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March/April 2006
Issue No.
6
One Man's
Story:
The Real Essence of
Athletic
Activity
In the pursuit of athletic excellence, we often
count on a team or athletic experience to help teach young men
how to be accountable to more than themselves - how to behave
as teammates and representatives of their school, organization
and family...
One Boy's Story:
Dads and Coaches
Are
Important
The adult
men who have been involved with my sports teams have created a
constructive environment where I can learn how to be a
responsible man when I have to make choices about my life in
the future...
Book Review:
The Education
of a
Coach
A
study of how Bill Belichick was raised by his father.This
book, reviewed by Jon Gale, provides insight on one of the
most esteemed coaches: Bill Belichick of the New England
Patriot...
An Interview with
Mike
Bailey
For this newsletter we
invited Mike Bailey, the head football coach at Portland High
School and full-time member of the Portland H.S.
Biology...
Volunteer
Opportunities
The Boys to
Men Youth Governing Board and the 2006 Boys to Men Conference
would love your support!
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Boys to Men 2006
Annual Conference!
Visit the conference web site for information and
registration!
Executive Director's
Column
In this issue we will focus on the theme of "athletics
and masculinity". The intention is in part to prepare for and
support our annual Boys to Men Conference coming up on May 12,
2006 which will focus upon this theme. But, we are also
putting time and attention in this area because of the
increasing amount of pathology associated with boys and
sports. I want to be clear that it is not the boys causing all
the trouble. It is the adults...
Reader's Resources on Athletics
and Masculinity
Contribute to Our June/July
Newsletter:
Letters Between Fathers and
Sons
Our June/July newsletter will focus on men's/boys'
relationships with their fathers and sons. These
relationships can be complex, deeply important, loving and/or
meaningful in ways that are exemplary or destructive. Boys to
Men is hoping to capture some of this complexity. We are
asking men and boys to write a note or letter to their father
or son for us to publish and share in our newsletter. This
letter might be something you wished you had written,
something you have longed to share, an old score to settle, a
thank you note, a posthumous expression of regret or love,
anything....long or short - whatever you feel moved to write.
Please submit by
May 31.
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A Word from the Executive
Director
In this issue we
will focus on the theme of "athletics and masculinity". The
intention is in part to prepare for and support our annual
Boys to Men Conference coming up on May 12, 2006 which will
focus upon this theme. (Check out http://click.exacttarget.com/?ffcb10-fe6511797464077f7617-fe1e167570620d7a731c71-fefd1572766301)
But, we are also putting time and attention in this area
because of the increasing amount of pathology associated with
boys and sports. I want to be clear that it is not the boys
causing all the trouble. It is the adults. As reported on the
Sports Done Right website:
"Even in
Maine... schools and communities struggle with issues so
often reflected in the national media such as fans harassing
officials, coaches and student-athletes, coaches'
thoughtless handling of their young charges, and the
spectacle of out-of-control parents and fans. Most
superintendents and school boards find themselves embroiled
in a sports-related controversy each year, requiring
tremendous amounts of time to resolve and taking a high toll
on relationships and the public trust."
While the
majority of people who participate in sports or function as
spectators do so because of the love of the game and those
playing it, investment in fitness and health and for the joy
of a team-centered activity, the few adults who emphasize
winning over everything else can ruin the experience for the
children who are involved, for some of the coaches and the
fans in the stands.
When my youngest
son, Micah (now in the 11th grade), was in the sixth grade, he
spent most of the baseball season alone in his team's dugout
because his coach prioritized winning over all else- even over
Micah's experience of and interest in baseball, which thanks
to the coach, no longer exists. Up until that point in time,
Micah loved baseball, but he has not played a game
since.
If you would
like to know more about the core values of Boys to Men, check
out our web site at http://click.exacttarget.com/?ffcb10-fe6411797464077f7610-fe1e167570620d7a731c71-fefd1572766301.
