Pete Carroll breaks down his practice organization, philosophy, and how they get players to buy in

| American Football | 03/30/2017

Not long ago, Troy Vincent shared an insightful video of Pete Carroll, head coach of the Seattle Seahawks, sharing his philosophy on practice structure, organization, tempo, energy, and the technique he uses to get players to buy in before stepping foot on the field.

Leaving the locker room, there is a sign above the door that simply says “I’m In,” and for Carroll, that translates to guys making a conscious decision to start their days work.

“When they tap that sign, they’re making an affirmation, and they’re saying ‘I’m in’ as they hit it and it’s a positive statement about what they intend to do and they’re coming out here to give everything they’ve got, they’re holding nothing back, and the world that may be troubling them or whatever is left to the side, and now it’s just about practicing football our way. I think that it’s a big deal and it’s something that our guys are really good at doing, and I love it,” Carroll adds.

You’ll notice throughout the clip that everything is very structured and highly organized, and you never see players standing around waiting for a drill to start. The tempo of a Seahawks practice really keeps things moving.

One of the other things that stuck out to me personally about the video is how Carroll instructs his coaches to “critique effort first” with players.

“One of the really simple guidelines that we utilize is that we critique effort first. Most coaches are going to talk about the mistake that somebody made as the play is ending, or what they should have done, or whatever. We’re looking at how they give their effort FIRST, because effort is everything for us.”

Carroll then adds that he and his coaching staff always focus on what they want to see and not what went wrong with a rep or drill:

“We don’t think that you have to emphasize mistakes. We have to be disciplined about how we use our language so we’re always talking about the next thing we should do right.”

Hear all that, and a whole lot more from Carroll in the clip.

Read original article in Football Scoop.

Doug has been the content manager for Football Scoop since 2011. A former college player and small college coach, Doug now serves as assistant head coach / offensive coordinator at West Ottawa HS (MI).