What good does yelling at your team do?

I think about this question every time I see or hear a coach going off on their team. I wonder deep down what that coach thinks they are accomplishing.

Personally, I don't yell, ever. I can't remember the last time I strained my voice for any reason. Even when my kids were little and were wondering off from me or getting into trouble, I always would go to them or explain to them why what they were doing was not acceptable.

So I guess maybe I'll never understand why some coaches, or people for the matter, feel the need to yell or scream at their players. To me it's pretty simple, in sports and in life there are expectations. If you fail to reach those expectations then you are usually offered suggestions to help remedy the problem or you are replaced by somebody who can do the job better. Seems pretty obvious. I mean, who would want to work for a boss that comes to your office or work space and screams at you for making an honest mistake? I think we would all be motivated and more aware of things, but our only motivation would be to not get yelled at again. While it may work and have the desired short term effect, long term it can cause a number of problems.

Relating this to youth sports, I'm sure we can all remember the over-the-top coach who was always yelling. For some reason, that's the coach that usually comes to mind more clearly than any other. I'm sure he was a great guy, and truthfully he probably yelled a number of positive things as well, but all we can remember are the times he would lose it and berate you or the team.

So why do coaches do that? Why do they scream at the top of their lungs when a player makes an error or a bad decision? Why do they yell at a player who goes the wrong way during a set play or pattern offense? It's pretty simple and obvious to me. Yelling at your players is a way for coaches to vent their personal frustrations. It's their way of showing everyone how good of a coach they are. What they're trying to say to everyone by yelling is that they feel like they are better than the players making the mistakes.

Webster's defines the coach as "one who instructs or trains." Being in the educational field for over 15 years I've never once seen an effective teacher who instructs or trains their students by yelling at them. Sure we'll raise our voice to our students, but that is for a desired effect. Yell at your students all the time and they'll begin to tune you out and try to find ways to have you make a fool of yourself again. As a coach, especially in youth sports, your primary job should be to instruct your players. If you look at the word 'train' in the definition, ask yourself what you're training your players for. Are you training them to live in fear of making a mistake? In my opinion, if you yell at kids that is exactly what you're training them to do.

Now if I take a step back, not all kids are the same. Some kids can handle being yelled at better than others. Some kids you can yell at and they become the beast that you know they are or can be. Some kids get yelled at and hope another ball comes their way. However, what happens if you yell at a kid and then they quickly make another mistake? Do you now yell even louder?

Again, I go back to the main reason I believe coaches yell in the first place. Yelling to me is a way for a coach to vent their own frustrations. They have now taken the focus away from the team and put it on themselves. I'd bet that 95% of the time, even in youth sports, the players know they made a mistake, so what good does yelling at them about it do? Just like in life, we know when we've made a mistake. The last thing we want is somebody coming down on us even more and embarrassing us for it. Fortunately as adults, many of our mistakes happen in private, so I get even more upset when I see a coach yelling at a kid and embarrassing them on a field or a court. Why is that okay for a coach to do that? How would a coach react if a parent stood up and started yelling at them for leaving a kid on the mound for too long? How would a coach like it if parents started screaming about how ineffective their press-break offense was? As coaches we all know the answer, it pisses us off. We hate being criticized publicly by parents that we think have no clue what they're talking about. So I hope coaches remember that feeling of rage and embarrassment we feel when a parent openly questions you in front of everyone the next time they want to scream and yell at a kid publicly.

So I guess I'm the perfect coach right? Nah. I've yelled at my teams before, but after I've done it every time I realize that all I was doing was voicing my own frustrations. Heck, sometimes I'll even catch myself using phrases like "I" was so embarrassed or "I" was so disappointed. In those moments I try to catch myself and bring it back to the kids and remind them of what they can do better.

Coaching should never be all about you. Like Webster's says, as a coach your job is to instruct. Nobody wants to make a mistake, and nobody wants to have that mistake discussed and pointed out publicly to heighten the feeling of shame. I have found the best way to instruct players is to wait until the inning is over and ask them what happened. An overwhelming number of times the player will tell you exactly what they did wrong, or why they thought what they did was right. Those moments are when you're a coach. There is nothing better than a player telling you what they did wrong, because at that moment you know you've coached them to do the right thing. If they tell you why they felt they were doing the right thing, well now you already know what to work on at your next practice so the entire team can learn from an honest mistake. In basketball you get frequent stoppages or can even call timeout as a coach. Instead of yelling across the court to embarrass a player, an effective coach can sub them out and have them explain things or correct their mistake on the bench. All of that can be covered in a short conversation, and that player is quickly back in the game without being publicly humiliated.

As a coach, if you have the same players making the same mistakes, then that falls on you as a coach. You as a coach have failed because you have either not worked to correct the mistakes in practice, or you have the player in the wrong position and need to give somebody else an opportunity. If you don't have anybody better, then why are you yelling in the first place? Every team/coach has the proverbial "whipping boy." It drives me crazy, but at the same time I smile and wonder why the coach is so supportive of others' mistakes, yet points out every little flaw in that one player. Is it because they can take it? Are they yelling at that one player to make an example for all of the others?

To sum it all up, I'll never understand the purpose of yelling. Anytime I see a coach yell I try to tell myself that they're doing it to make themselves feel better and to show of their "knowledge of the game." I encourage youth coaches who like to yell to think about what they're yelling about. Is this something that we need to work on in practice? If it is something you have worked on in practice, obviously more time needs to be spent on it. Also, think about how you would react if everyone you loved saw you make a mistake, and then watched you get scolded by your boss. When you feel like yelling, hold back and become an instructor for your team and your players.

Chances are when you're yelling things aren't going well for your team, and your players are already aware of that. While yelling might make you feel better about the situation, is it going to help the kids focus on the situation or only make them fear the next mistake? So what good does yelling at your team do? Besides helping you as a coach vent your frustrations, not much. Also, remember that when you're yelling, most people in the stands are now focused on you. They are questioning why you don't make a change. They are questioning why you have certain players in those positions if all you're doing is yelling at them. They are questioning why you didn't do anything to stop the other team from taking advantage of one of your weaknesses. In short, when you yell you're making it all about you.