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Have Some Players Stopped Listening To Hitchcock?
by Paul on 12/17/09 at 08:10 AM ET
Comments (3)
from Rob Oller of the Columbus Dispatch,
Hitchcock sees it as his job to educate these lads. So he explains. And explains. Unfortunately for him, the attention span of a 19-year-old twitters out at 140 characters.
So the issue with Hitchcock is not that he ignores young players, a reputation that he feels is undeserved, but that they ignore him.
Young talent especially tunes out when it thinks it knows it all. That occurs when the team is winning, which creates a stress point because Hitch’s toughest teachings follow wins, when he talks of exposing the hard truths.
“It’s an attitude of you win and you want to get better, rather than we won and ‘Aren’t we good?’ What I want to do is help players win, and have them come back in the room the next day and ask, ‘Where do we get better?’ That’s what great teams do.”
The problem with such harping is it wears on young players who want to run free, who want to enjoy the wins instead of learn from them, which might explain why the Jackets (14-14-6) have stumbled after a 12-6-2 start.
Filed in: NHL Teams, Columbus Blue Jackets | KK Hockey | Permalink
Comments
...the attention span of a 19-year-old twitters out at 140 characters.
Great description...and I’m afraid it’s all too true.
Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 12/17/09 at 12:31 PM ET
They can listen to Hitchcock until their ears fall off, but if they can’t skate well they can’t play good defensive hockey like Hitch wants and demands.
It’s no accident that Jamie Langenbrunne ris the player he is now. Yes, he’s played in New Jersey, but he rounde dhimself out at first in the Dallas organization under HItchcock. When he first arrived in Kalamazoo he was a pure raw offensive guy, full speed ahead all of the time, with no defensive ability to speak of. So Hitchcock can get through to young guys.
But like I said, you can preach team defense all you want… but if your forwards and backchecking and yet have to watch a pylon like Mike Commodore get skated around and Mason scored on for the 53rd time they’re eventually going to get frustrated.
Get Columbus some d-men that can skate and it’s a different story.
Posted by Primis on 12/17/09 at 01:13 PM ET
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Coaching must be the most difficult job in sports.
The X’s & O’s would be relatively easy.
Motivating your players for more than just a brief time....THAT would be what separates the men from the boys among coaches.
Just look at today’s articles on Hitch, Torts & Quinn.
“It’s SICOLOGY, son, SICOLOGY!”
Posted by w2j2 on 12/17/09 at 10:49 AM ET