Layne Gregory,
LCSW
Executive Director
Boys to
Men
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A Boy's Story: Dads and Coaches are
Important
The
adult men who have been involved with my sports teams have
created a constructive environment where I can learn how to be
a responsible man when I have to make choices about my life in
the future. By "constructive environment" I mean when
"doing well" and "trying hard" is encouraged and achievement
is complimented. My primary experience as a boy playing
sports has been very positive. My coaches have helped me have
some idea of how to grow up and, at the same time, be
comfortable being myself. Mostly, I have spent time in
sports activities with my father. He has been a real coach to
me and has heavily influenced me to strive for certain
athletic activities that I wanted to do but was hesitant to
try because I felt I was not good enough. For example,
just this year, I decided over the summer that I would like to
be on the middle school Nordic ski team. But, when it
came time to sign up I was too nervous to do it. I told
my dad and he reassured me that I would be fine and probably
would be a good skier on the Nordic team. When I got
back to school I signed up for it and I successfully got
through the season, even though I was only able to participate
in two races. I felt disappointed that I couldn't race
more, but I had a great experience on the team and realized I
had triumphed, with my dad's help, in my first season of
Nordic skiing.
Another
experience I have had with sports was when I played baseball
on the middle school team after a four-year break. I had
played on a little league team up through the summer after my
third-grade year, but then my family moved, and I stopped
playing. When the opportunity came to play again in the
spring of my seventh-grade year, I was very nervous about
starting again, because I thought that I had lost all of my
skill. In the end, however, I overcame my fear of being
terrible and joined the middle school baseball team. I
found out that I had not lost anything, and the only thing
that was different was that the field was bigger than the
little league field, so I switched from short stop to second
base. Also I have been growing my hair out since
kindergarten and I felt a little bit odd going out onto the
baseball field being the only one with a ponytail. The
good thing was that my coach had a ponytail too, so I did not
feel entirely strange. In fact, during one practice, we
had been running and I lost my hair elastic. I have had
a small amount of trouble in the past with not being able to
see through my hair, so I asked my coach if he had an extra
hair elastic, and he did. At that point I felt
completely accepted as part of the team.
What these
stories have in common is that they have to do with me,
sports, and my coaches or my father. All of these
experiences have encouraged me to feel good as an athlete and
a person in general. Most of the coaches I have worked
with have influenced me in important ways. For example,
my ski coach taught me how to get myself to go faster and also
to push myself to do things mentally, in the sense that I
should go for any sport that I would like to do. He did
this by helping me to have a good time doing something that I
was at first hesitant to do. So in the end dads and
coaches are very important to the life of boys and young men
because of their positive effect. This is of course
assuming that the coach encourages you and your dad also
encourages you to do your best and be your
best.
Article by Max Ritchie
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A Man's Story: The Real
Essence of Athletic Activity
The most recent
Super Bowl was the 2nd most watched television program in the
history of television. The NFL's TV contract revenue
tops 7 billion dollars. The rights associated with televising
the NCAA basketball tournament is a multi-billion dollar
affair. The broadcast and marketing rights alone for
professional and major college sports is tens of billions of
dollars in this country and the rates and stakes keep going
up. American people watch more sports on TV and in
person, interact through sports talk radio, play more sports
as part of their scholastic experience, through clubs,
community leagues and recreation than ever before.
No, you haven't
been sent a Mediaweek Online newsletter -- I cite these
observations to underscore the tremendous exposure to the
mega-amplified representations of sports and sports culture on
our young people, particularly our young men and boys.
Anything consumed at such a high rate by the American public
must be taken seriously for its direct and indirect impacts -
for its conscious and unconscious influence.
Anyone who has
coached or mentored a young athlete over a number of years can
tell you that what young people see in their favorite sports
heroes becomes a part of how those same kids see and
participate in their own sports experience. Many, if not
most, men can recall the times when we emulated our favorite
players in-action, mimicking moves and mannerism, from the way
a player talked to how he swung a bat or ran with the ball or
wore his uniform.
Perhaps more
than any other public icons, sports heroes tell men young and
old in our culture how to act. More specifically, they
figure significantly in setting the bar for what behaviors are
considered most masculine - manly.
Among the many
attributes associated with participating in organized sports
is that involvement in an athletics program is, in many ways,
a proving ground for adolescent males to learn how to fully
appreciate their future roles as men in the culture. But
the path we show young men to get there can be confusing (at
the very least), and destructive, (at the very worst).
Imagine your
confusion as a young man as you try and sort out the cultural
messages involved in two well publicized events. A brawl
took place at an NBA game in November 2004 between players for
the Detroit Pistons and the Indiana Pacers that spilled over
into the stands to include players and fans alike. A central
figure in the event, Ron Artest, was suspended by the league
for the majority of the season losing millions of dollars and
costing his team, the Pacers, severely in their quest for the
championship. Other players involved were heavily fined
and suspended as well. The event was almost universally
condemned for its inappropriateness - particularly as a poor
example for young people.
