John U. Bacon

The summer before Mac McKenzie became our little league baseball coach, I spent the season picking dandelions in right field, and batting last. But just weeks after Coach Mac took over, I rose to starting catcher, lead-off hitter, and team captain. Trust me, I was no bigger, faster or stronger than I was the previous season. But I had one thing I didn’t have the year before: confidence. Instead of playing back on my heels, I was up on my toes, and swinging for the fences.

I’m sure Coach Mac’s influence planted my desire to become a coach myself – and later, a teacher, too.

Last summer, when I wrote about Coach Mac, I admitted I had no idea where he ended up after his family moved to California the next year, or even if he was still alive. Well, a couple days later, I got a thank you letter from Coach Mac himself.

Just getting it thrilled me, but his message was even better. It was direct, honest and funny – just like the man himself. He told me about his family, about moving to Scottsdale, about his two bypass surgeries. In 1990, he received a heart transplant. He said he’d read my books and had every intention of writing years ago, but never followed through. But that day, when his wife found my story on line, this is what he wrote:

“I was blown away to see my name and the wonderful things that you had to say about me and my influence on you. I have had a very good and successful life with a few plaques, awards and complimentary speeches given to me, but none compare to what you said and how you have honored me. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

I don’t know if Coach Mac got choked up writing it, but I got choked up reading it. I promised him I’d write him a longer letter soon, and fully intended to. But my fall filled up with travel and speeches, deadlines and classes. I kept waiting to find enough time to write The Perfect Letter – and kept waiting. I wrote down Coach Mac’s name on my to-do list month after month.

Three nights ago, I was teaching my sports writing students at Northwestern University how to write a profile. I told them their subject doesn’t have to be famous. It could even be one of their former coaches. Then I spontaneously launched into my story of Coach Mac, right down to the sweat dripping off the tip of his nose while he smashed grounder after grounder during practice. I couldn’t resist telling my students how great it was to hear from Coach Mac – which provided just another reminder I still needed to write him. I scribbled his name down yet again.

I got my final reminder the very next day, when I received an email from a friend of Coach Mac’s I’d never met before. His message was as simple and direct as Coach Mac himself. “We lost Mac yesterday.”

This hit me harder than I expected. After all, I couldn’t have believed he’d live forever. I felt grateful I’d written the story about him – and even more fortunate that Coach Mac had read it, and responded.

But when I went back to read our correspondence, I was chagrined to realize I had never written him the longer letter I’d promised. I felt worse when I saw he lived in Scottsdale. A couple months after he sent me his first letter, I was invited to give a speech in Scottsdale – and if I had kept in better touch, I would have put it together, and Coach Mac and I would have gone out for a beer I would never have forgotten.

Still, we can’t do everything. I realize that. And I’m lucky. I know that, too.

After I drove back to Ann Arbor that night, about game time, I swung by Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School, where Coach Mac smacked all those grounders years ago. I was surprised to find the ball field has been replaced by a garden, with a shed in the middle of it. But when I crouched down into my old position, where home plate used to be, I could see it all – right down to Coach Mac, sweat dripping off his nose, tapping me another bunt to throw to first base.

Thanks, Coach. Sorry it took me so long to write.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

When you’re 68, working in a young man’s game, announcing your retirement is not a surprise. But Detroit Tigers manager Jim Leyland has a few underappreciated qualities that are worth remembering.

Jim Leyland was a baseball man to the core. Raised in Perrysburg, Ohio, the son of a glassworker, he grew up wanting to do one thing: Play baseball.

He was good, very good, so the Tigers signed him up to play catcher in their minor league system. But just to get to the majors, you need to be great – and after seven years battling to get to the big leagues, Leyland realized he wasn’t great. Not as a player, at least.

So he decided to become a manager, and worked his way up from Detroit’s lowest minor league team to its highest. That climb took him from Bristol, Virginia, to Clinton, Iowa, to Montgomery, Alabama, then Lakeland, Florida, and finally Evansville, Indiana – Detroit’s top farm club.

He polished promising young prospects like Lance Parrish, Kirk Gibson, Lou Whitaker and Alan Trammel into bona fide major leaguers.

They all made it to Detroit, but they left their coach behind. When the Tigers should have hired the man who built that team, they gave the job instead to Sparky Anderson. Okay, so Anderson had already won two World Series with the vaunted Cincinnati Reds. But even as a kid, I thought they got the wrong guy.

