First Things First

A few weeks ago, my training partner and I were talking about all of the things that come with jiujitsu getting more professional. Larger events, more money, and full-time coaches.

He asked me why some coaches insist on using as many syllables as possible when teaching regardless. So, today, we’re going to talk about one tip that can make everyone a better coach and why you shouldn’t speak to say more words.

More Opportunities In The Sport = More Coaches

There has been an explosion of professional jiujitsu events over the past several years. WNO, FPI, AIGA, CJI, BJJ Stars, and other events are all providing opportunities for more grapplers to compete full time for a livable wage. This also means that less and less jiujitsu athletes have to rush to open a gym to make ends meet.

This growing prize pool is also attracting new people to join the sport. In turn, jiujitsu gyms have more customers and money coming in to reinvest into their infrastructure. Professional teams have begun hiring more and more staff to effectively separate duties so.

B-Team, New Wave, AOJ, and others all have different staff dedicated to supporting different parts of the athletes’ journey.

Even the gym that I’m opening has a head coach, a strength and conditioning coach, and additional staff to support the team. Because we are so effectively specialized we discuss one question above all else, what makes a good coach?

The one thing I know for certain is that the best coaches weren’t necessarily the best former athletes.

Ray Longo and John Danaher, two of the best mixed martial arts coaches ever, literally don’t have a competitive martial arts record. Between them they have coached four UFC champions and some of the best professional grapplers of this generation.

If you’re at all familiar with Danaher and Longo you know they don’t have much else in common.

Longo is a fast talking New York native. He’s more Fonzie than fighter.

Danaher is a calm and calculated philosophy graduate student from New Zealand. Many people have described his mannerisms as Palpatinian.

They are on opposite ends of the coaching continuum except for one skill; communication. Both men are excellent at giving feedback that is simple, accessible, and memorable.

Okay, so, how do you do that? How do you give helpful feedback that is not only technical but also simple and memorable so it’s accessible and actually useful?

Cue The Outcome, Don’t Describe The Body

Working with a bad coach might be the most tedious and frustrating experience on Earth. Unfortunately it’s kind of the norm in jiujitsu.

Everyone jiujitsu student has had the slow experience of sitting on the mat listening to an instructor drone on for what feels like hours, “Rotate your arm approximately 40 degrees so you can further extend it until you can cleanly grab their cervical spine. Not like this, but like this. At this point, then you must…” You stop paying attention. You can’t pay attention.

You look around the room and see your teammates looking back at you…you think. Then you realize their eyes have glazed over. The creak of your instructor’s consonants has made the room comatose.

Jiujitsu can be an overly technical sport. With that comes lots of jargon. And as the sport is becoming more of a career opportunity, it seems like up-and-coming coaches want to build a brand based on their ability to use more jargon, regardless of if it’s helpful or not.

Newer coaches and instructors have a tendency to overcomplicate their messages. I think it comes from a desire to be descriptive. But, in being overly descriptive, they lose their athletes. Technical jargon is valuable only to the degree it makes the message shorter.

A good example of technical jargon is the term “scoop,” which means “leg under hook.” By saying scoop, you’ve told your athlete what to do in one syllable. “Leg under hook” is longer, less efficient, and, therefore, less helpful.

An example of more technical word choices being unhelpful comes from trying to tell an athlete to make space.

A good coach will say, “Push them away.”

Inexperienced coaches might say, “Extend your arm.”

Unhelpful coaches will say things like, “Flex your triceps.”

In sports science circles, this is known as external vs. internal cues. In short, external cues orient the athlete’s attention to the movement and its intended outcome. Internal cues tell the athlete about their own body and can be more confusing. At the very least, external cues get you to focus on your goal.

We can consolidate these two ideas to say that coaches should use jargon only when it shortens their message and gets their athlete to focus on the goal of their movement so their feedback is actionable and improves their performance. And really, a coach’s north star should be how well they help athletes complete their goals.

So What Makes A Good Coach?

Roughly 11 years ago last weekend, combat sports was flipped upside down. The UFC’s Brazilian middleweight kingpin, Anderson Silva, was taking on the next challenger, Chris Weidman.

After the first round ended, the camera showed an annoyed Anderson Silva in his corner. Then they rapidly went to Weidman’s corner. We needed to hear the sage wisdom that was inspiring his surprising success so early in his career. What we got was Weidman’s head coach and cornerman Ray Longo shouting into his ears, “I want you to punch a hole in his fucking chest!”

Short, memorable, accurate, and, most importantly, actionable.

Silva relied on evasive head movement to get his opponents to chase him. That gave him the counter opportunities he needed for his signature knockout wins. Longo recognized this and understood Silva couldn’t move his torso while his head was moving so he told Weidman to aim for something else.

Sure, Longo could have said, “When his head moves, his body can’t. Stay in front of him and jab at his chest to hit him and score,” but that wouldn’t have been helpful. Longo knew exactly how to talk to his audience. That’s why he is a hall of fame coach.

The best coaches pay attention to their athletes so well that they know what motivates them and how to best focus their attention. This is directly opposite to our example earlier of coaches that rely on overly technical jargon to wow their audience. When you go out of your way to impress upon your athletes you’re really doing that for yourself. It’s the exact opposite of good coaching. It’s selfish.

If you need one word to describe good coaching, it would be selfless. It’s about giving your athletes the minimum instruction they need to learn, train, and get better on their own.

Really, good coaching is about how well you can get out of the way.

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