SPORT PSYCHOLOGY:
Sport Psychology involves the emotional, cognitive and behavioral factors that influence athletic performance. As the noted baseball philosopher and Hall of Fame catcher, Yogi Berra, once said: "Baseball is 90% mental -- the other half is physical." While funny, it is also insightful: success in athletics in deeply tied to mental and emotional process.
Drs. Cushing have worked with scores of athletes from child prodigies, to high school, to college, and professional competitors, to help improve performance. Some of the areas where Sport Psychology techniques have proven useful include:
Performance enhancement
Goal stting
Use of mental imagery
Avoiding burnout
Performance anxiety: being anxious during competition
Motivational issues
Losing focus or concentration
"Choking" during competition
Anger cntrol
Adjustment to injury and help with mental aspects of rehabilitiation including motivation
Clinical issues effecting performance including: depression, eating disorders, substance abuse, steroid use, family problems, or learning issues.
For an intial consultation about your sport-related frustration or concern, contact Dr. Frank Cushing or Dr. Kyle Cushing. Your Sport Psychology questions will be answered by Dr. Coach (see below): e-mail questions to: drcoach@doctorcushing.com
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TOPICS COVERED IN CURRENT QUESTIONS:
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Self Esteem and Competition
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Sports Widow
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Playing Time is Issue
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Cheating
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Sportsmanship
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Temper when playing
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College Recruiting
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DR. COACH ANSWERS SPORT PSYCHOLOGY QUESTIONS:
Dear Dr. Coach,
We have an 11-year-old daughter who is very interested in sports and has played on teams since she was 6 years old. She was just invited to try out for a competitive softball team and our friends say we shouldn’t let her as it may hurt her self-steem if she doesn’t make it or doesn’t get to play. What should we do?
Perplexed in Poughkeepsie
Dear PiP:
While competition can be harsh.... so is reality. Your daughter, even at 11, can be the best judge of her ability to handle any possible failure. If she wants to try, you must let her. Life is like a poker game with our self-esteem made up of the chips. If she never antes up in the game of life she will never have a chance to win big. Fear of failure is overcome by success, no matter how small. When your daughter tries, the reward will be having the guts to put herself and her skills on the line and in seeing how she measures up to the best. The more often she attempts to achieve, the more success she will have. This is as true in school and the workplace as it is in sports. Athletics is a microcosm of real life,and the lessons learned in competition can prepare her for the rest of life’s challenges.
She must already have a pretty solid self-concept or she wouldn’t be willing to go for it. Support her competitive efforts and she will always be ready to take on the next contest in life. Stifle her and she will fold her hand, save her few measly chips and never risk playing for the trophies of life. Sure she may stumble and fall but help pick her up, brush herself off and prepare to try again. There is much to be said about the old college try (if at first you don’t succeed, etc.): look at Northwestern’s recent Rose Bowl football team. The underdog’s cry is always: “you gotta believe” and only through believing in herself will your daughter reach her full potential.
Certainly though, as responsible parents you will need to help her prepare for the appropriate level of competition. If she shows sufficient motivation and interest, work with her on skill development. Rent or borrow videotapes of drills to strengthen her weakest areas. Discuss the goals she has for the upcoming season and help her make them realistic given her skill level. Perhaps ask a neutral third party with some expertise (often high school coaches are more than willing to help with young athletes’ development) to evaluate her abilities and give you and her feedback about where she needs to improve. Consider local day camps specializing in her sport(s) of choice. Stress to her that players are made in the off season so if she is serious about wanting to reach her goals she may have to work towards them. However, if she doesn’t want to commit to such work, don’t push her. Sports should be fun, not an obligation or a chore. Don’t become her coaches; just be her biggest supporters. Simply relish her play!
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Dear Dr. Coach,
My husband and I have been married just over a year. He plays softball 4 nights a week in the summer, is in three basketball leagues in the winter,and wants to get into a fall bowling league. He often doesn’t get home from his games until 1 a.m. because “all the guys wanna have a beer and talk about the game.” I don’t want to nag or interfere with his recreation but this is beginning to cause trouble in our marriage. What should I do?
