ANCIENT& not so ancient WISDOM
offering a weekly positive perspective

June 17, 2004

Discipline and poise in practice become discipline and poise in the final moments of a game!!

- Jack Stallings 

Jack Stallings is Associate Professor, Department of Health and Kinesiology, and (until his retirement in May, 1999) was also Head Baseball Coach at Georgia Southern University (1975-1999). Jack Stallings retired from coaching baseball in May 1999 as the winningest active NCAA baseball coach in America with 1,258 wins. Jack coached at Georgia Southern for 25 years (1975-99), and prior to that, was the head coach at Florida State (1969-75) and Wake Forest (1958-68). He currently serves on the American Baseball Coaches Association Board of Directors and is a member of the Hall of Fame.

The following is an excerpt of an article by Jack Stallings for work, for athletics, for life. 

To deal effectively with pressure, we must acknowledge it exists and then learn how to handle it properly and effectively. Pressure is created not by the game situation but by how we look at it and how we handle it. It is not the situation or someone else making us tense, it is us! We create pressure by how we think or act, not by the situation we are in at the moment. 

The objective under pressure should not be to play super because that is an unreasonable goal; the objective of an athlete should be to play normally under pressure. 

Normal performance is possible in pressure situations because of proper concentration. By proper concentration you control the situation rather than the situation controlling you, so the player should focus on performance, not outcome! CONCENTRATION IS THE PROPER SOLUTION. 

Wishing you great and continued success!

Sincerely,