Foundation of Joy

Jurgen Klinsmann should have been the next US coach. Too bad. He get's it. He recently said that the US system is failing, and we are on the wrong road toward healthy player development.

Look at soccer in the US. Imagine a pyramid with competition being the highest level of soccer and team practices being the second level, generally this is the limit to kid's experience today.

But there is a third layer, a "lost foundation," of free play and individual skills mastery (deliberate practice). This foundation, is what kids are best at. It is the the learning and socializing on the neighborhood parks in free play. And, is also perfecting that free throw all by yourself until you get it right. If you play sports, this time spent is the best of your lives. Time and time again great players site these foundational hours as their favorite, and the key to their creative development. I like to call this the "Foundation of Joy."

This foundation should be the first priority. Without this foundation of joy, kids miss out on the most important hours of skill development, creative skills, enjoyment and learning. Yet in the US this foundation is given almost no attention.

Free play alone does not develop players, recent studies on expertise point to deliberate practice, a vastly different thing then you are likely to find at your typical soccer club. It's sometimes fun, sometimes hard work, all the time challenging and improving performance.

So development must be carefully balanced, U10's spend much greater time at free play as they build social and technical strengths, they participate in very little DP, while a U18 may have the balance of their training focused in Deliberate Practice and performance improvement.

Recent studies using hockey have shown that those who participated in the most free play (pond hockey) as kids were able to handle the increasing amounts of Deliberate Practice as they became young adults. These players were least likely to burnout, more likely to continue playing and enjoy the game for life.

So Play, that relaxed, just for the fun of it time, turn out to be hours that once established, give us the power to charge through that hard work that comes later. Free play inoculates us from burn out.

In the mean time it would be easy for me as a coach to prop up a group of U12's with tough deliberate practice, and they would likely do well--for a while.

Thisis what is happening here. Our best players train hard and early under expensive coaching. And this is how the Pyramid in the US is upside down: because the competition is ramped up early, deliberate practice is ramped up early. The fun goes out the window at U12 were winning and performance is the goal, little time spent in play, worse, it is often by coaches held to be mindless.

However by the time they are 16 they have little left to give. There is not that foundation of play to draw on and the burnout begins.

So when that kid says "it's just not fun anymore," what they are really saying is that in order to find their way through to the next level they have to put in more ours where soccer is fun, they can build their creativity and find their game again.

Write the book

I was playing pick up hockey the other day. We call it pick up, pay $5 bucks and there we have it. There was a guy flying around the ice smooth as silk. The puck made no sound against his stick as he cupped and dragged it all the time spinning and shifting always toward the goal. As he approached defenders he shifted down lower and seemed to get even smoother as he hit another gear.

One of the guys next to me said, "that guy plays like a ranger, don't he?" Meaning he plays like someone from the Iron Range where he grew up on pick up rather than instructional style youth hockey, his skating, puck handling was his own, smoother, cleaner more efficient, more skillful, and somehow suited just for him. A player like that would bedevil anyone, he was not playing hockey taught from the book, he was writing the book. I thought the comment nailed him, and what better compliment can we give to someone.

How does pick up and free play develop exactly? How does it teach the highest skill levels? How do we replicate it so that kids in soccer, hockey and all sports experience that joy?

Is instruction and drills even worth it at all? How exactly did this guy get to skate so well?

In the next few weeks I want to look closely at the learning behind pick up. How does it work, what are the essential and non essential ingredients? Is it relevant today? Can kids today find that joy? How do we get kids to write their own book? Let's see...

the myth of talent

"Talent is what gets you beat."
--Herb Brooks



"The ability to work hard is the greatest talent of all"
--John McEnroe


How often we label kids talented without really understanding what it is. Because we don't understand it, we tend to mishandle it.

Correct accumulated Practice.
I was at a late night white castle (don't ask). The burger maker was unfolding, flipping and stuffing hamburgers into boxes at the speed of light, her hands were a blur. She was smiling the whole time--man, she was good and she knew it. "Wow you are fast!" i said. She smiled and glanced up but a coworker spoke for her: "Oh yeah, she's really talented."

