Kansas Football Asked Me Anything | Alan Stein, Jr Q&A

I got to watch Kobe's really early morning workout, and I mean early morning like he started [music] at 3:30 in the morning cuz his goal was to get in three workouts a day. And as a young coach, I remember being very surprised [music] to watch at that time the best player in the world, he was doing such basic drills during this workout. He was doing a series of [music] pivoting drills and squaring up drills and ball handling drills. And as a young coach, I was just so surprised [music] to see the best player on the planet doing stuff that I'd done with middle school age players. And I had a chance to talk to him later that day, and I asked him why a player at his level would consistently work on [music] basic drills. And he said, "The reason I'm the best in the world is cuz I never get bored with the basics." And that was something that fundamentally changed my outlook on coaching, on performance, on every area of my life. So, the way I attack every area of my life, whether it's being a father or being a speaker, is I figure out what are the fundamentals of the basic building blocks that lead to excellence in this, and how can I work relentlessly during the unseen hours towards mastery of those skill sets. So, let's not make things any more complicated than it needs to be. Figure out what you want to be great at, figure out what the fundamentals are in that, and be great at them. And uh that that's one that's that's always stuck with me. Yes. >> What's your story and like how did you get in positions to work with all these great these great players and teams and become a world class >> So, I grew up in the DC area, which is where I still live now. And then I played basketball down at Elon University, a small school in in North Carolina. Uh I played basketball there 94 to 98. Um and then I moved back. Yeah, I'm old. I'm 50. And then I moved back uh to the DC area in 98 to pursue a strength and conditioning career. I I realized that combining my love of basketball with my love of strength and conditioning was the path I wanted to be on. Um for any of you that are familiar with the DC area, it's one of the hotbeds of high school basketball in the country. Some really great players have come out of there. And I got to work at two different high schools in Washington, D.C. The first was Montrose Christian, which is where Kevin Durant graduated from. The second was DeMatha Catholic High School, which also has a really good football program. And I got to work with, you know, a dozen future NBA players there. And both of those schools were Nike elite programs. So then I got to work for Nike and for Jordan Brand and for USA Basketball. And I got to be in rooms with guys like LeBron James and Kobe Bryant and Stephen Curry. And I mean, again, showing my age, the the first round of skills academies was Vince Carter and Paul Pierce and Amar'e Stoudemire and Steve Nash. And then that transferred over to Kyrie Irving and Anthony Davis. So I got to just spend days with these guys. And I'm a sponge. I mean, that first year I followed Kobe around like a puppy dog. I just wanted to ask him every question I could ask and learn everything I could learn from him. Watch every single thing that he did cuz I'm very observant by nature. And then after doing that for almost 20 years, I was ready for a new challenge. So I decided to leave the strength and conditioning space and pursue what I do now, which is corporate keynote speaking. The overwhelming 99% of my talks are to corporate folks. Are are to folks in the in the sales world and and so forth. So being in front of athletes and being in front of you guys is what I love to do. But the folks in that world, I mean, they salivate over the sports stories. You know, that the folks that I get to speak to would give anything to have experienced what I experienced in the last 24 hours and watch you guys do what you do behind the curtain and sit in on meetings and watch your walk-through and your practices and stuff. So I just consider myself a liaison to take the things that I learn from you guys and show folks in the business world how they can apply those exact same principles. Because the principles that I just shared with you have high utility. My goal for sharing them with you all is so that you can be the best football player you're capable of. You can be the best football program you're capable of. You guys can win at a high level and then many of you can go on to play on Sundays and make a lot of money playing this game. But at some point you will stop playing football and every single thing I just shared with you will apply to whatever the next stage of life is that you have. But thank you for that question. That was great. >> How do you uh balance like addressing your teammates that may have done something wrong versus like encouraging how you >> So he said how do you address a teammate that may have done something wrong? Well, first of all, from a communication standpoint, there's a huge difference between talking at a teammate and talking to a teammate or talking with a teammate. We also have to understand um part of what makes you all elite is that most of the guys in this room, I mean you you guys are alphas. You're super competitive. You're super driven, which means there's a lot of really