Contrast the general reaction to a Major League
Baseball fight several months earlier. In a game between
the Boston Red Sox and their biggest rival the New York
Yankees, players from both team were involved in an on-field
fight. Central to this scene were "new" Yankee Alex
Rodriguez and later-to-be Red Sox Captain, Jason
Varitek. The subsequent public discussions about the two
incidents and the players involved were very different from
the Pistons/Pacers game. For Rodriguez, he went from
a player whose allegiance to the team and acceptance by its
fans were in question to being affirmed by virtue of his
willingness to do violence. This was deemed in New York
as the moment "A-Rod became a Yankee". Consider
that Varitek was from that point forward enthusiastically
discussed as the "leader" of the Red Sox. Both men were,
in their own right, granted a right of passage for their
violence. The positive message, despite any suspensions
that might have resulted, was clear. In fact, a still
photo of the two players as they collided with one another in
combat was chosen as the cover for avid Red Sox fan Stephen
King's book chronicling the heroic season, titled, with little
irony, "Faithful". In this case, the response by
the fans and media spoke longest and loudest.
As a young man, how do you reconcile the
messages you're receiving about these two events. All of
these players reacted to their situations based on an implicit
code of conduct among male athletes and men in general - you
should be willing to inflict violence in order to "have your
teammates back" and protect the image of your manhood.
What are we telling young men with these narratives??
There is plenty of concern among parents,
teachers and coaches about how the examples we present through
presentations of professional and major college sports is more
and more leading to problematic behavior among young
players. Fighting, disrespect of teammates and coaches,
substance abuse and gender violence are all issues of real
concern for those who care about our young men and boys.
Increasingly, more adults are admitting that
these factors are hurting our kids in ways that extend well
beyond the playing field and into adulthood.
Perhaps there needs to be more attention paid to the
narratives of sports culture we present to young men if we're
to constructively address the problems.
In the pursuit of athletic excellence, we often
count on a team or athletic experience to help teach young men
how to be accountable to more than themselves - how to behave
as teammates and representatives of their school, organization
and family. After all, it is commonly held that part of
being a "real man" in our culture is to understand and assume
responsibility. When it comes to family and community, I
would certainly agree.
When considering the previous examples, I think
we have some distance to travel to get to a place where we're
more consistent, compassionate and clearer with our young men
in helping them find their way from healthy boyhood to healthy
manhood. Adults who are involved with boys- be they coaches,
parents and especially men- have a responsibility to talk to
young men about the real essence of athletic activity:
leadership, sportsmanship, commitment, fitness and ability to
work well as a member of a team.
Daryl
Fort, Board Member, Boys to Men and Sports Done
Right
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Book Review: The Education of a
Coach
The Education of a Coach by David
Halberstam, a study of how Bill Belichick was raised by his
father.
As most readers know, Bill
Belichick coaches the New England Patriots, and has had enough
success doing so to deserve a biography. Halberstam is
really only a part-time biographer by trade. When he was
30 years old he won a Pulizer Prize* for his reporting on
Vietnam in the New York Times, and he has since written
numerous books about a variety of topics. He is not the first
writer one would expect to produce a biography of a football
coach.
Belichick, not coincidentally,
does not fit the stereotypical mold of "football coach", and
as such caught the attention of Halberstam. They live in
walking distance from one another parts of the year on
Nantucket, and when they met each other by chance one day
Belichick told Halberstam that he has several of the author's
books on his shelf. Belichick is a well-educated man,
having attended Phillips-Andover and then Wesleyan University
and his press conferences never involve the chest-thumping,
aggressive manner of some other coaches' public rants.
He is famously self-deprecating, and while demanding, always
deflects praise to his players and assistant
coaches.
How did this come to be?
Most professional football coaches played the game at the
highest level, or at least in major college football;
Belichick played without any notice at a Division III small
college. He is unique in his utterly unemotional
approach to the game; often coaches at many levels motivate
players by questioning their courage, indeed their manhood,
but Belichick famously coaches in monotone, focusing on
strategy and performance.
Halberstam tells us that the
answer is to be found in the parenting of Bill by Steve
Belichick. The book is a focus upon how Belichick was
raised by his father, and how the successful coach of 2005
came to be through his parental guidance. In some ways,
it is an uninteresting read. If you have read one book
about a child focused on a sport, or an artistic activity, and
how that child's parents supported the ultimate success of the
child, well, you have read them all. Bill Belichick was
single-mindedly focused on football before he was ten, often
sitting with his father (an assistant coach at the Naval
Academy) for hours analyzing game films. Other than the fact
that Steve pushed his son to perform in the classroom more
than on the football field, the formula is familiar: kid falls
in love with football, or the piano, or singing, and parent
guides kid to success. Perhaps the only difference is
the level of innate intelligence involved in this story- Steve
and Bill were gifted with an ability to see the world broadly,
and indeed see a football game broadly, far more so than their
peers, which led them to success based upon their
insights.
