Winning Youth Football

The Dummy Relay Race Game for Evaluating and Conditioning Youth Football Players.

We use a variety of fun games to not only condition our kids but for team building and evaluation purposes as well. Youth Football is a game that values core strength, this is the strength a player has from just under his hips to just under his chest. This strength is what allows players to control their bodies. Youth Football is all about very short bursts of speed and changes in direction. Those that can burst, stop, change direction and accelerate in very small areas are those that have the natural ability to go very far in the game of football.  

Unfortunately the typical 40 yard dash or pushup contest doesn’t measure for this skill set, but there are games you can play that will help reveal those that do and do not have this core strength. One of the kids  favorite “games” and mine as well (game for the kids, an evaluation and conditioning tool for me) is the Dummy Delay race. This is a game that once you do it, the kids will beg for it all season, you will undoubtably hear please coach pleeeeeeese, pleeeeese can we do dummy relay races from your players. It’s a game that will get all the kids shouting encouragement for each other and have the parents howling with laughter from their seats.

Getting Started

You start by dividing your team into “teams” of 4-5 kids. You may want to have each assistant coach be the “head coach” of a single team to bring some competitive fire to the game. Put a pylon down to mark where each team lines up to start. The players from each team are  in single file line behind their team captain or coach. Next put a pylon directly in front of each teasm starting cone at about 15 yards for 9-10 year old kids. You can go longer distances for older kids and shorter distances for the younger kids. Just make sure all the teams are lined up side by side and have the same distance to run to their cones. Now have the captain of each team start  it off by grasping a tall blocking dummy, this is usually done by holding the dummy the long way close to the chest in bear hug type fashion. The goal of the game is to run with the dummy around the pylon and back to your teammate, it is a relay race. When the player gets back to the starting pylon he hands the dummy off to the next player on his team. We usually have the 4 losing teams do 5 pushups to make it interesting with coaches shouting encouragement for their respective “mini” teams. 

How It Works

What you will find is the kids that have core strength, the athletes, will have little problem holding the dummy and running around the pylon. If you hold the dummy to your chest the long way you can feel the strenght it requires from your core to keep the dummy upright and stable. On the other hand, those that have poor core strength will wobble when they try to run with the dummy and will rarely be able to run it a straight line, they will look like a listing ship or even fall over. The results of this game may really surprise you. We have often had nice looking big kids we thought were real athletes, struggle with this, initial looks can deceive you. On the other hand we have had small wiry kids that didn’t look like they were very athletic at all just crush this drill and go on to play significant roles for our teams at “skill” positions. This game really separates the kids that can play from those that can’t, a huge time saver we all need in that first week of football practice.

Conditioning

If you do this game using a quick enough pace with small enough team sizes, it can even help you with your conditioning. Think about it, the distance covered is 30 yards, about 7 seconds worth of a short burst, then the 4 other players do their 7 seconds and time to do 5 pushups means a total “rest” of 40 seconds beween when a player does his 7 second burst. Sounds like the interval many football plays are run in real games, a 6-7 second burst followed by a 40-50 second interval to get the ball set and in and out of the huddle, hmm imagine that.

The Real Fun Part

Once we have had ample time to evaluate the players, we like to add a twist to this game for purely fun and team building reasons. Pair teams against each other by having just 1 pylon for both teams. The goal is to run around the pylon and back to your next relay player, but now contact is allowed. So when the competing players go around the pylons they can run into each other using the dummy against their chest as a big cushion. The squeals of laughter will be heard in the next county on this one, I promise and your parents will think you are some kind of cool coaching genius. Be careful not to allow mismatches as the kids are not wearing pads or mouthpieces.

We usually do this game at our first practice of the season. In the end you will know who your players are and have a bunch of enthusiastic, motivated and satisfied kids and parents.

To sign up for Dave’s free youth football tips newsletter please go here:

http://winningyouthfootball.com

Copyright 2008 Cisar Management

Republishing allowed if links are kept intact

Last Public Coaches Clinic of the Year

We are still doing a number of private clinics, but the last public clinic is coming up in 8 days.

On Saturday July 12^th the last public coaches clinic of the year will be held in Lincoln, Nebraska at Southeast Community College. If you haven’t been able to get to one yet, this is your last chance. The clinics are a great way to get personal and to learn by seeing up close and participating in demos (don’t sit in the first 2 rows if you are shy). Most coaches like the up-close and personal interaction of the clinics.

 Unlike the Baltimore or Chicago clinics where there were 150-190 people present, this one will have less than 40 attending by design.  It is theatre style and each coach has his own comfortable padded chair and writing desk, the facility is top notch, the best we have ever presented at. There are 3 huge overhead screens for video and all whiteboard drawings are transmitted to the 3 huge screens as well. If you are flying in, check about flying into Omaha, the rates are much cheaper and it is only an hours drive away. This is a clinic you can’t pay at the door, you must pre-register through Southeast Community College by contacting Nancy Holman at 402-437-2700 or nholman@southeast.edu you can pay by credit cared over the phone and the cost is just $60 and includes lunch.