Leyland didn’t whine about it. He kept working, until he got to be a big league manager six years later for the Pittsburgh Pirates. They won three straight division titles before the owners conducted a “fire sale,” selling off the all-stars Leyland had helped develop. Leyland could never understand it when somebody didn’t care as much about the game as he did.

In 1997, he took over the Florida Marlins, owned by Blockbuster Video tycoon Wayne Huizenga, and promptly led them to their first World Series title. But the next year, Huizenga held his own fire sale, dismantling a title team. Leyland took a rare shot, telling the press he thought his job was to win championships, but that’s apparently not what his boss wanted.

In 2006, 27 years after the Tigers’ passed him up for their top post, they named Leyland Detroit’s manager. He took the long-dormant franchise to its first American League pennant in 22 years.  Under Leyland, the Tigers won four division titles and two pennants. Not bad.

But Leyland has plenty of critics. Since the computerized approach to managing – made famous in the book and movie, “Moneyball” – took over the game a decade ago, fans expect managers to make decisions by the book, not by their guts. When Leyland makes all-star hitters bunt with men in scoring position, or pulls great starting pitchers for weak relievers, the fans howl, and not without reason.

But I can’t help but notice Leyland’s teams always won. Everywhere. In the minors, in the majors, in the National League, and in the American League – at every level, in eight different states, and five decades.

Perhaps coaching is about more than just computing. A major league baseball team spends almost every day together for eight months a year. They see each other more than they see their wives and kids.

Players aren’t robots, either. To get almost all his players to play their best when they’re playing for him, Leyland did something computers can’t, something we don’t see during games. He must be a hell of a guy, and a great leader, too. He cares about the game – sometimes more than the millionaires who play it – and he cares about them, too.

My dad, who served three years in the Army, told me he likes Leyland because he stands by his troops, and never chews them out in public.

Yes, that’s old school – but that was Leyland. And it worked.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

I loved baseball from the start – but it didn’t love me.

When I started in tee ball, I was so short that if the catcher put the tallest tee on the far corner of the plate, I couldn’t reach it. Yes, I struck out – in tee ball.

Our first year of live pitching didn’t go any better. One game we were beating the other team so badly, we were about to trigger the “Mercy Rule,” and end the game. Coach Van pulled me in from my post in right field – where I kept company with the dandelions – and told me to pitch. I wasn’t a pitcher – I wanted to be a catcher, like Bill Freehan – but I’m thinking, “This is my chance.” I walked three batters, but miraculously got three outs before they scored any runs. We won – and I figured that was my stepping stone to greater things.

I was surprised my dad wasn’t as happy as I was. He knew better – but he didn’t tell me until years later: Coach Van was not putting me in at pitcher to finish the game. He was putting me in to get shelled, so the game would keep going. He was putting me in to fail.

The next game, I went back to right field, and the dandelions, never to return to the infield the rest of the season. But when Coach Van and his family moved, our assistant coach, Mack MacKenzie, became our head coach – and my world changed almost overnight.

Coach Mack wore a baseball cap on his big, square head, with his big, square glasses. He looked tough, with a permanent squint and the underbite of a bulldog. When he was smashing ground ball after ground ball, sweat dripped off his pointy nose. He occasionally swore, which was novel then, and we thought that was pretty cool.

But he thought I was feisty, and funny. I could tell he wanted me to do well, and that he believed I would. The effect was immediate, dramatic, and lifelong.

From the very first practice under Coach Mack, I started smacking the ball, as if I’d been waiting years to do it – which I had been. Our first game that season, he started me at catcher, and had me batting lead off. I got two hits – the first of my life – and my teammates voted me captain.

I was on fire for baseball, playing some form of it every chance I had, whether it was “Pickle,” “500” or home run derby. Didn’t matter. I wanted to play.

One Saturday morning, practice was rained out. But, this being Michigan, a little while later the sun came out, so I biked down to the schoolyard to check it out. There were a few puddles here and there, but the biggest one was behind the plate, where I would be, and it didn’t look that bad to me.

I rushed home and called Coach Mack. He told me if I made the phone calls, we’d have practice. I convinced enough of my teammates to come down to convince Coach Mack to come down, too – and we practiced.

After he’d hit ground balls to third, shortstop, second and first, I’d say, “C’mon, Coach Mack – gimme one!” Meaning, roll the ball out, for me to scoop up and throw to first.

“You wanna bunt, do ya?”

“C’mon, Coach Mack! You know I do!”

“There you go,” he’d say, and he rolled one out just for me.

