We all have fear and failure

You know that we all have fear and failure.  Sometimes we get fixated on just winning championships and while we are very proud of that, sometimes those wins are empty.  As I suggested in the earlier blog, what do we become as a result of the chase?  How did you get there?  How did you treat your players during that time?

Here's some of the best advise that I can share with you that was shared with me a long time ago.  Know that there is a 1/3 of the people that you meet that will be trying to drag/bring you down.  They will be trying to take the life out of you.  Selfish people, trying to only look out for themselves.
There is also the middle 1/3.  These are the ones who just go with the flow.  At the beginning of the season for example they are at the top 1/3.  When you are undefeated, when everyone is starting the game, going to be all league performer, they love the coach, the team, the school, the whole world!

But during the middle part of the season it isn't going so well.  That middle 1/3 now go to the bottom 1/3.  A person not starting anymore, goes to the bottom 1/3.  Your at the bottom of the conference race, they go to bottom 1/3.

Then you have the top 1/3.  These are the players that go out and give you all they have each day, they give you energy every day.

You must learn to build armor.  Protect yourself from the bottom 1/3, the people that talk negative, the school administration, maybe even your own team.  Don't bring that bottom 1/3 home with you.  Everything that you have done that day is going to be second guessed by the bottom 1/3 that day.

Key to remember to enjoy your coaching:
A.  Don't let the bottom 1/3 drain the life out of you.
B.  The middle 1/3 are interchangeable, they will go with the flow.
C.  The top 1/3 will always give you the energy on good and bad days.

Ask yourself who are you going to protect yourself from personally and professionally?
How are you going to do that?

Each of us have a strong voice and weak voice.  I was thankful that early in my life I was surrounded by people who taught me to believe in myself.  You have to master this ability to have a strong voice to stay at the top of any profession.  But each of us has a dark side that we have, that weak voice.  Things like I want to quit, I am horrible, I don't look good, we can't win, etc.

Ask yourself are you contributing to your players weak voice?
How can you help them build that strong voice?

So here is the trick, to know when this is happening to the player and give them a solution on the spot so that they can correct during each of their moments in their lives.  For example, I provide each of my players during a workout for example, when things are tough, I want them to ask themselves a better question.  I want them to listen to the weak voice, I don't want them to ask themselves bad questions, like why am I missing the shot?  Their weak mind will tell them dark things, like you are too slow, not quick enough, you don't want to be here, why are you here?  Instead, I want them to ask themselves a better question.  Such as, what can I do to make this basket?  Now their mind will listen to the strong voice, the one that is providing solution, it will come up with solutions, like shoot the ball higher, snap the wrist, quicker.

Our real goal is to provide our players with a belief in themselves.  We have to create conditions for them to do that.  We have to give them a blue print to follow.  We must convince them when they can't see yet.

I know each of us have done this in some form or fashion, you probably didn't realize it, but you were giving your players a blue print for how to handle things, like the creating of belief in the pressure moments:  Something like this has gone on in each of your locker rooms.

We have been here before.  This helps your players reflect on the past and to know what each of them do well.
You are here again.  Reminding them of their good , why they have earned the right to be proud of where they are at.
Now let's go out there and show them.  Let's have some fun.  Giving your players the right to belief, and know that everyone will celebrate on the other side of reaching this success.

I also spoke in one of the earlier blogs as well about failure and how much of a role I believe it played into each of my practices, learning from it daily.  We as coaches get comfortable talking about winning no problem, but we can't really talk about the failures with such ease.

I wanted to make sure that each day in practice there was a built in disadvantage in practice where we were going to have to focus on failure recovery.  We had to learn how to handle it, not only by being placed in difficult situations but to each other, by saying my bad, next play, and perhaps a fist pump to signify that we are moving on, teammates saying, we got you.

I used a 2 minute drill in practice where there was going to be a clear failure recovery system in place and the pace would just dictate day to day who was feeling better, who shot better, attrition was in place, you name it.  If you want more details just email me and I will send to you:  Coach Saintignon email

The last thing I want to leave you with is the notion of leaving a lasting legacy.  We all hear of this?  What is it?  You know that we each get a sentence out of our life that will be summed up by our players.  Think about someone who has died, and you walk up to them and ask them who was it, they will give you and entire life of that person who lived, summed up into one sentence.  Coach Bob, he was a great coach.  So you get the idea, we only get one sentence.