Young Sports Widow
Dear Widow,
You should begin by asking your spouse what is more important to him, your marriage or his sports? His behavior thus far seems to indicate he doesn’t value your relationship, and that is your main concern. Talk directly with him about your fears about the direction your marriage is heading. Tell him that you want to and will be supportive of his sporting pursuits but only to the degree they don’t threaten the fiber of your intimacy. Unfortunately, that is precisely what is beginning to happen.
If you were to point out to your husband that you need to be more involved with him, he might hear you and respond to your needs. You might tell him that he could have both: a successful marriage and a continued involvement in sports. However, it will be necessary to balance his love for you and his love for sports. Ask him to include you in his sporting activities. That way he has the best of both worlds: you and his athletics. There are co-ed softball teams and bowling leagues for couples. You ought to go to some of his basketball games and go out with him afterwards. Begin to enjoy recreational activities that are enjoyable to both of you. Tell him of your interests and ask that he get involved in them with you.
In the event that he is non-responsive to your requests to act like a mature, responsible husband and share himself with his wife, you must seek marriage counseling. Whether or not he goes with you to the counselor, you need to get advice, support, and feedback from a professional. He may not be capable of being in an intimate relationship and is using sports as an avoidance tactic. He may have an alcohol problem and sports are just an excuse to go to the bars and stay out until closing. He may have never grown up and hasn’t yet realized he needs to live like a married person and not like a single guy. Whatever the reason, it would behoove you to uncover it and address it. If he won’t cooperate in the counseling you need to get yourself educated as to how to identify and resolve the problem. Since he may be providing little or no emotional support, you might need some help in sorting out your feelings.
No young wife should be left home alone 3 or 4 nights a week. Your concern is very valid and he needs to hear it loud and clear. That is not nagging: it is communicating your alarm. Do so directly, firmly and often until he heeds your concerns. Good luck, I am rooting for you and your marriage.
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Dear Dr. Coach,
My wife and I are extremely frustrated with our son’s high school basketball coach. Our son has so much talent and is not getting enough time to play in the games. He has won awards at camps for being an all star and now he rarely gets an opportunity to show what he can do. We are afraid he will not get the basketball scholarship he has his heart set on if he doesn’t play and score more. How do we convince the coach to have confidence in his ability?
Losing Sleep in LaGrange
Dear Losing Sleep,
Your son may not have as much talent as you believe. As parents, we are often quite biased in our assessment of our child’s abilities, especially in athletics. We may exaggerate the significance of positive feedback and ignore the reality of more unbiased evaluations if they don’t fit our dreams and desires for our children. Therefore, the first step in dealing with your frustrations is to make sure they are based in reality. A Division I basketball coach once told me that parents always believe their child was at least two levels of competition better than how college coaches evaluate the same player. It is possible you are doing your son a grave disservice by perpetuating a myth about his level of talent and fueling your own frustrations as a result of your overestimating his ability.
Coaches want to win. In order to win consistently the best players must play. Most coaches would sit their grandmothers on the bench and play Attila the Hun if it would help them win. If your son isn’t playing, the odds are great that it is because he is not one of the better players on THAT team. Maybe his style of play isn’t compatible with the team’s philosophy. Perhaps another player at his position does more of the things the coach believes his team needs from that position than does your son. Possibly your son’s game lacks some of the fundamentals that his coach demands from his players. Conceivably your frustration has spilled out onto your son and has taken some of the joy out of the game for your son and his attitude has been effected. Whatever the reason, you might consider encouraging your son to discuss with his coach, in private, what he must do to get more playing time. He could inquire as to what particular skills must he develop or improve to better his odds on playing more. Have him ask the coach if there are any attitudinal or behavioral changes he might make to make him more valuable to the team.
