Words

If I could turn back time
If I could find a way
I'd take back those words that've hurt you and you'd stay

I don't know why I did the things I did
I don't know why I said the things I said
Pride's like a knife, it can cut deep inside

Words are like weapons, they wound sometimes 

- Cher in If I Could Turn Back Time

Everyone has heard the rhyme, "Sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me." Words do hurt. Words have power. Words stick. Being able to use words well adds empowers you. 

1. Hear counsel first from Chris Voss (former FBI hostage negotiator): 

Saying “I do not want to sound disrespectful” usually backfires. It signals exactly what comes next. Labeling the negative instead makes the message land better and builds credibility. pic.twitter.com/YsfdtzquJe

— Christopher Voss (@fbinegotiator) January 27, 2026

Consider how the message 'lands' in both cases. 

2. Leadership expert Jim Afremow shares a proverb: 

"One kind word can warm three winter months." ❄️
~ Japanese proverb pic.twitter.com/iC6wiwld9O

— Dr. Jim Afremow (@goldmedalmind) January 27, 2026

3. Navigating hard conversations is an art.  

• Coaches set boundaries for discussions. For example, they don't discuss another player with a team parent.
• Some coaches elect not to discuss playing time other than limiting discussion to "need areas to improve." 
• Most coaches don't discuss strategy outside the team.
• Always have difficult conversations with another adult present. There can't be misstatements with other listeners present.
• The "24 hour rule" blackout rule after games allows cooler heads to prevail. Tempers can flare in the immediate aftermath of games. 

As broadcasters, you encounter other issues. If you say, "the quarterback is a wonderful player," fifty other sets of parents may hear "they didn't say anything about my kid." Describing a play, "the pass was overthrown," can become, "those guys are haters." 

The bottom line informs that "words matter" and it's worth the trouble to think and communicate clearly and with nuance. 

Lagniappe. Outstanding tips...definitely a keeper. 

Advice

This guy literally dropped the best life advice you'll ever hearpic.twitter.com/cTfTSNwfXs

— Arjun Patel (@ArjunPatel_AI) January 25, 2026

In an ideal world, we accumulate wisdom and dispense good advice. Grateful to those who shared theirs.

First, a few relevant quotes:

"There is nothing cheaper than free advice." 

"Never take criticism from someone from whom you wouldn't take advice."

"Your friends stab you in the front." - Oscar Wilde

Advice is not monolithic. It's not one-size fits all; each tidbit won’t resonate. Good advice is rare yet often crosses domains. Good advice is timeless. Choose some and think how it can relate to sports:

1) Develop a clear and relevant philosophy. 

For example, the Fourth Agreement, “Always do your best.” Your philosophy informs your ideals, values, and standards. 

2) Learn every day. 

Learning pays you every day.

3) Read. Read. Read. 

Reading takes us to meet people and see places we wouldn’t otherwise know. The differences between who you are today and whom you become in five years are the people you read and the books you read. 

4) Make friends with the dead. 

Get to know Eleanor Roosevelt, Lincoln, and Franklin. 93 percent of people ever born are dead.

5) Place your character above your reputation. 

Reputation is what people think about someone. Character is who they are. 

6) Establish priorities. 

Coach Ellis Lane taught timeless priorities - family, school, sports.

7) “Mentoring is the only shortcut to excellence.” 

Find a mentor. Mr. Rogers shared good advice, “Look for the helpers.”

8) Many key words end with _bility:

• Ability
• Durability 
• Reliability
• Responsibility 
• Accountability 

9) Have a “NO” button. 

A NO button keeps you out of trouble. “Never follow a lit fuse.” - Dr. Tom Walsh

10) Surround yourself with good people. 

Good people avoid the killer S’s - softness, selfishness, sloth (laziness). Some say we become the average of the five people we are around the most. Choose well.

Lagniappe. Anne Lamott is a favorite writer. She says her six year-old grandson often wakes and says, "Today could be the best day ever." Make that happen.

Lagniappe 2. Own the standard. 

