The Pop Warner School of Fear

“I wonder if I’m the only one,” is a subconscious statement I’ve made to myself innumerable times. That’s the statement that kept me from sharing fears and asking the tough questions from as far back as elementary school. I figured that if I was the only one, the question need not be asked and the fear was purely a rare condition. But I was asked recently about why a particular group of athletes lacked the “drive”, as it’s called, to compete despite having all of the mechanics of their respective sport. I didn’t have the answer readily available but see if this resonates.

When I was younger, I played one year of Pop Warner football and one of my positions was punter. I could kick a football over trees in practice but in the games, with defensive linemen rushing and my inexperience with a long snapper I would drop the ball or occasionally punt the ball over my head behind me. I was comedy in motion because of the limited time I had spent transitioning practice elements to game situations. But in the interest of keeping it real, I was scared, afraid of onlookers, afraid of failure in front of my team/coaches and afraid of being the reason for a loss.

There’s a difference between practice and a game, between controlled environments and wildly unpredictable competition. The variables of a game situation offer a complexity that only resembles the confines of a scrimmage and here are some of the contrasts:

Practice                                                   Game

• Isolates specific skills                        Demands the use of random skills in combination
• Conducted without officiating       Officiated by impartial judges who call you on your mistakes
• Places you among teammates        Places you in competition with opponents (usually strangers)
• Takes place with no audience         Takes place in front of people rooting either for or against you
• Involves most/all players                 Involves the players that give the team the best chance to win

When you pay close attention to the dissimilarities between the game and practice constructs, you have to see that practice is meant to replicate and produce mastery. It’s meant to acquaint the competitor with situations and movements that can be applied instinctively at full-speed with maximum intensity. It’s also a time to build relationship with team members so there is no hesitation to take the risks in battle needed for you to perform at the highest level possible. Success is not likely if practice cannot be transferred over to the real deal. So now I’ve come to compete free of the pseudo-dignity…the obsessive concern with how I’ll be treated if I perform below expectation. To answer my friend’s question about how to get his team to have the drive I’d say, “Tell them to admit what they fear about going hard in the game.”