Recap: Why Drills Don’t Build Skills - OLP Lounge

Welcome back to another edition of the OLP Lounge. I'm LeCharles Bentley and I'm joined by Mr. Taylor Boggs, who's seemingly becoming a mainstay on this show. At some point I gotta get somebody else on here, I gotta get off, one of the two, to give some other people some camera time. But we want to dive right into two particular topics that's been pretty hot in these social media streets, as they say nowadays.

Yeah.

Hot in these social media streets. That we want to address. Well, one of them is the idea of drills not building skills. And this has been a hot topic for many coaches, but the irony is I've been talking about this for like the last 3 to 4 years of drills doing a very poor job of building the skills and the necessary skills for high-level offensive line play. And some coaches took, took it the wrong way, and I understand, and I believe, Taylor, that a part of the reason why so many coaches take issue with the idea of drills being challenged, it's because they're so emotionally tied to drills. And oftentimes we see— I see you smiling— oftentimes we see coaches begin to identify themselves with what they do and not what they know. And for me or for you or for anyone else to come in and challenge them on their perceived identity, then it becomes an attack on them. And what you all have to understand, this isn't a personal attack. This was not and is not intended to attack what you hold near and dear and true to your heart. And for many coaches, we understand the drills that you do oftentimes becomes your identity. We are not attacking your identity. We're just saying that you may want to change your makeup. In order to become what you want your players to become, and for you to become the coach and teacher that you are capable of being. Now let me explain briefly, because sometimes people do a better job of hearing things versus reading them. I'm a bit similar. When I say drills do not build skills, it's through the context of this: skills are a freestanding reality. The skills that we establish as coaches and teachers with our players They become the foundational elements to the drills. The drills only provide context to the schematics or context to situations that we're trying to get players to adapt to or learn more contextually about. I gave an example of a deuce block. So let's just say Taylor and I want to execute a deuce block, and if this were the case, then the 3 technique is in trouble, 'cause I'm telling you, I'm coming. Downhill, that's old school, not like nowadays left and right. But anyway, not to digress. Not to digress. If Taylor and I want to execute a deuce block and a coach says, "Hey, I got a great drill for it." Cool, no problem. It helps you and I build context within the scope of a deuce block within the broader scope of the game and the schematics. Makes complete sense. But if I don't understand as a player how to, number one, get into an appropriate stance, how to then begin to apply the appropriate force to execute the appropriate movements for said deuce block, it does not matter how many times we run through that drill. It's not going to build the skills necessary to accomplish the demands of the task. So now what ends up happening is At that point in time, you begin looking for a new drill. Well, this drill isn't working, we need something new. Well, what you need to really be thinking more in line with is, let's build the skills first, then we can apply those skills to any situation or any method at that point. But you can't do it until you go through that tiring, intentional, and arduous process of establishing the base of skill first. There was a coach on social media that brought up a really good point. And the point was the comparison between the drills versus skills and using pass rush drill versus understanding pass rush or pass blocking mechanics. Great analogy. And let me explain that a little bit deeper. We all believe in use pass rush drill. I hated it as a player. What about you?

Oh, it's the worst part of the day.

Okay. Now, we also understand this. We've heard every coach say this: it's not an offensive line drill, it's for the defense. So that's the beginning of the bullshit slippery slope. Okay? Right there. Am I wrong?

No, no.

That is the beginning of the bullshit slippery slope that we begin to slide down. Okay, let's just roll with the idea it's not an offensive line drill, it's for the defense. Fine. Well, your players really aren't learning. They aren't building skill while in the heat of one-on-one drills. If your players do not understand how to get into an appropriate stance, how to mechanically and effectively apply force in order to efficiently take a pass set, it does not matter how much time you invest into one-on-one drills, because those necessary skills are just not going to show up. Then we compound that by adding stress. The more stress that we apply to the athlete within that environment, we're more apt to see the athlete begin to go what's called native, which means that nothing that we want to have happen is going to ultimately happen, because everything with offensive line play is learned. They're learned skills, learned habits. But if we don't ingrain them into our athletes, then that doesn't allow the athlete to express those learned traits, number one, within the context of the scheme, and then number two, while doing so under pressure. So my last and final point on this, I understand and empathize with a lot of coaches out there. The drills are who you are. You're all about the bag of tricks. That's cool. But what you have to understand and begin to embrace is the idea that it's not what you do, it's what you know that's going to ultimately get the most out of your players. That's my take on it.

