Improving Your Coaching By Judging More Than Just The End Result
How Do We Evaluate Whether an On-Ice Decision Was a Good One?
“The tendency is to judge a decision based on its outcome, rather than its quality.”
-Annie Duke
A common trait among average coaches is their tendency to judge the outcome rather than the process, which involves observing, analyzing, deciding, and ultimately executing.
Related: The Best Question in Hockey
Just because something worked out doesn’t mean it was a good decision. Similarly, just because something didn’t work out doesn’t mean it was a bad decision. While sometimes related, the decision and the result are often independent of one another.
Too often, the end result determines whether people view the decision as ‘good’ or ‘bad’. To level up decision-making, a person must separate the two.
A classic example is the Seattle Seahawks' decision to pass in the Super Bowl resulting in a turnover and a lost championship.
Pete Carroll, the (then) Seahawks head coach, shares his thought process, and you can gather that it was probably the ‘right’ call if you don’t strictly consider the outcome.
“An aggregate of all of the data from NFL plays in recent history revealed a 1–2% chance that a pass play in that situation would result in an interception. An incomplete pass or touchdown were better odds. An incomplete pass uses barely any of the 26 seconds remaining and stops the clock. It’s basically a free play and still time for two more.
A run play that falls short ticks precious time off the clock and allows time for only one more play. So, it’s just math. Risk a 1-2% chance of an interception in exchange for 3 plays instead of 2.” - Carroll
If You’re Scared, Don’t Coach Developing Minds
There’s no need for risk-averse, turnover-free, fear-based play if you’re in the business of developing hockey players. In fact, the opposite is probably true.
“You can be cautious or you can be creative, but there's no such thing as a cautious creative.”
– George Lois
The aim should be to empower players to be courageous with the puck. Winning youth games by playing safe hockey is the antithesis of development.
As an amateur coach, you can’t have your cake and eat it too… If we’re starving for creative players at the midget/junior level (how often do you hear coaches complain that they inherit ‘hockey robots’?), then we must change our approach. We need to develop creative hockey players.
Fear Is A Killer, Courage Over Result
There's a problem, because the quality of the decision should not be ruled by the quality of its outcome. Those two things are independent.
Fear is a killer. It creates tension and anxiety in the body, mind, etc., all of which hurt player and personal development.
The thought behind the play is more important than the execution. There are errors of:
Choice (perception/action, misread, etc)
Execution (too much weight on a pass, muffed shot, etc)
At any developmental level, execution errors SHOULD be fine.
If you focus on their choice and intent, you’ll care less about the result. What they think at the developing age and what they are ‘trying’ to do is more important than the result. More than anything, it’s what’s best for them in the long term.’
Needs a place to start? Start asking your players more questions, including the best question in hockey… “What did you see?”
Further Reading