My daughter played collegiate VB for four years. And I can truly say the mindset is totally different. You absolutely must be able to focus on the next play and that play only. It's a game that is 100 percent about focus. In football you can take a whole half off and still win. In VB if you do that you'll get your ass beat quickly and you'll lose the locker room.

Our FB players could learn a few things from them. I've heard coach Elko speak in locker room speeches and Coach Morrison as well.

I am impressed with both. Elko for his brutal honesty. And Morrison for his ability to get players to believe in themselves.

I think a championship level coaching staff has to do both. I definitely think both coaches can learn from each other and I am glad we have a culture where that is encouraged. Our AD seems to focus on that a ton. Which is good.

But I think their our VB teams ability to focus on the next point and cast out everything except doing their job is amazing. I don't think we quite have the same level of attention to execution in the football arena yet. But we certainly are doing that better.

Next year I would like to see an entire game played well by our football team. 60 minutes from whistle to whistle. That is the next step for our program.

The next step is NOT about wins and losses. It's about consistent execution. For a whole game.

Maybe they should just take up golf instead. Get a head start on the only sport in their futures

TheDecadeSapling said:

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Maybe they should just take up golf instead. Get a head start on the only sport in their futures

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Actually golf is a sport that also requires consistent mental focus. I'm not sure I agree.

Difference is our volleyball coach is a hired assassin and our football coach is in over his head.

Ag CPA said:

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Difference is our volleyball coach is a hired assassin and our football coach is in over his head.

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What makes you think Elko is in over his head? 11-2 in his second season?

Everyone on this team executed except Marcel Reed on third downs and Klein who asked him to pass on third downs. There is much overreaction going on. Fix that specific scenario and we are a championship team.

Ag CPA said:

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Difference is our volleyball coach is a hired assassin and our football coach is in over his head.

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Dear lord the awful takes are never ending.

Elko teams seem to play scared in the big moments.

Volleyball did not.

Because he lost to the two good teams he played this year, tired of pumping up spare coaches we hang on to around here based on inflated records. RC stuck around forever in the 90s for the same reasons.

Aston04 said:

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Elko teams seem to play scared in the big moments.

Volleyball did not.

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They didn't play scared. They just lost a very close game to a good team in a heartbreaking manner which is how we do it in football.

RC was a damn good coach and I presume Elko is also. The two losses, particularly the UM loss, was galling because it was a game we should have won but our offense was entirely inept. Elko probably regrets letting Klein hang around to deliver that **** show.

As for Morrison, what I saw of his messaging it was 100% on point. Not too wordy but simple and focused. Play your game, you deserve to be here and you're good enough to win by being the team you've worked hard to become. So, they didn't take the floor thinking they had to suddenly do something extraordinary. Reminded me of Herb Brooks.

Great post, OP

I've got no snide remarks for you. This is a very good post

The volleyball team improved all year long to a point where they were unbeatable. Kentucky had beat A&M twice in the regular season and barely recognized the squad that mopped the floor with them yesterday.

You could argue the football team peaked at Notre Dame and never really improved that much from there.

I've heard of comparing apples to oranges before...but this post really takes the fruit-cake.

Volleyball players are not vastly overpaid nor as pampered as football players.

My daughter is playing club volleyball now and this is exactly how I try to support her. Forget the last play, and focus on the next. She's susceptible to beating herself up on a bad play and it ruins the next series of plays.

I never played the volleyball, but as a cornerback, we always preached forgetting the last play. Reed could use a lot of that mental fortitude.

Rarely do I like hanging a loss on one guy. So not trying to do that now. But our season really did go as far as he was able to take us. Good and bad.

Ghost of Bisbee said:

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Great post, OP

I've got no snide remarks for you. This is a very good post

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Agreed. He should post more.

With the exception of 2012, our football teams rarely get better as the season goes on.

There is something to be said for mindset in sport, and life in general. Around 50 years ago the term flow came into being.

It is simply about being relaxed, not anxious about the outcome, and dare I say having fun, what might be termed mindfulness, being in the moment, or some such.

Jamie Morrison has it as a coach. So does that ******bag Schlossnagle.

There were flashes of it during the season, most notably the Carolina game. However, unlike the volleyball team and baseball team that was one win away from a national championship themselves, when push came to shove the Ags wilted under more trying circumstances.

It's not for lack of talent that they performed so poorly against Texas and Miami, but being too caught up in the moment, what it meant individually and as a team, expectations, fear of failure, you name it. It does not mean we would have won with the right mindset, but they wouldn't have looked so terrible.

Several of their players have literally said we "play to win" not "play to not lose. "

Which one of those did you see from our coaching staff the past 3 weeks?

Quote:

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Everyone on this team executed except Marcel Reed on third downs and Klein who asked him to pass on third downs. There is much overreaction going on. Fix that specific scenario and we are a championship team.

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This is silly. We have no running game. Our offensive line can't generate push, and out backs fall down. If you can't run, you have to pass on 3rd down. If you can run, you should be able to pick up first downs way easier than we were able to. Laying it all on Reed is jus stupid.

one safe place said:

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Volleyball players are not vastly overpaid nor as pampered as football players.

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Huh? But you do realize those Vball players are playing against other Vball players and so forth with the "pampered overpaid" fball players right?

