Today’s project is a special one – Vermont Skills Challenge
Think about this quote for a little bit… “The tallest buildings are only built on the strongest foundations.” All of these skills challenges take you through “foundational” skills that you have been doing for years. If you paid attention and were diligent with your work, your foundation will be strong. If this is not the case, remember that there is always time to invest in stregthening your foundation, but it will take time and effort.
Whenever I do these “basic” ball mastery skills, I constantly hear from young kids, “I’ve done that before” or “this is easy.” My response is always simple and direct and usually sharing a story from some master player that I have seen.
I remember the first time I saw Diego Maradona warm up before a 1994 World Cup game down in Foxboro with Argentina playing Greece. I had never seen someone “dance with the soccer ball” while warming up. It was so pure and simple. He was juggling, passing and dribbling while dancing to music at the same time. He was not doing complex drills specially and scientifically crafted for that specific match. He was going through his “basic” normal routine that just so happened to be in his own dancing way.
But, here is a great tribute video to Kobe Bryant (a version was shared with the Far Post community over Facebook just after his passing)… I am asking every player to watch this video & listen carefully to the message.
A Lesson from Kobe Bryant – “Never get bored with the basics”
I also wanted to share today’s WEDNESDAY WISDOM with you. I heard this saying once, “You never miss the water till the well runs dry.” And this was usually followed up with “and when it is pouring, you forget how lucky you truly are.”
I remember as a young boy constantly nagging my parents about getting new and better cleats… My parents refused to buy me “nice cleats” for a few reasons. First, my feet were growing constantly. The second reason was because it was very hard for them to afford new cleats. Now if you don’t know me that well, I am a very stubborn person. I refused to take no for an answer and kept hounding them – I guess I just didn’t think it was fair that my friends were all getting nice new cleats and I had to use old hand-me-downs. I also hate saying this, but I wasn’t even that serious about soccer at the time anyways… but that was beside the point for me… Then they shared a story with me about Pele when he was growing up playing mostly in the streets with no shoes and a “make-shift” ball… along with a very direct, “you don’t understand how lucky you truly are.” That was when everything was put into perspective for me. Please take a moment today and really reflect on how lucky and “wealthy” we all are.
Thank you, Coach Todd
Vermont