I have been on the journey.  You will be remembered by how you treat those players that were under your supervision.  How you think, act, speak, that is your pattern of behavior.  That becomes your character and thus your legacy.

What's your sentence going to be?

Coach Saintignon
OC Magic Basketball

Achievement, the truth.

Are you like the many who believe that reaching success brings you happiness?

All of us having something that is missing from our lives.  We think that if we achieve the hole will be filled up and we will feel better about ourselves.  We think people will look at us differently, or we are going to get to a level where we feel complete as a person.

But really what happens is the more success you have the more driven you become for the wrong reasons, you become unhappy.  Chasing the championship doesn't happen right away, so when you finally do win it all after taking years of work, you might reflect and think that you were looking at it the wrong way.

Achievement brought me for example, to think more about my purpose in life and what I was doing as a coach because once I began to win, it didn't fill the void of what I thought was going to come of it.  I thought I was going to feel differently.

You can get to a point of now what enters your mind.  You might think of a parade coming for you and really it's just back to getting ready for the next season all of a sudden.  You ask yourself, now what?

I read a book on University of North Carolina Soccer Coach, Anson Dorrance, who has won so many national titles, more than 20.  I read where after they win a title, a symbol that he gives his players, is a rose.  To symbolize that the feeling of winning the title won't last long.  Think back to your last achievement?  How long did that feeling last?

Sometimes you feel relief instead of joy.  I remember coaching under tremendous stress in the Middle East as I took a team that the ownership wanted me to get to the Playoffs, talk about pressure, I had just walked into this job.  I didn't have the luxury of training camp, of getting to know players, I was a replacement coach at the end of the year, fixing the problems left by the prior coach who was just fired and trying to get us into the playoffs.  I did succeed, but I remember the feeling of happiness for everyone around, but for me was relief.  I couldn't enjoy the feeling that I should have been experiencing until the end of the season upon reflection as to what was accomplished.

Sometimes we will tie happiness to our level of achievement.  Like getting caught up in winning instead of getting to know our players.  Like winning back to back titles.  I know that the way to really go about it, is to judge how you did by clearly knowing did you fulfill the potential of your team.  But we all know that's not what happens.

We get into comparing.  Like when you hear of announcers who say that this player just willed the ball into the basket, refused to lose, there are a number of these lines that all announcers use from time to time.  Sounds great, but as a coach and a player listening, you think to yourself, what sometimes I want to win? Sometimes don't?  I want to will the basket and refuse to lose as well.  That's the worst thing is to hear and start to get into comparisons.  You and your team have great drive and passion, but if you don't win the championship it's not a reflection of who you are as a person.

We can get focused on winning and not people.  Many times especially if you have been winning, the expectation will be for you to continue to win.  If you were number 1 you were supposed to win, if you don't win, you will be criticized for not winning.  The classic no win situation.  Focus on the development of your players and not on the winning.

You will enjoy the journey as you Pursue Your Passion!

Coach John Saintignon
Coach Saintignon
OC Magic
@stignon

What do people remember?

Let me tell you, many coaches just don't really pay attention to this side of the game.  But I want you to at least think of how these questions pertain to you and pertain to your athletes.

Ask yourself, do you feel like your identity is tied to your results?  Like if you play well, you feel good.
Do you see results out of your control?
Do you see how you are allowing something that is outside of your control to affect the way you feel about yourself as person?

Most of us will have answered this with a yes.  This is where we can begin.  On common ground to discover truly what people remember.

Ask yourself now who was the leading scorer in the NCAA 3 years ago?
What is the name of your favorite teacher?
Why did you pick that teacher?

You discovered like many of us, we don't know who the leading scorer was in our own sport!  That is a common answer.  But each of us can pick that special teacher.  Usually because the teacher got to know the student.  There are many responses that can be had, see if you think of any of these?  Supportive, got to know me, made learning fun, challenged me, helped me.  Sound familiar?

What was the purpose of those questions?  Who was the leading scorer, favorite teacher, how come you picked them?  It's a reminder.

What do people forget?
What do people remember?

1.  People forget stats.
2.  People remember who you were as a person.

How do you want to be remembered?

