Herb Brooks: Charismatic Motivation in Coaching
In the following essay, I will argue that Herbert “Herb” Brooks was a charismatic leader due to his powerful motivation and his high expectations. He expected great things from the players he coached, but mostly, he expected them to think of the team and not themselves. He motivated with a powerful punch, mostly through fear, but was able to unite his teams and eventually the country.
Herb Brooks was born on August 5, 1937 in St. Paul Minnesota (Herb Brooks). Growing up in Minnesota, he became attached to the sport of ice hockey. He spent years practicing and playing this sport, and in 1955, he led his high school team to the
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Herb expected his team to achieve elevated, difficult, and challenging goals. He expected his players to sacrifice their time for the greater good and the team. He instilled the importance of selflessness and teamwork into their heart and soul’s. Pushing the team to the point of exhaustion, helped them realize the level he expected them to perform at. They began to realize that giving one hundred percent was not enough, and neither was two hundred percent; nothing was ever going to be enough. He made them realize that maximum performance could always be obtained and exceeded. Herb understood his players, and understood how to get the best out of each individual player. Making their best a part of the team, made the team a strong, unbreakable unit. To have his team achieve such high expectations and goals, he had to find ways of motivating them.
Herb became know as a compelling and fearful motivator. According to the ESPN website, he motivated by fear, and the team became more afraid of him than they did of the Soviets. He motivated the team with exhausting drills, and threats to cut players and bring new ones in. He pushed them harder by telling them they were not good enough. The ESPN website accounts a time when Herb once said to his players: "You're playing worse and worse every day and right now you're playing like it's next month."
This may not sound like a good motivational tactic to
It’s often an uphill fight. The ego-driven culture of basketball, and society in general, militates against cultivating this kind of selfless action, even for members of a team whose success as individuals in tied directly to the group performance. Our society places such a high premium on individual achievement, it’s easy for players to get blinded by their own self-importance and lose a sense of interconnectedness, the essence of teamwork.”
He frequently ignored his scouts and his coaches. He implemented decisions he thought was best and he never settled for less. He didn’t follow their advice. I admired Al’s strength and determination. He had many inspirational quotes like, “All I do is win” and “Just win baby win”.
Leadership. After going to West Point and being mentored by General Douglas MacArthur, Lombardi understood that leaders were born, not made. He believed leaders were justified through their hard work, and the same can be said about football players.
Pat Summitt and Mike Krzyzewski are legendary coaches icons that will always be remembered for their lifetime achievements and winning the championships in a unique style. It’s tranquil to say that they are great coaches but what enhanced their ability to be even better was their capability to showcase transformational leadership and emotional intelligence. These two individuals have set a new standard for what the coaches should instill in their personal values to allow them to be consistent in the efforts to inspire a vison, challenge the process, encourage the heart, enable others to act, and model the way.
Dietrich displayed reliability in his confidence and courage before the Battle of the Bulge. Author and historian, John Toland, declared in Battle: The Story of the Bulge, that Dietrich’s grit and belief would lead his Sixth Panzer Army to victory on the first day of the attack, which in turn, inspired trust from his troops (19). Confident leaders with committed supporters typically achieve goals with great efficiency. Green Bay Packers Coach Vince Lombardi was confident in his team and inspired his players to commit to being the best football players that they could be. The 1967 Green Bay Packers went on to become one of the most dominate football teams ever and win the first Super Bowl.
