Quote:
Originally Posted by PepsiFree
Great clip, and exactly what needs to be understood before people go criticising Gulutzan when he says the team wasn’t prepared.
The coach can motivate, he can get a little more out of players, he can equip them with the proper knowledge and systems and give them the tools. But coming ready to work? That’s 100% on the player. If you’re not mentally prepared to play the game, that’s you not doing your job, it’s nobody else’s fault.
It sounds like there are some people who rely on their boss to encourage them to get out of bed in the morning. I’m sure that’s nice, but it’s not reality. You come to work prepared to work, simple as that.
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You really think that the state of confidence and mental preparation of a professional athlete has nothing to do with the things the coach says and does in his or her official capacity as coach?
Can you actually not see that clip is a coach motivating his players to be ready to play...by expressly calling them out in front of a television camera (which Gulutzan did his own version of last night saying it should be embarrassing to get your ass kicked)? That is to say, a coach doing his coaching duties?
You think that was a coach answering a journalist in an effort to advance the world's understanding of player responsibility as a public service announcement? Haha nope. That right there is a coach speaking directly to his players...in a made for Hollywood moment that I keep hearing doesn't happen in professional sports.
This whole 'does your boss do that?' thing is a false comparison. Elite athletics competition is not the same as every other occupation. Is yours a job where the boss holds a media scrum after each work day to discuss your level of effort and whether he has you and your coworkers hitting peak performance?
I do not question the players need to have responsibility for their actual performances and pre game preparation. They could play Tetris on their phone in the hotel instead of having a nap or not drink water on game day. They could spend all day thinking about what movie they are going to watch with their girlfriends after the game instead of thinking about line match ups.
But to suggest that a coach has 0% of a role in finding ways to make that kind of stuff not happen? Where do you get that idea?
The Micheal Ferland you are currently watching play great hockey would not be playing the game at all if it was not for the fact that his NHL coach took personal responsibility for noticing and doing something about it when Ferland was not showing up to work prepared.
Winning coaches consider this their responsibility. How do you account for the Mike Babcock quote I cited about him waking up every morning and doing his best to love his players and make them feel good?