How To Be a Better Coach (Encore)
How To! with Mike Pesca
Peach Fish Projects
4.3 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 26 August 2025
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When Kelly volunteered to be the head coach for his son's baseball team, he was nervous. He had no formal training, but he knew he wanted his players to have equal playing time—and have fun. Which they did, until the yelling started and the season ended in a stunning loss (and quite a few tears). What can Kelly do better next season? In this encore episode of How To! from 2021, Amanda Ripley connects Kelly with Doug Lemov, author of Teach Like a Champion and The Coach's Guide to Teaching. Doug shares some fantastic advice for commanding attention (and managing failure) that we can all learn from, on or off the field.
If you liked this episode, check out Congrats, You Won the Olympics. Now What?
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This episode was produced by Derek John and Rosemary Belson.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi everyone, I'm Susie Weiss, and I've noticed there's just simply not enough podcasts in the world. So I'm launching my own. Let's go. Let's go, baby. Second Thought is a weekly show about pop culture. The stuff everyone's been binging, arguing about, obsessing over. Here's the thing about heated rivalry. I mean, even the most devoted swifties, I think we can agree, not our best work. We'll be hosting thoughtful conversations with culture's most important figures. Talk about genius. |
| 0:22.6 | Talk about generational talent. |
| 0:23.7 | Coming to headphones near you on |
| 0:25.0 | April 17th with a first guest you won't want to miss. Available wherever you get your podcasts. |
| 0:30.0 | Hey, how to listeners, it's Carvel. If you've ever been a coach, you know that you can't just |
| 0:34.8 | push your athletes all the time. Rest is just as important as conditioning. |
| 0:39.5 | So while the how-to team takes a break this week, please enjoy this episode about how to be a better |
| 0:45.4 | coach, which we produced back in 2021. If your kids are registered for youth sports this fall, |
| 0:50.9 | and especially if you coach young athletes, then you're going to love this one. But the takeaways from this episode about motivating people and turning mistakes into victories |
| 0:59.7 | and dealing with backseat coaches are actually relevant for anyone who in their everyday life |
| 1:05.4 | has to either coach or be coached. So we hope you enjoy it. And we'll be back next week with a brand new episode. |
| 1:12.5 | And without further ado, here is our former host and a former youth soccer coach, the great Amanda Ripley. |
| 1:21.1 | Welcome to how to. I'm Amanda Ripley. As a reporter, I've been in a lot of uncomfortable places. |
| 1:28.3 | I've been in prisons, crack houses, hurricanes, but I never got as nervous as I did on the |
| 1:34.3 | sidelines of a soccer field coaching a bunch of 10-year-old boys. |
| 1:38.3 | I mean, I've played soccer my whole life, and I was always solidly mediocre. |
| 1:43.3 | But through a series of events, |
| 1:45.4 | I ended up coaching my son's soccer team for about five years. And I mean, I hate to admit this, |
| 1:51.7 | but I can still remember my stomach tensing up during those games, the feeling of absolute |
| 1:57.4 | elation when my players scored, and profound despair when they lost, all of which I hid |
| 2:04.8 | from them, of course, most of the time. Anyway, it was just way harder than I expected. So I have a lot |
| 2:12.5 | of sympathy for this week's listener. My name is Kelly. I'm 46. I live in just outside of Seattle, Washington. |
... |
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