Ripping Off the BandAid

“Any idiot with a whistle can coach.”

I stumbled across that line years ago. A coach added, coaching was just “making little girls cry every day.” Both quips land a punch, but they miss the truth.

Coaching carries weight. Coaches teach skill and strategy, but also character and composure. They help players regulate emotions, find resilience, and learn lessons that outlast sport. They add value to individuals while molding teams, all while being judged on the scoreboard.

John Wooden, in his Letter to Players, explained that every decision he made would serve the team. He warned that individuals wouldn’t always agree. But under his leadership, UCLA won ten national titles. Wooden understood that the team’s welfare came first—even when it stung.

Every season ends in tears: tears of elimination or, rarely, tears of triumph. As Viktor Frankl wrote in Man’s Search for Meaning, life inevitably includes suffering, and purpose comes in how we face it. Sports mirror this: training hurts, improvement demands sacrifice, and failure is never far away.

No athlete succeeds at every level. The easy escape is to blame “the idiot with the whistle.” Yet even Wayne Gretzky once scored just a single goal in a season—when he was seven, competing against eleven-year-olds. Growth demands struggle.

This week’s scrimmages with Lynnfield and Marblehead, and the upcoming volleyball jamboree, will test that truth. Some players will rise and earn Coach Scott Celli’s trust. Others will stumble, and face the choice to reset and push harder—or mentally check out.

The story is timeless. Robert Browning wrote, “Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp, Or what’s a heaven for?” Sport isn’t designed to soothe our egos; it sharpens us to face reality. Every match has winners and losers. When the Band-Aid gets ripped off, fight through the tears.

Lagniappe. In professional baseball, hitting .300 makes you an All-Star. Volleyball isn't so different. Here's the hitting percentage formula:

The official formula (NCAA, FIVB, and most levels of play) is:

$$\text{Hitting Percentage (HP)} = \frac{\text{Kills} - \text{Errors}}{\text{Total Attacks}}$$

Where:

• Kill (K) = an attack that directly results in a point.

• Error (E) = an attack that goes out of bounds, into the net, or is an illegal hit.

• Total Attacks (TA) = Kills + Errors + Attacks kept in play (including those blocked back but kept alive).

1) Nobody hits 100%, not even close.

2) Attack errors happen at every level. 

3) Generally hitting over 30% is strong.

Always do your best and don't worry about the scoresheet.