Where Do Football / Basketball Coaches Learn This Stuff?

[RutgersMO]

Seems like a lot of former big name / not so big name players express an interest in coaching. What differentiates someone who wants to coach but hasn't a clue, from the mavens who have studied at college or sat on the bench as assistants / put in their dues?

While I get the latter scenario as a process...and most likely, there are prodigies: people born with IT.

It happens in Math / Music: maybe we need a prodigy or idiot savant for Basketball!

MO

 

[PSU_Nut]

Seems like a lot of former big name / not so big name players express an interest in coaching. What differentiates someone who wants to coach but hasn't a clue, from the mavens who have studied at college or sat on the bench as assistants / put in their dues?

While I get the latter scenario as a process...and most likely, there are prodigies: people born with IT.

It happens in Math / Music: maybe we need a prodigy or idiot savant for Basketball!

MO

Coaching is all about who you know and connections. It is a tough career to break in to. Unless you are a big name former players you just need to get lucky. You have to be in the right place at the right time. Then once you make that connection perform for them.

 

[imbazza2]

PS NUT is only half right who you know and connections only help when you have the brains to be successful.
Nut is off base as you look at most if not all coaches rarely are the great FB players Chip Kelly, Urban Meyer come to me quickly not great players but learn why they were beat and fix it so it does not happen again. Luck is not some much i.e. take Meyer started at Saint Xavier High School in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1985. Yes he met OSU coaches there but he would not move up unless he stood out via superior inventive mind, who like a sponge sucks in what is good from others. No matter where you are HS, college or the pros, winning is a result of intelligence over brawn. Schiano was good at that but he was never able to do in a game but by following Tuesday he would have a solution to a given problem.

 

[MozRU]

I've had quite a few friends get into college coaching after playing in college in Div III up to 1AA.

As a GA, life is tough. Basically no pay. 18 hour days. "Who wants it more?" Its those 5yrs where you better make connections and "learn the game inside and out. Both sides of the ball."

*If you are D guy, you better become an expert at defense, plus have a good idea what they are doing on the opposite side of the ball.
*If you an O guy, you better become an expert at offense, plus have a good idea what they are doing on the opposite side of the ball.

A couple of friends didn't make it. They just weren't smart enough to understand the entire game, communicate it to players and coach them up. A few made it - either being superb recruiters because they were just talented in relating to kids or just know Xs and Os better than the next guy.

Its life. Some are just better than you.

(I love coaching. Pop Warner up to Freshman in HS. I feel I am good individual coach. One on One. I can teach a new DEnd to close the off tackle hole and contain. I am not very good at running the show. Could never be an OC or DC. Just not smart enough.)

 

[_dave_]

Being a great player doesn't make a great coach. See Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and Wayne Gretzky as just three of many examples. Like most other vocations, it takes talent, hard work and luck.

Wasn't too long ago that Rutgers had an offensive coordinator that never played football at any level. Even at the head coach levels, like coach Leach at WSU, there are examples of some that never played the game.

 

[gef21]

It is all about your connections and who you learn from. My break at the D1aa level came because a guy I coached with got hired as the HC and immediately brought me with him. The success there allowed me to pick and choose where I wanted to go when I went back to the HS level. The connections I made at the D1aa level, and successful high school level, now leaves me with options to go different places (back to the college level or stay at the HS level)

The football coaching world especially is all about who you know.