big egos in this room and that's a good thing. I you want that. Now, you want to use your ego and your confidence for the betterment of Kansas football, but I would never want to be in a room where no one has an ego. But we have to understand that there's a self-preservation mechanism that if you're going to what I perceive is feel like you're attacking me or you're criticizing me, my very first natural inclination is to defend and to protect. I mean, that's why you guys have the BCD on your front. No defending or or deflecting. Is it defending or deflecting? >> They're synonymous. >> E- Either one, defending or deflecting. That's a natural tendency to do. That's why it's on your shirt because it's natural for you to criticize what I just did and me want to protect my ego. But when we can learn to put our ego aside and say my friend right here is actually giving me a gift because he cares enough about me to tell me something that I could do to get better. Like that's an invitation to greatness. So as soon as you can I want you to have an ego, but if you can temporarily set it aside and look at a teammate that is holding you accountable as them giving you a gift, I mean, if someone handed you a physical gift right now, it doesn't matter I mean it could be a chain, a watch, an iPhone, it doesn't matter. Most people are not going to turn away a gift. You're like, "Thank you, dude. I appreciate that." But when someone's giving you some feedback on how you can actually get better, it's the same thing. That's a gift. And for many of you that have the ability to play at the next level, like that's a way more lucrative gift than someone giving you a chain or an iPhone. If you're telling me something that's going to put me in the upper 1% of players in this country in my position, so then I can go on and make a whole lot of money playing the game I love, why would you ever turn that away? So, learn how to be open to feedback. And that's where humility comes in. The best players in the world, the best athletes in the world know how to blend confidence with humility. They earn the right to be confident by putting in the reps during the unseen hours, but they always remain humble. And in this case, humility means I am always going to stay open to being coached. I am always going to stay open to feedback. But most importantly, humility means no matter how good I get, I know I can still get better. See, that's the other danger of the comparison game. If the comparison game is hot I'm higher on the depth chart than you, so I'm better than you, so I'm good to go. That's a very that's a that's a that's a that's a weak mindset. The mindset needs to be I'm number one on the depth chart. I need to do everything to protect that, but I'm still not as good as I'm capable of being and I'm definitely not good enough to play on Sundays yet, so I still have work to do. And that's humility. And I tell you what, any of you that can blend confidence with humility to that degree, I mean sky's the limit. There's nothing that can stop you. So, be open to to hearing what your teammates have to say. But it's also enough about knowing personalities and knowing that I might have to talk to him in a slightly different way than I talk to him because they have different personalities. And you have to be chameleon-like enough as a communicator to speak the language of the person that's receiving your feedback. So, it's not how you want to say it, it's how they'll best receive it. And and that's what makes football so hard. I mean, I spent my life in basketball. You had 15 guys that you needed to get to know, couple managers and a few assistants. I mean, you guys got a lot more people that you got to get That means you guys need to get to know I mean, look around the room, including coaches and support staff. I mean, there's over 100 people that you should get to know on a personal level enough to know how can I best communicate with this person. And that's not easy. But greatness isn't easy. Winning championships isn't easy. No one said it was going to be easy, nor should it be. These are great questions, guys. >> Watching these three athletes practice, what would you say are common denominators? What are the three things that you actually practice in? >> He said, what are the common denominators or common traits of them in practice? Um First is a respect and appreciation for the fundamentals and the basics. There was never an aspect of practice that they thought this is beneath me. I don't need to do this. You know, again, I'm a basketball guy, so if this sounds stupid, but at least from watching football, for the most part, football comes down to blocking and tackling and throwing and catching on some level. So, like if you guys are doing basic drills that improve those skill sets, don't look at those as a waste of time or I'm just going to go through the motions or I'm just going to be casual. No, those are the building blocks of what it takes to be an elite football player. So, they have a respect for those fundamentals. The second is they approach everything with the same mentality. See, if you approach practice one way and then you approach a game a different way, then you're deciding when to be excellent. And I already told you that switch has to be on all of the time. That can't be something that you negotiate. You