Coach Wooden (Los Angeles, Freedom: college, live, floors) - California (CA) - City-Data Forum

RedJacket · 06-05-2010, 01:11 PM

Having read a number of articles on John Wooden since his death yesterday brings me to say this:

Today's college basketball is littered with millionaire coaches w/o a lick of decency. They wear their $2000 dollar suits while standing on the sidelines yelling and swearing at the refs and players. The players are built multimillion dollar stadiums and show up loaded with tattoos, cocky attitudes, and behavior away from the court that's nothing short of disgusting.

I can't help but think what Coach Wooden really thought about today's players and coaches.

I know what I think: pathetic.

nmnita · 06-05-2010, 01:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by think first

Having read a number of articles on John Wooden since his death yesterday brings me to say this:

Today's college basketball is littered with millionaire coaches w/o a lick of decency. They wear their $2000 dollar suits while standing on the sidelines yelling and swearing at the refs and players. The players are built multimillion dollar stadiums and show up loaded with tattoos, cocky attitudes, and behavior away from the court that's nothing short of disgusting.

I can't help but think what Coach Wooden really thought about today's players and coaches.

I know what I think: pathetic.

I agree with you 110%. I would say the loss of Wooden is so sad, but actually, he led a good life, was a good man and his time was up. I am sure his memory will remain in many hearts for years to come.

NIta

BRinSM · 06-05-2010, 01:50 PM

i don't really like hearing about deaths in the news, but it usually has no affect on me (ie Gary Coleman, Dio, etc...), but i was actually very saddened by the news of Wooden's passing. i remember the stories my dad used to tell me about the UCLA teams that he coached. no other team in NCAA basketball has dominated anywhere near the level that UCLA did during Wooden's tenure. Apparently he was also a very respectable human being and the world won't quite be the same without a person of his stature.

coo77 · 06-05-2010, 02:02 PM

Wooden was an amazing coach because he was an amazing person. He didn't focus just on winning the game for the sake of winning. He cultivated his players to be good people, men of class, men that played with honor and respect. His pyramid of success really was key to his coaching. During half time he would focus on an area of the pyramid the team needed to improve on. He didn't mention "winning," but rather personal success. He once said he was more proud that his players all graduated, had high GPA's, and succeeded in their lives as leaders after graduation rather than the 10 championships.

SoCal35 · 06-05-2010, 07:24 PM

This is a very stirring talk by Kareem praising Coach John Wooden for being a great coach and great man. Kareem and Wooden....two class acts!

YouTube - Kareem Abdul-Jabbar speaks about Coach John Wooden

CapnHawk · 06-05-2010, 10:59 PM

We lost a very remarkable person and a true gentleman.

LaoTzuMindFu · 06-06-2010, 05:53 PM

Thank you for starting a thread on Coach John Wooden. He was truly a remarkable human being.

Lot of the posters here in the Los Angeles forum are not L.A. natives and probably not sports enthusiasts, but Coach Wooden was one of the three sports ICONS here in Los Angeles with the others being Magic Johnson and Tommy Lasorda. Coach Wooden was the greatest coach in the history of sports.

DOUBLE H · 06-06-2010, 06:05 PM

The thing that separated Mr. Wooden from his peers is the way he handled people, not only through the game but also halftime talks. He didn't scream in his players ears or throw chairs across basketball floors to get his point across.

Very few people in this country receives the Presidential Medal Of Freedom. He did in 2003.

He was able to get more out of his players than they thought that they could actually give. He wanted to be more than just a basketball coach.

Regarding his players, friends, and even acquaintances; If he saw a gap of where you were and what he thought you could become, he felt it was his God given responsibility to close that gap, not only as a basketball player but as a human being.

Thankscoo77 for the illustration regarding Mr. Wooden's pyramid of success. I'm a fan of ESPN's Sport Century series, which aired on ESPN in 2000, which are one hour biographies on various sports figures of the 20th Century. I remember to this day what Bill Walton said about that pyramid that coo77 posted and Mr. Wooden. "If I ever got down, depressed, was unsure about a situation, or something like this, I had something I kept in my billfold that I would pull out and read. It was a piece of paper illustrating Mr. Wooden's "Pyramid Of Success", and after clearing my head I knew what to do. That problem I had turned out to be no problem."

It's going to be a long time before sports fans will ever again see a man with as many positive qualities as John Wooden. He was smart, driven, compassionate, personable, humble, religious, and a very giving individual. RIP, Mr. Wooden.

LaoTzuMindFu · 06-06-2010, 06:28 PM

I posted in another thread that I had the great pleasure of meeting and chatting with Coach Wooden on a few occasions since we frequented the same spots in Encino. Guy was soooo nice and engaging even to me being a complete stranger. Those were moments in my life that I will always remember because they guy was so willing to give advice and teach. I told him I was also a coach (fitness coach and martial arts sifu - kung fu and taichi and sensei - karate) and asked for his advice.