely true for SOME female athletes. Not all. There are successful stories from both sides of this discussion. Coaches find their greatest success when they match players with their coaching style but I think the first step is recognizing that there are different successful styles.

 

[indianafp]

You know. I am that coach that is positive with the girls. One that doesn't degrade them or call them out. Our team meetings after the game do go over a few things we did wrong, but we always end with things that went right. I don't care how bad the weekend is, something good comes out of it somewhere. With that said, I have been told, I'm not hard enough of them. (I was like.."that's new"). There was some that were willing to leave if I didn't get "harder" on them. Now, in my lifetime I have been around some really bad coaching. Seen it, lived it. I tried to shy away from becoming them. I am now trying to figure out what "harder" is. Is it take the fun out of the game and ride them the whole time ( I personally can't do that) or is it as simple as making these girls have repercussions for their actions (like errors and the Backward K). I don't know. Maybe it's discipline. The problem is, I don't want to lose who I am but I also know that maybe I do need a little more discipline. I guess what I am saying is sometimes parents want that type of coach. Now..I won't go as far as tearing them down in front of all, but sometimes the parents have approached the coach and asked them to be harder. You won't see me taking it to the point of taking the fun out of the game or tearing a girl down, but if more discipline is what they want, well they will get it more discipline.