worst speaker at a clinic

Coach, I am wondering too. I have sat with him some 20 times in the last 10 or 12 years. All have been a very good experience.

Our staff is speaking at a clinic in two weeks. This will be our first. I feel fairly confident about our presentation - heavy on Xs and Os and video cut-ups and light on stats and words. I'm looking forward to it. It should be a great learning experience for our staff.

I cannot recall the speaker, but he was supposed to present why his defense was so good.....but simply said, "Hey, me and my coaches...we really ain't that good....the whole reason our defense was good was because we had two kids that were 6'4" and 285lbs at our DTs who are now serving time in prison...."

Well...at least he was honest.

The sad part, after taking your clinic fee to pay these high priced speakers, is they are simply and straight fowardly twlling you exactly how it is. Lots of schemes are very workable with great results, PROVIDED YOU HAVE THE PLAYERS TO IMPLEMENT THEM!!! You can hash, rehash, talk all you want, but the end result is it all comes down to the players abilities not the scheme. I'm not going to sign off with my usual, "just my opinion" on this post because it is not just my opinion. It is the opinion of many hundreds of us who have spent our lives in this game, and that is not intended to sound as though I am talking down" to anyone because I certainly am not. It is just a natural fact. If you pay a fee to go hear some guy you never heard of speak, and you don't like his presentation, then it probably is your own fault
for not getting better informed on what he would be addressing. Most HC's that I know, are well versed in public speaking and always produce when called on to do so, but some are not. When I go to hear a winner speak, sure I would like to hear his philosophy, but I know the real reason anyone wins and it certainly is not X and 0's but rather how good his players are at accepting his system and then how good are they at executing that philosophy, AND HOW GOOD ARE THE COACHS AT COMMUNICATING THE KNOWLEDGE THEY HAVE TO THE PLAYERS??? Those are the real reasons that need to be addressed when you talk about winning.

Coach Easton

The worst speakers I've listened to are those that have to use foul language to get their messages across. Coach CAmpbell

Coach Campbell,

Was setting in an owners meeting that the league had brought in some high powered media guy from NYC to speak to us about a media promotion. Every other word was the F word, and I mean, literally, every other word! I took it for about 15 minutes, then just quietly left the room and drove the 8 hour drive back home. When I arrived I had a phone call waiting from the League President and I returned it immediately. "JC, why did you leave, whats the matter? This guy was dynamite, you should have stayed, etc." I told him in no uncertain terms, "if that guy is part of it, count me out, period! I don't appreciate public speakers who address any type of meeting with that kind of filthy mouth!" They didn't enter into an agreement with the guy or his company, which pleased me no end!

JC

Worst speaker to date is still - Steve Greatwood, Univ. of Oregon d-line coach -now oline coach. Language and innuendos and handed out free passes to a local strip club too. Unfortunaltey he was the speaker right before a coach i wanted to hear from.

Luckily we have Crowton here in Oregon now.

I sat through a coach like that in Atlanta @ the Mega Clinic there. He was the HC at Jenks HS in Oklahoma. The speaker list had him talking about his 4-3 scheme. Instead, he showed 25 minutes of highlight films of when Rocky Calmus played for him a few years back and then did 5 minutes of overheads showing about 800 different blitzes out of Bear.

After each sheet of blitzes he would say, "We don't use these much, but I thought you guys might want to see them." This was my very first coaching clinic and I was disappointed, but after that it got better. I heard a guy speak from Michigan, a high school HC. I can't remember his name and will have to look in my notes, but he was good. He used guys in the audience to demonstrate the techniques he was discussing, along with video and overheads, and he seemed excited to be there unlike some who just went through the motions.

Like I said before...it's tough to break the Goergia Soutrhern Cult!

I have been to 5 NAVY practices this spring but that's about all you can get out of them. You just have to figure it out yourself. They are more than happy to toss you in a room with film but they will disappear as soon as the video appears.

It's unbeliveable!

I heard he was good. Hang 50, what did you get out of the NAVY practices? I was going to go down to their clinic, but I had another engagement. Let me know. Thanks.

Along those same lines I heard a coach from New Jersey. Talked about defense, then threw a coach out for arguing his scheme could not stop the wing-t.

Ed Mierkort at South Dakota is another excellent clinic guy. No BS, good drills.

I heard a very successful coach at the Glazier clinic this year. I left after one session because he was putting me to sleep. He put on the film, and said "We could have done whatever we wanted with these two guys in the backfield."

I wish clinic speakers would learn that the coaches who attend his sessions are there to learn. Clinics would be so much better if we all had speakers like this.

Airman, once again I couldn't agree more. I have a long story about a Manny worshipper, but for the integrity of the board, I will not post it here. If you are that interested in hearing it, Email me at CoachCella@aol.com.

Sometimes, you see a guy who is very knowledgeable but has a hard time communicating his ideas to the audience. Our OC is like that. He knows the spread offense forward, backward, up, down, and sideways, but often gets so wrapped up in philosophies and conceptual stuff that you would swear that you were talking to the Dali Lama. He's a great guy to have in a film session, though, because his knowledge of attacking defenses vertically is really impressive.

Along with what airman was saying, IMO the worst clinic speakers are guys who simply brag up their program and give you endless statistics. If anything, I usually take liitle away from those speakers because, in the back of mind, I'm always saying to myself "Hey, this guy has great athletes. That's why he is so successful".

We are speaking at a clinic in a few weeks. Our goal is to give the audience stuff they can use. We don't think that people are going to be happy sitting for 45 minutes listening to a bunch of blowhards talk about how many records they have broken and how many championships they have won.