Parent Applying to Coach

Hire assistant coaches to do you and the program a favor, not them.

You think coaching your own son (see another recent thread on here) could be difficult?

Try having an assistant who only wants to coach because his son is playing, and will be done as soon as his kid is.

Don't do it.

In a thread such as this, you are going to get numerous anecdotes based on everyone's experiences. Mine, one of the best football coaches I have met was a youth coach who moved up to HS with his son, and then continued coaching after his son graduated.

That said, I am sure others have had nightmare experiences.

Our district is so small we aren’t even able to pay assistants so I take any help I can. I’ve had parents and siblings of players as coaches. Had very good experiences as well as very bad ones. Over time I’ve developed a set of rules regarding these types of coaches. Our most basic rule has been to try and have the parent not be their kid’s position coach

I'd at least interview the guy, if I needed a coach.

I'd let him know straight up about expectations over his son, and let him know its termination on the first strike.

Mixed experience -

in 2015 we hired a guy whose son was on the team and he’s still with us. Great guy. Would run through a brick wall for the program. I can only hope to be a shell of him if I get the chance to coach my kid.

Last year we hired a guy whom we later found out was only out there to not only coach his son but try to get the younger QB’s to quit or switch positions so his son could be the QB his senior year. Literally found out tonight he withdrew his kid from the school last Friday now he’s going to be some other school’s problem.

My advice - look for the warning signs. Does he send his kids to all threes bogus camps to get “exposure”? Does he talk about how much better his kid is than his classmates? Does he talk about how his son and his classmates could win state their senior year? Talk to parents of other kids he’s coached at the youth level. You could be getting yourself a good find like the first guy we hired.

We've had some bad ones and actually had some great ones over the years. But I'll say that even the great ones weren't without some additional drama along the way caused by the family dynamics.

We had one where the kid was a 4.0 student, 3 year starter, unquestioned leader and best player for back to back years, 2 time state champion wrestler, got a D1 scholarship for FB, the whole deal. And his parents are two of the best people I know and his dad was a greatt coach and would still be if he had kept coaching. With all that said, even that situation caused some drama that wouldn't have existed if we didn't have the "dad coach" situation.

It got to the point that the HC instituted a no dads coaching their own kids policy. I think he made a couple exceptions to that rule over the years but I think they were all situations where the coach was in the program before the kid entered HS.

I don’t like to make blanket rules because one dad is different than the other.

With that said, if I have a new Dad that wants to coach at the high school level, I typically do not allow him to coach at the same level as his son. Once I see him coach, I can make a more qualified decision down the road as to whether or not I think he’s a good fit at a different level.

We just had a parent who was also a Varsity Assistant. He’s been in the program over 7 years and started coaching before his two boys were in high school (which is also a preferred way of bringing a parent on). He coached on Varsity the last three seasons his oldest son was on Varsity. His son was the hardest working player we had and one of the hardest working kids I’ve ever had. And, he was a great player for us. So, sometimes it works out. But, Dad also didn’t coach his son’s position and He would let me know privately when he wanted to talk to me as a coach or parent. It worked in that situation.

And now, he’s going to be or Frosh Head Coach.

I have had 2 dads coach for me as volunteers. They were both great. They both did things that were vital to the program. Only once did I have a hint of a problem, and it wasn't a problem. In a game, I got on his kid pretty hard (he was a great player and it didn't happen much), and he came over and started making an excuse. I simply looked at him and asked, "are you a coach or a parent right now?" he walked away and later apologized. Where I coach, staffing sometimes is hard to come by. If you can get a hard working loyal guy, dad or not grab him.

My experienced has been mixed.

I coached with one father who was an incredible assistant. He knew his stuff, understood his role and remained neutral with his boy. And, he was a QB coach that worked directly with his son who turned out to be an All-State player for us. But, this guy had a ton of coaching experience at the high school level, had taken a few years off and wanted to get back into the game.

However, one of the worst coaching experiences I had was with a daddy-coach at the high school level. The guy had coaching experience at the high school level as well and it seemed like a good fit when we brought him on. It wasn't. He b-tched continually about his kid not playing varsity ball (he was a starter on the sophomore squad) and caused many headaches for us. He used to bring a cooler of Gatorade for his kid to games and practice and had a tantrum when we told him that he either provided enough for the whole team or stop doing it all together. One time, he disrupted an entire film session because one of his kid's Gatorades disappeared.

Unfortunately, my latter experience is enough for me to tell a parent that I don't want them coaching their kid.

I would definitely poke around his youth coaching reputation. I wouldn't look at "success" per se, I'd look at what his reputation is. Most of us know who the Daddy ball guys are, and those kinds of coaches aren't going to change their stripes.

And by the way - if the parents all like him, that should be a pretty solid positive indicator. Many parents see daddy-ball even when it's not happening - so when they don't see it, I'd be inclined to believe it's a complete non-factor.

Not as a coach, but when I played my HC brought on two junior coaches to run the JV team. Basically, their kids were in the 7th and 8th grade and they were pretty much there not to coach - but to get view of what the program was like before deciding whether to send their kids to catholic schools.

Needless to say both kids went off to catholic school.

That sounds like a HC problem.  

I agree with this 100%.   I am kind of surprised that none of the "NO NO DON'T DO IT..EVER" type posts seemed to ever consider the possibility of simply communicating if a problem arises, or shutting it down if necessary.    I would suspect that if the guy was to become a problem, it would show up fairly quickly. 

If you need a coach and hes good then sure. Give him a shot.

I would just have a policy about coaching the same position as your kid. Heck, put him on the other side of the ball.