Wait a second, talented? How did she get this good? Was she born to do this? Or was it the repitition? Is our special talent out there waiting for us? If so how do we find it? Or do we work at it?

Putting burgers in a box or kicking a soccer ball, they both begin and live in the brain. by sending the neural signals out to her hands those signals flow through a pathway to her hands at a faster speed than you or I, at least for this specific task. Those patterned movements are flowing from her brains to her hands so much they create a high speed super highway made strong through the correct pattern movements, signals and feedback fly back and forth to the brain. She gets to a point where the signals are faster than her recognition skills. She now puts burger in boxes "without thinking."

In soccer terms a technique grooved correctly over time becomes a skill used in the game and done quickly. Ask a great player how he did something, chances are he will tell you he doesn't know. Those impulses that go to the brain on you and me are basically skipping the brain. They are doing it without thinking.

"When you start thinking, you hurt the ball club."
-- my dad

Technique should focus the early years on perfection, not speed. Younger talented kids tend to dominate with aggressiveness and speed. They want to go fast. These kids often have difficulty slowing down to perfect something. Shooting, receiving and ball handling need to be grooved as perfectly like a Federer forehand. Once grooved then pressure should be introduced. First space, then time, then defender. Finally, using correct accumulated practice Perceptual and cognitive skills such as cue recognition, pattern recognition and knowledge of situational probabilities are acquired through baby steps of small sided practice, 1v0 to 2v2 to 3v3 and futsal.

Over and over they make correct responses. This is correct practice being accumulated. This is hard work --what we see is what we call talent. Kids, even young ones who seem like they can step on a field and do their thing naturally, should be credited with the work that got them there. It's not something magical, they played at it, they worked at it, they loved it, they repeated it, that's why they are good at it. They are in control of their talent through correct accumulated practice. As coaches and parents we should always understand and give credit where credit is due.

Let kids play, work and try, always let them know they are the ones in control. Where they require mentoring is in fixing little technical issues, slowing things down, giving them more challenging tasks to perfect when ready.

Then repeat a little faster.
Sometimes I tell the white castle story to 12 year olds who are working Brazilian tech training. I want them to accomplish it perfect, and faster. "Get those burgers in the box!" I say. (meaning do it faster). When I do that I do accomplish the final objective, they are doing it perfect, faster and now with a smile on their face. Kids like to be good at it. They like to be fast. They like to accumulate practice and will smile and enjoy it. They like to see what they can do.

Our special talent is what we love. Or, looking at it another way, talent is loving what we do. By loving it we work and play at it. We enjoy getting better and seeing what we can do.

If we understand, nurture and reward the work and play involved in creating what we call talent, then someday we will all put balls in the net as easily as burgers in a box!

Best soccer is closest to home

I was invited once to serve on a panel for MYSA winter symposium. The topic was recruiting and the the question put to the panel was is recruiting best for the kids? Does it assure development? The three other panelist all agreed that given the correct environment the best players get better when playing together. Yes, was the general answer.

"No" is said.

"Recruiting the best kids create the best teams RIGHT NOW, but they do not assure those players, currently the best of the best, will develop to their fullest potential, in fact, it's likely that they will not. "

The best soccer is played closest to home, I said.

Soccer in the basement is better than soccer in the backyard. Soccer in the backyard is better than soccer at the neighborhood park. Soccer at the neighborhood park is better than that at your local club, and your local club is better than the elite team across town.

By moving across town to play for the elite teams, especially at the younger ages, players are taking a huge risk with their development. Here's why:


1. Time
Zidane, De Stefano, Puskas, Cruyff, Maradonna, they all played at their local street as much as they could. They were not in their cars driving to White Bear Lake, they were out their doors and on the street. The closer to home the more time to invent, and create. By the time kids are eight we are loading them into cars. Remember those pesky 10,000 hours.