Value the person more than the player.  Our identity, if it's tied to you as a player then you will feel dejected if you miss the shot.  If the identity is in yourself as a person, then you will be able to show how to bounce back, how to use the adversity.  Totally different way of approaching and looking at it.

Focus on Character skills:  There are Performance skills and moral skills.  Pick a few.  Performance skills such as to name a few:  hardworking, resilient, competitive, positive, etc.  Moral skills such as:  unselfish, trustworthy, respectful, caring, etc.

Ask yourself can these skills be developed?

What about the performance skill you selected, if you developed it, would it make you a better player?
What about the moral skills you selected, if you developed those, would it make you a better teammate?
If you grow these skills it actually makes you a better player and teammate which will lead to better results.

Let's not forget that developing the character of our athletes is more important than the play they run, or the points they score.  If you focus in on the character development, you will get better results.  The players want the better results, what you as a coach have to develop is the Character Development to help them get there as well as the skill development.

Give this some serious thought.  What are your thoughts?

Coach John Saintignon
John Saintignon
Orange County Magic Basketball
Twitter
Facebook

A Hero's Journey

60-or-so years ago, a writer named Joseph Campbell traveled the globe researching the greatest "Heroes" in our history:  People like:

Moses

Buddha

St. Anthony

Prometheus

Osiris

People like that. Legends.

Mr. Campbell broke down the common paths that every single one of those Heroes followed on their way to legend-status.  And created what we now call "The Hero's Journey."

Here's the basic idea:  At some point in our lives, we are all "called” to do something.

It might be to travel.  It might be to write a book.  Or, it MIGHT be… Basketball.

Doesn't matter:

We are ALL hard-wired to feel this "call" deep down inside of us.   Something pulling us into action, pulling us to become who we are "meant to be."

We don't have a choice in this, either.

It's been programmed into us through decades of  rituals where:

• A young man is sent into the jungle for the first time - alone - to bring back food for his tribe, or die in the process.

• An apprentice travels far and wide to meet "the teacher", who then puts him through dozens of intense trials before he is finally allowed to learn his craft.  I can relate to this one with my Karate Sensei’s, :)

• A boy living under a set of stairs gets a letter from an owl summoning him to a world-famous school of witchcraft and wizardry where he continuously battles a series of dark and powerful forces, before finally defeating the un-nameable superpower who threatens to destroy the world if no one stops him. 

This "call to action" happens to everyone, whether we like it or not. 

Those who REFUSE the call never get to go through their own personal series of trials; Never conquer their own "Hero's Journey.” And are now stuck in purgatory for the rest of their lives:

Never quite becoming who they ARE, deep down.  Never quite realizing their dreams.  Never experiencing the life they could have lived.

Actually, here are Mr. Campbell’s exact words:

"Often in actual life, we encounter the dull case of the call unanswered; for it is always possible to turn the ear to other interests. Refusal of the summons converts the adventure into its negative.  Walled in boredom, the subject becomes a victim.  His flowering world becomes a wasteland of dry stones and his life feels meaningless. Whatever house he builds, it will be a house of death. All he can do is create new problems for himself and await the gradual approach of his disintegration.”

- Joseph Campbell

The Hero with A Thousand Faces, 1949

Harsh - and wise - words.

And here's where you come in:

Someday, you're going to be "called" to do something.

I can't tell you what that thing is.  But if you're here, reading this right now, I'm guessing you've already had your first call and it won't be your last.

The future holds many, MANY more adventures.

And when those calls come, just remember:

The journey is NOT optional.

Not for a True Elite.

But your journey today:

Finding the best training and coaching available seeking out the best players to match up against.  Like this Saturday at J Serra High School at 10 a.m., where we have NBA players, college and high school players all playing on the court; on their quest to be the best.  Exposing yourself to high pressure game situations drilling yourself every single day, alone, in the gym never backing down from a single challenge along your path.  And, finally becoming the player (and PERSON) you're meant to be. 

Like I said:

If you're here, right now, reading this.  Your call to action has already come!

All you have to do now is take it.

We have a few of our players on that Hero's Journey right now, Gage, Luis, Ivan, Gianni, Ryan, Andre, Clarissa, Julia, Spider, Amazon.  

