Anyone who knows me knows I think sport is a fabulous thing. There is a lesson in every team, in every spot of over time, in any pass, in any win, and particularly in every loss. At its best, sport mirrors the highs and lows of life, the joy of success, learning how to deal with failure, how to deal with teammates, how to deal with your own place in the scheme of things.
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At its worst, sport is many things too. From sideline parents who berate their children, to professional athletes involved in scandals involving money, drugs, rape, domestic violence.
But, in the grand scheme of things, no matter how much the media reports on these things, I truly believe sport is more good than bad.
And that's why I love it so.
Perhaps it was a case of eerie timing the week I interviewed Mark Wadie about his super program Coaching Men into Boys, an initiative set up to engage coaches as mentors for young athletes.
I took advantage of a rainy afternoon and re-watched one of my favourite sports movies ever Friday Night Lights, the story of a Texas high-school football team and their dream run towards the state finals. It was based on a book Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream (1990) by H. G. Bissinger, followed the story of the real-life 1988 Permian High School Panthers football team.
The film - and I haven't read the book, but it's high on my to-read list - is full of this quiet desperation, the boys, the town, the pressure to do well, the pressure to escape. It has characters that epitomise the worst in sport, you've only got to watch Tim McGraw as Charles Billingsley smack his own son around when he drops the ball, and you shudder. And without giving the ending away, that's the saddest but most joyous end to any sports movie ever.
So here I was, swirling around in thoughts of how a great coach can bring out great things in a young athlete, how important it is for children to have guiding adults that aren't related by blood, but perhaps by a common purpose.
We've all seen bad coaches. We've all been coached by bad coaches. Perhaps even been a bad coach at some stage of our lives.
But over the years, in my experience as an athlete - apply whatever qualifiers you want to that statement - as a sports journalist, as a parent, I have had the pleasure of seeing many great coaches.
Men, in the most case (and that's a column for another day), who are gentle and kind and patient with the children under their care for a few hours every week. Who know when to apply a stern voice, know when to laugh, know when to lay firm boundaries, know when it's time for the kids just to have fun.
There's a line in the promotional material Wadie gave me on the day I interviewed him, a quote from a former high-school football coach (and we're taking American Football) Mike Berg*, who says "If we're only teaching them how to play the sport then we're failing them big time."
Any who is involved in sport, at any level, needs to remember that one.
*Kind of glad I Google-stalked Mike Berg a bit. According to his Twitter feed he is now University of North Dakota football radio colour analyst (maybe one of the high schools here could appoint me as their colour analyst?) after a 35-year high school coaching career. His feed is full of great quotes, here's an early favourite: "Championships are built on a thousand invisible mornings."
Now get up and go watch your kids play sport. And then pull on your own boots too.
