Famous words by one of our great sports prophets; Mike Tyson. As a coach you know exactly what Iron Mike means. You’ve been there, in a game, the plan starts to become reality and then BAM… something completely breaks the plan and you have to adjust.
No problem, you can make an adjustment to the plan and keep moving forward.
But what about the mental game your athletes are playing? Did the face punch disrupt the momentum your players had? Did they hang their heads when your best player got hurt? Are you rehearsing for this moment?
Pull The Rug
It’s important to prepare for plan disruption and not just from a strategic level but also psychologically. You need to put your team into situations where things are going smoothly, and then pull the rug. Here’s a few ideas we’ve seen some of the programs we’ve consulted implement:
Competitive Drills
You’re likely already doing drills where you put groups of players together to compete against another group. Maybe a race to hit a certain amount of shots, skill work, or other measured effort. When a team is just about to win the drill, move the goalpost. Add 5 more shots, lengthen the run, or just add more reps.
Physical Exhaustion Learning
Right on the heels of one of your most physically taxing blocks of a practice session teach your team a new concept. What we’re doing here is trying to replicate the chaos of an in-game punch to the face where we have to quickly get the team to understand the change we’re making.
Out Of Position
It’s always bad when, for reasons like injury or foul trouble, you don’t have a player available to fill a position. This needs to be rehearsed. The third base player who is your backup to your backup catcher needs to get reps behind the plate. Your power forward needs to get reps at center. The teams we see doing this well surprise the athlete in practice so they can experience the panic of having to immediately, and effectively, play a position they don’t get a lot of time at.
Learn And Grow
When you rehearse like this it is a time for your staff to do some real coach stuff. Watch your team and the individuals to see how they respond. Are your leaders leading? Is team body language positive? Are certain players collapsing under the pressure? Determine who can handle the face punch and who needs some more coaching to prepare them for the next one.
Now go out there and roll with the punches so you can win.