Southeast Community College is at 301 S 68^th Street in Lincoln, which means it is on the Main Drag “O” Street and 68^th. It is impossible to miss. Hope to see you there. The clinic runs from 9-3.

For more info on the topics covered please go here:

http://www.winningyouthfootball.com/footballclinics.php

Evaluating Youth Football Players

Evaluating youth football players either for a draft or to determine positions is one of the most important but most poorly performed tasks done by many youth football coaches. Too often a player is assigned a position because he “looks” like the position without regards to the skills required of that specific position.  Often times kids that look like football players or are the sons of coaches are given preferential treatment and are selected for the “skill” or glory positions. Another mistake many youth football coaches make is they evaluate kids for skills in a way that has little or no correlation to what actually are critical success factors to performing well on the football field. Quite often a player is assigned a position based on just one required attribute of that position without regard to the entirety of skills needed to play the position.

I Made the Same Mistake

The end result is you often have youth football teams that don’t perform anywhere near the potential of the aggregate group. So often when I’m asked to come in and trouble shoot poorly playing teams, they have kids in the wrong positions and the disparities in players is blatantly apparent if you know what to look for. Early on in my coaching “career” I too was bamboozled by the physical appearances of players. One of my first years coaching a tough talking 10 year old kid showed up to our first practice, he had “the look” a Mohawk haircut, shirtsleeves torn off, scowl/I want to tear your head off look on his face and he was a stocky but solid 120 lbs. Heck I would have guessed he had a pack a day cigarette habit from the attitude he put off, we were drooling at the thought of having him playing football  for us. On the other hand there was this skinny quiet kid with a crew cut, and only 8 years old, probably weighed less than 65 pounds. He looked like one of the kids most coaches probably pray the DON’T get at first glance.

Looks Like Tarzan, Plays Like Jane

The Mohawk kid turned out wasn’t in very good physical shape, which isn’t a real big deal, but he was an excuse maker as well. He was one that questioned every drill and when he didn’t win a drill (we do almost everything in competition format) he had an excuse, he slipped, he started late, the other kid cheated, he had overeaten that day. In addition to all that, he didn’t have very good body control. He could move fairly well straight ahead but when he went to make a turn of cut it was like he was trying to turn the Titanic, he couldn’t do it. His core strength was terrible and his quickness was awful. While there are some technique and core strengthening movements we can do to improve this, even dramatic improvements would still have this player in the bottom 20% in this critical area.

Looks Like Jane, Plays Like Tarzan

On the other hand the shy scrawny 8 year old seemed to be a natural when we did our games/drill that revealed core strength. During the Dummy Relay Races, he was able to not only lift and maintain the balance of the dummy but he was running with it, where others were doing a wobbly jog. During the Towel Game, he always drug his opponents to the cone, showing excellent leg strength, natural leverage and heart. Even in the Sumo Game he showed excellent trunk and leg strength, tenacity and great natural leverage. The Deer Hunter game in my opinion is the best and most fun way to determine a players”football speed”. Football speed means the ability to start, stop and accelerate in small spaces, being able to change direction and control your body to escape the “hunters”. Our scrawny little 8 year old excelled at this drill, while our Mohawk was the first one out.

Doing Accurate Evaluations

The net is you cant judge a book by it’s cover and you HAVE TO measure kids to reveal their football playing skills, not how fast they can run 40 yards or how many pushups they can do. How many times in a football game do kids actually run 40 yards? And how often are 40 times actually accurate? The answer to both is rarely to never. What does a pushup prove? Upper body strength does very little to aid your linemen in his blocks, a proper block places much more emphasis on foot speed, trunk and leg strength as well as attitude and aggressiveness. Some say you can’t test for toughness, resiliency, tenacity or aggressiveness until the kids put the pads on, that is simpley not true. So according to those that beleive you can’t put kids into postions until you put the pads on for at least a week put themselves WAY behind. For them  it is a crap shoot until the 2^nd or 3^rd week of practice. The Towel Game, Sumo Game, Dummy Relay Races and to an extent the Deer Hunter reveal all these traits without wearing pads.

If you are drafting players you have a huge advantage if you know what to look for and how to look for it. If you don’t have a draft, being able to evaluate kids properly  is STILL a huge advantage because you can assign positions earlier, put your schemes in quicker and you don’t waste a ton of time shuffling players from position to position to position like a church social cake walk until you find the right spot for the poor confused player.

 Making It Fun

If you can make the evaluation proccess fun for the kids it is an added bonus. The first week of practice the kids and the parents are paying close attention to the fun factor and you. You can make some huge deposits in the emotional bank accounts of the parents that week if you can make the evaluations fun. We use all the above mentioned fun evaluation games during the evaluations of my teams and they are all found in my book. I’ve found the drills/games are so effective we are able to put kids into the correct positions after the first practice with a 95% success rate.