On losing teams, players talk about what should happen.
On average teams, coaches have to reinforce the standard.
On elite teams, players own the standard—effort, attitude, details.
When the team is player-led, the process becomes the culture.
And the culture wins.
🎥@tbhorka pic.twitter.com/6ys8Sm9Mgp

— The Winning Difference (@thewinningdiff1) January 26, 2026

Coaching - Process, Consistency, Standards

Coaching isn't a monolith. It's team selection, player development, lineup selection, game strategy, strength and conditioning, practice, in-game adjustments, and the essentials - motivation, encouragement, support and more.

The truth about coaching:
You’ll spend hours drawing up plays and planning practices.
But the hardest, most important work?
Teaching kids how to handle adversity, how to trust their teammates, and how to grow into confident young men and women.

— Steve Collins (@TeachHoopsBBall) January 23, 2026

Every player and team faces adversity, each different. It reminds me of the beginning of Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." 

Coaches are economists. Economics is the allocation of scarce resources. There's only so much practice, individual attention, playing time, recognition, health, and luck. Coaches don't control as much as people think they do. 

Relationships, mentoring, and modeling excellence separate programs and coaches. And no matter what you do, it's never as good as you want. 

Lagniappe. From ChatGPT Plus:

Here are three core principles from Alistair McCaw's Habits That Make a Champion, distilled to what actually matters in sport and life:

1. Champions obsess over process, not results

McCaw is relentless on this point: outcomes are lagging indicators.
Elite performers anchor their identity in daily behaviors they can control — preparation, recovery, focus, and effort.

“You don’t rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your habits.”

Coaching translation:
Scoreboards don’t build confidence. Reps do. Film study does. Sleep does. Warm-ups done with intent do.

2. Consistency beats intensity

Champions don’t rely on motivation spikes. They rely on repeatable systems. What matters isn’t the heroic workout or inspired practice - it’s the quiet, boring, done-again-today habits.

Small advantages, practiced relentlessly, compound.

Key insight:
Missing occasionally isn’t fatal. Being inconsistent by design is.

Sport lens:
Show up on time. Same pre-practice routine. Same recovery habits. Same attention to detail — whether it’s a Tuesday in January or a playoff game.

3. Standards > goals

Goals are temporary. Standards are permanent. McCaw argues that champions don’t ask, “Did I hit my goal?” They ask, “Did I live up to my standard?”

Standards remove negotiation.

Examples of standards:

• I finish every rep with intent

• I respond to mistakes with composure

• I prepare as if I’m playing tomorrow

This aligns perfectly with culture building: standards travel with you when conditions change.

The through-line

McCaw’s central claim is simple but ruthless:

Excellence is not an event. It’s a habit stack.

Be Seen and Be Heard

Brad Stevens says the teammates he respects most aren't the stars.

They're the ones who "can play but don't need to play."

After 20+ years of coaching, he's identified 5 traits that great teammates all share:
(📌Bookmark this) pic.twitter.com/kVqvx1cibE

— Coach AJ 🎯 Mental Fitness (@coachajkings) January 24, 2026

Everyone wants to play, to contribute, and to excel. Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra reminds us that "there is always a pecking order." 

Basic rule: Control what you can control. 

1) "Always do your best." 

2) "Excel in your role." If you get limited time in games, there's no reason to give less than maximum effort in practice to make players ahead of you better. 

3) Be a great teammate. Support, encourage, and be the player that others call. 

Everyone should be able to identify you as a great teammate. The coaches and your teammates should see and hear it. During games the families and fans should see and hear it. Be seen and be heard.  

Get in Your Notebook

Volleyball is a thinking person's game. Top players track development of:

• Skill (technique)
• Strategy (tactics, volleyball IQ)
• Physicality (strength, quickness, endurance)
• Psychology (resilience, emotional control)

 They monitor knowledge and performance over time in a notebook or "commonplace book." Winners are trackers. 

What belongs? 

• It's YOUR journal. You curate what resonates for you. 
• Quotes
• Tips
• Articles
• Video links (personal and other)
• Philosophy

As a student, athlete, or a professional, you own your work, your growth, your education, and ultimately your results. 

Sometimes it helps to "show your work." Here are five highlights abstracted by AI from Austin Kleon's "Show Your Work." 

1. Process beats product

Don’t just share the finished masterpiece. Share the work in progress: drafts, notes, failures, revisions, questions. People don’t connect to polish first - they connect to process. Seeing how the sausage is made builds trust and curiosity.