Coach John Saintignon

Coach John Saintignon

Twitter

Orange County Magic Basketball, Inc.

Pursue your Passion!

What players on a team think?

Yesterday, I had a great conversation with several of our coaches on Orange County Magic who are navigating their respective High school teams and their formation and organization challenges that are going to come up.  How many players to keep on a team?

Now each coach has their own perspectives on their formation of their teams and why they do what they do.  I personally didn't want to carry more than 12 players.  I wanted the team to have enough to count on each other, keep rooming lists even, and to make sure that I had the 12 that were committed to the team.  But there are some interesting ideas as it relates to this as I posed with my experience in High School and then going to the PAC-10 conference where I heard this term, minutes.

Before I go into that, I want to share with you what I shared with Coach Sean and Coach Ron.  Some questions that I asked them to ask of their players.  I did this when I was a high school coach and also with my individual meetings with players in the PAC 10 and my professional teams abroad to get my own perspective so that I could get to the heart of things as we entered into the season.

Teams are fragile.  If for example you carried 12 players as was usual with my team, here is what I discovered, see if this is true with your own experiences?

Players 9-12 want to play.  Players 6-8 want to start.  Players 4-5 want more shots.  Players 2-3 want to be the best player.  And the best player wants to play at the next level.  This was true of my high school teams, NCAA Division 1 and 2 and of course, even my professional teams abroad.

There is nothing wrong with this as you have been teaching your players all along to want more, to strive.  It becomes a problem when it outweighs the teams needs.  You know everyone needs to sacrifice for your team to be successful.  Your players need to see this and feel that they are part of the solution.

Here is how I got to the heart of the matter.  Try this.  Ask your players these questions and see what you discover.

1.  How many minutes will you average this year?
So of course, this varies if you are a high school coach because the maximum amount of minutes that you can hand out is 160 minutes (5 players x 32 minute game), if you are a college or overseas coach the maximum you can hand out is 200 minutes ( 5 players x 40 minute game).  Ask your players this question, how many minutes will you average this year and then add up all those minutes.  I usually discovered about 300 minutes was the norm.  OK,  that was impossible.

2.  Next question that I would ask.  Will you start?
In basketball you can only start 5 players, but the responses were usually around 9 players who believed they should or would start.  Again impossible.

3.  How many points are you going to average?
When I added this up, we were always going to be the highest scoring team in the country, :).  I tell you.  Usually added up to nearly 160 points per game.  Again not impossible, but you know.

What this proved to me and my coaching staff was that we needed to really address the players that sacrifices were going to have to be made by all, roles were going to have to be embraced and rewarded, recognized by the coaching staff.

This type of early discussion allowed everyone to feel that they had a role and an important part that was going to be rewarded and recognized.  These were daily efforts on our behalf to make sure we paid attention to all these little details in terms of player relations on and off the court to make sure we were centered and ready to drive toward our goals together as a team.

Before the other distractions come, you know outside expectations :)

Here is Coach Bill Parcells, I know it's a football hall of fame speech, but the message is clear about the locker room, the sacrifices that a team makes, why it is special and how winners and losers handle things.  Enjoy.

Bill Parcells What Makes a Team Great

Let me know your thoughts.  I love hearing from you.

Coach John Email

Pursue your Passion!

Coach John Saintignon
John Saintignon
Orange County Magic Basketball

What is your master plan?

OK, so where do we begin the season?  How do we make sure that we are teaching our players all that they need to know for a successful season?  How do you stay on track?

You need to start.  You need to create a master plan so that you have a reference point to look at.  Really, to keep on track and stay on track.  Sometimes we as coaches tend to focus on a few things and run out of time during the season and don't cover something and wish we had.

I learned how to get this done as I was a high school coach and visiting clinics and hearing NCAA coaches at UNC and UCLA talk about it, but how did they put it together?  That was never shared?  How much time did they spend on things?  I asked them for information and dug deeper as I had a thirst for how to become the best coach that I could become.

Here is what I put together after gathering information from many coaches across the country.

Coach Saintignon Master Plan for Basketball

I used this especially during the season to make sure that I was staying on track.  One thing you will have to keep in mind is that you will always have to modify, adjust and adapt.  This is true in all things.

University of North Carolina Practice

Coach Bobby Knight Indiana University
*Please note that there are typos, this was a document sent to me, so I had no control over the spelling.