The first game we are almost always significantly ahead of our competition, even though we always practice less. A big factor has to be being able to do accurate and effective evaluation and early placement of players.

The evaluation should be preceded by making sure you have very detailed descriptions of the requirements of each position on your team so you know which skills you are looking for to make the best fits.

The Ultra in Unusual but Effective Evaluation Drills/Games

Here is a very interesting method one High School uses to evaluate it’s players, the Rabbit Catch. Bobby Bowden even thinks there may be merit in this unique assessment practice. Think about how closely this activity mirrors what suucessfull football players do on the field on game days. Notice the 4 State Championship Rings on the Head High School Coaches hand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_R_0FryVRNk

For those of you that are using my system, doesn’t this look very similar to our Deer Hunter drill/game ? Evaluate your players well and you will not only be well ahead of your competition, but you will have much happier players and parents.

Copyright 2008 Cisar Management

Republishing Allowed if Links are Kept Intact

http://winningyouthfootball.com

The makings of a great youth football defense. How does it happen?

When designing a defense in youth football you have to first figure out what plays you are going to defend. I’ve done coaches clinics all over the country and I’ve yet to come across a group yet that didn’t think that the sweep was the play they HAD to stop first in order to be successful in youth football. Most also agreed that the Dive, Reverse,Off-tackle Power and Drop Back Pass were the #2,#3,#4 and #5 threats.Many youth coaches felt the sweep was so important to stop that they often listed the Sweep as #1, #2, and #3 in order of importance. I may have to agree with that to an extent.

The second step in determining your defensive scheme is to make sure you have a mission statement for your team. Your defensive scheme has to align with your mission. Our mission statement is: To develop a love and appreciation of the game in our players so they can benefit from the life lessons the game teaches. We want to play competitive football, where the average individual and the team can have success while playing everyone in all games regardless of circumstances.

Obviously if you are like us and are going to play everyone ( not all the same amount) or have minimum play rules, you have to ask yourself; “Where can my weakest players play where they can have personal success and add team value on each and every snap?”.You have to ask yourself, what schemes and techniques out there not only help us stop the plays we have to defend but also accommodate my goal of playing even weaker players on defense?

The 4-4

When we were designing the defense we use now we started with the base 4-4 that we got from Jay Smith who before coaching with us had coached at Canyon Springs California High School. They won two USA Today National Championships during Jay’s tenure there. While this defense worked very well for our “select” teams, it didn’t work well at all for our non-select teams. We found this defense required 2 pretty good down linemen, 2 rush ends that had to be fairly athletic, 4 reasonably athletic and aggressive linebackers and 3 descent defensive backs . While our “select” teams didn’t always have the perfect mix of players for this defense they were able to make it work well. Our “select” teams were the best players chosen from a group of 100-150 players, those not chosen were put on “B” teams and played other “B” teams of similar size and abilities. As you might imagine those “A” teams were made up of a much different grouping of kids than our “B” squads.

Need for a Change

While this league had no minimum play rules, I mandated an 8 play minimum play rule for all of my teams in the league and a 16 play minimum play rule for my own personal team, to show my other coaches, that 8 plays were easy to get in. With about 25 players  per team we had to really hustle to get everyone their plays. We found we did not have the athleticism on these non-select teams to run the 4-4 effectively and get everyone in the game like we wanted to. Our weaker players were just whiffing while  playing in all that space and we didn’t have 2 stud defensive linemen to anchor the middle, all the studs were on the “A” team. We were getting beat on sweeps because our 2 best linebackers had to play the middle and with the next 2 best players playing outside linebacker, they couldn’t cut off the sweep from their positions.

Designing Something that Works

We had to design a defense that would allow these less talented kids the chance to play and compete by stopping the plays most of our opponents were trying to establish, the sweep, dive, reverse/counter, off-tackle and drop back pass (lesser extent). We also had to factor in the passing completion percentages for youth football teams in our area. For age 8-10 it was about 20%, for 11-12 it was about 25% and for 13-14 it was about 30%. So we came up with a defense that concentrated on stopping the run with a heavy emphasis on stopping the sweep, stopping the home run play (reverse), clogging the inside and allowing even our weakest kids to get on the field. While our new homegrown defense didn’t look like anything we had seen before, it used some of the concepts of our old 4-4 for stunts and blitzes but incorporated a whole new group of techniques we found average kids could execute.

Colleges Using This Defense

Over time I discovered that this defense (minus a number of youth techniques and adjustments we have in place) was used back in the 60’s when College teams had to worry about defending the run more than they do today with all the spread passing that is so popular, imagine that. The problem is that many youth teams run the popular college defenses like the 4-3, 4-4, 3-5-3 etc which are designed to stop the college offenses of today, not the run based offenses of the 60’s or the youth offenses with their 20% pass completion rates. Our defense most closely resembles a youth version of the Wide Tackle 6 that Jerry Claiborne’s teams used at  Virginia Tech and Maryland in the 60’s and  ‘70’s . When the college game moved to more passing, this defense was abandoned as they did not feel they had the coverages in it to effectively stop the better passing teams. It was very successful back in those days and widely used after Claiborne made it popular at Maryland and Virginia Tech.

