BY DAVID ONJILI
Every Thursday or Friday, I do make it a personal initiative to watch a movie. Being an ardent sports man, I have a bias to movies that have a sporty theme. I have a rich collection that easily comes to mind; Bugs Bunny, Invictus, Remember the Titans, Karate Kid and most recently Coach Carter. Invictus is a movie worthy of your time; it’s a story of how the late Nelson Mandela uses the sport of rugby to unite an apartheid nation. How sporty. The Titans is another one like Invictus. It is all about integrating blacks into an all white team yet, Karate Kid is special, particularly if you have kids. It teaches them the need to stand up for themselves against bullying and above all to use their Karate skills not to pick up fights irresponsibly but to defend themselves because with the skills comes responsibilities.
Last week, I sat down to watch Coach Carter, must admit it’s not a new release but those were the most riveting 136 minutes. It is about high school kids in a tough and predominantly African American neighbourhood in the United States of America. Their only way out of trouble; gangs and drugs, is the game of basketball. Their parents are okay, at least they are out of trouble but one worrying element is that they seldom attend class and their academic records are very poor.
One day, a former student, Coach Kim Carter attends one of their night games and the anger and violence from these boys amongst themselves when they lose a game reminds him of his time at the school playing basketball. He resolves to come back and be their coach, a job with meager pay and no guarantee of sporting success let alone academic. His wife is skeptic because of the financial constraints in the family but she knows she cannot talk him out once his mind is made up.
The coach comes up with a raft of measures he calls a contract, that each player must sign before they play for him. It included; every player in the team scoring a 2.3 grade average, they must attend all their classes and above all sit at the front row and they had to wear a shirt and tie during game nights. He reminds each player that they must be 20 minutes early for practice and that winning games was dependent on how they performed during training. There was punishment of push-ups or running up and down the court (suicides in basketball jargon) for any indiscipline that would be done and no player, however talented or senior would be given preferential treatment.
The above paragraph outlines the basic foundations of any sport; discipline, punctuality, academics and above all respect for teammates. If one teammate fails, it can never be an isolated incident, because basketball and football unlike tennis or golf are team sports. Many players and coaches fail to grasp the very basic concepts of sports, to most, they seek the success that comes and the feeling that follows when the crowd cheers and shouts your name. Yet, this is not what makes champions.
No substitute for discipline
The aspect of discipline is so wide that it would require a whole article. Yet, the basics include showing up for training sessions earlier and leaving last, going the extra mile in training, eating the correct diet and getting enough rest, avoiding partying, alcohol and other. None of the stars on top of their game; Stephen Curry, Roger Federer, Fernando Alonso, Lionnel Messi, Victor Wanyama and Mo Farah will ever make headlines for indiscipline and that’s why they are top of their respective sports.
It does not matter how talented or dominant you are, there are bare minimums that you must meet to succeed. Personal discipline has no substitute and that’s why despite his football talent, Mario Balloteli had to be sold by Liverpool, Lamar Odom has been battling stress and bad media publicity after he stopped focusing on basketball and married in the Kardashian family.
It is an honour to wear that jersey
“Play for the name at the front of your shirt and the world shall remember that name at the back,” by Anonymous. This is a quote so dominant in the sports arena, any player who gets the chance to play for any team must know that it is a privilege that can be denied to them anytime and with no explanation if they do not respect it. That is why players kiss the badges on their shirts when they score or win, it means and must mean something to wear that jersey because you have to respect the history behind it. The history and pride of the club must be defended with sweat and blood. “Leave it on the floor,” is a famous phrase by Lebron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers in the National Basketball Association (NBA). You must give everything during a game so that at full time you have no regrets.
Coaches are fathers
In the movie, Coach Carter helps one of his young players, Cruz, survive death from a gang. He comes home to him late at night after his gang member cousin is short dead before him. He apologizes and promises to do everything to earn a place in the team. Without talking, Carter welcomes him to his house with a big fatherly hug.
