Football, Toughness & Leadership

The Jonathan Martin / Richie Incognito fiasco has me thinking back to my experience playing high school football.  In my three years putting on the pads - which I look back on with incredible fondness - I was on both sides of this debate; a rookie who was "toughened up" by team leaders and then subsequently becoming a team leader who had to help younger players figure out how to survive and thrive on a dangerous field in a physical game.

If you know me personally, you likely know that I am never afraid to stand my ground.  Part of that comes from my upbringing, but a significant portion of my toughness comes from my experience playing high school football.  The first time I put on pads I was barely 5'4" 150-lbs; a wimp who only joined the team because a confluence of events led to there being an extremely low number of players on the roster which threatened to disband the team.  I had always loved football and figured this was my one shot to play; however I was late to pick up the tackle game and in all reality - based on my size and experience - probably had no business playing on a proper team.  I understood very quickly that surviving would require a crash course in physical and mental toughness that I had no experience with and could not even come close to understanding by watching the game on television or in the stands.

One senior in particular took me under his wing to transform me into a tougher version of myself. He spent the whole season working on me, physically challenging me on and off the field and saying some of the worst things you could imagine to unleash the rage I would surely need to overcome what at times were 100+ lb weight differences between myself and my opponents. I wouldn't say I was even close to being abused, but - not surprisingly - our relationship was completely strained by the end of the season. While lines were surely crossed, the toughness I learned from this experience allowed me to throw it right in his face and stand up to him when he tried to take it too far.

I never held a grudge against him though, because I saw results in myself.  In the summer in between sophomore and junior years our team went to Boston College football camp and got grouped with players from Poly Prep and Don Bosco Prep - nationally ranked HS programs that have produced several NFL players; I won the Dominator award for outworking players who were being scouted by major college programs. My junior year I was named a full time starter at Right Guard, and I played nearly 100% of the snaps on offense the rest of my career; it was not uncommon for opposing coaches to seek me out after games to tell me how impressed they were with my play. My senior season, our offense was converted to a Power Run scheme, much of which was predicated on my ability to play RG at a high level.  At the end of my senior year, I was awarded by the coaches with the Gatorade Will To Win Athlete Award.  The bottom line is I had been properly motivated to find whatever it was inside myself to overcome tremendous odds and become a much more than serviceable football player. The toughness I learned to exude and control is a part of me now and will be forever. In the end it worked...FOR ME...

However, motivation is a tricky thing.  What worked for me was not guaranteed to work for other players around me, and when attempting to motivate the underclassmen that came after me I had to learn this lesson the hard way. I did and said some things that initially turned some of the kids I was trying to mentor off. I had to recalibrate my approach and learn to motivate unique individuals with unique approaches.  I'm proud to say that after initially not even being able to hit me back at all in practice - and at first completely rejecting me as a mentor - the player who replaced me after I graduated went on to be an All-League RG; he even played in college. I can't even come close to taking all the credit for his development, but it has always filled me with pride that I could have helped motivate him even a small amount to realize his talent and maximize his ability. As I saw it, it was never about respecting me; it was always about respecting himself.

(Surprised that I went on to major in rhetorical studies in college?)

Seen through the prism of my experience, it is tough to really tough "to blame" either Martin or Incognito when it comes to the scandal surrounding the Dolphins.  If Jonathan Martin was enduring abusive behavior that was driving him into an advanced state of emotional distress, it certainly doesn't seem like he did enough to draw the line of what was appropriate with him. You hear stories all the time of younger players in all sports getting pranked or hazed; sometimes the story is those younger players making it absolutely clear to the veterans that they are not a joke, that they are not the guy you treat that way, and that they are not motivated through those means. We don't know all the facts but it sounds like Martin allowed this behavior to happen for a long time, conditioning Incognito to think his behavior was much more OK than it apparently was.

However Richie Incognito the team leader has a responsibility to stay on the right side of "the line" when motivating his younger teammates, regardless of what he can "get away with" because of his veteran status. What he said is obviously deplorable - especially in a professional setting and there is no excuse for it.  Had this been a different working environment, Martin would have already sued his boss for allowing an abusive manger to run the office.

We may never know all of the facts or details about Martin & Incognito's relationship prior to this scandal going public - we certainly do not right now - so my interest in this story lies very much in the question of Incognito's leadership and the intent of his motivating tactics.  How could Incognito possibly consider his unlimited options of motivating Martin and land on the actions he took and the words he used? How could anyone? How could he have possibly analyzed Martin's personality, body language, etc. and decided that this was the best path towards his development as a player and a teammate?

In the end the fault lies all the way at the top, with the GM & the Coach.  There is no excuse for not being all over this problem.  Incognito's past history of over-the-line behavior is well documented and they have a responsibility to keep him reigned in. But suspending Incognito has completely deflected blame from team management towards the locker room, something I hope changes now that the Dolphins locker room is fighting back.  Part of a coach's job is to control the locker room and it's tough imagine a situation that is more out of control than this one.  Part of a GM's job is to make sure the mix of personalities on a team meshes well enough for the team to be on the same page.  Both Joe Philbin and Jeff Ireland seem to have failed wildly at doing their jobs when it comes to this scandal, and I think they should lose their jobs so the Dolphins can begin moving forward by instituting a completely different culture.

Government Shutdown

The linked site shows a number of running-total statistics related to the current government shutdown. It paints a very good picture of just how stupidly harmful the shutdown is and demonstrates why it needs to end immediately.

http://labs.enigma.io/shutdown2013/