OT: Coach O (LSU) - Pregame Motivation (The Athletic)
Wanted to bring this up to the board regarding the significance of pregame motivation - it can come in all forms.
I'm not saying Harbaugh needs to necessarily smash chairs but we have heard he's not much for the pregame Rah Rah. I've always thought an emotional edge was critical for Football. Would love to hear your thoughts.
For those that have the Athletic I've linked here
And an expert for those who do not:
Ducre: It was before one of our 11 a.m. games. He came in. I guess he sensed the energy of the team was a little low because we normally play games at 6:30 or 7 o’clock. It was our first morning game in a while. We weren’t really talking that much, and we were playing a lesser team. He comes in and is like, “What are y’all doing, what are y’all doing?” He calls for coach Moffitt, our strength coach, and asks him for a Red Bull; they always have a big stock of them.
Seth Newsome (LSU DE, 2016-18): He drinks as many Red Bulls and Monsters as he needs. He’ll drink at least three or four of them.
Ducre: He takes it, he picks up a chair, he slams the chair down repeatedly to the point that the rivets start flying off. He grabs another chair, he stands up on that chair, and he had an undershirt on.
Moore: He ripped his shirt off. Not like took it off but ripped it in half down the chest. I don’t know if he had pre-cut it down the middle or something, but yeah.
Ducre: Then he pulled his keys out, stabbed a hole in the bottom of it and shotgunned it.
Moore: And we went nuts. It was awesome.
Gallman: He had two Red Bulls and he Stone Cold’d them and chugged them. That definitely got us hyped up.
Moore: That’s probably the most genuine energy I’ve felt in a team room. I’ve had other coaches try a bunch of different tactics to motivate, to energize, and guys will go along with it a lot of times in jest, kind of egging the coach on. But it’s definitely genuine with Coach O.
October 22nd, 2019 at 2:47 PM ^
Honestly, if it were just about pregame speeches, wouldn't they have been better before now?
October 22nd, 2019 at 2:55 PM ^
Right?
Seems to me they caught lightning in a bottle with the combination of Joe Brady and Joe Burrow.
October 22nd, 2019 at 2:57 PM ^
Coach O’s method is one of things where people buy it because dude is legit what he portrays. Hes that guy.
But on the flip side people will turn on that when things go South. Its a thin line between hype and cringe.
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:12 PM ^
Not like this is some magical key to winning. You think Saban or Belichick does this shit? BUT how can you dislike Coach O. Sometimes I tire of someone getting loved up by the media but never heard controversy about the guy, not a jerk to anyone and pretty funny.
October 22nd, 2019 at 6:26 PM ^
You think Nick Saban is not intense?
October 22nd, 2019 at 9:03 PM ^
What coach at that level isn't intense? But I'm sure Saban isn't shotgunning red bulls and smashing chairs. The point is a lot of people seem to think that's what wins games, and has been cited as a reason Harbaugh has lost some. As opposed to recruiting a bunch of athletes and hiring a good OC.
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:19 AM ^
I guess if you recruit good athletes they should be on the field at crucial moments in the game too. But yeah, if you had a good OC they would be.
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:21 PM ^
People love it when they're winning. Thought he was originally no more than Cajun Hoke, but Coach O has proven he is an elite recruiter and a good coach with the staff he has around him.
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:21 PM ^
Expanding on the OP -
You have the ball first at PSU and CALL A TIMEOUT.
Perhaps with the appropriate prep both during the week and pregame - you use your fist play to KICK ASS.
But as some have said so far, if it was all about the hype, wouldn't that have shown itself by now?
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:53 PM ^
I can't remember, did we run out of time outside in the first half? That's right we didn't.
October 22nd, 2019 at 4:14 PM ^
I don't know what the fist play is...not sure I want to.
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:42 AM ^
Funny how so many people want to avoid saying Josh Gattis was not ready to take over an offense. He's in over his head. But all the "speed in space" sounded nice a few months ago. It had us believing.