2. Honest, correct feedback
I warn coaches that coach to kid feedback is like a long range walkie talkie, lots of static with only some of the words get through. Kid to Kid feedback is like a broadband connection, it's immediate, fast, clear, and brutally honest. Feedback, as they say, is the breakfast of champions. Closer to home are the people you trust and understand and respect--giving feedback even more power. Far from home, playing with a person who is good but doesn't know you too well--that person will hold back feedback--good and bad, tempering the time spent learning.

3. Locus of control
Playing close to home kids will likely feel in control. They decided to play, they put in the effort, their organization, effort, leadership and play improves the game--they are in control of their development. By taking the kid across town that locus become about the new environment. The control is passed to the coach or other outside agent. Kids start to believe that only this new environment--be it the elite club across town, or the great coach with the powerful team is the next step to get to the highest level. But with the player feeling in less control the hope of getting to the next level is left to chance as much as anything else.


4. Friends
Baby bears wrestle with each other to prepare themselves for the fighting skills required as they grow. Play, especially in a team sport setting similarly allows kids to experiment on the skills required to be successful in life: Respect of others, giving your best effort, balancing hard competition with play, experimenting and acceptance. If you have friends that are near by you are more likely to bring out the best in each other.

5. Fun Environment
By playing with friends and family close to home you create an environment that sets the example and consistently produces excellent learning and growing experiences. Most of all this is fun, and fun is now associated with learning and getting better. These experiences are what we drive our kids all over town for--learning a how to Cruyff spin effectively is likely to have many more repetitions outside your house as at the game in White bear. Because they want it to continue kids learn to care for and shape that precious environment, they understand innately that without that perfect balance their learning (and fun) stops--it can really become a living thing. Kids today are not that different and if given the chance would love the opportunity to try it.

Elite kids
Kids playing elite leagues suffer this more than anyone. Imagine what your local neighborhood game would be like if the best two players were sent across town? Chances are those players were the organizers, leaders, holding up the tradition, without them the local game dies out. And the elite players themselves are missing touches, honest feedback, and the chance to experiment with friends and family. I have seen many, many kids recruited away to join elite teams, I have rarely seen continued growth--it's more common to see their development flatline. This will always hold the US back.

Advice?
Play with your kids, don't try to teach them. Play to win, that's important, winning is not. Enjoy yourself, experiment with what you can do with a ball, keep learning, as a kid or an adult show inquisitiveness. Play pick up yourself and enjoy it. Keep kids where they are. Be confident they can learn where they are. Don't buy into the calls of the elite club--did Tony Sanneh move across town to play? Did Victor Kasanezky? No they played with friends, a lot.

Of course they need good skills and solid coaching, especially early should be found, but it should only be technical. Don't push, let the kids drive it, until they are 16 or 17, they don't need to go anywhere--just play and play a lot.

Look out for your club. Are they about teams or about people? Do they develop? Or do they go through the motions? Is there leadership on board? Is it about the kids? Or is it about their kids? If all the clubs (and a lot of work needs to be done here) are strong, there is no need for moving across town.

One of the panelists stopped me afterward, he currently runs a large elite club, and in no way do I begrudge him. This is what he believes is best for kids, interestingly, he turned to me after the discussion "Ted, I always enjoy your thoughts, but I don't get half of what you say."

Oh well, can't win 'em all. Just keep trying.

Building the player from the inside out

"67, Chevy Impala convertible. Vintage beauty, must see. Ready to roll!"


Old Blue was not quite this nice, but I always told everyone it's what's on the inside that counts...


Winnipeg
Once a group of us wanted to play in a prize money tournament in Winnipeg. It included the best club teams from Winnipeg, Ontario proper and Thunder bay. Anyone want to go? We enlisted 11 committed players, a keeper and 10 field players.

How do we get there?
The guys from the suburbs guys were going up together in one car. It was Thursday. We needed a ride for the other 6 by Friday afternoon.