Just 18-19 TD’s Given up in Last 8 Seasons Total

This defense has served us well, helping us to a 78-5 record over the last 8 seasons. Our first team defense has had just 18-19 total touchdowns scored against us in that time period. The first team has had just 1 sweep play and 1 reverse play of over 10 yards run against it in that same time period. For those that have the 2006 or 2007 season DVDs, they can attest to that. More importantly this defense has allowed us to play and even start some of our weakest players on defense. Many coaches I know play their best 11 on defense and then put their weaker kids on offense. This not only hamstrungs the offense, but deprives the kids of getting the experience of playing both sides of the ball.Think about the plays you need to stop and how you are going to get everyone in the game before you choose a defensive scheme for your youth football team. While many will tell you to “coach what you know”, if you know a defense that is designed to defend High School or College offenses, that defense may not be the best choices to defend what you will see from youth offenses. And remember the College and High School teams aren’t required to play all their kids, it is an entirely different equation than those of us coaching youth football have to deal with.

Copyright 2008 Cisar Management, Republishing allowed if Links are kept intact.

To sign up for Dave’s free newsletter please go to:

http://winningyouthfootball.com

Wild Tales of Youth Football in Montana

Many of us take for granted that we have enough kids to play on our youth football teams, that we have a league to play in and fields to play on. That isn’t necessarily the case in all parts of the country.

Last week after the private coaches clinic I did in Laurel Montana (Billings), I took the family to do some horseback riding outside a neat little place called Absarokee. It is a remote Montana town about an hour north of Yellowstone Park and absolutely beautiful with gorgeous unspoiled mountains, trees, clean fast moving rocky streams and rivers and plenty of wildlife. Wanda the owner was a very accommodating lady, taking our small group on short notice. As she saddled up the horses for our little jaunt, she asked me what I do and what I was there for. When she found out I was a “football” guy she shared with me a number of her local youth football experiences.

Her son is quite the rodeo athlete and attended College on a full ride rodeo scholarship, BUT his first love is football. When he was young all he could talk about was playing football, the only problem is the local High School has just over 100 students and there just isn’t the population to support a youth team. Well Wanda didn’t let that stop her, her plan was to recruit enough local kids so they could put together a team and have a place for this son and her two others to play football. While this may seem simple, Montana and much of very rural America has much to offer and quite often youth football or organized team sports of any kind are difficult in finding support. She organized a “group bonding” event for her son and some of his friends as well as some of  the kids they thought they could talk into playing youth football. It was the Montana version of a football recruiting event.

Creative Youth Football Recruiting

 This group of 10 boys did what many youth in Montana do when out with their buddies, they took their 22 rifles, went across the river and were hunting rabbits together. If you aren’t from a rural area, you don’t understand how common and “normal” this is and

The Bear

Well the boys game to a Y in the path so one group went to the left and one group went to the right. The group to the left went about 50 yards and came up upon a bear, a very large bear. They ran to where their other buddies were at and breathlessly told them of their great find. The other group didn’t believe them, so together this band of future youth football players went back to where the bear was last seen. Sure enough they came back up upon this bear to everyones delight. One of the boys told the rest of the group he had a bear ‘tag” at home, which allows him the right to shoot one bear.

The group came up with the idea to tree the bear so their friend could run back to his house, get a proper rifle and shoot the bear. Using their 22 Rifles, noise and youthful determination, they treed the bear. Meanwhile their buddy with the bear tag ran home over 2 miles, got his rifle, an ATV and his all important bear tag and hightailed it back to his friends. The excited AND frightened buddies had done their job keeping the bear in the tree so the young 11 year old bear hunter could get his bear. They brought it back to his home on the ATV, to everyones amazement. According to Wanda the game warden said the bears skull was the largest he had ever seen.

Team Bonding Montana Style

Now how many of us can say their youth football teams have bonded like this? Wanda was able to recruit enough kids to form a team and this nucleus of kids went on to set some records of their own. In youth football her oldest sons team not only never lost a game, when they got to High School they never lost either. They won several State Championships and were even written up in national news stories for their long winning streaks playing 11 man football in a TINY school.  Who knows how many of these kids would have never got to experience football and that amazing streak had it not been for Wanda’s creative “bear hunt” recruiting event.

While her son has won many rodeo awards and medals, his fondest memories are those of his youth football days, hunting bears with his friends. Needless to say we were both busting guts as she told this amazing story, one that gets told around these parts by now 24 year old men all the time. I’m sure each and everyone of their sons and grandsons will hear that story as well.

