When Should Football Practice Be Open?
posted by Scott Hood on Monday, July 30, 2007
He doesn’t always believe in doing things the conventional way. You know, “by the book.” He has his own mannerisms, speaking style, football philosophy. He’s not afraid to tell you what he feels.
Spurrier is unique in another way: he often likes to have the media and fans watching when his football team is practicing or scrimmaging.
Why? He believes it helps foster the psychological development of his team. He wants to see how his younger players will perform in front of a few hundred or a few thousand fans before the time comes to play a real game in front of 82,000 frenzied fans.
Most of USC's workouts this past spring were open, if you recall. Last year, the first 10 or 15 fall practices were open before Spurrier closed them to facilitate preparation for the regular season.
Anybody could walk through the gates and watch as many blocking and tackling drills as they wanted, even if they weren’t a Gamecock fan.
If nothing else, Spurrier is fearless.
Unfortunately, few coaches share his belief that practicing in front of fans is a good thing for the players. Spurrier noted Monday that he thinks some coaches take the paranoia thing a bit too far.
The fact that USC is now one of the few schools from a BCS conference in the country that allows fans to watch a limited number of pre-season practices has made Spurrier rethink his philosophy.
That’s too bad. But I understand his position. If no one else wants to play ball, why should he?
As Spurrier explained Monday, he doesn’t want to be the only coach in the SEC that conducts open practices. The conference is too hypercompetitive for that. So, if Mark Richt (Georgia), Urban Meyer (Florida) and Phil Fulmer (Tennessee) are banning fans from the sidelines, why shouldn’t he?
Of course, the myopic ones among us blame this trend of closing practices on the internet dweebs like myself who cover this stuff for a living. But there are many factors conspiring to influence the past and present decisions of coaches to close practice.
In my opinion, one of the major reasons coaches are closing practice throughout the country is they want to leave no stone unturned in their quest to protect their job and the million dollar-plus salary that comes with it.
Some probably even believe “valuable information” such as the number of calisthenics during the warm-up period would fall into the hands of their bitter arch-rival.
Thankfully, Spurrier doesn’t believe in such foolishness.
In my opinion, an actual college football game is far more complicated and has too many variables than cyberspace would lead you to believe. It’s 11 guys against 11 guys on every play. Execution is paramount.
Hence, what you read or digest on most internet sites covering their respective football programs has little influence on the outcome of games.
But coaches require a scapegoat.
A player misses a tackle? Blame it on the internet. A player drops a pass in a critical situation? Blame it on the internet. The opposition stopped us on 4th-and-inches? That’s because they knew our play from the internet.
It’s this fear that someone out there is watching them that has driven most coaches to close practices.
Where’s the harm allowing fans to watch a helmet and shorts practice? None. What will fans or, egad, internet sites learn that might affect the outcome of a game? Nothing.
But I do have one good reason not to want to watch football practice.
I’m sure I’ll offend some of you when I say that, quite honestly, watching a football practice is often like watching paint dry. The opening hour of most USC practices I’ve witnessed the last couple for years involves repetitious work on basic fundamentals and techniques.
It’s tedious, to put it nicely.
The second hour, when the Gamecocks typically match up in pass skeleton drills and the 11-on-11 is a little more eventful. You actually get to see offensive and defensive players face off, even if there’s usually not much tackling involved.
But getting through that first hour is always difficult.
That’s why I carry a large box of No-Doz with me at all times whenever I head out to cover a practice.
But it’s also useful when I’m forced to listen to coaches overcome by paranoia try to justify why they have to close practice.
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In case you haven’t noticed, Steve Spurrier is a little bit different than most other college football coaches.
He doesn’t always believe in doing things the conventional way. You know, “by the book.” He has his own mannerisms, speaking style, football philosophy. He’s not afraid to tell you what he feels.
Spurrier is unique in another way: he often likes to have the media and fans watching when his football team is practicing or scrimmaging.
Why? He believes it helps foster the psychological development of his team. He wants to see how his younger players will perform in front of a few hundred or a few thousand fans before the time comes to play a real game in front of 82,000 frenzied fans.
Most of USC's workouts this past spring were open, if you recall. Last year, the first 10 or 15 fall practices were open before Spurrier closed them to facilitate preparation for the regular season.
Anybody could walk through the gates and watch as many blocking and tackling drills as they wanted, even if they weren’t a Gamecock fan.
If nothing else, Spurrier is fearless.
Unfortunately, few coaches share his belief that practicing in front of fans is a good thing for the players. Spurrier noted Monday that he thinks some coaches take the paranoia thing a bit too far.
The fact that USC is now one of the few schools from a BCS conference in the country that allows fans to watch a limited number of pre-season practices has made Spurrier rethink his philosophy.
That’s too bad. But I understand his position. If no one else wants to play ball, why should he?
As Spurrier explained Monday, he doesn’t want to be the only coach in the SEC that conducts open practices. The conference is too hypercompetitive for that. So, if Mark Richt (Georgia), Urban Meyer (Florida) and Phil Fulmer (Tennessee) are banning fans from the sidelines, why shouldn’t he?
Of course, the myopic ones among us blame this trend of closing practices on the internet dweebs like myself who cover this stuff for a living. But there are many factors conspiring to influence the past and present decisions of coaches to close practice.
In my opinion, one of the major reasons coaches are closing practice throughout the country is they want to leave no stone unturned in their quest to protect their job and the million dollar-plus salary that comes with it.
Some probably even believe “valuable information” such as the number of calisthenics during the warm-up period would fall into the hands of their bitter arch-rival.
Thankfully, Spurrier doesn’t believe in such foolishness.
In my opinion, an actual college football game is far more complicated and has too many variables than cyberspace would lead you to believe. It’s 11 guys against 11 guys on every play. Execution is paramount.
Hence, what you read or digest on most internet sites covering their respective football programs has little influence on the outcome of games.
But coaches require a scapegoat.
A player misses a tackle? Blame it on the internet. A player drops a pass in a critical situation? Blame it on the internet. The opposition stopped us on 4th-and-inches? That’s because they knew our play from the internet.
It’s this fear that someone out there is watching them that has driven most coaches to close practices.
Where’s the harm allowing fans to watch a helmet and shorts practice? None. What will fans or, egad, internet sites learn that might affect the outcome of a game? Nothing.
But I do have one good reason not to want to watch football practice.
I’m sure I’ll offend some of you when I say that, quite honestly, watching a football practice is often like watching paint dry. The opening hour of most USC practices I’ve witnessed the last couple for years involves repetitious work on basic fundamentals and techniques.
It’s tedious, to put it nicely.
The second hour, when the Gamecocks typically match up in pass skeleton drills and the 11-on-11 is a little more eventful. You actually get to see offensive and defensive players face off, even if there’s usually not much tackling involved.
But getting through that first hour is always difficult.
That’s why I carry a large box of No-Doz with me at all times whenever I head out to cover a practice.
But it’s also useful when I’m forced to listen to coaches overcome by paranoia try to justify why they have to close practice.
- Permalink, Discuss, Blog Home
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Scott Hood. Since February of 2005, Scott has covered the South Carolina football, men's basketball and baseball programs for GamecockCentral. He may be reached by email at scottblog(at)gamecockcentral.com. Replace (at) with @.