Worry About Your Own Damn Team

In his first year as a coach, Anthony Lynn had no idea who John Wooden was.

(I know…that crazy! But it’s also the reason this newsletter needs to exist).

In 2000, Wooden came to speak to the Denver Broncos, where Lynn had just started as a special teams assistant.

“I knew he was a winning coach, [but] I didn’t have a clue who he was at the time, to be honest with you,” Lynn recalls.

At lunch, Lynn slammed a massive folder down on the table and proudly began taking Wooden through his latest scouting report, section-by-section.

After quietly sitting through the unsolicited presentation, Wooden turned to Lynn and said, “You did all that?”

Lynn, chest puffed out, responded “Yes, sir.”

“You know, son, I’ve never compiled a scouting report,” Wooden responded.

“I thought, yeah, that’s cute,” Lynn said, “but I felt this work was really important and this is what we needed.”

That interaction is a another reason this newsletter needs to exist. Lynn, 32-years-old at the time, with his whole coaching career ahead of him, disregarding a piece of wisdom from John Wooden, 90-years-old at the time, and looking back on what served him well during his coaching career.

Years later, the penny dropped.

“What he was trying to say, really nicely, was that you can can waste a lot of time worrying about the other team and you need to worry about your own damn team,” Lynn told the LA Times. “That has always stuck with me from that moment forward, and I don’t spend as much time on the opponent as I do my own team.”

He realized the advice wasn’t to not do scouting reports, it was to make sure you’re spending the bulk of your time on your own team.

After that encounter in the food hall, Anthony Lynn became a Wooden disciple, reading his books and studying his work. Lynn would go on to be a highly-sought-after head coach in the NFL, leading the Chargers for four seasons (including their first year in Los Angeles…the city where Wooden made his name).

If I can achieve one thing with this newsletter, I’d like it to be to shorten the amount of time it takes for the penny to drop. While we need youthful exuberance and an I can do it better attitude in coaching, both are more effective when paired with a strong regard for the wisdom of those who’ve gone before us.

What if, at the lunch table, Anthony Lynn’s response would’ve been “that’s interesting, why is that?” instead of “that’s cute”.

What if, at the lunch table, Anthony Lynn had acknowledged “that’s different from anything I’ve ever heard before, can you tell me more?”

What if he’d stayed curious just that little bit longer?

Craftsmanship in any domain is about excellence, elegance, and endurance. And the only way to achieve all three is to use the pool of knowledge from previous generations.

We are not tearing down.

We are not disregarding.

We are building on top of.