This gives you a little idea to help you during your season in your preparation phase.  Should anyone want more, please email me at johnsaintgnon@gmail.com and I would be happy to help in anyway that I can.

Pursue your Passion!
Coach John Saintignon
OC Magic
Coach John Saintignon

Winning, Losing, Results

So we are at that time of year where as a coach and player there is the talk about winning and losing and the results that are being produced is at the forefront of many discussions.  There are many things that can derail us as coaches, players that I want to see if I can remind to see if this helps a bit.

As I stated before all of us can get off the rails so to speak and get caught up in disappointment because of the thinking that we can win, or deserve more.  We can lose sight and turn away from what is most important during the course of the season.

We all experience success, we all have an ego that say we deserve this or that.  We believe that maybe we are talented enough that we can maybe take it easy here or there, ease up on some of the development that should be occurring or the training that should be happening.

One of my greatest moments of coaching was the time that I spent learning from Coach John Wooden.  As I was coming up and winning, thinking that what we did was a direct result of my teaching, etc., Coach spoke in parables, quotes, and with poems.  One in particular that has become my favorite that he usually recited to me to make his point, was "IF" by Kipling.  I was reminded that winning and losing were impostors.  To treat them both the same, according to Coach Wooden, he used to tell me that you are not as good as people say you are and your not as bad as they say either.  The players that you work with on a daily basis, they are why you coach.  They are under your supervision and are you giving them the attention that they deserve and not just only talking about winning or losing and the end game, the results.  Are you concerned with them as individuals as this is a short lived game, it doesn't last forever, but your relationship just might.

I began to change as a coach each time as I am sure everyone who came in contact with Coach Wooden, did change.  It's easy many would say coming from someone who won National Title after Title and UCLA with the best of the best.  But he was pointing out to all of those who looked for his advise, what was important.

I once had a team that I was playing against in a tournament, I believed that we were good, I saw that the talent level on the other side of the floor during warm ups wasn't that great and noticed that our own players thought that they were just going to run them over as well.  We weren't serious as a staff and also as players during the warm up.  I didn't address the situation as I should have right then and there, as a result, we ended up getting beat that night because we didn't approach the game the same as we would have had it been the championship round of the tournament.  We were the better team, only on paper that night.  I was so frustrated, furious as I knew we should have been better, I second guessed myself, took it out on the team, coaching staff, when I knew all along that it was my fault, period.  So to this day, I take every opponent serious, as all the championships that I have won as a coach, were formed during that lesson learned that night.

The bottom line is that when you experience success we all think that we can cut corners from time to time and still achieve the end result, the win.  Many of us get caught up thinking that we are bigger than the game.  This comes from us only focusing on winning.  We can get caught off the rails and make it so that we believe it's all about the X's and O's and not about the Jimmy and Joe's.

So ask yourself?  What are you doing each day to make your players better people.  Is your message only about the sport?  Only about winning?  There is much more to this than just getting the W.  That night we lost I should have addressed the importance of respect for each opponent and that we owed it to ourselves to give our best effort regardless of who we were competing against.

We can become consumed with winning.  We can forget about getting home to your significant others.  Your family, children.  We make up excuses that we don't have the same talent, we don't have the same facilities to compete with others.  We need to practice longer, stay in the office so others will notice that we are giving all to this team.  We can think that we need every advantage to achieve what we want and the thing that we usually sacrifice first is our family.

There are incentives to winning as well that have been placed, with bonus structures, raises, etc.  This has now become a performance based industry.  Including AAU.  Winning supports your ego, yes, it also allows for those players to come to your programs, which leads to them going to NCAA., which allows players to continue with your program.  So it's now come to this, winning is everything.  Here's the problem.  99% percent of us aren't winning the ultimate national championship in the sport.  So here's the question.  How do you want to be remembered?  Maybe the focus from winning should be to developing people.  And make that the national championship that you are trying to create.  Coach Wooden told me that he knew he did a good job, 10 years later, when those that were under his supervision, were doctors, lawyers, parents, businessmen, etc.

The lessons learned from sports are lifelong.  What lessons are you imparting to those under your supervision?  Make this season your best, use your own definition of the results your looking for.

I look forward to helping.