TX_COWDOC said:

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Ghost of Bisbee said:

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Great post, OP

I've got no snide remarks for you. This is a very good post

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Agreed. He should post more.

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Well, let's not get ahead of ourselves

9 seniors.

I'd say the football team overachieved, given some of our talent deficiencies.

One think I know, VBall is really INTENSE as each point is so critical. You can go down 4 or 5 and it seems the world is ending and you're on the verge of collapse. Then you win 2 or 3 in a row and the other team is feeling all the pressure.

crazy CRAZY sport.

The mental make-up of the ladies though- WOW!! Just the Nebraska game alone- so many instances:

Starting out down 3-9 just like the vball world assumed, then turning it around for a first set win.

Fighting off 10 set points in a 72 point set, then losing it, and the heavily favored home team in front of 18,000 scream people ready to sew it up, but you reverse the flow and deliver a 15-13 match win.

Indeed every sport of ours could use what these women have.

Ag CPA said:

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Because he lost to the two good teams he played this year, tired of pumping up spare coaches we hang on to around here based on inflated records. RC stuck around forever in the 90s for the same reasons.

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Notre dame?? That's a very shortsighted view. Even the middle of the road SEC teams are good. LSU in Baton Rouge and we won by 3-4 TDs, for one.

We used to get blown out against good teams. Elko hasn't gotten blown out but once in 2 seasons

Hahahaha it's easy. Women win. Men don't. The men seem to be a bunch of entitled *******.


I bet women's volleyball has seen <10% of the money football has. And won in spite of everything else.

Football at A&M is a GD embarrassment.

Elko could learn a lot from Morrison

Nino Brown said:

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one safe place said:

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I Volleyball players are not vastly overpaid nor as pampered as football players.

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Huh? But you do realize those Vball players are playing against other Vball players and so forth with the "pampered overpaid" fball players right?

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What I realize is that if you pay someone too much, whether a player or a coach, some of them don't put for the effort like they should. We have had some of both when it comes to football.

AGinHI said:

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There is something to be said for mindset in sport, and life in general. Around 50 years ago the term flow came into being.

It is simply about being relaxed, not anxious about the outcome, and dare I say having fun, what might be termed mindfulness, being in the moment, or some such.

Jamie Morrison has it as a coach. So does that ******bag Schlossnagle.

There were flashes of it during the season, most notably the Carolina game. However, unlike the volleyball team and baseball team that was one win away from a national championship themselves, when push came to shove the Ags wilted under more trying circumstances.

It's not for lack of talent that they performed so poorly against Texas and Miami, but being too caught up in the moment, what it meant individually and as a team, expectations, fear of failure, you name it. It does not mean we would have won with the right mindset, but they wouldn't have looked so terrible.

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The ultimate sports psychology book is "The Inner Game of Tennis." Pete Carroll at USC would have his players read it. It's about this mindset you talk about

Sterling82 said:

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As for Morrison, what I saw of his messaging it was 100% on point. Not too wordy but simple and focused. Play your game, you deserve to be here and you're good enough to win by being the team you've worked hard to become. So, they didn't take the floor thinking they had to suddenly do something extraordinary. Reminded me of Herb Brooks.

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We should hire Stewart Smalley as an assistant coach in charge of pre-game pep talks. We'd win every game if we just had 'Coach Smalley' tell the players:

First of all: you're good enough.
You've watched the film. You've run the drills. You've done the work sometimes twice, because that's just the kind of people you are.

Second: you're smart enough.
You know the playbook. You know when to dig deep, when to trust your training, and when to say, "Maybe I don't need to force this throw maybe I just need to believe in my teammate."

And third and this is important doggone it, people like you.
Your teammates like you. Your coaches like you. The 12th Man really likes you sometimes loudly, sometimes for four straight quarters, and they support you and want you to grow.

Now, I know there may be a little voice inside your head that says,
"What if we make a mistake?"
And to that voice I say: It's okay. Mistakes are just opportunities wearing little disguises. Sometimes they're blitzes. Sometimes they're false starts. But they do not define you.

What defines you… is discipline, heart, and a deep, calm belief that you belong right here, right now, on this field.

So go out there today.
Breathe deeply.
Stand tall.
Play for each other.
Play for the maroon.
Play for the 12th Man.

And remember:
You don't have to be perfect.
You just have to be Texas A&M.

Because you're good enough.
You're smart enough.
And doggone it… you're gonna win this football game.

" You absolutely must be able to focus on the next play and that play only. It's a game that is 100 percent about focus. In football you can take a whole half off and still win."

That statement is probably in the top 3 of the dumbest things ever posted on TexAgs, and that is saying ALOT, no offense to you personally.

It is also in direct contradiction to how Saban, Elko, Smart, Jimbo, any CFB coach coaches his players. 10000% focus on your job, every play, max intensity every play, forget the last play focus on the next play, don't worry about the scoreboard worry about your assignment, don't focus on winning focus on the process of what you need to do to give yourself a chance to be successful, etc., etc., etc……

Any coach worth a s*** in any sport says the same thing.

The VB team concurred the Inner Game .. relaxed concentration mixed with extreme levels of believe, fun and confidence! I never watched much volley ball but it was the most impressive thing I've seen in Aggie sports.

Who is your daughter?