Over coaching.

I try to hold back a lot. Even if I see more than one thing wrong with a players technique I will only coach them on one point at a time. Doing more than that will make their head spin.

I don't know that you can over-coach, but you can flood kids with TOO MUCH INFORMATION AT ONCE.

You could instruct the same amount of material, delivery it two different ways, and get two different results

throw it all at them at one time = crap for the rest of the year

piece by piece....get some confidence.....add a little more.....get some confidence....tweak a little more.


focus only on whats important - pick your battles
........is it absolutely essential that they get corrected on ____ RIGHT NOW?

if not, maybe postpone the correction.

good stuff here boys
something that a lot of coaches fall into at times

how do you guys figure out when you think this has happened?

I think last year I tried to over-analyze everything. I felt that since our team was lacking talent we should be smarter than everyone else and get an advantage with information. It really worked against us. I wasn't coaching by my gut as much. To answer Tog's question, I knew this when I looked at my call/situation sheet and gave that play to my runner and stood there regretting what I had just said the whole time, feeling like I should have called something else.

I think Brophy is right, you can't really over-coach, but you can over-think.

In 99 I was the head varsity baseball coach at a school (my only head varsity stint in any sport). The team was loaded with talent. I had ZERO assistant coaches. These players had been good baseball players when they got to me.

I don't think we talked about "how to" hit the ball one time. We talked about situational stuff, bunting, etc., but never "choke up, more weight on your toes, keep your head still....."

As a team we won 18 straight games at one point and finished with a legit .357 batting average. People wanted to give me credit.....I laughed. WHY FIX WHAT'S NOT BROKEN? I could care less if the hitter started with his back facing the pitcher if they hit like that.

What I did do as a team of hitters was challenge them. We had a + or - game where they received points for the +s and -s. 1 point for a single, etc. Baserunning was included. I charted this stuff religiously and they boys couldn't wait to see the next days stats of how many points they shot up from the game before. Another thing I did was, we were having trouble hitting the ball to the opposite field. 4 points was the highest value they could receive (home run). I told them, "any oppo shot is 10 points". So, we had this cocky catcher who smashes the ball off the right center field was and cruises into second base (right handed hitter). The players had to show me how many outs their were when they got to a base safely. Instead of showing me two fingers for the outs he holds up both hands wide with all fingers showing me the point amount, 10 for the blast he hit off the wall.

I was laughing histerically. We were down 7-0 and proceeded to score 13 runs in one half inning batting around 2 and 1/2 times.

Nothing techinical about that.

Yes you can over coach, and I've seen it many times. Giving them too much information at one time is the picture of overcoaching, whether its in practice or in the game. How many times has a practice drill ground to a halt because the coach was going through every single facet of some skill and the kids (all of them) have eyes like touchdowng spoke of. When you take a kid out during a game to "coach" him you need to give him the one thing he needs to go back in there and be successful, not a complete breakdown of Chapter 6 from How to Coach LB's. Just give him that one piece, that first piece of the puzzle.

I agree that you can certainly over coach. Coaching QB's, if the kid can throw the ball accurately and on time and he's quircky as all get out, he's still throwing the ball accurately and on time.

I think what has made us successful at getting things across to kids is to first get their attention. When they are interested (in anything), they are focused and like a spong, soaking up knowledge. A big key in this is that we will teach the pieces of the puzzle (techinque, individual roles) but explain the big picture (scheme, place in the game) of why we are doing it, I think kids gain confidence in knowing "why" we do things. Once they get addicted to learning football, it snowballs into kids having tremendous confidence on the field. I don't think its possible to overcoach when the kids get like this.

A related point is at what point do you drop technique concerns if a kid is getting the job done. We tried fo ryears to have our 50 ILbers step with the inside foot on the snapo as they read the play. They always switched their feet in games. After about 5 years ( we're not too bright ) we just had them line up with their outside foot up, on the snap, they automatically switched their feet and we got what we wanted. Same thing with def. ends.

I don't think these posts have said that extra work on fundamentals (drills) equates with "overcoaching". I think the "over" part refers to imformation overload, whether in the moment or in the big picture. However, if you over anything - drills, information, or conditioning - you run into diminishing returns, and eventually fatigue and lowering of performance.

I coached for a legend in MS. One of the many things that made him good was that he could get kids to do what he wanted with fewer words than anyone i've ever met.

When preparing to coach the o line for him, I asked him about teaching blocking progression, with different steps and positions. His response was "tell them to lead with their nose and run their feet. To hell with all those steps. Get em blocking now and correct em as you go."

While in TX, I ran into the exact opposite in fellow coaches. It was like they knew too much for thier own good. Like they had been to more clinics than they could handle. "Worrying about mice when elephants were coming"

Good point coachbleu. Well put.