Dear athletes and coaches,
My name Justin Zoet a former football and basketball player, and am now coaching both football and basketball. I am writing this in an effort to help better the relationship between a coach and the athletes he/she is coaching, and for athletes to know what to expect from a coach and how to further support coaching tactics. I played football and basketball for 10 years of my life and grew up surrounded by coaches as my father, uncle, and grandfather were all coaches. They taught me how to develop a positive relationship between players and coaches. It is very important to the success of a team to have a great player-coach relationship with mutual respect going each way.
First, to develop a positive relationship as a player with your coach you should always listen to your coach and try to adjust what you are doing wrong to be coachable. Along with those simple tactics, a player should try to just talk to their coach and get to know the coach as more than just a coach. This goes a long way, I know this from previous experience with my varsity coaches. My relationship with the varsity basketball coach at Caledonia High School is one of the best relationships I have. We talked almost every day about what was happening in our lives and it made me respond better to what he was trying to improve with my game because it showed me that he actually cared about me. I also saw the other side of this with a few of my teammates. They didn’t take the time to get to know the coach so in turn, they did not like the coach and thought that he was not a good coach because they didn’t listen to him and try to make things better between them. As a player developing a good relationship with your coach is important in the way that you will be able to see him as more than just a sports coach and a person that understands you. Also with my football coach, developing a relationship with him and talking to him about football made him more acceptable to suggestions that I had to improve the team and play calls. Developing a relationship with a coach is important in the way that they will respect your opinion more, take your suggestions and try to involve the suggestion to make it work, as well as you will have more respect for your coach and take their suggestions.
As a coach, in order to get the players to respond to you in a positive way you need to build a relationship for them. Most people think of coaches as just people who tell their athletes to do certain things and only try to win. But the best coaches in my opinion are the ones who care for the players as much as they care about winning. As a coach, I have realized that my players respond better to me after I take the time and get to know more about them personally. Once the relationship of not just being a coach to a player but a friendship is formed, the players will respond better to what the coaches say and overall become a better team. Also with showing players that they care about them, the coach is setting an example of how the players should treat their teammates. When the coach shows care for all of his players, and the players show care for each other and the coaches. The entire team will benefit greatly and positively impact their chances to succeed in the season.
Sports are a huge part of society today, a large percentage of people throughout the world pay attention to a sports team and root for their team. If the team is playing to win and make their fans happy the relationship between the players and the coaches needs to be a good one. If the relationship is there then the teamwork will be much stronger, and everyone knows a team that works together is a lot better than a team of individuals who are playing for themselves.
Sincerely,
Justin T. Zoet
