How to reduce injuries follow the leader

[kcsu]

In D3 football one of the best teams year in and year out is St Johns of MN. There coach who has over 700 wins is very different in his approach. For one there is no hitting in practice. None. They instead focus on being perfect in the exectution side of the game. I for one dont know if this is the way to go but they have been succesful beyond belief. So for SU how about a few thoughts.

1: On kick offs always kick the ball out of the end zone. No contact or very little

2: Once the season starts little if no hitting. Thud only.

3: No lifting during the season for any on the three deep

I believe that these three things could reduce injuries and help the players stay fresh for Saturday. Lets face it if a D1 kid doesnt know how to tackle block etc.. by the time the games start you are not going to teach them by live hitting during the season. Same goes for lifting. How much are you going to improve by lifting during the season? I would rather the kids focus on execution and staying fresh

 

[MadNY3]

In D3 football one of the best teams year in and year out is St Johns of MN. There coach who has over 700 wins is very different in his approach. For one there is no hitting in practice. None. They instead focus on being perfect in the exectution side of the game. I for one dont know if this is the way to go but they have been succesful beyond belief. So for SU how about a few thoughts.

1: On kick offs always kick the ball out of the end zone. No contact or very little

2: Once the season starts little if no hitting. Thud only.

3: No lifting during the season for any on the three deep

I believe that these three things could reduce injuries and help the players stay fresh for Saturday. Lets face it if a D1 kid doesnt know how to tackle block etc.. by the time the games start you are not going to teach them by live hitting during the season. Same goes for lifting. How much are you going to improve by lifting during the season? I would rather the kids focus on execution and staying fresh

Anyone on this board who has not coached football or lacks a medical/physical therapy degree should kind of stay out of what a major D1 football program should do on conditioning, etc., IMO.

 

[bevosu]

Anyone on this board who has not coached football or lacks a medical/physical therapy degree should kind of stay out of what a major D1 football program should do on conditioning, etc., IMO.

I gone.

 

[shu 49]

If su didn't lift in season there would be 40 guys out. Absolutely needed. Also, u can make pretty good gains inseason lifting. I do the lifting for my h.s. Team and it really helps especially against teams that don't. Go su.

 

[CIL]

In D3 football one of the best teams year in and year out is St Johns of MN. There coach who has over 700 wins is very different in his approach. For one there is no hitting in practice. None. They instead focus on being perfect in the exectution side of the game. I for one dont know if this is the way to go but they have been succesful beyond belief. So for SU how about a few thoughts.

1: On kick offs always kick the ball out of the end zone. No contact or very little

2: Once the season starts little if no hitting. Thud only.

3: No lifting during the season for any on the three deep

I believe that these three things could reduce injuries and help the players stay fresh for Saturday. Lets face it if a D1 kid doesnt know how to tackle block etc.. by the time the games start you are not going to teach them by live hitting during the season. Same goes for lifting. How much are you going to improve by lifting during the season? I would rather the kids focus on execution and staying fresh

They can do that because they are freaking St Johns. Their talent is far superior than that of their peer group. They could add a 4th that said "Must drink 12 beers before kickoff" and they'd still win most of their gains.

The lifting most teams do in season is called maintenance. It's 2 sets of 5 at 70 percent of max -- nothing insane along with prehab type stuff (mobility stuff).

 

[Millhouse]

They can do that because they are freaking St Johns. Their talent is far superior than that of their peer group. They could add a 4th that said "Must drink 12 beers before kickoff" and they'd still win most of their gains. The lifting most teams do in season is called maintenance. It's 2 sets of 5 at 70 percent of max -- nothing insane along with prehab type stuff (mobility stuff).

I believe you but it's surprising guys are as strong as they are with that much time on maintenance

Id like to learn more about how football teams train

 

[Finwad32]

There's been more and more teams that are going to a very limited contact approach. In the past six years we've changed our approach depending on personnel and depth. We were very deep this year with a lot of position battles, so we were a lot more physical than the previous two years. I don't know if there's any correlation, because I don't have a big enough sample size, but our injuries were up significantly this year. Not so much bad injuries, but, nagging ones that decrease a players productivity.

Bad injuries (tears and breaks) are more happenstance than anything else IMO.

 

[JackBauer44]

I personally believe that no hitting during practices makes for lousy execution. We were hit really hard by injuries this year and were forced to Thud, and limit ourselves during "Best vs. Rest" team periods, and it made us sloppy on Friday nights. In terms of lifting, Duke has a great schedule that they use that I'd love to implement into a program. It starts the day after the game with getting a small lift to get out the soreness from the previous day, and has different physicality levels for each day leading up to the walk-through the night before the game.

 

[CIL]

I believe you but it's surprising guys are as strong as they are with that much time on maintenance

Id like to learn more about how football teams train

You'll probably lose some gains during the season, that's pretty much the norm. But you have to remember, these guys aren't Joe from the local LA Fitness. Even your average player even at a FCS school is an excellent athlete. These people are pretty much gifted and come into school with natural ability to get stronger than the rest of us.

