Veteran Kansas City newspaperman Greg Hall, who writes a sports blog called greghallkc.com, recently published new Texas coach Charlie Strong's set of rules and expectations for the Longhorn football program:
1. Players will be attending all of their classes and sit in the front rows of their classes. GAs, academic folks and position coaches will be constantly checking now.
2) “No headphones in class. No texting in class. Sit up and take notes.
Strong standards: New Texas coach Charlie Strong let players and coaches know what he expected at UT, right from the beginning. He inherits a team that has gone 8-5, 9-4, and 8-5 over the last three seasons (Brendan Maloney-USA TODAY Sports).
3) “If a player misses a class, he runs until it hurts. If he misses two classes, his entire position unit runs. If he misses three, the position coach runs. The position coaches don’t want to run.”
4) “No earrings in the football building. No drugs. No stealing. No guns. Treat women with respect.”
5) “Players may not live off campus anymore, unless they’re a senior who hits certain academic standards. The University will buy out the leases for every player currently living off campus and put them in the athletic dorm.”
6) “The team will all live together, eat together, suffer together, and hang out together. They will become a true team and learn to impose accountability on each other. The cliques are over.”
7) “There’s no time for a rebuild. ‘I don’t have time for that.’ The expectation is that Texas wins now.”
8) “Players will learn that they would rather practice than milk a minor injury.”
9) “The focus is on winning and graduating. Anything extraneous to that is a distraction and will be stamped out or removed.”
10) “I don’t want to talk about things. I’d rather do things. We just talked. Now it’s time to do.”
Strong had a 37-15 record at Louisville, including 11-2 and 12-1 in the last two seasons. Led by future NFL quarterback Teddy Bridgewater, the 2012 team won the Sugar Bowl 33-23 over #3 Florida.
Strong wasn't the first choice among Texas fans, particularly wealthy boosters, but he's sending a clear message that he intends to turn the Longhorn program around, beginning with a change of attitude and behavior, enforcing a standard of discipline in every aspect of practice, academics and overall team organization.
At Oregon, there were some charges last year that the team lost discipline under a first-year head coach, that the devotion to preparation and focusing on winning the day and preparing for the next opponent was misplaced.
The Ducks moved into a swanky new building loaded with amenities, and the danger is great that players and even coaches could be lured into a certain complacency about work habits and effort. They're privileged. They're pampered. It takes tremendous will and maturity to maintain discipline in posh surroundings, to maintain the hunger to win and achieve at the highest level.
Oregon's team does have a core of tremendous internal leadership and outstanding young men who seem to recognize and value the opportunity to play at UO and work out of the Hatfield-Dowlin Center. The return of Marcus Mariota, Hroniss Grasu and Ifo Ekpre-Olomu underscores that fact.
Still, a football team only continues to get better and exceed expectations when the standards, principles and values are clear and consistently applied.
While it wouldn't do to merely parrot Strong's rules, every coach and every team across the country should be challenged to ask, do we expect this much and give this much structure to our athletes? If not, why?
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