Youth football comes in many shapes, flavors and sizes, but no matter where it is at, it’s  creating positive lifelong memories for our kids. What kind of memories are you making for your team?

Coyright 2008 Cisar Management

Republishing allowed if links are kept intact.

For your free youth football coaching tips newsletter, come here:

http://winningyouthfootball.com

Youth Football is Youth Football, No Matter Where You Are

Many coaches seem to feel biased about certain areas of the country having better quality youth football than other parts of the country. Some youth football coaches from less densely populated areas of the country also seem to often feel a bit inferior about the level of play in their areas.

My personal experience and the evidence of results of National Youth Football Tournaments don’t give credence to those ideas. I’ve seen video or watched teams play from nearly every state in the country and I’ve done clinics for over 5,000 coaches all over the country. I’ve seen great youth football played in areas of the country known for great football like Florida, Texas, Ohio and California. I’ve also seen some of the worst coached youth football in those same states. I’ve seen excellent athleticism and well coached football from states most don’t think of when they think of football, places like Utah, Maryland, Virginia, New York, Illinois and Washington. At the youth level no one area of the country dominates, just look at the winners of the Pop Warner National Championship or the big Unlimited National Tournament in Daytona. The teams come from all over and there is no trend, winners come from all over the nation.

While many feel their leagues are competitive and their area of the country is somehow inherently better than others I highly recommend you take your team to one of the many national tournaments. They are a real eye opener and a great experience for your kids. As a kid I still remember my Bowl trips, especially the plane trip to Las Vegas and I know our kids love going to Florida as well.

As the kids get older maybe there are some differences as weather, regional preferences, and Spring Football or even year round football make certain areas of the country “hotbeds” for football talent. Some states even have huge football budgets and coaches who either don’t teach at all or have very low class loads and even “athletic” periods where they meet with their football players year round in the classroom. Those differences may account for some of the differences in DI Football players coming from various states. But in the early development years the differences are not as large as many might think.

I had the pleasure of working clinics in Utah, Montana and Washington State these last three weeks and they play good youth football there. Great people and coaches in it for the right reasons, and they play good football. Some of the most organized leagues I’ve come across. More on that in the next few days along with some UNBELIEVEABLE stories and some new tips. Yes we have a youth football/ live bear story that is almost too unbelievable to report. Just know that while youth football has a lot of commonality across the nation, there are some HUGE nuances, including shooting a live bear in Montana during a youth football event, don’t miss this one.

Sorry for the delay in posts, very tough to get it done when we are on the road.

Copyright 2008 Cisar Management

Republishing Allowed if links are kept intact To sign up for Daves free newsletter:

http://winningyouthfootball.com

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Seattle and Salt Lake City Clinics:

Some important information for the Salt Lake City and Seattle Coaches Clinics:

The Seattle Clinic is SOLD OUT, but we were able to get a larger room and now have room for an additional 40 coaches. To get the $30 discount you have to register no later than 5/25. we have at least 14 coaches coming down from Canada for this as well as coaches from Idaho, Oregon, California and Montana. Looks like a great group, including a number of coaches that are already running our system.

For Salt Lake City, we have room for at least 20 more coaches, but to get the discount you need to register no later than 5/21. We have coaches from Idaho, Montana, Colorado and Tennessee attending this one so far.

Remember the earlier you register, the earlier you get the book mailed to you. Many youth football coaches feel they get a lot more out of the clinic after getting a chance to review the book ahead of time.

Show up on the day of the clinic without pre-registering, you pay $125. All attendees get a free copy of the book “Winning Youth Football a Step by Step Plan” on CDROM and a box lunch.

http://winningyouthfootball.com

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Nice Problems to Have When Coaching Youth Football.

There are problems you don’t want and problems that are actually kind of nice to have when you are running a youth football program. One of the “problems” is having too many kids that want to play for your teams. When facing this type of dilemma, for starters you have to determine if you can handle the growth BEFORE you scramble to find money for equipment as well as find and train additional coaches.

Managing Growth

Managing growth can be quite a challenge. Most are tempted to just take as many kids that want to sign up and hope for the best ,when it comes to coaches, facilities and equipment. We made that mistake in Omaha, with the first program I started. We grew from one team to 16 teams in the course of 5 years. Since over 70% of our kids there came from Single Parent families, we really had to scramble to get coaches at all, let alone qualified coaches.

In retrospect we grew too fast and our kids quickly out-grew our ability to provide consistent competent coaching. That is what spawned my coaching book, DVDs and clinics, they were all a necessity for the survival of my own program. This was before the materials caught the eyes of a few key people that pushed us into developing this site and the commercial sale of the materials. There is a point where you do grow too fast, you outgrow your infrastructure and ability to provide a consistent quality environment for the players. It’s up to your leadership to determine how much growth is too much and to manage it accordingly.