Maintenance pretty lasts from August to December. You take a few weeks off and get right back into things. I'm not saying they are on;y doing 3 to 3 sets of 5 on the bench and squat and call it a day, but they certainly aren't doing 3 x 10 on bench, 4 x 8 on the incline and banging out dips until they can't move. There is a much bigger emphasis on olympic lifts and explosiveness these days.

Sample off season day would have

• prehab stuff: foam rolling, mobility work, band pulls for shoulders, rear delts, etc.
• some med ball work: throws, slams, etc
• olympic lift 3x3
• standard push pull, squat, etc 3x5
• lunges 3x8
• pull ups 3x8
• curls, etc 3x8

These programs today are designed to get players in and out in under a hour. Freshman and RS freshman, players that don't play much might more a tmost places, but even then, it is nowhere near the amount of lifting, conditioning, and plyos being done in the offseason. These kids are also spending time in practice beating themselves up a bunch too.

 

[kcsu]

I played college bball and we did something along those lines. In addition my coach who is in the hall of fame did very little if any conditioning in season. Our entire practice was spent on game planning.

As to St. Johns they do not have a talent advantage. In fact every player is non scholorship. zero. If you watch any of their games what you will see is a team that is beyond well coached. They usually dont beat themselves and the game planning is exceptional and yes they are fresh. Im not saying that there should be no hitting in season but im also not a big believer that once the season starts it actually matters especially given our schedule. Going to thud once you are injured isnt the point. Coach G has over 700 wins with i believe 5 or 6 national championships so all in all i will take his record over anything we have done. Last point Ben used a non traditional approach to conditioning and that seemed to work out pretty well.

 

[anglerman]

Weight lifting is probably the most important thing you can do to prevent injuries If there's was no lifting during the season many players would lose a significant amount of muscle mass. In fact they Almost all would. Any one who thinks being smaller and weaker will prevent injuries is simply out of their mind the execution would go to crapp as well.

 

[007]

Memory blast and apropos of absolutely nothing, but back when I played (nearly 100 years ago) the maniac I played for had full contact practices almost every day of the season, including Oklahoma pit drills to end the practice. Your toughness was routinely judged by how much "paint" you had on your helmet (full helmet to helmet contact would frequently leave a streak of paint on your helmet from the guy you hit). Paint from the other team's colors was a badge of honor. Anybody else remember those days?? It's a violent game and always has been. I loved the contact.

Come to think of it, that probably explains a lot of things in my life...

 

[CIL]

I played college bball and we did something along those lines. In addition my coach who is in the hall of fame did very little if any conditioning in season. Our entire practice was spent on game planning.

As to St. Johns they do not have a talent advantage. In fact every player is non scholorship. zero. If you watch any of their games what you will see is a team that is beyond well coached. They usually dont beat themselves and the game planning is exceptional and yes they are fresh. Im not saying that there should be no hitting in season but im also not a big believer that once the season starts it actually matters especially given our schedule. Going to thud once you are injured isnt the point. Coach G has over 700 wins with i believe 5 or 6 national championships so all in all i will take his record over anything we have done. Last point Ben used a non traditional approach to conditioning and that seemed to work out pretty well.

When did you play collegiate hoops? Much has changed in the last decade with thoughts on conditioning and training. I played both collegiate football and hockey and can tell you training is vastly different now than when I played 15-20 years ago.

I'm well aware of St John's D3 status and coach G. But for you to think that they do not get a superior athlete than schools like Hamilton, Hobart, Tufts, etc you would be mistaken. I will argue that the LACK of scholarships in d3 sports lends itself to an even greater talent disparity between programs than division 1 athletics. St John, Mt Union, etc.

Mt Union has 110 kids on their roster. My alma mater Hamilton has around 70. It allows players to be recruited over each and every single season without having to worry about a scholarship limit, unhappy players transferring, etc. It actually creates an insane amount of dynasties that wouldn't exist at other levels. For instance:

• either Mt Union, St Johns, Wisconsin Whitewater, or Rowan have appeared in every D3 championship game since 1994!
• Hobart lax 13 out of 14 years
• White Water or Marietta in d3 baseball 4 out of 5
• Middlebury Hockey 8 out 12

 

[kcsu]

When did you play collegiate hoops? Much has changed in the last decade with thoughts on conditioning and training. I played both collegiate football and hockey and can tell you training is vastly different now than when I played 15-20 years ago.

I'm well aware of St John's D3 status and coach G. But for you to think that they do not get a superior athlete than schools like Hamilton, Hobart, Tufts, etc you would be mistaken. I will argue that the LACK of scholarships in d3 sports lends itself to an even greater talent disparity between programs than division 1 athletics. St John, Mt Union, etc.

Mt Union has 110 kids on their roster. My alma mater Hamilton has around 70. It allows players to be recruited over each and every single season without having to worry about a scholarship limit, unhappy players transferring, etc. It actually creates an insane amount of dynasties that wouldn't exist at other levels. For instance:

• either Mt Union, St Johns, Wisconsin Whitewater, or Rowan have appeared in every D3 championship game since 1994!
• Hobart lax 13 out of 14 years
• White Water or Marietta in d3 baseball 4 out of 5
• Middlebury Hockey 8 out 12

I played about 30 pounds ago Sure things are way different and i get that i just think that cutting back on contact during the season is smart.