My Brother Glenn, and I lived on Lake and Knox, famously right on the corner of Lake Calhoun in Uptown. It was August 1 and hot! they were rolling out the tents for the Uptown Art fair, it would be a good time to escape the city. So, Thursday night, still no plan for how we were getting to Winnepeg when we rented a movie called "Something Wild." In the movie, Melanie Griffith takes Jeff Daniels on a road trip to a high school reunion in a series of beater convertibles.

The next day Glenn called. "I have an idea, I saw a nice convertible for sale"

Nice?

I was at "Ron and Arnie's Used cars,"on east lake street, looking at the 67 baby blue chevy impala convertable, amble rust around the wheel wells, the sales man flashing his hand at me, "from the inside out baby! From the inside out!" He open the hood to show me the engine I knew nothing about, "and that's a rare z series electro-glide 2000 (or something like that) transmission. It's what's on the inside that counts!"

I handed over 9 one hundred dollar bills and rolled out of the lot.

It was 5 PM. At 6 PM six of us climbed in, three in the front, three in the back with room to spare, top down, to drive the 500 miles through the august night to Winnipeg.

"old Blue," was a good car. It got us there and back and served us well. Never quite the internal fortitude Arne sold me on, but that saying "from the inside out," stayed with me.

Just because Arne was stretching the truth dosen't mean he wasn't on to something...

What we CAN see is not important
So often the first thing we worry about is what we CAN see, uniforms, warm ups, equipment, marketing, elite team level, or whatever. The message we send is get the outside right and it proves the inside is solid. But what is really important? It's what's on the inside. Even skill and athleticism pail to the power of will, as Jose Mourinho says, you only need two things to be a player: you need to be able TO do it, and you need to WANT to do it.

The 11 of us who made that trip all wanted to do it. We were all were strong on the inside. We filled up Old blue with leaded gas, and each of us filled up our emotional fuel tank. And with a powerful inside engine, a little fuel goes a long way.

With kids, building that love of the game is our first and most important task. Much effort should be paid to balancing appropriate challenge and ability levels to help them find success. As they find success, however small, fill up that emotional fuel tank then set them off on a trip. Add the support and belief of others and they will get there.


How did we do?
Of 64 teams we ended up losing in the semi finals. Everyone of those players loved the game, they were solid people. Several of those players became the spine of the first Thunder team. To this day when we meet we chuckle over that weekend, the effort so beautifully pictured by our bench: 11 bags and no coach.

Keep working at it
The tournament director was at the podium, he was holding up 6 beautiful blue Adidas bags and 6 ugly brown bowling bags. He was announcing the sportsmanship award... "this goes to the best sports... eh, the ones who show us what soccer is all aboot!"

The beauty of Canadian tournaments is the sense of community and history, they always hold these big social Banquets. The DJ had stopped playing Madonna's "Holiday," the basement room of the Winnepeg Ritz was quiet with anticipation as the Director paused dramatically. The 11 of us watched and hoped.

"The award goes to the St. Paul Internationals!"

We rushed the stage, and in front of the entire tournament, wrestled between us over the 6 blue bags. So much for sportsmanship.

We do our best, but we all have things to work on. But with the inside set right we will do OK.

"if a had to pick one single reason for my love of sport..."

If I had to give one single reason for my love of sports it would be this: I love the tests of the human spirit. I love to see defeated teams refuse to die. I love to see impossible odds confronted. I love to see impossible dares accepted. I love to see the incredible grace lavished on simple plays—the simple flashing beauty of perfect form—but, even more, I love to see the heart that refuses to give in, refuses to panic, seizes opportunity, slips through defenses, exerts itself far beyond capacity, forges momentarily of its bodily habitat an instrument of almost perfect will. In all my life I have never known such thoroughly penetrating joys as playing with an inspired team against a team we recognized from the beginning had every reason to beat us. I love it when the other side is winning and there are only moments left; I love it when it would be reasonable to be reconciled to defeat, but one will not, cannot; I love it when a last set of calculated, reckless, free, and impassioned efforts is crowned with success. When I see others play that way, I am full of admiration, of gratitude. That is the way I believe the human race should live. When human beings actually accomplish it, it is for me as if the intentions of the Creator were suddenly limpid before our eyes: as though into the fiery heart of the Creator we had momentary insight.

