It’s not uncommon for people to lose perspective about sports, whether they’re in the stands or on the sideline.
Fans tend to be the worst at this. Every win is a coronation. Every loss is a tragedy. Every cross comment or written word must be part of an “anti-(my team)” agenda. It actually can be a source of amusement for those of us who no longer sit in bleachers.
The second-worst offenders in the department of lost perspective are coaches — particularly football coaches. Their entire world too often is their team. They obsess, often to the point of paranoia. They work 20-hour days and sleep on office couches and give any assistant coach the stink eye if he doesn’t do the same. There is no outside world.
My favorite story: Former Washington Redskins coach Joe Gibbs used to have his wife tape dinner-table conversations so that he could keep up with his family. He would listen to the tapes between important meetings. You know: like punt coverage.
I feel bad for coaches who’ve obsessed and stressed themselves to the point of having health issues. I really feel bad for their families. But it’s all self-inflicted.
Perspective, people. The jobs that truly should be considered the most stressful don’t involve wearing a whistle around your neck or deciding what to do on fourth-and-1.
Brain surgeons and heart surgeons have high-stress jobs. It’s easy to understand if they lose sleep at night.
Emergency-room doctors, anesthetists, obstetricians, mental-health counselors who have to hear other people’s problems all day and strive to dissuade them out of harming themselves.
Pilots. Air-traffic controllers. Presidents. 911 operators. Detectives and first responders to a murder scene. SWAT team members. Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines.
School principals. (My wife made sure I added that one.)
Football coaches seldom lose because they didn’t work hard enough. Actually, sometimes the contrary is true. Some coaches and general managers have told me they took a year off between jobs to decompress and evaluate themselves. The added perspective paid off.
Hopefully, all coaches will begin to take better care of themselves — and understand that spending five fewer minutes in the film room isn’t the end of the world.
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