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:49 PM ^
Remember when Harbaugh used to get all hyped up and would go up to his quarterback and slam his fists into the top of his shoulder pads several times. It seems like a distant past. He just seems much more lethargic before games now. Not that it made anyone play any better, but the difference in his emotion before games seems to have changed.
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:53 PM ^
He still does it. He was seen on camera the last 2 games doing it to Shea.
October 22nd, 2019 at 4:01 PM ^
This can't be true. It doesn't fit the narrative.
October 22nd, 2019 at 6:31 PM ^
Yeah, it's a narrative, because we see this guy all the time, huh:
October 22nd, 2019 at 3:52 PM ^
There's a crowd on here that wholeheartedly believes that Harbaugh is the best coach Michigan can land...
Is that really true when new high-level coaches come out of the woodwork every season?
Nobody was praising the Ed Orgeron/Cajun Hoke hire when it first happened, and they were making fun of LSU for striking out on their first two options... Now he's got them rolling.
Ryan Day and Lincoln Riley were both relatively inexperienced and risky when they were hired to be head coaches.
Matt Rhule has a depleted Baylor performing way above expectations right now.
October 22nd, 2019 at 8:37 PM ^
People view Harbaugh differently because he played here.
Strip his alum status, and he's basically replacement level.
October 22nd, 2019 at 4:15 PM ^
The best motivation for any team in any sport , is knowing their coaching staff is good and that they will put you in the best position to succeed.
October 22nd, 2019 at 4:54 PM ^
Cajun Hoke has some nice gimmicks.
Brady Hoke should have gobbled up a dozen donuts, smashed a headset against the wall, and then wore the broken headset during the game.
October 22nd, 2019 at 5:16 PM ^
Nice. I laughed out loud on that one. :)
October 22nd, 2019 at 8:59 PM ^
Nice visual, I laughed. You have potential.
October 22nd, 2019 at 5:22 PM ^
yaw yaw yaw yay footbaw
October 22nd, 2019 at 6:17 PM ^
I mean, it's not like Cajun Hoke is in good shape. There's going to come a time when those Red Bulls catch up to him...
Otherwise, the best rah rah I know of was before the 1969 OSU game. Bo came and just paced for 5 minutes as the game time clock counted down. After it hit zeros, the officials said called for them. All Bo said was "it's time".
October 22nd, 2019 at 6:24 PM ^
You mean you're supposed to start the game fired up?
October 22nd, 2019 at 6:35 PM ^
As far as pep talks go, if you're a good team it helps. If you're not so good it doesn't help.
October 22nd, 2019 at 11:19 PM ^
Such a tired narrative that Harbaugh's teams don't have energy when the game starts. I watched the skycam version of the Penn State game and you can see all the players on the Michigan sideline screaming and yelling just as much as Penn State. LSU doesn't win games because Coach O rips his shirt off.
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:28 AM ^
There was so much energy form that Josh Gattis offense, right at the opening of the game, that Jim Harbaugh had to call an emergency time out to avoid a delay of game. That's bursting out of the gate energy.
The offense so much plays like they believe in what Josh Gattis is selling. You can just see it. The crispness. The fire. The explosion. The confidence. The attention to detail.
Thanks. We needed to be enlightened it's just a narrative.
Orgeron, his intensity, it means nothing. Teams don't need no firing up. Delays of game on the first play. Just do it!
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:43 PM ^
Will everyone still be buying into this when they lose to Alabama for the tenth time in a row? Guess we'll see.
I mean if this gets his guys all the more psyched up then go for it. And credit to LSU, they seem to have finally figured things out on offense. They always had all the talent in the world but never had a single clue about how to use it. Now they do. And who knows, maybe these pregame speils are helping. But they still have to get through Alabama, and like OSU vs. Michigan, that game is a loss for LSU until they prove otherwise on the field.
So I guess we'll see how cool everyone thinks these routines still are after they lose to Alabama again.
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:13 PM ^
Yeah, I don't know why Coach O wasn't doing that stuff when he was 10-25 at Ole Miss.
Would have totally made them a winning team.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:57 PM ^
I've always felt that the best teams needed little in the way of theatrics for motivation. I think the best teams are self motivated by winning!
Go Blue!