Nerves as a Coach

Sounds like you’re just trying to be a good coach.

I feel you. I mean when Blaxxxton missed the tee I almost lost it. And I blew my top at Bleightyn for picking dandelions out in left field.


Not that shite! Not on my team!


Raaaaargh!!!

We'll never make the postseason at this point.

I definitely did. I coached my son’s soccer team from U7-U11. First few years were okay but once they really cared about winning, I got super into it.

I would spend a few hours after a loss thinking through my head what went wrong.

I don’t know if professional coaches feel the same way. I’m not sure I could do that for a living. I wouldn’t be able to disengage from it.

I used to get very nervous when I coached my daughter’s soccer team. I’m usually pretty hard on myself performance wise and I didn’t know anything about soccer. Just cared too much and wanted the girls to have a good time.

I didn’t know how to play the game and a lot of the teams were completely stacked with multiple “assistant” coaches who had really good daughters. I had a bunch of new players and they’d get pretty discouraged early in the year. Learned a lot and we went from losing 10-0 to like 1 or 2-0 by the end of the year, even had a few draws and a win

Was very rewarding after it was all said and done because the kids stuck with it, improved and the improvement was pretty obvious.

You aren’t alone friend.

Last year I got a 6 year old thrown out at 3b to lose the championship game. That kid also happened to be my son, and the sadness and disappointment in his eyes is something that took me weeks to shake. Didn’t sleep a wink for 2-3 nights.

absolutely! i coach a lot and get way more nervous that i ever did as a player. I guess it's because i want them to succeed/be in the best position and best prepared.

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Am I crazy or is coaching way more stressful than playing?

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Only for coaches of losing teams. As the DC of my son's K-2nd flag football team, we have the best D in the league when it comes to points allowed, and I have no nerves on game nights.

Yes, coaching youth soccer has turned me into an alcoholic.

Yep.

I had the opportunity to coach 5-6 year old basketball this year. About 30% of the players liked playing and wanted to win. The other 70% didn't really give a shite. We practiced once a week for an hour. The attention span was approximately 20-30 minutes, at best. We would get to the game and our kids looked like they had zero idea of what was going on. No matter how many times we practiced a situation, once the game started it was like they were seeing it for the first time. Not surprising, we lost all but two of the games.

Some of the games were just complete arse kickings. I never cared about the W/L record, but in those games it didn't even look like most of our kids wanted to be there. The reality is, they didn't. They were just playing because their parents wanted them to. But I always felt so bad because I felt like I wasn't giving them a chance to compete or getting through to them. I didn't care that they lost. Just at a loss in trying to figure out why they weren't getting what we were teaching and how I could do better.

Then my child played on a different team. A team with kids that actually wanted to play the sport. The practice was not that much different than mine. It's just the kids on the team wanted to be there and learn.

Sports aren't for everyone. Especially when kids are young. And no matter how much to try to teach and encourage, if they don't care they don't care.