Point out to your son that there are many possible contributions in building team morale and team unity he could make to his team whether he is playing a little or not at all: in practice, on the bench, on the bus or in school each day. Encourage him to always keep his head in the game. I recall an occasion when I was coaching where the last man on the bench, who rarely played, won a game for our team because he knew there was a foul to give before the bonus free throws and communicated this to the coaches who used the information to stop a game winning shot by the opposition. In effect, he was the MVP of the game and never played a second. Educate your son as to what being on a team is really all about: making any contribution possible, whenever possible, no matter how small.
As far as his not getting an opportunity to show what he can do, remember, and remind your son that he has that chance every day in practice, in every drill, in every film session or team meeting as well as in the time he does get in the games. You and your child might remember the old adage: “The cream rises to the top.” If your son has the talent it will eventually show and be recognized. In the meantime he must continue to work hard and improve his weaknesses in basketball and in life. You and he must resist the urge to whine and complain and instead become a source of positive energy for him and his team.
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Dear Dr. Coach,
My husband has taught my son to golf. They now play together at times and my husband has noticed our son is cheating. We are quite concerned. What does it mean? What should we do?
Distressed by Deception
Dear DbD,
We could psychoanalyze the underpinnings of your son’s desire to beat his dad, but it would prove more fruitful to directly address the problem: Do not allow your child to cheat! Immediately correct him when he begins to cheat. When he cheats, tell him precisely what he is doing wrong, what he should be doing and why. For example, when your husband sees your child cheating on the course, he should stop and say, “Son, you are cheating. You need to play fairly if you want to continue playing.” This should be said as privately and discreetly as possible. After one warning per round, your husband should be prepared to walk off the course with your son, announcing: “I don’t enjoy playing with people who cheat!”
You might wish to explore the nature of competition in your family. How intense is it? Make sure that you and your husband and any other kids in the family play by the rules at all times: wait their turn, share, and do not argue when playing competitive games. Actions speak louder than words, so be sure to set a good example for your son.
Teach your young golfer to ask for help from dad when he is frustrated and feels like cheating. Inspire him to practice and not just play so as to improve his skills in order to reduce his need to cheat. Help your son realize that self improvement is more important than being the best, “winning,” “beating” someone else, etc. Inspire him to feel that improving his own score is better than always trying to “beat” someone else. Also, make sure your child understands that cheating in competition may make other children not want to play with or compete with him again.
Ask your husband to make sure he is putting the emphasis on personal improvement, enjoying each other’s company, the beauty of golf courses, and having fun. Try to avoid the trap of focusing too much on the score and not enough on the other enjoyable aspects of golf. Inform your son that the greatest golfers of all time understood golf was a metaphor of life and that winning is only a small part of life’s rewards. A plaque hung in my son’s room for years quoting Walter Hagen, one of golf’s greats, announcing: “As you walk down the fairway of life, you must smell the roses, for you only get to play one round.” Explore with your son the broad meaning of such golf philosophy and point out life’s and golf’s roses any chance you get.
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Dear Dr. Coach,
I have been teaching third grade for 15 years and have seemed to notice a decaying of sportsmanship in the
children. Is this really occurring? If so, what can be done about it?
Instructing the Ill-mannered
Dear Ill,
Yes, unfortunately the trend towards boorish behavior on the playgrounds and playing fields in this country is on the rise. It makes me sick, too, as it should all of us who are responsible to teach our children values. All parents, teachers, coaches, officials, school administrators and athletes themselves must share the blame for the posed antics of the next generation of poor sports.
Oh it would be easy to blame Bart Simpson, Beevis and Butthead or even Deion Sanders but the responsibility lies with those of us that tolerate it (with an extra 20 lashes to the crude TV commentators who seem to relish and applaud it). Parents must point out the positive role models in sports and identify their sportsmanship in action. Show the children how such appropriate athletes handle success and how they deal with failure. Identify Grant Hill’s lack of arrogance. Recognize Derek Jeter’s tendency to applaud others’ efforts. Tell youngsters to notice Jerry Rice’s ability to share the victories but shoulder the defeats. Teach our youth that the mature, decent sportsman consistently demonstrates these unselfish traits. Parents might consider not endorsing the prancers and self-glorifiers in sport by refusing to purchase sporting goods with the bad actors names or numbers on it. Children need to have unsuitable and inappropriate behavior corrected as soon as it occurs. Consequences for such unsportsmanlike conduct should be swift and severe.
