Today's blog is all about showing passion when playing your sport!!!
I hate the fact that most children and adults don't really show any emotion when they are playing a sport. I watched both of my son's baseball tournaments this past weekend and there was only one team over the whole weekend that showed any passion when they were playing. The result from the sidelines was that it was fun to watch because the team showed that they were having fun playing the game and the coaches were allowing them to have fun while playing. The rest of the teams out there were like robots, they never smiled or got excited when a nice play was made or an error was made. They were afraid to show any kind of emotion because the coach or coaches didn't allow that type of behaviour from them which quite frankly is sad. We (as coaches) quite often forget to let kids fall on their faces and be allowed to make mistakes to see what type of player he/she actually is that indeed we develop robots that do not learn to think the game and learn what can make the game exciting or frustrating. Look at Tiger Woods, he does the fist pump after a great putt or chip shot, which at first was thought of as showing off and not very professional in regards to the game of golf but now people are starting to learn that absolutely you should show passion when you have done something that you and everyone watching know was great. Kobe or Lebron James in basketball, Sidney Crosby or Alexander Ovechkin scoring a fantastic goal in hockey, a baseball player hitting a walk-off home run or going up and over the fence to take away a home run. I could go on and on but you get the idea. Make no mistake about it, I am not talking about showing up your opponent, I am only saying that coaches please encourage your players to have passion when playing and players don't play the game if you don't have any passion to play in the first place. I would love to hear your comments and please pass this blog onto friends, family and coaches to see what they think and feel.