Think: practice clips, whiteboard photos, marginal notes, ugly first drafts.

My take: Jump start your creative and critical imagination. 

2. You don’t have to be an expert — just a few steps ahead

Kleon pushes back on impostor syndrome. You don’t need mastery to share value. If you’re learning something today, someone else needs it tomorrow.

Teaching-as-learning is legitimate. Humility + clarity > authority.

My take: "share something great every day." Maybe it's a dog video. 

3. Share something small, every day

Consistency matters more than volume. A paragraph, a quote, a sketch, a drill idea. Small daily signals compound into a recognizable voice and body of work.

This is Atomic Habits before Atomic Habits: identity is built by repetition.

My take: Win the grind. Press on.

4. Be generous, not promotional

“Show your work” is not self-marketing. It’s contribution. Credit sources. Link freely. Celebrate others. Make your corner of the internet useful.

Generosity is the flywheel. Attention follows value, not hype.

My take: Make your work championship quality. 

5. Build a home base

Social platforms come and go. Algorithms change. Have a place that’s yours - a blog, newsletter, archive - where your work lives and accumulates.

Rent attention, but own your library.

My take: Your thoughts and ideas have value. Write them down. 

Big takeaway:

Show Your Work isn’t about visibility. It’s about participation - joining the conversation by letting people see how you think, struggle, revise, and grow.

Discipline

All opinions expressed in the blog are mine. The blog is not an official publication of any City of Melrose organization. It is designed to provide volleyball, sport, and life tools. 

Every activity (home, school, extracurriculars, work) requires discipline and "coloring inside the lines." The "star player" can't show up late and lead.

Someone shared Coach Mike Vrabel's introductory message to players (mild language). He doesn't ask for the moon and the stars, just common sense guidelines. 

Lagniappe. It's not enough to have the "golden ticket." 

THE TRICK OF LIFE

"If you don't personally develop ... if you don't grow ... if you don't evolve; at a certain point in your life, your advantage is going to become your disadvantage."

~ this entire clip from @InkyJohnson is powerful and motivating! pic.twitter.com/pObvw3NZg7

— Jamy Bechler (@CoachBechler) January 22, 2026

"*The Smartest Guy in the Room"

*Adapted from my basketball blog

A line often attributed to Lincoln says, “I learn from everyone — sometimes what to do, sometimes what not to do.” 

What tools can we share with players to help them learn, to become "the smartest guy in the room?"  

Add value

• "This is what I can do for you." LA Rams coach Sean McVay says, "Everyone benefits from coaching."
• Are we investing our time or spending it? Limit distractions. Cellphones are great tools and distractions. 

Improve attention

• Recognize attention limits. The Pomodoro Technique uses 25 minutes on and five minutes off. Study with a strategy. 
• Mindfulness improves attention and behavior, even in elementary school aged children

Learn about learning

• Spaced repetition extend the learning period, don't cram. "Repetition is the mother of learning." Wooden's EDIRx5 (explain, demonstrate, imitate, repeat x 5) was ahead of its time. "Repetitions make reputations."
• Self-testing after study, ask ourselves "what did I learn?" and "what was the author's intent

Simplify

• Simplifying recognizes limited "working memory." Jocko Willink, Navy SEAL leader, tells of an operator who says to reduce the plan to three items, because that's all he can remember. There's truth in that. 
• "He who chases two rabbits will catch neither." - Russian proverb  Teach players and teams to be good at what you do a lot. Being good at half-court defense and handling pressure will keep you in a lot of games. A variation from Wooden, "“Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.”

Checklists 

Teach the symmetry of the game. Coach did it another way with a hand-drawn "Key" and three "Keys to Victory." 

Storytelling

• Man is the storytelling animal. People remember stories. We tend to remember 'peak' and 'end' experiences. The end experience of the Webber timeout, Princeton backdoor winner against UCLA, or Carolina eight points in eighteen seconds to take Duke into overtime stick with you.
• Capitalize on storytelling features - SUCCES - simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional, stories  

Habit formation

• "Win the morning; win the day." Develop a morning routine that works for you. Pick (the items), Stick (with them), Check that you're applying them. 
• "Make good habits easier and bad habits harder." If something is a distraction, get it out of the way. If something helps, keep it obvious. 

