A Note on Coaching

Why the Personality of a Head Coach can lead a team to success
By Josh Fyffe     

     

           In the NFL we are dealt with a range of head coaches varying in strategical strengths and weaknesses and certainly different locker-room personalities. I have never valued the personality aspect of a head coaching position until examining examples from other sports and teams that have exhibited success.

Being a Syracuse student, I am obviously heavy on the Orange bandwagon, as we have been a top 10 team all season long, and at one point we became the first team to be unanimously ranked number 1 since Duke in 2010. Anyways, I don’t know if you saw Tyler Ennis’ shot at the end of the Pitt game but it was probably one of the best first hand experiences of my personal sports-fan life. But what was even better about the win as a whole was Jim Boeheim’s reaction.

Boeheim was quoted right after the game saying that Ennis had played his worst game for the Orange and then went into the locker room and berated the whole team for completely under performing (which they did). He went around the locker room and said something along the lines of “you played like shit, you played like shit, you played like shit, Ennis that was a hell of a shot I will give it to you, but this cannot happen again.” Boeheim did an excellent job of separating the elation of winning on a buzzer beater and keeping an undefeated season alive and still maintaining the mindset of not getting carried away by the win and improving the mentality as a team.

Relating this back to the NFL, let’s look at two polar opposite head coaches (in terms of locker room personality); Rex Ryan (of the New York Jets) and Bill Belichick (of the New England Patriots). Put Ryan into Boeheim’s position, would he react in the same way? No way. He would be the type of person who would have a few 30 racks waiting in the locker room and would run in (or waddle in) dousing Ennis in champagne spray.  Belichick on the other hand would walk in a bit relieved (from winning the game) but at the same time disgusted. Belichick exhibited this type of reaction earlier in the 2013 season when the Patriots pulled out a highly improbable win down 12 in the final two minutes against the Browns. Although Belichick was happy that the Patriots won the game, he knows they will not be prepared the following week if he doesn’t crack down hard in the locker room after.

My personal biases aside, why does a head coach’s personal reaction to this type of win matter? Looking throughout the history of Ryan’s coaching tenure with the Jets, there always has been some type of midseason collapse (like they again exhibited this season). A lot of people forget but they were pegged as the probable six seed for the AFC playoff picture when they were sitting at 5-4 and coming off a big home win over the Saints going into their bye week. I’m sure Ryan was ecstatic after knocking off a top tier team like the Saints, especially after besting the Patriots in the previous weeks. However, these positive reactions by Ryan were detrimental to his team’s success; I believe he took away their drive. I am not implying that the Jets had a very talented roster this season to begin with, however they had the defensive man power to handle both the Saints and Patriots high flying offenses. After the bye week the Jets continued on to lose their next 4 of 5 including a three game losing streak to non-playoff opponents. The Jets ended the season catching fire, but only because they found something to play for again (saving their head coaches job).

Employing a hard to please mentality such as Belichick or Boeheim pushes the best out players. After an important win, having a “not good enough” mindset will only push players more to improve. Coach K of Duke has done this for years as well, and it is no coincidence that Boeheim and Coach K are at the top of the all-time college hoops coaching greats.

Make no mistake that I believe that Rex Ryan has a very intellectual defensive football mind, his brother does too. Rex could have actually been one of the most revered defensive coordinators of all time if he stuck with the position, but I believe that because of his locker room personality, he cannot be the forefront of a team that holds a winning tenure, despite his defensive intangibles. Head coaches that are reserved and critical in the locker room will squeeze the pulp of their players and breed a successful franchise (ie Belichick, Boeheim, Coach K, and even Joe Torre).

My advice to teams hiring head coaches in the future; look for the critical and hard to please coaches that can drive players and keep them grinding even after the most rewarding wins, not the coaches that get swept away with the intoxication of a significant win and have historically continued to fall short of the threshold of greatness.