As adults, we all may need to examine our own behavior insofar as sportsmanship. What messages are we sending to our kids when we yell at referees or criticize or argue with coaches? Coaches ought to do whatever possible to be aware of the trash talk and other one-upmanship acting out that has become all too common and discipline the culprits accordingly. Umpires, referees, and all other sporting officials at all levels could help eliminate the excesses in bad behavior by strictly applying the rules for unsportsmanlike conduct. School administrators must stop letting victories be the only criteria by which they judge coaches. The athletes’ on field behavior must be monitored and modified, when needed, by the coaches and the coaches should be held responsible for violations of proper decorum. Parents should demand accountability from coaches and administrators in all intramural and interscholastic competition from grade school through college. Parents and coaches might consider stressing how to dress for sporting events. The great John Wooden actually taught incoming UCLA freshman basketball players how to put on and tie their shoes. The word uniform should mean and be just that: unvaried--uniform in all aspects. The idea of some players wearing black socks, or wristbands or different color shoes or other variations from the team uniform has become a form of self-glorification. What will we have next, neon hats with signs: WATCH ME?
When our children see the tantrums of the Woody Hayes and Bob Knights on television and no one does anything about it, they learn that acting out not only is not a problem, it might make you famous. The electronic media has also contributed to making good sportsmanship a lost art. By not condemning, but rather, at times, glorifying the dances, and pointing and taunting of some of today’s publicized athletes, sportscasters have unwittingly, perhaps, helped to create a selfish, self-centered, self-important, boastful monster. Advertisers have also helped with the decline of goodness in sports. Because they have exalted trash talk in ads and downplayed the aspect of being a role model, children are exposed to bad manners almost as much during the time outs of televised sports as during the contests themselves.
Undoubtedly this must be a somewhat unpopular position. I wonder, as you might however, my teacher friend, “why isn’t this talked about more often?” Perhaps, therein lies the problem.
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Dear Dr. Coach,
I am a pretty good high school soccer player but my temper messes up my game and hurts my team. I am constantly receiving red cards for fighting which means I must leave the game. My coach tells me I must control my anger better. How can I do that and still keep up the aggressive play that has won me notice and helped win games?
Combative but Confused
Dear Confused,
Competitive energy can stem from aggression so it can be useful as a psychological motivator. Yet, as you have found, with aggression like most behaviors, excesses can cause problems. The answer though, isn’t to lose your aggressive nature on the soccer field but rather, to channel it appropriately. You are right; you must learn to control it.. .not allow it to control you.
The will to win is a life force that creates energy, which can lead an entire team when properly focused. However, feelings of power, anger or strength often are misdirected through outbursts of uncontrolled aggression. This leads to problems in sports because the aggression is not directed towards the ultimate goal: to win. It sounds like that at times you have allowed your anger to become a singular, selfish focus: revenge, ego promotion or some other personal indulgence. When frustrated, it sounds like you tend to lash out and lack self-control. You must start by practicing self-restraint. Begin to recognize the difference between game aggression that helps your team and situational aggression such as a retaliating with a cheap shot, which is harmful to the team. Own the fact that when you fail to restrain your self-important impulse to retaliate you are doing what the other team wants: helping them win.
You can work on anger control by practicing the following techniques:
Self Talk: tell yourself that you and your team can’t afford for you to act on your anger impulse. Remind yourself the sweetest revenge is a Victory. Focus on your role in the game and what is needed from your position at that moment.
Focusing: Wear a rubber band on your wrist and when the impulse to lash out inappropriately comes on, recognize it, and snap the rubber band. Snap it and snap it and snap it until you have regained focus on your job and yourself and move back into the flow of the game.
Use Relaxation: Breathe deeply, from your diaphragm; breathing from your chest won’t relax you. Picture your breath coming up from your “gut.” Slowly repeat a calm word or phrase such as “relax,” “take it easy.” Repeat it to yourself while breathing deeply.
