GBMWolverine: We Won, You Lost!!!
Posted at 7:00pm — 11/8/2011
GBMWolverine: We Won, You Lost!!!
I have been very fortunate throughout my career. I have achieved many goals I thought were long shots. Part of, a big part of, the success can be traced to my tutelage under a hall of fame coach, an absolute legend. He took me, a decent athlete who had zero chance of winning games or playing, under his wing as a coach in training. Coach missed no opportunity to relay his advice, sage strategy, or life lessons to me minute after minute, month after month, year after year. His expressions remain in the minds and speaking patterns of hundreds decades later.
His team rarely lost, but after losing a very rare two out of three, coach turned to me and said, “Remember (Doc), the alumni, the fans, the program loyalists will have an instant message for you after every game. The message of the fans, coach stated, was to be either, “We won, or: You lost!!” Simplistically Coach stated to me, it is easy walking in the parking lot after a win and being semi-adored with fans singing praise and chanting we won, great job. But the wise one also said to me to be ready for the day your team lost a tough game or the crucial game. The body language, the stare, the verbiage changes quickly and the language is less likely to be we lost, but instead they lost, or a much more pointed and personal response, YOU LOST.
This happens everywhere, there are just some spots that are much more vitriol, and the poison is both strong and long lasting.
So the great one (spoken in affection) after giving this epiphany did not leave the lowly one wanting for further clarification or a remedy. The first thing to remember is it is not a universal WE, it is really just us, the team, and not with us is them, and there is a clear barricade that must be built and maintained. Only the immediate team is the we and everyone else is the them or the they.
The great one went on: it is key that your players believe in the we aspect and in you as the coach. It is also key that the players listen to the we, the coach, and the collective group, and put little stock in the them or the they factions.
Doubt is a poison and there is doubt from the they and them faction after every game, win or lose. A sign that things are going south quickly is when the players enjoin even entertaining the logic, conclusions, or agenda of the they and them factions.
Isolating young players is near impossible, so the coach needs to clear heads, instill messages, and get to work, with haste and purpose.
This happens, the great one noted, by having one faction, one true we, the team, and not self-appointed we’s that come and go with the wind. Inclusion is a must, strife and factions are a must not.
There is a school in the Big Ten where the word we is stated 1,000’s of times a week; it is sickening. But when this school loses the word we will, over the course of a few hours, change to they. I call this school the WE, We, Oiu, WEE WEE school.
This team of Michigan Men will follow the wise one’s method and thought, guaranteed. The they’s that are granted access, like writers and other media, will get greeted cordially. But this crowd is the they and them group, and once the session is over it is back to dealing with the we crowd.
Problem is, regardless of a coach’s best intentions, the we, the they, the them, for some turns to the me or the I.
The world has changed.
So, teams lose games, tough breaks happen, the we part of the equation feels it much more than the they or them. Right now the team is preparing for Illinois and three straight running quarterbacks. There is not much time, other than a polite hello, for those outside of the real “We” group.
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Written by GBMWolverine Staff
Go Blue — Wear Maize!