What
makes a good coach or manager? Part of
the answer, I fear, is doing everything the opposite of Robin Ventura. (Wake up, Robin, your team is 0-3).
But
there has to be more. I wonder because
Clare is in the dugout now with a whole new role to play; what counts is how
well she motivates and evaluates players while employing tactics to strategy. In other words, she’s learning to play chess
with human pieces. And Bobby Fischer
never had to worry about a wet field or a sore hamstring.
It’s
still early, but I’m detecting evidence of a fair but tough approach from my
only child. Clare always worked hard as
a player. In high school, it was
grounder after grounder for practice at second base; at Elmhurst, Clare wanted
her coaches to rain down fly balls at her in right field. And she never showed off circling the bases
on one of her homers. So, she’d expect
the same from her players, all hard work and head down. That may or may not qualify her as a “players’
coach.”
Moreover,
there are issues on the college level Casey Stengel and his buddies never had
to worry about. Casey went ballistic
over a harmonica on the bus. What would
he do about iPad, iPhone or ITunes? A
girlfriend/boyfriend suddenly deployed to the Middle East? Temptations in the next dorm room scary
enough to turn Billy Martin into Billy Sunday?
No, coaching these days is a 21st century challenge, and we’ll
just have to see how my daughter handles it.
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