Use imagery; visualize a relaxing experience from either your memory or your imagination.
Calm yourself. Count to ten, count the number of victories your team has had in your career, recite to yourself what happens if you lose your cool, remind yourself that a calm player stays in the game, take a deep breath and go back after the ball, not the opponent.
Restructure your thinking: Change the way you think. Angry people often swear or curse and when you’re angry your thinking might be highly exaggerated. Try replacing such dramatic thoughts with more rationale ones. For example, instead of telling yourself, “oh, that bum, I’m gonna kill him”, tell yourself, “it is upsetting and frustrating and it makes sense that it would bother me, but, it is not that big a deal and getting mad isn’t going to help anyway.”
Use humor: When you get angry and call someone a name or refer to them in some derogatory, imaginative manner, stop and actually visualize what that word or phrase would literally look like. Angry people tell themselves: “things must go my way.” When you feel the urge to think like that, recognize it and then picture yourself as a god or a king, a supreme ruler who owns all malls and parks and roads around and has all the power. The more detail you can get into your imaginary scenes, the better chance you have to realize that maybe you are getting carried away. You might also realize how unimportant the thing you are angry about really is.
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Dear Dr. Coach,
I am an eleventh grader who plays varsity basketball. I am receiving letters from college coaches. Friends say that letters don’t mean anything so I don’t know what to think. Are these schools interested in me or not?
College bound?
Dear College,
If you love basketball and want to play in college, with the interest colleges are showing in you already, you almost certainly will have the opportunity. However, you are in a bit of a pickle: that of getting a realistic appraisal of your talents that will best match you with the level of college competition where you can succeed and be happy. Luckily you have some time before a decision must be made. Also, your healthy skepticism about the recruiting process should serve you well.
First, your friends are right: letters from college recruiters may not be worth the paper they are written on. The initial typewritten letters kids receive from coaches are written on word processors and are sent to perhaps 100 or more players even though the school only has 2-3 scholarships to give. A few years ago, I knew of two guards from the same high school conference that got the exact same letters from the University of Texas outlining 14 specific reasons to consider Texas. The last reason was: “We want you very badly!” Must have been a fickle coach because neither player ever talked to the coaches by phone, ever had a home visit with Texas, ever made a paid campus visit to Austin, or obviously, was offered a scholarship to Texas (or any other Division I school for that matter).
The letters are the first step in a highly sophisticated, heartless business procedure for colleges to get athletes very interested in their school until the college decides which athletes they really want. It is kinda like asking 50 girls you never met to the prom to make sure you get a really great date.
A more reliable sign of interest will be if the coaches call you on the phone. However, be aware that typically these coaches sit down every evening in the allowable recruiting season and call dozens of kids just to chat and build a relationship in case the school wants them. But usually, the coaches haven’t yet seen the player play. Once they have seen your game on tape or live, if they are still talking with you, you have a chance at a scholarship. If they offer you a paid visit to campus they are usually ready to offer you a scholarship. Until then it is all just a hustle: remember they are talking to many players at your position.
To find out where they really see you, ask them directly:
1). How do I rank with the other players you are recruiting at my position?
2) What are the best parts of my game?
3) Where must I improve most to succeed in college basketball?
Take the suggestions to heart and work hard, especially in the off season, to strengthen your weaknesses. Attend competitive camps in the summer and play year round. The exposure and improvement will increase the number of schools where you might be able to play. If you really want to play, don’t be too proud to consider all levels of college basketball. While there are only less than a thousand Division I scholarships a year available to the tens of thousands of high school basketball players in this country, Division II and NAIA programs also give scholarships. There are also tremendous opportunities and programs at the Division III levels as well as in Junior Colleges which you should not overlook.
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Dr. Coach is a former coach and practicing clinical psychologist. His syndicated column appears weekly. Send questions to: Dr. Coach, Glenwood Testing Center, 2823 Glenwood Avenue, Rockford, IL 61101 or via e-mail: drcoach@doctorcushing.com
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