As I’m writing this section, the universe keeps testing me. Each time I write about a topic, an obstacle is presented at the perfect time. I take it as a sign to keep improving the book.
Hockey Twitter went nuts over this Twitter thread by a Ph.D. student. And my worst fears are being realized. I had to send out an emergency newsletter to my audience in hopes they would share it with the wider #hockeytwitter world. Here’s the thread:
First, let’s look closer at the above tweet and learn about how graduate school works. “I was given an assignment by the committee called, Why Football Coaches Need to Fall out of Love with Rondo’s in Practice.” So, their goal is explicit for him, present information that the committee wants to see on how rondos aren’t “good.” With me so far? There is a clear bias from the jump.
As a graduate student, when the committee says you need to do something to get your PhD, well that’s a pretty strong incentive. He’s being incentivized by the university to complete a task thinking a certain way to obtain the degree/get to the next phase in program.
Different Science, Different Outcomes
Due to social sciences being a “softer” science like a degree in “coaching education, leadership”, or whatever the university titles their major, most students are given the option or forced by their major professors/committee to pick a side. It’s more pick a side than study this objectively because it’s more difficult to test objective measures in social sciences.
Let me give the stark contrast of a “hard science” graduate level project to explain what I mean by that…
Let’s say your project is in animal nutrition. You conduct a trial with a control group and an experiment group of pigs, but in both groups, you can control everything, you can take objective measurements, and everything is documented.
What they eat, the specific formula (ratio of protein, carbs and fats in feed)
What they drink and how much
Where they spend their days and nights, the environment doesn’t change (pigs stay in pens)
You can track things like weight and biological measures such as cortisol levels, and know if they were impacted by your experiment directly
This setup allows you to change one variable and see what differences it creates. If you can change more than one variable, you won’t know which interventions helped, hurt or made no difference.
It’s akin to doing an elimination diet as a human. When you strip your diet down to meat and eggs because you know certain foods don’t agree with you. You can only bring one food back to your diet at a time. You wouldn’t add milk and green peppers at the same time, you wouldn’t know which one fucks up your gut.
In a soft science trial like this, there is no way to truly tell if rondos are an effective intervention or not. A team would have to commit to only doing rondos in practice for a period of time and then playing games. At practice, if it’s not a rondo, it wouldn’t be allowed. But even then the study would have its shortcomings:
What if your players went home and reviewed film or learned game concepts on YouTube and that started to make them a more effective player in certain game contexts?
What if some played on a 2nd team and had team practice later that day where they worked on other skills?
What if 50% of your players eat a diet of pop tarts, Lunchables, and other highly processed foods that impair cognitive function which is why their decision-making is poor in training and games?
The point I’m trying to make is you can’t control everything with human beings in a sporting context. The default in a soft science is to analyze something like a rondo based on current “best practices” and a smart person’s ability to post-rationalize and create a narrative around buzzwords like “representative environment” and “transfer of training…” The outcome of all this… A subjective opinion.
It doesn’t matter if I’m correct or not either, I’m modeling a level of discernment that you can use to make informed decisions on any topic in the future, this framework isn’t specific to using rondos or not.
I mentioned earlier that I had a fear about this thread going viral, if you don’t use discernment, the cautionary tale can turn into a horror story.
Don’t Outsource Your Thinking
One of the anti-goals of the New Wave Coach is to avoid outsourcing your thinking. More straightforward, “think for yourself.”
Recently in 2020, you may have noticed a world event in which people began the very observable trend of outsourcing their thinking to experts. This is a dangerous game to play as George articulates in his tweet. And outsourcing our own discernment to blindly listen to others compounds and gains traction when we succumb to confirmation bias. If someone we all respect in the field jumps on board, the bandwagon gets rolling.
My goal isn’t to pick a side (at the end I’ll explain why I think rondos are better for hockey than soccer anyway) or say that Jack or Karl is wrong, my goal is twofold:
Give you the whole picture of a higher-level education project and the incentive structure (the committee wanted that side of the argument presented)
Point out the 2nd order effects of “high-level coach” confirmation and outsourcing your thinking
Ignoring these 2 points creates a worst-case scenario.
