What's the best thing to do when a coach yells at you?

At my first newspaper gig, coach of Podunk High blew up at the ME. Coach said he had no problem with me but wouldn't talk to me on the record since he was mad at the paper. I thought about blasting him in a column but didn't really see what good that would do. I called him every week looking for preview info. He'd get mad and say he told me he wasn't talking to my paper. I'd always calmly reply "Coach, I know what you said, but I'm not doing my job correctly if I don't try to talk to you."

I made sure the parents knew I was calling every week and trying to get him to talk after games but that he wouldn't cooperate. Parents can be a pain in the ass, but sometimes that works to your advantage. After a couple of weeks he started talking again. He apologized to me at the end of the season. Sometimes it's better to take the high road.

 

I just want to say that these postings are brilliant. I'm sitting around the sports department reading some of them to the rest of the lads and we're absolutely howling! Thanks.

 

Yesterday, I had a soccer player after a game tell me that when I asked for an interview that "my coach told me it would be better if I didn't talk to you." He left me, went back to his coach, said out loud "You told me not to talk to him right?" The coach nodded and the player went along his merry way. I asked the coach during the interview, "Oh, I guess John didn't have much to say today did he?" Coach just looked at me, smiled, and answered all of my questions about the game.

 

In one post-game PC with about 12-15 members of the media present I asked the coach why he decided to punt instead of going for it and he went off about having to defend his decision to a bunch of people who had never coached.

I interrupted him in a loud voice (I've got some serious volume in which I don't have to yell to get my point across - works well when you're a dad with boys) and said "that's the whole point. You were so busy being defensive you didn't take the time to even listen to the question or consider an answer. No one asked you to defend it. We want an explanation because we don't know if someone was hurt or if you saw something we didn't see or if you knew something about tendencies that we don't know. That's all you have to do."
He stood there dumbfounded, which was easy for him, and said "oh. ... well ... We really didn't think we could get the first at that point because we hadn't been moving them off the ball all day."
And I said, "OK, thanks."

In another PC with a notorious asshole basketball coach, he started going on about how the owner of our paper owned some property that happened to be leased by an adult theatre. At the time the students on campus were protesting the fact that the university was invested in South African companies during aparthied.
So me, being a notorious asshole, said "so I guess we can blame you for aparthied in South Africa?"
He didn't know what to say.
I'm not good at much, but I'm one heck of a smartass.

 

I know someone who works at a paper where a coach won't call in results because he doesn't want his next opponent scouting his tennis players based on how they did in a previous match.

 

The coach probably can do it on the field or the gym. However, he can't stop a player from talking to you when he's not there, and he can't stop you from talking to a parent. He also can't stop you from talking to a principal, superintendent, or school board member. The coach isn't holding the strongest hand in this situation.

 

Shit, well, I better get to work sending these fucktards to school. They deserve it, they work so hard.

 

I had to get creative for the first few games of the 2006 season when the coach prevented most of his players and coaches from doing any interviews with me (the QB didn't care and talked to me anyway). I got a lot of "I can't talks" and "They told me I can't talk to you."
When it heated up and he went off in a presser, I called the coach on the BS with one simple line. But it only got worse.
My editors met w/ him and the AD, told them I wasn't going to be replaced -- my only fault in the problem was hurting their feelings.
The only thing that changed it all was when the coach's mother died mid-season and I made it a point to tell him how sorry I was for he and his family. After that, we never had another problem.

 

You know, doing stuff like this makes you seem like a human being. It makes sense to say that to someone, but we always don't do it. Amazing how much mileage something like this can get you, so says a former intern whose job it often was to write feature obits (and I kinda enjoyed it, too).

 

When I did it, I had no alterior motives. I genuinely felt bad for the guy because I knew how close he and his mother were.
But when I had a sit-down w/ his agent a couple months later, the agent also said that was what turned things around. He saw that I wasn't just some sportswriter trying to bury him. He saw that I was a human being.

 

I know, and this is what I mean. Sometimes we (not just you, not pointed toward anyone in particular) all get caught up in evening the score and stuff. Being human and relating to people, instead of being a flaming prick 24-7 (again, not directed at anyone), helps tremendously.