Manu Ginobili, Tim Duncan and Tony Parker alongside their coach Gregg Poppovich of the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA are the most high profile father and son relationship a sporting franchise has ever seen. Watching a Spurs game and how tough if not brutal the coach is to the men and the hugs they exchange post match is special. In Kenya, striker Dennis Oliech enjoyed a special relationship with his coaches Jacob Ghost Mulee and Francis Kimanzi, the role of a coach is to be involved in the lives of the players if they allow him. Players are mostly talented youth that come from broken homes and tough neighborhoods, all they need is guidance and if a coach does not provide this, they get it in drugs and loose the plot.
A coach is a special person, many fans will judge him on the results the team produces on a Saturday afternoon after a match and rightly so but few do get to understand what they do for players the rest of the week. While you can have an opinion on any coach, never ever insult a coach, his role in the team and especially the players is massive and mostly behind the cameras.
Unstoppable shared vision
Coach Carter was clear; the students had to excel academically to be in his team. Their term report indicated the opposite and he made a decision to close the training gymnasium for the boys to go to the library. This attracts nationwide headlines as parents vote to kick him out of team but his players stand in solidarity with him and remain in the gym until their academic grades improve.
Whatever vision a coach has, he must share with his players and make sure they all buy into it. That is why Pep Guardiola will play tici taca, Jose Mourinho will play defensive football and Jurgen Klopp will play Gegenpressing. They have an ideology that they sell to the players and any player who does not agree to it is sold. Any coach, be it in professional football, estate leagues or school games must be very clear to his players what they have to achieve and they must ruthlessly execute that irrespective of public opinion.
Players have a voice; it is called respect
Nothing is more inspiring and progressive as watching professional players in the United States of America standing up to the bigotry of President Donald Trump. It all started when Trump uninvited Stephen Curry of the Golden State Warriors from The White House in a meeting where the NBA champions go to visit the President. This was viewed as a racist move from the President and the entire American sporting world is making their voices count, they are kneeling when the national anthem is being sung and others are making their discontent known.
Playing is more than winning, it is about players being conscious of the environment they live in and standing up against any form of oppression. This tweet by legendary player Kobe Bryant sums it all…
“A #POTUS whose name alone creates division and anger. Whose words inspire dissension and hatred can’t possibly ‘Make America Great Again.’”
In Coach Carter, the players ignore the directive by the school’s board to open the basketball gymnasium for them to train after their coach had forced them to go to the library to read and better their grades. They choose to read from the basketball gymnasium in solidarity with their coach so that they can honour their contract by improving their grades, a move that surprises the school teaching fraternity but emboldens their unity as a team.
Always give your best
“I will forgive you if you lose the ball and we concede a goal and eventually lose the game but I will never forgive you if you do not give 100% during training or in a game,” Pep Guardiola, after being named Barcelona coach.
While the ultimate goal in any competition is to separate the winners from losers, the commitment by the players and the lessons they have learnt through the journey of preparing for the game counts so much. During the game as is during practice, it is demanded that players give it all because as a matter of fact, victory is always a matter of fine margins.
The movie Coach Carter ends with Richmond losing to Saint Francis by 1 point, dejected players hanging their heads in the dressing room are disrupted by Coach Carter whose words explain the depth and reason why we engage in sports.
Carter reminds them that despite the loss they had earned a bigger victory in conquering their personal fears and stigma that society had placed on them (not college material). They were actually scoring great grades. This self victory that the sport of basketball had given these boys was far greater than the newspaper headlines of winning or losing and that the boys he had first started coaching had all turned into men. The greatest victory in this movie is that all the players graduate from high school and join college, some on full scholarships with others on partial ones.
I hope that players get to understand that behind the chasing and kicking of balls, running, sports does indeed offer great life lessons. Next time you go watch a game, kindly show it some respect whether you are a player, coach or just a mere spectator.