- The Joy of Sports by Michael Novak

Little Hawks

A new coach once looked at a Blackhawks program, seeing the players perform fimiliar step overs they commented dismissively "well, the moves are generic aren't they?" In a way that is true, there is nothing new under the sun and for Blackhawks or Coerver to claim a movement or special skill is missing the point. The movement is an external manifestation of what is going on in the brain. Once the movement is completed the player then assesses how it went. It was cool! It was fun! I did it! The important thing is not the physical movement, it's what happens in the hearts and minds of the young kids as they recognize that they are in control. If you don't understand that you will simply force feed kids something you want--not what they want. What is important thing is building an early love of learning and enjoyment with the ball. Feelings are important to learning. This is why Little hawks and Blackhawk programs are successful: They prioritize the person as they build the player from the inside out.

This is priority one with our youngest players. Next, we set about designing a curriculum that provides opportunities for growth. Dr. Marianne Torbert of Temple University has identified three interrelated concepts that when applied to play activities enhance and increase the growth and development of children. I teach these concepts to our developmental and Little Hawk coaches to consider in developing and executing training sessions:

1. Expansion --anything that increases the number of potential growth experiences.

Reduce lines, lectures, waiting. Provide many opportunities to work and learn with the ball. For little Hawks this means as much time with the ball as possible.

2. Equalization --equal opportunity for kids of all experience, gender, size and level. Children have the right to participate in activities at their own ability level.

Allow for different levels of challenge to match the different abilities. How do we do this? All our games provide repetitive opportunities without exclusion. If we play knock out for instance, we allow the players to come back into the game with a special skill activity. It means no exclusionary games.

3. Interactive Challenges. Players participating at their personal level contribute to the growth of other players who may be a level above or a level below.

This is very important and rarely understood correctly. . Almost everyone understands part of the getting something out of it by playing "up" players see a faster level, they are nudged to speed up and grow their game. The misunderstanding is that only you cannot learn anything by "playing down." Perhaps the greatest dribbler of all time, Garincha, integral in the world cups of '58 and '62 for Brazil would take his ball to the school yard to practice with children! Of course he was probably keeping the ball in the face of 100 kids making the task complex, but he must have gotten something important from those kids.

Playing at a level below is the most misunderstood and perhaps the most integral piece of player development. Think street. As a youngster you must at some point step on the field for the first time. Someone on that pitch is a level or two (or three!) above you. They accept you on the field. They act as mentor, leader, keeper of the game. If they are playing against you they will beat you off the dribble. They will practice the most difficult tasks against the lowest level players, learning what they can do and taking risks.

Kids who understand this get more practice, create a larger repertoire of movements, recognize the recurring situations and tend to rise to the highest level. Unfortunately the opposite is true. Often kids will drop out of games with younger kids, to them it's lame, it's not their fault, they lack the capacity to create and only enjoy competing, because they have nothing to learn they are bored and the game is not fun. These players often struggle when they get older as ball comfort and creativity becomes more important.

The Achievement of this concept is a critical element for successful youth coaching. All teams have players with a wide range of abilities, and it's the responsibility of the educator to stimulate growth of each player. Providing activities that pose interactive challenges enables each player to participate at their own level while stimulating the growth of other players with whom they interact.

How do we do this? The game of Crab soccer is a good example. As the game progresses, players of lesser ability become the first additional crab while the players of greater ability find the dribbling challenge increase as more and more players become crabs. They get a more complex challenge to match their current ability level.

Build the player from the inside out then provide a healthy, safe and nurturing environment with plenty of opportunities to learn and grow. The hard part is the execution. It's not easy to make this all happen and it's taken me many years striving to get it right. As a wise old Swedish coach once told me about teaching kids:"it's good work, but it's hard work."

To read more on the topic of youth development follow my Blog called "Joy of the People," at joyofthe people.blogspot.com