know, you need to approach every drill in practice as if it's a two-minute drill in the fourth quarter of a game against Kansas State. Like you have to approach it that way. And when you can learn to have the attention to detail and the focus and the effort in a practice when no one is watching, then you're on your way to to being elite. And last thing I'd say is the great players actually loved practice because that was their playground. That was their laboratory to get better at their craft. And they would say, "Man, there is no place I'd rather be than in the gym working on my handle or working on my shot because this is the game that I love. And I know that if I commit to doing this right now, then when the ball goes up and the cheerleaders start dancing, I get to show everyone all of the work that I put in behind the scenes." So, they looked at practice as almost a better opportunity than games. And that's really, really, really hard to do. Thank you. Great question. >> How has your perspective changed now observing and speaking to organizations and teams in comparison to how you would have thought about a lot of this stuff when you were coach? >> A good portion of my perspective on life and almost every single thing I just shared with you guys, I did the exact opposite of when I was your age. Cuz you guys are what? 18 to 22 years old? Yeah, I'm 50 years old. When I was your age, I was an absolute knucklehead. I thought I had all the And I wasn't anywhere close to being the athlete that that you guys were. But I thought I had the answers. I thought I knew better. You know, you guys have shirts on that say no BCD? When I was your age, I was the king of BC ending. Like that was Anytime something didn't go my way, it wasn't my fault. It was the coach's fault. He doesn't like me. It was your fault. You messed that up. So, I I struggled a lot with that. So, a lot of this I've just learned cuz I've done it the other way and I've learned that it doesn't work. And it's not very fulfilling. And I didn't achieve or perform at a very high level. But it took some life experience and some maturity to get to the point to be able to say, "All right, the way I've been doing it ain't working. So, let's do something different." You know, I I I'm a believer in the basics and simplicity. For you guys still taking notes, write this down. Here is Here is my sure fire guaranteed recipe for being successful in any area of your life. I'm about to blow your minds. You're going to all get your money I don't know what you paid for these tickets. You're about to get your money's worth. You guys ready? Do more of what works. >> [snorts] >> Do less of what doesn't. That's it. If I had a mic, I would drop it right now. I just gave you guys the key to life. Do more of what works, do less of what doesn't. Now, there's obviously some nuance in that. The nuance is you have to be self-aware enough and observant enough to pay attention to what is working and double down on that and do more of it. But you also have to have the humility and the awareness to find out what's not working and start to do less of it. But if you can constantly course correct, and I think that you should be recalibrating your lives every single day and figure out, you know, that that could even be something that you do at night before you go to bed. Like, what worked well for me today and how can I do more of that? What didn't work well? How can I do less of that? And start tweaking those dials. And then you'll start to really hone in on creating a blueprint and a recipe for being unbelievably successful. But you can only do that if you have humility, self-awareness, if you're paying attention. I mean, that's I know this is going to sound very motivational speakery and it's going to sound kind of lame and corny, but that's all right. I'm kind of lame and corny. Every single night before you go to bed, you should say the following to yourself. I just traded 24 hours of my life for the progress I made today. Am I cool with that trade? Ask yourself that. Cuz you'll never get that day back. That day is gone. It's over. In the history of the world, you will never have that day again. So, ask yourself, am I cool with trading a piece of my life for what the progress I made today? Am I good with that? And if the answer's yes, then I hope you sleep really soundly that night. If the answer's no, then I hope at least you pull a lesson from that and don't make the same mistake tomorrow. But be grateful, hey, I got another crack at this thing tomorrow. You can even break that down to a practice at the end of practice. I just traded however long practices are, two or three hours of my life for what I got out of practice today. Was that a good trade for me? And the more of you that can say yes, the more consistently, again, the only byproduct of that is winning, which is what everyone else wants. We don't focus on winning, we focus on the process. But when you adhere to the process and you execute with excellence and precision, the winning takes care of itself. >> [snorts] >> And you have to believe that and you have to trust in that. >> Thank you again, Alan. We really appreciate it. >> Thank you, coach. [applause] Appreciate it, guys. Thank you. Good sir. >> Thank you. >> That's fine. That's something to think about. [music] >> Thank you. >> [music]