August 6, 2008
EHT grad Jason Sacks helping make coaching positive
By TOM WILLIAMS
Sports Columnist
Earlier this year, in a South Jersey youth basketball game between 10-year old girls, a former professional athlete who
is now a local TV analyst verbally abused a female referee so badly that the local officials' board announced it will
no longer work a game if he is in the building.
The unsportsmanlike explosion by Mitch Williams is just one embarrassing example of things that have gone wrong in youth
sports.
In another incident, closer to home, an out-of-control parent challenged a high school coach to a fight. The challenge
was so forceful that the police had to step in.
There are too many examples.
Egg Harbor Township High School graduate Jason Sacks is hoping his organization, the Positive Coaching Alliance, will be
able to minimize incidents like those. You probably remember Sacks as a three-point shooter for George McNally in the
late 1990s or as a runner on EHT's champion cross country team. Since then he's graduated from Syracuse University,
where he called play-by-play on the school station in three sports. He has also worked with McNally in his basketball
program.
"Two and a half years ago I was getting my Master's Degree in sports management at New York University," Sacks said. "I
had just worked with the Knicks and was helping out coaching the NYU mens basketball team. But I wanted to find
something full-time after I got the Master's. I saw that the Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) had an opening for New
Jersey and Pennsylvania. I visited their website and liked what I saw."
Though relatively new, the PCA is no small-time organization. Lakers' coach Phil Jackson is its national spokesperson.
Other recognizable sports names on the advisory board include Sen. Bill Bradley, Larry Brown, Doc Rivers, Steve Kerr,
Summer Sanders, Nadia Comaneci, Dean Smith, Ronnie Lott, Herm Edwards, Steve Mariucci, Barry Zito, Gene Washington and
Kerri Strug.
"Our goal is to work with schools and youth sports organizations to make sports the most positive experience possible
and to keep the young athletes involved in sports longer", said Sacks, who has advanced to director of PCA partner
development and has moved to Chicago. "We want them to learn that youth sports, and that includes sports on the high
school level, is more than just winning and losing. A lot of it has to do with gaining experience and building
character. We want to help coaches focus on a new way to coach, a way to get more out of their players with the positive
approach.
"We do live, inter-active workshops for different audiences. We have a leadership workshop for administrators, school
board members, athletics directors and other decision makers. We have four different levels of workshops for coaches. We
have a workshop for parents, to better define their role. And, for school districts, we have a student-athlete workshop."
Many segments of the workshops are available online (positivecoach.org) along with blogs that deal with subjects of
interest. For example, current topics include whether having no-cut teams is a pro or con, plus discussions regarding
steroids and the treatment of injuries.
"A lot of coaches," Sacks said, "especially those that have been around a long time, have this 'my way or the highway'
approach to coaching. It might work in some situations but things continually change in sports and in society and
coaches, especially those coaching our youngest athletes, need to change, too. We call our philosophy creating the
double-goal coach. The first goal is to win, because we believe that competition is good. The second, and most
important, goal is to teach the character education through sports.
"For example, we teach that mistakes are OK because you learn from mistakes. A lot of times coaches will tend to take
players out of a game right after they make a mistake. That creates even more anxiety within the player, who is already
losing confidence because of the mistake. Our approach is research-based and the research shows that if you are a player
out just focusing on not making mistakes, then you are not playing up to your potential."
Sacks says that the parent workshops are as important as any. "We teach parents to leave the winning up to the coaches
and the athletes and to focus on making the experience a positive one for their child," he said. "We talk about how to
handle pre-game conversations, post-game conversations and how to handle themselves on the sidelines and in the
bleachers. We also emphasize the importance of a positive parent-coach relationship.
"Parents also need to know that generally the ride home from the game isn't the best time to discuss the game in detail.
There needs to be a cooling off period. I joke with people that whether I felt good about my shooting that night at EHT
depended on which parent I rode home with. My mom's comments were a lot softer. We also teach young athletes how to
properly bring their concerns or their problems to their coach, instead of complaining to their parents and creating a
tense atmosphere. And the coaches need to create a situation where the parents know what is expected of them and the
athletes know the coaches will listen to their concerns."
Strangely, only one group in this area is involved with PCA. "The Wildwood Little League is one of our partners, a group
that has taken advantage of what we offer," said Sacks. "They have participated in a series of workshops. To my
knowledge, they are the only group at any level in the Atlantic-Cape May county area, so far. We have a stronger
presence in Central Jersey."
To set up an arrangement with the Positive Coaching Alliance, contact Sacks at 773-506-4744 or through the PCA website.
He is one more former Cape-Atlantic League athlete who is working to improve the sports experience for everybody
involved.
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