Resist the Temptation to Grow Too Quickly

How much growth is too much? When you have to assign head coaches that aren’t ready yet, due to pressures to field a team. We had to do that in Omaha or face turning away hundreds of kids when we first started. Those were trying times, having to deal with the up and down quality levels of the coaching staffs of my various teams. This problem lead directly to us developing the system and a standardized method for developing all of our teams. Once we did that, our combined retention numbers went from 70% to above 90% and our combined winning percentage went from the mid 40s to 81%.

In the new program I started where I live now, we have severely restricted the number of players to fit the coaching talent we have in place today, no rolling of the dice hoping that we somehow come up with the right number of quality coaches. Develop your coaches for head coaching jobs right now, before you grow, rather than grow and have head coaches learn on the job. We have developed a comprehensive development plan for those that want to head coach, so they will be prepared to take on the challenge and do a great job. This plan includes having the existing head coaches give up part of the duties to the head coaches in waiting as well as the apprentice coaches taking on more and more game day responsibilities as the season progresses.

Dying Programs

While training and mentoring coaches may seem like quite a hassle, you could have the other problem. There are plenty of youth football programs out there that are shrinking and dying. In Omaha alone there were several youth football programs that have ceased to exist today that seemed pretty healthy back in 1998.  There are others that had over 160 kids in their programs in 1999 with less than half that today. At many  of the youth football coaching clinics I do I hear from lots of coaches that are scraping by with squads of 14-15-16 kids where their opposition has 25-40 kids. These programs are starving for kids.

The Tulsa Turnaround

When you have a well run organization and your youth football teams are consistently competitive, getting players is rarely a problem. I got a call today from Dell Frazier from Tulsa Oklahoma In 2006 his team lost every game and scored just 1 offensive touchdown. In 2007 after buying my program and putting it in to the letter, his age 10-11 team went 9-1. He was flabbergasted in the first game when they won 20-0, as they scored 3 times as many touchdowns in that one game as they did their entire season the year before. Dell told me not only did all his kids decide to come back, but he has been overwhelmed with new requests to play on his team. He is feeling pressure to take in upwards of 30 kids. The same is true for the group I did the clinic for in Florida last weekend, they are busting at the seams with kids that want to play for them.

How We Did It

My teams were all full by March this year and I added 2 new teams. Our only recruiting effort involved a flyer we distributed at one school. We never even had to run any adds, as we had plenty of people calling us night and day to sign up. We told parents to just send in their checks to reserve their spot and once we got 23-24 kids at each age group, we cut off enrollment and put new signups on a waiting list. The list is designated  based solely on the date when we received their checks at my home. This created quite the race to get checks to my home quickly, to the point we had complete strangers, personally dropping off checks at 9:30 at night and 6:30 in the morning, rather than trusting the timing of the Post Office. I also had a litany of waiting list parents that called me trying to tell me what a great athlete their son was, despite my commitment and stated policy of adding kids based ONLY by the date of receiving checks. Some of these parents seemed visibly put off when I told them “I don’t care if your son is a good athlete or not, it doesn’t matter, we take anyone”.  Maybe it was a misperception of our program on their part or maybe they are just the kinds of parents we hope to avoid, not sure about that one. This is how we managed growth, not by selective recruiting, but by the timing of getting signups in. Be careful if you go the seletive recruiting route, it may create some issues and drama of its own.

Having too many players that want to play in your youth football organization is a great problem to have. We are all tempted to try to help as many kids as we can, but in the end, sometimes what’s best for the long term viability of the organization is slow growth. Quality will always attract quality. Mange this problem carefully, plan ahead for growth and don’t water down the quality of the instruction you can provide.

Copyright 2008 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. Republishing allowed if links are kept intact.

http://winningyouthfootball.com

More Youth Football  Coaching “War” Stories

When we go out to do private clinics, we get a chance to hear some of the most incredible stories from you youth football coaches. Some of what you have to endure might have even made even Old Testament Job wince. I will never forget the story I heard last year from a youth football coach that was running my system for the first time. The head of his organization was against it from the start, the head honcho wanted this team to stick with his “tried and true” Power I. Now mind you, I have nothing against the Power I, we ran it in years past. BUT the Power I was not working with this grouping of kids and this organizations teams were losing consistently, losing big and most importantly, losing players.

Worst to Almost First

Well our friend decided to try our system out of near desperation after yet another losing season. His team went on to post a 9-1 record, a huge improvement over the 2 win season of the previous year.  His team quadrupled it’s offensive production and had 9 different kids scoring touchdowns. You would have thought the head of the organization would have been giving this coach a golden wristwatch and keys to the city right? Nope, he told our friend, “You’ll never beat team X with that offense”, So our heroes team wins 9 games, makes it to the super bowl and loses the championship game, has fun, get’s all the kids involved and retains everyone and all the big cheese can say is “You’ll never beat team X with that offense” ?????