In his coaching it was not all glamour, on March 15, 1963 Arizona State defeated UCLA 93-79 the first game of the NCAA Western Regional Tournament. John had just created a new dimension of a 2-2-1-zone press that was designed to force teams to shoot the ball quickly. The final score did not discourage Wooden for at the end he announced that he liked what he had seen. John Wooden worked with his players and on March 20, 1965 UCLA won the second consecutive National Championship using Wooden’s zone. Determination in any sport is crucial and that is what John Wooden had in every practice and game. This trait of John Wooden’s was by far the strongest and the earliest developed. When John graduated from the 8th grade his father gave him a card with three rules, don't wine, don't complain, and don't make excuses. From these rules John knew that the only other option was to succeed. He built a Big Ten University from what was once an organization without a home court. His players saw the determination in there coach and displayed it as well. By showing determination and instilling it in his player John taught that the people who do work the hardest will receive the glory and the ones with natural ability can only strive so
Despite initial setbacks, Coach Dale gradually gained the trust of the team and the community. Using unconventional coaching methods, hard work, and discipline, the team begins to improve, defy expectations, and
Coach Steve Rocker is one of the most successful high school basketball coaches in Kentucky’s history. Coach Rocker was very successful in previous years. Strangely, this year was very different for him. For the first time in his professional life, he is falling short of his expectations, the community expectations, and the team’s expectations. His team lost a lot of games, but most importantly the boys had no motivation or desire to bring the team out of the rut they found themselves. His players have lost their will to win, their love for their teammates, and their passion to play. Coach Rocker’s motivational methods that have always worked before and resulted in success are now failing, and he doesn’t know why. He argues that his players have become selfish and bored with winning because they have been so successful in previous years. “And there’s no question that my guys have lost their drive to win because they’ve won so much in the past. Now all they want is individual ‘wins’…which just doesn’t cut it on a team” (Gongwer, 2010, p. 17).
His team was a bunch of guys from Minnesota and Boston. They did not get along with each other, but Herb helped them realize that they no longer play for their college teams. He helped them realize that they were one team now and without teamwork they could not achieve their goal. Herb never told them this is what they needed to do, he helped them realize this by asking them whom they play for. Each time the guys would answer with their college team. After that long night of coediting after the preseason game one player realized that they played for the US Olympic team. This is what Herb wanted them to realize. Another example is after a player got hurt during a game in the Olympics. He called him a name and the whole team got fired up. Herb’s goal was not to offed this guy, but was to fire him up and the whole team. I like this technique because he forced the team to figure it out. I would not have enough patients to make them realize this. As a coach you cannot play the game for the athletes, but you can guide them in the right
Miracle portrays Coach Brooks as idealistic. Through his coaching and leadership style, Brooks’ ideals were a microcosm of our Capitalist society. Without Coach Brooks, this team would have not accomplished what it did. To this end, Herb Brooks maximized player potential by pushing them to be the best they could be. He saw a talented group of young men and knew that if he encouraged and pushed them enough, he could help them achieve their goals. Despite not having the stars the Russians did, Brooks instilled a work ethic that overpowered the Russians. This was rooted in Coach Brooks militant drills during practice. While Coach Brooks was a great coach when it came to the x’s and o’s of the game, he was an even better leader and motivator. More so, he inspired confidence in his men. Playing against Russia was a seemingly insurmountable task and was
“I believe that man’s greatest hour, in fact his greatest fulfillment, his finest fulfillment—is that moment when he has worked his heart out for a good cause and lies exhausted, but victorious, on the field of battle (Lombardi, 2001, p.46).” These are the words of Vincent Lombardi, perhaps the greatest football coach of all time. Lombardi’s leadership philosophy emphasized the importance of winning…striving for perfection, but not at all costs (Lombardi, 2003, p.ix). He believed in “being a person of character, finishing what you start, never compromising your goals, and
Sports management is a really broad field, therefore I decided to focus on my minor and one of my major interests of this field: coaching. In this paper I will be explaining my personal five building blocks that make up a well-rounded coaching philosophy and coach. Those blocks are; leadership, organization, attitude, respect, and resiliency. Each of these five aspects are equally important and balance each other out. Leadership, the action of leading a group of athletes towards a goal. Organization, being able to organize a team and have a plan in order to help the team achieve goals. Attitude, it is very important for a coach to have a winning and positive attitude that is contagious to the players. Respect, there has to be a good
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