Yeah, spot on. I mean, spot on.

That's my take on it. Go ahead.

Well, I was thinking like that, like right now you have the Senior Bowl, they're posting all the clips of the one-on-ones and it's like, oh, we're going through this again. We're watching guys bull rush one-on-ones. Oh, he's so strong, this and that. But with high school kids, they're starting their weekend camps and they're just doing one-on-ones, right? And I'm like, I'm talking to a kid from my high school and he's like, yeah, I'll get— I got to really get better at that outside speed rush. He's a tackle. And he's like, he's going to go to these camps and start doing one-on-ones. And I'm like, well, if you still had the problem in season, it's not going to be fixed.

It's not fixed.

Like, I can remember even a rookie when I was on the Cardinals, we would do like really good drills because they were completely in context of what we were running. We ran duo, we worked the heck out of ace and deuce blocks, and we did kind of that high leg, that gallop shuffle, which is a skill. It's a skill. And we would keep running it over and over and he couldn't get it. And it was just obvious to me. I'm like, well, you know what? He's young. He's not strong right now. Which is tough to be in the NFL. You're not strong enough. But he, you know, he needed to have his strength developed. He didn't have a redshirt year. He just got by on some stuff and whatever he did in college. But he didn't have the skills or the strength to even do that. I'm like, so we could do this drill over and over. And guess what? It's not going to get right. Correct. But I mean, luckily he was drafted, so they gave him enough rope to hang himself. You know what I'm saying? But then Buddy Morris is a good strength coach.

He got him stronger. Awesome guy.

And he could do it.

—Yeah.

—But I'm like, we wasted a whole OTAs, like, thinking that drill was gonna fix it. Like, his— he was lacking the skill. And strength's not always the skill you're lacking. That was just that case. —Right, right.

—You know what I mean? I think that that's something that— everyone loves talking about the process.

Everyone loves— —We've been talking about this, we're blue in the face.

Everybody loves talking about the process, the process, the process. And what I tend to do is I can't disassociate many coaches from some of the players that they talk about so badly. And this is what I mean. We hear coaches love pontificating about, "Ugh, you guys don't appreciate the game. You don't love the process. You don't respect the process. Some of y'all just love saying that you play football, but you're really not a football player." You know? All day.

All day. Taking shots. That's social media. Take shots at kids.

We hear this all day, right? But it's the same thing with many of the coaches that took, uh, that didn't take this recent post too kindly. And it's the exact same phenomenon where many coaches love the idea of the whistle. You love the coaches meetings, you love putting the dip in and sitting there talking about the game, you love going to seminars, drinking beer with your buddies and fraternizing. All that is great. You even love the authority that that you may have over some other athletes. But when you really break it down and say the process and identifying, it's not about what you do, it's what you know. And in order to achieve the what you know, you have to be willing to get naked and invest in yourself. The same thing you ask and demand of players. You ask the players not to be the one that loves the jersey, loves Friday nights, loves going out the tunnel, but you don't wanna go to the weight room? You don't wanna do the extra mobility work? You don't wanna study? Well, that's all of the stuff that's gonna ultimately yield the return that we're looking for. And it's the same thing on the coaching side. You can love the drills, you can love the seminars, you can love hanging out with your buddies, all that's great. But if you don't love the process of becoming more of a what I know type of coach versus a what I do type of coach, you're no different than the players that you're whining about on social media.

Nah, that's so true.

Am I wrong? Nah, it's true. They're no different than the players. They spend so much time saying that these kids don't get it. No! You know why they probably don't get it, coach? Because you don't get it. You don't get it, you haven't gotten it, thus they can't get it. I don't hear the coaches that do get it. They're not the ones out here talking about these kids don't get it.

These kids are soft. These kids are soft.

I used to work with them. Back in my day, we used to do this. Well, the fact of the matter is, if you really want your athletes to get it, you have to get it. If you don't want to be the ath— excuse me, you don't want the athletes to be in love with the methods, and the methods being the uniforms, the sweet spat, the towel, the little stupid mouthpieces with the fangs and everything that goes along, you know, the stuff. Drills and all the methods and the schematics, that's the stuff. That's just the stuff on the coaching side. But you gotta get in the weight room, coach. You gotta get into the books, coach. You gotta get into the grind. You gotta be willing to get naked and get into the sewers of this thing and really begin to build and establish who and what you're going to be about. But I can tell you this, if it's about the methods, you're misleading yourself, you're misleading your program, and you're definitely misleading your players.