Last Place Coach Advises Super Bowl Coach

Mind you the critic’s team not only did not win a game that season, they only scored 4 touchdowns in THE ENTIRE SEASON. I kid you not, I’m not exaggerating an iota. The gaulle of someone with that kind of scrawny production criticizing a coach that had performed a 180 degree turnaround ? As unbelievable and ridiculous as this may sound, it is oh so true and unfortunately more common than you might think.  Just be prepared to bite your tounge and be diplomatic, there are lots of parents and even coaches out there with no history of success that either think they know more than you or are so jealous of your success, will try and discount it at every turn. All you can do is smile, bite your tongue and hope they read a copy of “Atlas Shrugged” some day.

A ‘Silliness in Youth Football Coaching Award” Warranted

Another story that comes to mind involves another organizational head. I hope I have my facts straight on this one, if I don’t it is real close. Like many organizations, this one fields 2 teams at every age group. While the teams are supposed to be equal, they aren’t, all the returning players are funneled into the “anointed” team, all the leftovers and rookies go to our buddy’s team. Our poor friend knows the only way his team is going to survive with his “land of misfit toys” lineup is to do something different than the other teams in the league. He finds the web site, buys the material, drinks the cool-aid and becomes a believer. As you probably guessed, this team starts off slow, but by seasons end they are the most improved youth football team in the league ( almost all rookie players) and end up 6-2-1 if I remember right, even giving the “anointed” team a very surprising run for their money.

The following season it is the same story, all the best players are cherry picked for the anointed team all the rookies and less athletic kids are “dumped” on this team. On top of this,  the organizational head is so concerned that the ‘leftover” team will beat his anointed team he took 4 additional players away from the leftover team just 1 week before their first game. Can you imagine?  Well our friend ended up having a great season, they beat the anointed team and lost only to the eventual league champion, with a makeshift lineup. Coach told me lots of other coaches in the league would show up to watch his games, not to scout, but to see all the misdirection and precision ball movement of his offense with very average kids. He ended up getting a bunch compliments from a number of his coaching peers last year after these games. My hat goes off to coach for keeping his cool and keeping his focus on the kids and his end goal and not the organizational head or what he didn’t have for players. By staying positive even in the most difficult and silly of circumstances yielded the kids and coaches a season to remember.

Coaching Youth Football in an Upside Down World 

Guys, youth football isn’t perfect. But know if your situation isn’t perfect or if you are getting your heels nipped by those afflicted by the green eyed monster of jealousy, you are not alone. Be prepared for it and expect it, even if you are doing everything right. Keep the end goal in mind and coach your kids up to their fullest potential. Unfortunately that jealousy flaw is part of human nature. Try not to take it personally.

Copyright 2008 Cisar Management, all rights reserved

Republishng allowd if links are kept intact.

http://winningyouthfootball.com

Wading Upstream When Coaching Youth Football

Many “mature” youth football programs that have been around for 10+ years or more often have ingrained traits. Many times it is almost like some of these clubs have their own identity or even “brand”.  Most leagues are made up of various identifiable “brands” or clubs. Each has it’s own unique personality and way of doing things.

Most youth football leagues are made up of a variety of these unique “brands”. There is often friendly and sometimes almost unfriendly and unhealthy competition amongst the coaches of the various clubs.

The Nature of the Beast

As most of you coaches know, it takes quite a bit of time and effort to keep a youth football program up and running. While most of the “heavy lifting” is done by the “parent coaches”, in order for there to be long term stability there has to be continuity and that means some leadership that stay beyond the “lifespan” of their own childrens participation. Unfortunately, for most organizations, those types of resources are somewhat limited. Thank goodness for these people, without them all of us would have to start from scratch every few years.

Unfortunately SOME of those that have been around a long time also bring with them some unneeded baggage that actually inhibit the ability of the organization to meet it’s mission. Some of these well meaning coaches will be coaching against you and they don’t like change or anything that makes their organization shown in a poor light. They will always be your biggest critics. Any type of “change” means they will have to learn how defend a new scheme or defend against techniques they’ve never seen before.

Being a Bit Different

 My own teams are the most filmed, studied and talked about in the league we play in because we run something much different than anyone else, we consistently score a lot of points and we consistently win. I’m sure those opposing coaches get tired of hearing from parents; “Why can’t we execute or score the kind of points the Eagles do? Or why don’t we have those cool football plays like the Eagles? Or why can’t you get the ball to so many players like the Eagles do. Or why can’t our kids block and tackle and play lights out defense like the Eagles do?” They tire of hearing it and sometimes their frustration and embarrassment shows. Unfortunately if these coaches can’t stop you, they will often try to discount you or become the king of the excuse makers.

We get to hear so many interesting stories from you coaches via e-mail, phone and in person at clinics. That is probably the most fun part of me doing this, listening to these amazing stories and in some cases being able to help in a small way. Some of the situations you have to deal with are down right difficult and silly in my opinion. There is often egotism and backside covering in youth football on so many levels. While there are fantastic leagues with great and committed people reaching kids all over the country, on the other hand there are also small minded, egotistical, jealous “human barriers” out there as well.