The description of father and son
cannot really be described as a perfect role model for raising
boys. They both appear in the book to focus on their
single passion to the exclusion of virtually all else.
The happiness that they derive from it does not necessarily
bring happiness to those in their immediate circle (though
millions of New England fans probably would make a case for
the overall output of human joy that resulted from Steve
Belichick's parenting, as might millions of music fans
regarding the job Yo Yo Ma's parents did). Steve and
Bill are both described spending many nights sleeping in their
offices to enable them to perform the way they do as
coaches. The discussions at the dinner table, when they
are there, inevitably involve the game to which they have
given their lives.
That said, on the grand scale, we
can probably agree that if we teach our sons to work hard,
treat people fairly, and act humbly, even in a trade where
unfair treatment is commonplace and self-promotion almost
required, we have done a pretty good job raising our boys to
be men. Steve Belichick spent so much time with his son
not only teaching by example, but by talking with him about
coaching, both what to do and how to do it, that Bill became a
coach almost indistinguishable from his father
professionally. And this is ultimately Halberstam's
point- while Bill Belichick was born with certain gifts; he
was raised to be the person that he is.
* PULITZER PRIZES
are annual awards given for achievements in American
journalism, letters, and music. The prizes are paid from the
income of a fund left by Joseph Pulitzer to the trustees of
Columbia University. The prizes have been awarded each May
since 1917 on the recommendation of an advisory
board.
Jon Gale, Esq.,
Board Member, Boys to Men
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An Interview with Mike
Bailey
For this newsletter, we invited
Mike Bailey to share his thoughts on what makes a man
successful. He is the head football coach at Portland
High School and has been a coach for more than 20 years. He is
also a full-time member of the Portland H.S. Biology
Department.
What was the best thing
about growing up as a boy?
Hanging out with the
guys. The camaraderie in sports gave me a group and I liked
the competition, but I liked the camaraderie even more.
I was pretty shy when I was young. Sports also gave me
confidence.
Please define what makes "a
successful man."
Successful men are well balanced
and in touch with their masculinity and male sexuality.
I think a masculine male is connected to others and is
self-confident. Successful men are in touch with their
sexuality, whatever that might be, whether gay or
straight. A masculine man is supportive of diversity of
all kinds. Our athletes are supportive of
diversity. Successful men are always trying to improve
their state of mind and out look.
What are the challenges you
see for young men growing up today?
Unfortunately,
boys today face lots of distortions in their lives.
There is too great a focus on money in our society and too
much emphasis in sports on just the win loss column.
Sports should be an extension of the classroom, focused on
developing the whole person, not just an athlete. In
sports we can expose kids to competitive situations and help
them learn to handle success and failure, and teamwork.
Also, this physical training helps them to develop
discipline.
There is lot of pressure today
around drugs and alcohol and to be sexually active.
Divorce has an adverse effect as well.
While there are many challenges for
young men today, there are also some benefits. Society
is more tolerant today. We are more accepting of
differences. At Portland High our kids are very open to
new cultures and backgrounds. New kids are always moving
into the area. Our players are very accepting of
this. Teams give new immigrants a sense of
belonging.
How can adult men support
this transition?
Adult men and coaches can be role
models for kids without dads. I get more enjoyment from
watching this development in my players than our wins and
losses. I see myself as a teacher first to my players, and a
coach second.
Boys need a good foundation of
exposure to many things, then they can make choices about what
to pursue. Our culture sometimes limits boys too much
and gives them too little room for growth.
We also need to let boys see a mix
of strong and sensitive emotions. We try to teach our players
that losing will really hurt, and they need to learn how to
get through it. We tell them we can only ask them to do their
best and it is ok to cry when they hurt.
What community supports do
boys need to grow-up to be successful?
Society can
encourage the development of sports that create a total
player, a member of a team, school and society. We
believe in this broad development. Our players can earn credit
towards their athletic letter through community service, and
keeping their grades up. For instance, our players do
fundraising for the Ronald MacDonald House and the local soup
kitchen.
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