Summary:

• Add value
• Improve attention
• Learn about learning
• Simplify
• Use checklists
• Become a storyteller
• Habit formation

Did you notice that these are not specific to sport? They work for most aspects of life, including relationships and work. 

 

Somewhere

All opinions expressed in the blog are solely mine. The blog is not an official publication of any City of Melrose organization. 

Years ago I had a patient in his 30s who hated his job...and loved acting. He said he had done some commercials and dinner theater. He had neither wife nor children but had a dream...to act. I asked why he didn't follow his dream. He said, "My friends say that I'm not good enough." I replied, "Get new friends." He went to Hollywood. I never saw him again. 

Maybe not so many people believe in you. Do you believe in yourself? Are you willing to make the sacrifices and have the resources to follow the dream? It doesn't have to be volleyball. 

Sometimes the dream seems impossible, unfathomable. And yet it comes to pass because you willed it. This is such as story. 

Fight for your dream and sometimes it comes true. 

Lagniappe. Own it. 

A true leader of men! He doesn’t make excuses but instead preaches about accountability starting with himself. A quality of a great leader! pic.twitter.com/Y0aETWAWT5

— Bruce Straughan (@bruce_straughan) January 19, 2026

Simplicity Wears Well

Every leader needs to read this paragraph and this book. It came out today. https://t.co/hKHaZCbrMA pic.twitter.com/hSNqYH4RQc

— Jon Gordon (@JonGordon11) January 21, 2026

I've read a few Jon Gordon books:

• "Soup"
• "The Positive Dog"
• "Training Camp"
• "The Hard Hat"
• "The Energy Bus"
• "You Win in the Locker Room First"  

My favorite is "The Positive Dog." Naturally, it's about the power of positivity. Positivity and belief go a long way. 

What five simple things power student-athletes? 

- Take care of business at home and in school.

- Treasure and treat your body...sleep, nutrition, hydration, recovery.

- Be in great physical and mental shape. 

- Work hard. 

- Don't overcomplicate things. Simple works. 

Four Levels of Mindset from Robert Saleh

All opinions in the blog are solely my own. The blog is not an official publication of any Melrose institution. 

Learn from leaders and other sports. Former Jets coach and 49ers Defensive Coordinator Robert Saleh describes four levels of "mindset." The ideas today are stolen from Saleh (the language in the video is not appropriate). 

Commanders

Competitors

Contenders

Survivors

...............................................................................................

Survivors look for the easy way out. They're not about achievement or excellence, but getting by. They find the sustainable path of least resistance.

Contenders are higher on the food chain. They're motivated by external factors - playing time, money, or fame. They do what they can to achieve their specific goals. The do their best only when their minutes, money, or recognition are on the line. 

Competitors have internal motivation to be their best regardless of the situation. "This dude is trying to personal record every day of life"...and has a championship mindset.

Commanders are competitors with an additional quality, "they bring others along with them." Saleh says they created "a standard, a way of life...it's who you are, your DNA."

Programs win with competitors and commanders. Which are you? 

Lagniappe. You have a job to do. My boss in the Navy, CAPT Walsh, would tell us, "Handle it, boys." We handled it. 

Geno Auriemma shares the difference between successful people and everyone else.

"Don't tell me how rough the ocean was, just bring the boat in."pic.twitter.com/o93bpq18KD

— Coach AJ 🎯 Mental Fitness (@coachajkings) January 21, 2026

 

Managing Disappointment

You'll learn a lot about your players by watching how they handle disappointment after a loss.

— Coach Mac 🏀 (@BballCoachMac) January 21, 2026

MVB has never had an undefeated season despite winning a state championship, four semifinals, and ten sectional titles. The goal each season is to win the finale. 

Some seasons end with a 'sense' that teams "left everything out there" and others that "there was still meat on the bone."

How do you respond to disappointment? How do you rebound when playing the best available opponent? 

We're either getting better or we're getting worse. We never stay the same. 

Lagniappe. Chessmasters "chunk" positions, mentally organizing attacks and defense by grouping pieces. A pawn can defeat a king.