In doing a few private clinics these last few months I had the privilege of working with  several quality organizations and several groups of simply outstanding coaches. Coaches that not only were great X’s and O’s guys, but guys that were in youth football for the right reasons. Some of the things I saw:  teams that were overflowing with kids, everyone coming back to play ( great retention numbers), enthusiastic coaches, open minded and committed coaching staffs. Universally their kids respected and admired them, very easy group of kids to work with. You could just tell, the kids loved playing the game, they couldn’t wait to get football practice started and they hated it when practice ended. In fact, one group of coaches was able to marshall a group of 20 or so players overnight to a next day practice. This was smack in the middle of baseball and lacrosse season, you know they are doing something right when they can pull that off.

Youth Football Drama Unfolds

One story I have  to share with you that was told to me in the “off-hours” discussions at one of these clinics I did lately by a coach that put our system in last year for the very first time:. After our classroom clinic and on field demos, we went with the coaching staff to a local restaurant for lunch. One of the more demonstrative coaches shared with the group in a very animated fashion several very humorous stories of his first season running my Offense. Last season he was at a game scouting an opponent and overheard several of the coaches from his next weeks opponent, talking about his team. The opponent coaches had no idea our friend was a coach as they unknowlingly bragged to him  about how they were going to crush his team the following week.  These opposing coaches seemed to take such glee in how they were going to stop that ‘silly” offense and blow up the “wedge” play and everything else for that matter with ease. These guys went on and on about how “stupid” the wedge was and how it had no chance of working against their defense. In fact these coaches involved our friend in the conversation, they demonstrated to him how the linemen would get down low and bunch up together, again sarcastically mocking the offense to the hilt. Imagine their shock and horror the following week when they saw this very same coach  come out for the coaches introduction and coin flip.

 Our friend is quite the story teller, he is one of those guys that has everyone laughing and can put you on the edge of your seat, you know the guy, the life of the party. As he told the story he was a flurry of activity, standing up, sitting down, moving around the table, arms flailing, voice rising and falling, and of course lots of smiles and laughter. The game results were almost as interesting as how the story was told. By the time the game started our friend was a little fired up and had his mind made up he was going to start with the wedge play to see if this other team really had all the answers to back up their coaches bravado. The first offensive snap went for a 70 yard wedge touchdown, coach was grinning a bit and pretty happy.  After holding the other team to a 3 and out, the next play for our friends team: you guessed it, a 63 yard wedge touchdown. On the inside, our hero was beaming, throwing his fist in the air, silencing his poorly informed naysayers, but on the outside he was calm and confident, with maybe the hint of a knowing grin on his face.

He thought about running the wedge play every play in that first half to prove a point, but was the better man and held off from what probably was a pretty tempting course of action. By halftime the score was 35-0 and our hero called off the dogs to make it a 42-7 final. At the end of his story I joined the crowd in roaring laughter that was probably so loud it startled a few of the restaurant patrons. Thank goodness it was Florida and we were in a fairly low-key place that this group frequents regularly. I think I laughed so hard part of my lungs are still on the floor somewhere in that restaurant. These weren’t his only critics, in the end his team finished an improbable 14-1. They beat at least 7 teams that had far greater talent than his team, based on the game tapes I watched. This was a magical season by a youth football team that had no winning tradition and excellent coaching.

While I had met some of the coaching staff for this team a number of times (very high quality guys), I had never met this coach. Our introduction included a warm hetrosexual hug, something that comes from sharing a common bond or experience. I’m always a bit surprised by the warm welcomes I get from people I’ve never met. But, being a midwesterner, for me it is one of the biggest benefits of doing what I do.

Know It May Come Your Way

Be prepared, is what I’m trying to get across to you. When you aren’t running the very same thing as most of the teams in your league you can be the target of a few jabs. If you have greater talent than anyone in your league, it makes a lot of sense to run exactly what everyone else is running if that makes you happy. But when you don’t match up, when you DON’T have the best talent, how are you going to be able to compete running the same stuff as most of your opponents?   When you score a lot of points and win a lot of games like many or most of our teams do, the jealousy fangs of some will unfortunately appear. Stay the course, but know those jabs may come your way.

In the end many of the curious and the critics of our hero in this story are now taking his team seriously. When you have success, it is impossible to ignore no matter how much anyone would like to. The teams in this Club that ran our system went a combined 23-1 and now other teams in the club are looking to adopt some of what they are doing. I know this coach is forever grateful to the coach (KMJ) that brought this system into this organization. I’m sure the parents are glad that coach was open minded enough to listen to the coach (KMJ) that researched . learned and brought the system to his attention as well. Mind you, I am NOT taking credit for this teams success, the coaches and players did a simply superb job, their execution was nearly flawless.

If you have any similar stories, please share them with us.

Copywright 2008 Cisar Management, all rights reserved

Republishing allowed if links are kept intact

http://winningyouthfootball.com