Coach John Saintignon
www.ocmagic.org
www.johnsaintignon.com

The image of a champion.

The image of a champion is someone who is bent over drenched in sweat to the point of exhaustion— when no one else is watching. 

As everyone’s basketball season is about to get underway, this is often the image that is not seen.  So much goes into preparation for anything.  There is a correlation between the mental and the physical training.  For example when I train my basketball teams, I want them to be in the best condition possible; I called it my 12 week plan.  It took them through so much, including the “messy middle” where everyone in all things wants to quit.  This is where it gets difficult to persist.  Relationships, marriages, businesses, sports all have this messy middle, where things get difficult and people quit.

 

I found that this is where it was especially to get help from your teammates, colleagues, support system, coaches, bosses.  This is the where the strength comes from.  There is shared pain and a shared joy that usually comes from this type of training.  

But what I am learning from Karate is that same concept of never quitting, putting things into perspective and to believe that if I don’t quit, the Sensei’s won’t quit on me either.  This has helped me as a person, as a father, as a businessman, as a coach.  To use this same idea with everyone else…I won’t quit on you. 

Often in life it’s not the people who are the smartest, educated or talented who succeed, it’s often the ones who just persist.  The problem is that we live in an instant society.  If we don’t get the results that you were looking for immediately people switch, this is true of marriages, careers, learning a skill.  So I have some suggestions that may help in staying the course.

1.    Set a goal.  Start from the finish line and work backwards.  This will help you break down what you are trying to accomplish into smaller achievable goals.  Your mind works best when it can focus on a few things at a time to achieve, gain momentum and continue forward in the pursuit. 

2.       Improve your pace and push through.  There are times when you have to just pick up the pace.  The best way is to continue to ask yourself,  “Why am I doing this?”  It will help you reconnect to the goal that you have in mind.  It will help you visualize the victory.  Ask yourself what will accomplishing this goal do for you?  How will it make you feel?  Most of us can do more than we believe we are capable of.  The pursuit of anything worthwhile you will have to press on and ask why you are doing what you are doing.

.

3.       Run and walk at the same time.  There has to be recovery time in anything you pursue.  When you grind out a project, when you are working constantly it’s a recipe for burnout.  All of my training sessions have built in recovery periods to keep everyone fresh, and this applies to us all.  Staying up late to finish homework, to complete a project isn’t good for anyone.  All achievers have this instinct of “Keep working, keep working!”  For example, you have a project, and a deadline looming and your trying to push through and it takes you 4 hours to do something that if you had a good night sleep, and you worked on it in the morning, you could get it done in 20 minutes.  So this is why we all need this change of pace.  Like the top tennis players in the world, the very best, use the time in between the game, they stand still, they use those few seconds to be still, rest, and over time, over the course of the match, equates to quite a bit of time, it helps their endurance, and it becomes a big deal at the end of the match.

4.       Kill the distractions.  Stay focused.  The phone today, with texting, emails, etc., takes away from the focus.  We also just need to identify what we are going to do.  You have got to learn how to say no so that you can be committed to the bigger yes. 

5.       Change your self-image.  They may see themselves as a quitter.  Maybe you quit on something, a job, a relationship.  Inner dialogue has to change, that you are a finisher.  Karate for example yesterday, our Sensei gave us a drill of punching with weights, slow stress, a good amount of punches to be delivered, and then we dropped the weights and the amount of punches increased exponentially so that would force us to think about quitting.  The challenge to get through that was to have a positive self-talk, and to get creative in the sequence, and think in terms of 2 at a time to get through to the end. 

It’s important to just never quit.  To get through to the end, even if you have to walk.  Finish.  Confidence will come because you have built this muscle; you have made it through the messy middle and crossed the finish line.  You will trust yourself and have the resources to figure out anything.

Have the perception that whatever you undertake, it’s going to take longer than you expect.   This will be a temptation for you to quit.  Discouragement over the apparent lack of progress will also be a temptation to quit.  Going alone on a project, will be a temptation.  Don’t go at things alone.  And also getting disconnected from why we are doing things?  Why is this important?  What are the consequences of not completing?  This is usually the biggest reason that will keep you persistent. 

Thank you for your time, I look forward to your thoughts!

Coach John Saintignon

www.johnsaintignon.com

www.ocmagic.org