Chapter 1—Baptism by Soccer

If [it] keeps putting one foot in front of the other without stopping, even a lame turtle can go a thousand li.

- Hsun Tzu

I like this 2200-year-old piece of advice. It’s the perfect simile for my experience as a soccer coach because I was like a lame turtle when I began coaching—struggling and slow. I didn’t know enough about the sport to be anything else, but I kept working and eventually got where I wanted to go.

I coached recreational soccer for my three children for 16 years. When I began coaching, I didn’t know anything about the game. I grew up in Wisconsin, where football was king, and no one played soccer. Years later, when Judy and I thought soccer would be a good outlet for our five-year-old son, I was conscripted into coaching because someone had to do it. That was the beginning of my soccer odyssey—a life experience that exposed me to some of the most challenging and rewarding situations I ever encountered.

 A recurring theme in my experience was that I often confronted potentially life-changing decisions that involved my children without knowing how my actions would influence their futures. Those were frightening circumstances. Now, I can look back and evaluate what I did right and where I went wrong. Was it worth it? Would I do it again? I still ask myself those questions because there were marvelous moments when I watched my children grow and transform into young adults, and painful encounters when I witnessed them being treated unfairly and physically injured. I can’t undo the effects of those events. We still live with them every day. The story of how they influenced our lives is the future of this blog.

Let’s begin this story the same way I was introduced to the sport—with a discussion at the kitchen table.

Chapter 1

When I was growing up, I never played soccer, I never watched soccer, and I never wanted to be a soccer coach. Coaching soccer was thrust upon me when Judy and I decided that a sport involving running and balls would be good for our six-year-old son. Owen was a constantly moving, busy child. We tried tee-ball, but the pace was too slow for him. He spent his time on the field kicking up dust clouds and grinding holes into the ground by spinning in his kid-sized baseball cleats. He was a natural but didn’t love the game and was a little bored, so we continued our search.

The first time we suggested soccer, he was five years old. Owen was reluctant because he lacked experience with the game. We encouraged him, but he was unwilling, so we relented and waited. A year later, we suggested soccer again. The exchange was one of our first truly adult conversations with him. The opportunity came as we sat at our kitchen table on a lazy Saturday morning. Judy did most of the talking and adopted a playful, humorous mood like moms do when they state something ridiculously obvious.

“I think you will like it,” she said. “There will be lots of running, which you like to do, and lots of balls. You will be playing with your friends, which is also something you enjoy.”

Owen listened as Judy continued, “There will be practices after school during the week and games in parks around town on Saturdays. And if you don’t like it, you can quit. We want you to have a good time.”

I chimed in with a supportive nod and, “Yup,” but it was unnecessary. That last part had sealed the deal. It was a no-risk offer of something that sounded fun. Owen thought for a minute, then said, "Okay.” That was the beginning of our family soccer experience. I didn't know it, but I had just become a soccer coach.

I was thirty-six years old, and we lived in a university town where soccer was well organized. Thousands of kids played soccer on fields surrounded by cheering parents every weekend. The local soccer club oversaw that activity. It distributed registration forms, collected money, processed registration forms, assigned players to teams, painted fields, and, if no one volunteered, randomly picked a parent to be a coach and get things started. That "coach's" job was to contact each player and arrange the first practice. I unknowingly dodged that bullet. Instead, Kathy was selected, and she called us to organize things.

A few days later, we met on the playground at a local school, a short bicycle ride from our house. She introduced herself to our group and explained that she was the designated coach but lacked firsthand soccer knowledge. She wanted help. Her statement confused Judy and me because her title and the bag of equipment she possessed bolstered her authority. We assumed she had the experience to warrant the appointment. To her credit, Kathy came to practice with some activities and a sign-up sheet for the postgame treat. Those things only reinforced our confusion. We thought she was the coach, and because we did not want to overstep, we let her take the lead.

Under Coach Kathy’s direction, we adopted a communal approach to soccer, but as practice progressed, I realized that none of the parents knew how to teach the game—though some had played a little. Like me, they showed up because they thought soccer was the right thing to do for their kids, but without experience, coaching soccer was challenging.