My fear is that some coach was driving to a summer skate, had rondos on his practice plan, saw this tweet, and then crossed the activity out, never to do rondos again. If you’ve chosen to outsource your thinking to others, that is a very real possibility.
Here is another way to think about this.
Thought Experiment
Imagine you’re a U18 Head Coach for a AAA team in St. Louis Missouri. St. Louis is an NHL city and you notice at practice on a random Tuesday that Craig Berube, the Head Coach of the NHL Blues is standing on the glass observing your practice.
Like most coaches, “you’re always trying to get better” and other comforting clichés you say to yourself like, “I’m not above getting feedback from anyone.” You get his attention and ask him if he’ll still be at the rink in 20 minutes when practice is over. You’d love to get his feedback. He agrees and in 20 minutes, you’re sitting in the office, chatting with an NHL coach. Lucky you.
He doesn’t beat around the bush because high-level coaches love to be direct and come right out and say whatever they want. He tells you that he didn’t like “X” drill that you did. Doesn’t give much as to why he doesn’t like it, but that feedback sticks to you like glue. He’s an NHL coach, of course, you’re going to take it as gospel.
But the question is, should you? Most coaches (me in my earlier days included) would scrap the drill and never use it again without thinking another second about it. Done. Next. We put high-level coaches on such a high pedestal when really, they should just be looked at as “somebody else with an opinion.”
Before you throw out the drill, here’s what I want you to think about. If your players love “X Drill” and they can see the value in doing it, why would you scrap it? New Wave Coaches know how important user experience is. It is the most important thing. The players are the only feedback you should care to get.
Okay, okay, let’s get back to rondos.
The Other Side
To rondo or not to rondo, that is the question.
-Soccer Shakespeare
To put it like Vince Lombardi on day one of training camp, “This is a rondo.”
Watch the first 12 seconds of this 5v3 rondo
The soccer player uses the “bumper player” in the middle to escape pressure.
Looks a bit like this:
Every powerplay is a rondo:
5v4
5v3
4v3
Every OZ sequence with the goalie pulled is a rondo:
6v5
6v4
6v3
Every breakout that stays on the strong side of the ice is a rondo. Typically 4v2 or 4v3
Hockey has more short passing than soccer. Hockey has tons of small area/corner play.
Hockey has powerplays which often determine who wins and loses. The most important part of the game is a rondo.
And I hear the echoes from above, the academics say it’s not specific/representative enough and won’t transfer… let me give you another example of how it CAN transfer. Let’s talk dog training.
It Can Transfer (Thinking and Work Required)
We’re going to use the example of a sit-stay. This is a common command most owners give their dogs. Let’s pretend you take your dog to a coffee shop on a Saturday morning. There are people and dogs everywhere, but you want your dog to stay in one position and ignore everything going on. You tell your dog to, “sit” then “stay”. Your dog sits and then immediately gets up. You try again. And again with no luck. What’s going on here? Why is it so difficult for him?
You realize you haven’t been practicing this command at home… or anywhere for that matter. How can you expect your dog to perform in a high-stress and chaotic environment if you haven’t done the work at home? They have to have success in a low-stakes environment before throwing them into “Game 7”.
A rondo is analogous to the “work at home” portion of dog training. You can’t expect your players to make decisions under pressure in a high-stakes environment if they haven’t had practice in a low-stakes one. However, to maximize the potential for transfer, rondos need to be specific to game scenarios. And that’s on the coach to create. If a traditional rondo of standing in a circle doesn’t seem “representative”, then adjust it. Here are a few examples.
Want to do a rondo that simulates a breakout? Have this circled player that looks like the right winger play the rondo with his back turned to the middle of the ice:
The two players below the goalline (defensemen) can only rim pucks along the boards. The circled player takes the puck under pressure and either slips to the center or the net front D… like in a real, dirty puck breakout sequence in a game. Make adjustments to make it translate. On the next rep, he can turn and face to take clean passes.
Want to make it look more like an offensive sequence/powerplay? Move the rondo from the circle/corner out to danger areas in the offensive zone:
Think for yourself, make something you see better, put your own spin on it, build on top.
Rondos have a place in our game. Try it out as Alex did. Or build on top to make this rondo better.