Each week Press Pass Sports speaks with an anonymous coach (past or present) to discuss their entertaining career, their lives, and things you wouldn’t hear in a normal interview.
For the inaugural week of Coach’s Confessions, we have a football coach who has been involved in the game for 13 years for several schools in and out of the Texas Panhandle.
Don’t worry, from 1990’s crushes to trading dirt for a drone, this coach has a laugh or two for you.
What is the biggest thing you love about your job?
“Working with kids everyday. I’m a big kid, I get to spend my day with those kids and I still think their jokes are funny and I’ll laugh about those forever.”
What’s the absolute worst part of the job?
“Dealing with crazy, unrealistic parents.”
Was there ever a moment in your career that ultimately changed how you do your job?
“When I became an athletic director and head football coach. I was a coordinator for seven or eight years. I thought I had it all figured out, and the moment you’re the man and everything you think is black and white all of a sudden becomes gray. Sometimes the last thing you do at work is coach football because you’re having to put fires out left and right.”
Parents either make or break a great coaching job, what’s your best parent story?
“We had a stud quarterback when I was further south. His dad was a real hick and he thought we needed a drone at practice. He shows up one day at practice with a really nice drone. We had to act like we used it for a few weeks because he traded five loads of dirt in his construction company for that thing. It was a nice gesture, but it was worth more trouble than good. He’d pop by every once in a while asking about it but we always told him it was charging since we used it so much.”
What’s the funniest thing you’ve had happen with an athlete?
“We’re in a junior varsity 4A-5A game and I had a freshman quarterback. We called an inside zone play on our own goal line and I told the kid to ‘keep it out the back.’ I meant for him to keep the ball and go towards the backside of the play, but he turns around and runs out the back of the endzone. He jogs over smiling, I was about to chew him out but he did what I asked, ‘kept the ball and went out the back of the endzone.’ All the coaches including me died laughing knowing that a kid just gave up a safety in the middle of the first quarter.”
What’s a game day habit you have?
“I always put funny pictures on my play card. This week I have Shooter McGavin from Happy Gilmore, last week was 90’s crushes, featuring Jennifer Love Hewitt. One day last year I had local news anchors on there. I always put pictures on there to fill the blank spaces on my play cards. Whether its hot chicks, crushes, or pictures of coaches.”
Do you have any guilty pleasures you’d like to confess?
“I love Lifetime movies. Especially in the off-season. They’re an hour and a half long, the acting is so bad, the plot is super predictable, I just laugh and shake my head that someone sat down and made this movie for $10,000 and it’s on T.V..”
If you weren’t a coach, what would be your profession?
“I think I’d be a lawyer…no, I’d be an auctioneer, man. When I get excited I talk too fast, so I think it’d be perfect for me.
Who’s the funniest coach in the area?
“Brent Lile. The dude is hilarious.”
Why do you coach?
“I coach because I love to compete. I hate losing more than I love winning. It’s like playing golf with your buddies for money, standing over a three-footer and knowing there’s something on the line. The thrill of competition is something I’ve always had in me and coaching is how I stay with it.”