I grew up in the Midwest at a time when no one played soccer. Instead, I played what Americans called football and participated in it during grade school and high school. I was not a great player, but my football coaches taught me a few fundamental things that are almost universal in athletics: step and kick, stay on your toes, bend your knees to lower your center of gravity so you can move quickly, and keep your head up so you can see your opponent. Armed with those basics, anyone can coach six-year-old soccer players. Since I didn't know much about soccer, I defaulted to that skill set on the first day. I emphasized good form, and things worked out. Players improved, and I began thinking about the game.

The nine boys on our team were all first-time players except one named Nathan. He was a friend of Owen’s from school. Judy and I were glad that Owen knew at least one kid on the team, but our relief was short-lived. While we practiced, Judy chatted with Nathan’s mom. She told Judy that because his skill level was more advanced than the rest of the team, she was going to inquire if he could be moved up one age level—there must have been room for him elsewhere because Nathan did not return.

By the second practice, I realized I had a knack for diagnosing why a player struggled with a particular skill and was good at suggesting how to improve. Unfortunately, other parents did not share that ability, and I wondered why they were unable to help appropriately. In general, parents either did nothing or tried to teach skills that were too advanced. They were teaching what they knew, but it was not what needed to be taught.

One parent, a tie-dyed dad, stood out. He had a great variety of beautiful, tie-dyed T-shirts but terrible teaching instincts. His idea of a productive drill was to challenge a player, take their ball, and then use his body to shield them from it. He defeated every player but only succeeded in teaching them how it felt to be dominated by a grown man with soccer experience and the ability to block them from the ball using a technique that put his butt in their face. I tried to redirect his actions by stepping in and conferring for a moment. “Don’t take the ball from them. Challenge and make them move the ball around you,” I suggested.

He didn’t say a word and either misunderstood or disagreed because he resumed his butt-shielding activity. That was my first lesson: Not all people are good coaches. His heart was in the right place, but he lacked the experience and judgment to do the right thing. Fortunately, soccer drills don’t last forever, and we moved on to the next activity—a scrimmage.

Kids participate in soccer because they want to play, so it made sense to our group of parent coaches to end practices with a scrimmage. But we could have done much more. A good soccer practice has four components: a warmup, an introduction to a skill, a drill that highlights the skill, and a game that reinforces the use of the skill. Unfortunately, our group of novice coaches was unaware of the convention. Our practices started with step two, which usually emphasized dribbling and shooting, then went straight to step four. Step four was simple: divide the team into two squads and scrimmage. That was when I first heard Kathy shout three words that I came to regard as the mark of a novice coach.

One squad dominated the scrimmage while the other struggled, managing only to chase the player with the ball. The weaker team likely felt tired and ready to go home. Frustrated with what she perceived as a lack of enthusiasm, Coach Kathy shouted, “Get the ball.” She urged the players on, but her voice sounded screechy and a little angry. Nothing changed; no player responded. A minute passed, and she shouted again—still nothing.

She was right. The weaker team needed to change their play, but they didn't know what to do, and telling them to “get the ball” did not relay helpful information. I knew something was wrong with what she was doing, especially because she seemed to be yelling at players out of frustration, but I couldn’t put my finger on why it was wrong and how to fix it. That was the challenge of being an inexperienced coach—I didn’t know what else to do. “Getting the ball” sounded simple, but it wasn’t. Coach Kathy needed to break down the process and teach players a skill to help them achieve what she wanted.

If I were to teach an adult to solve a calculus problem, I would not give them a pencil and paper and shout, “Solve the problem.” Instead, I would introduce them to new mathematic techniques and instruct them to use their existing algebra and thinking skills to find a solution. Similarly, “getting the ball” requires new tactics that build on existing athletic ability. Those skills are simple on their own. Each step is relatively easy and logical, but none of us parents knew the process. We were all uninformed, so we shouted, worked on skills, and scrimmaged in preparation for our first game.

The team was coming together. We had some players, including Owen, with natural abilities and some who could have been more enthusiastic. It seemed like an acceptable mix, and we thought we were ready for the first game. We looked forward to game day on Saturday.

END

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