With this being the middle of the NFL playoffs, I thought it may be good to consider something from one of the greatest coaches in the history of football, and a genius when it came to motivating players.
Vince Lombardi made the statement that “winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing!” He regretted ever saying it. Not because it wasn’t true, but because it was so terse and to the point that it was misunderstood. He never gave license to justify any illegal, immoral, or unsportsman act to win a competition. All he meant was you must push yourself to the limit of your endurance in preparation and throw aside anything that hinders you from reaching your goal.
The way he pushed, prodded, and manipulated the Green Bay Packers might seem scandalous to the outside observer, but remember these were grown men wanting to reach the highest level of sporting competition. Every one of them was free to walk away but they didn’t because they wanted to win. Lombardi did everything to get them to that highest level, and his more “colorful” antics are what’s most remembered. I think he’d be horrified to hear that coaches at lower levels would even think of trying them. He always modified his methods for the player and would never have placed the pressure he put on the Packers on a Pop Warner team or a group of high school boys. But he would have always put himself under that pressure.
The key point is that he would willingly work himself to exhaustion and accept any humiliation to win. In his book Ten Men You’ll Meet in the Huddle, Bill Curry told of an event he witnessed in the Green Bay locker room. Lombardi was angry about the team’s performance and was accusing them of not trying. Bart Starr stood up to him and told him that he was wrong, and Lombardi backed down. Bart Starr was the only player who could get away with confronting Lombardi. He could because Lombardi knew that when the team was behind in the fourth quarter, they’d look to Starr to bring them back and undercutting Starr would undercut the team’s confidence in him. To Lombardi, winning championships was more important than his ego. Compare that to other teams where the head coach’s, or the owner’s, pride is so great so to preclude anyone else from having greater accolades than them. For such teams winning stops being the only thing, and very soon it stops being anything.
#Winning is the Only Thing #Lombardi #Bart Starr #Bill Curry