Discipline in the first year of rebuilding

Sometimes you have to shoot some hostages...

You are rebuilding for the future, not for this season. Keep that in mind. Set high expectations NOW. Most of the kids will rise to the standard. The ones who don't...you weren't going to win with them anyway.

Ive been in this situation 3 times and have done it 3 different ways. IMO the ONLY way that works is to define what you will not tolerate and hold the kids accountable. It is a down program for a reason. Unless you set the expectations high right now. Just like classroom management, if you define your expectations - communicate, hold the kids accountable - consistency and show the kids the end results. Being a coach is not a popularity contest but it is also not a tough man competition either. The first year is the most challenging but if you start out the right way it sets the tone.

How many tardies does it take to boot them? One? Three? Six? What's the magic number?

For us being late for practice gets you up-downs (unless there's a good excuse). If it's a recurring problem there will be a discussion (translation: a$$-chewing). I can't recall the last time that we busted a kid out strictly for tardies. Obviously, if a kid does it day after day you will have to to do something (translation: dump his sorry a$$).

Pick the hill that you're you're willing to die on. Establishing discipline early is important. Get after the important things first, though. Disrespect, missing practice, lack of effort, being a jack-off in the classroom. Those are reasons for dumping a kid. Being late needs to be handled but it's not a hanging offense IMO.

I get what you're saying. I'm not in favor of cutting kids except of course for serious violations of rules or repeated violations of rules, etc. I guess I'm all about second chances and third chances in some cases...that's just me. I know not everyone is like that, but I want to try and avoid "leaving a child behind" (sorry, couldn't help the dig at the current educational mantra). Clear expectations with consistentency is key IMO, and the head coach believes the same thing. My issue I guess or my wish is that we can do more than this. We can increase our chances or speed up the turnaround if we have some sort of positive reinforcement. I know everyone has examples to counter this statement, but psychology tells us that punishment doesn't work. Reinforcement (positive or not) is the best thing to change human behavior. I'm all for consequences, but in addition to that...that's what I'm searching for right now in my career.

I spoke with my HC last night about this matter and during the discussion we talked of players showing up late. Everyday they'll be set conditioning work and we'll add to that conditioning work as needed. Example...we start with 10 40's. His plan is to start practice at 3:30, regardless of who's there. We're not stopping practice, we're not changing anything for kids that show up late. They will just jump in and keep going. At the end of practice, say if we had 10 kids late, we'll add 10 40's on to the conditioning. Everyone pays the price and the idea is that peer pressure will take care of the late problem or the late problems will take care of themselves.

I'm not necessarily against this but my worry is we have no leaders. Our players (hell our staff) is not a "team". We're not bought in to anything. So I'm worried about morale. I'm worried about the overall attitude just getting worse and kids will quit because of the conditioning. I have never been accused of being kind-hearted or mushy mushy, but I know this sounds that way. But like I said, we're not a team. We'll have 80-100 players on Monday and 8 coaches. After the head coach, I've been around the team/school/program more than anyone else, and I only know about 25 different kids or so (off-season attendance was terrible) and I'm only close to the HC. My thought is if I'm a player in this day and age and I've known nothing but losing in so many facets of my life especially in football, why am I going to do extra because this other guy that I don't know and don't care about shows up late? Why should I do anything for him? I don't know him and don't care about him. I don't hardly know this coach who's yelling at me for being late. Forget this!

Please don't get on me for being to touchy-feely. I agree with what you're thinking! IT'S FOOTBALL!!! I know, I know, I agree. However, I'm thinking high expectations set, consistent enforcement, team building, show them football is a positive and we're there for them. Kids will fall to the wayside of course. Am I wrong for thinking that what our coaches did to us or team-orriented punishments are the wrong course of action?

Short answer-yes.

We had a situation where a great friend of mine was in the 1st year of taking over the "big time" program in the area lots of pressure and expectations on us at this school. He's freaking out cause a few kids quit because they weren't happy about this or that (as soph. playing varsity). We had an old school guy coaching with us who was a big time D-1 coach and respected all over the football community at all levels. His quote on the whole thing "Just remember that Jesus only got 11 of 12 so ya can't save em all" So don't feel bad if you loose a few over the course.

Remember you also have a stake physically and mentally( we all know what a season from hell can do to you in both areas) in the season and you don't want to kill yourself by coaching a group of guys who don't buy into it get the kids who get it on the field and make examples of them. Keep up with the peer justice, making the team pay, you would be amazed at how some kids will rise up and get stuff straight when they are getting run into the ground because of a few jerk offs.

I'm with 19delta...

Set the standard as high as you would want it with a top-notch program and most of the kids will push to reach it... The ones who don't even try need to be weeded out! Understand that although the goal you tell the players may be extremely high, you and your staff need to have smaller, more realistic goals for progress.

Example:
If one of the problems is off-season attendance... If your goal is 80%, but it's been more like 20% before you got there, then set the goal at 80%. All of your coaches need to be pushing the kids toward 80%, telling them that they will accept nothing less than 80%, but in reality if year 1 you get it up to 40% (that's 20% better than the year before), then year 2 60%, year 3 70%, and by year 4 you should be at 80% or higher! I would take a 10% increase each year at our school!

If you expect nothing from them, that's what you'll get...
If you expect everything from them, that's what you'll get as well!

Some GREAT posts here. cqmiller, fatkicker, phantom dcohio...obvious those guys have been in this situation before.

Here's what it comes down to for me: Kids WANT to do it the "right" way...they WANT to have pride and work hard and do the things it takes to be a winner. The problem, IMO, is that, too often, the ADULTS who are responsible for the kids don't do their job...they DON'T create, foster, encourage, and DEMAND competition, accountability, discipline, and an honest day's work.

You are either coaching it that way OR you are letting it happen...there is NO OTHER ANSWER than those two options.

Coaching is hard...not the game planning, not the practices, not the Xs and Os. What is HARD is managing people...making a decision that, while it may be the "right" decision, it is a HARD decision because someone is going to be disappointed in the end.

And for those of us who have worked in inner city programs, having those high standards is even MORE important...by cutting kids too much slack...by not having high standards...by letting the inmates run the asylum, we, as coaches, are not doing those kids ANY favors. At some point in their lives, they are going to HAVE to be accountable...accountable to a wife, to a child, to a job. If we let kids cut corners now, is it any surprise that they will cut corners when it REALLY matters?

It's not about being a harda$$ or being unsympathetic. It's about being in a position where you MUST influence kids to make the right decision when everything and everyone is telling them not to.

Great post!

Being a member of a football team is practice for the real world. Coaches are not doing ANY FAVORS by not having consequences for kids who don't meet the standards. In fact, by letting those kids slide by, I would argue that you are actually setting those kids up for failure. At some point in the future, that kid is going to have to be accountable. If he doesn't learn how to be accountable from you, who is going to teach him?