The next year I became a better hockey player, too, and I don’t need to tell you the central role sports have played in my life. But that’s where it started.

I’ve always been too dependent on my teachers, coaches and bosses. When they don’t believe in me, I don’t go very far, but when they do, I’m capable of – well, more. And sometimes, much more. I’m sure this is why I’ve always attracted to coaching and teaching, too. I know how much difference it can make to have someone believe in you.

A couple years later, the MacKenzie’s moved to California. I have no idea where they are now. I don’t even know if Coach Mack is still with us. But he’s still with me.

“C’mon, Coach Mack! Gimme one.”

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football” – both national bestsellers. His upcoming book, “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” will be published by Simon & Schuster in September 2013. You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

Just a few hours after Michigan State beat Notre Dame with a gutsy fake field goal in overtime, Spartan head coach Mark Dantonio suffered a heart attack.

Granted, Dantonio is probably wired a little tighter than most. If you see a picture of him laughing, the photo was probably taken with a quick-reflex camera. But the fact is, every college coach is wired tight – simply because they have to be.

Anyone who’s coached their kids’ soccer team knows how nerve-wracking even that can be. But for my money nothing beats college football for pure, mind-frying stress.

First, you’ve got to schmooze a few hundred teenagers, their families and their coaches, in the hopes that a couple dozen of them might come to your school. Then you have to persuade them to go to class, to study, to stay out of the bars and off drugs – and then go out on Saturday and beat the hell out of the guy across the line, or else the first four virtues won’t save your job.

And your players, of course, have got problems of their own. Just take the offensive line, for example. The first guy’s worried about getting benched, the next guy’s worried about playing in the pros, the guy next to him is worried about flunking out, and the guy next to him is worried his girlfriend might be pregnant.

Meanwhile, the coach is worried they might jump offside or miss their blocks. If they do, they’ll jeopardize the efforts of the skinny 19-year-old kid behind them, who’s supposed to kick a pointy ball some 40 yards over gargantuan defenders, straight between two posts 18.5 feet wide – all into a 20 mile-per-hour cross wind, with 80,000 drunken fans yelling at him to miss it.

If any of these guys screw up, the coach will lose his job and have to move his family. So will his assistants. And so will the coaches of the school’s two dozen other sports, who depend on football revenues to fund their programs and salaries, too.

No wonder they go crazy. Years before Woody Hayes ended his career by punching a Clemson player on the sideline, on more than one occasion, during practice, he became so angry that he punched himself – in the face.

Hayes’s most famous protégé, Bo Schembechler, suffered his first heart attack at age 40, right before his first Rose Bowl. He had another heart attack and two open-heart surgeries before he retired – at age 60. Even his critics had to concede, the man gave his all for Michigan.

Dantonio’s colleague, Spartan basketball coach Tom Izzo, told me, “When I’m coaching, I feel guilty that I’m not recruiting. When I’m recruiting, I feel guilty that I’m not coaching. And when I’m coaching or recruiting, I feel guilty that I’m not spending more time with my family. You can’t win.”

Yes, today’s big-time coaches make big-time money. In 1969, Schembechler came to Michigan for a grand total of 21,000 dollars. Those aren’t even digits in coaches’ contracts today, which now have periods, not commas.

But with bigger money comes bigger pressure. When Michigan builds a $226 million addition to its stadium, they have to pay for it – and you can’t pay for it without winning games. And if you don’t win games, you get ripped every day on cable TV, talk radio and the internet, not to mention good old-fashioned newspapers – usually by people who criticize you for not meeting standards of excellence they could never achieve themselves. And, your kids will get insulted in school – by their teachers.

Yes, the money’s better. But having seen college coaches up close, I can tell you this: I wouldn’t take it. And if you saw the price they pay, you might not, either.

So, Coach Dantonio: Get well soon. Your job will be waiting for you.

About the author: John U. Bacon lives in Ann Arbor and has written for Time, the New York Times, and ESPN Magazine, among others. His most recent book is “Bo’s Lasting Lessons,” a New York Times and Wall Street Journal business bestseller. Bacon teaches at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio; Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism; and the University of Michigan, where the students awarded him the Golden Apple Award for 2009. This commentary originally aired on Michigan Radio.

John U. Bacon

The surprising United States Olympic men’s hockey team will play Finland today in the semi-finals, inspiring some to compare them to the last U.S. men’s team to win the gold 30 years ago, Lake Placid’s “Miracle on Ice.” Sorry, even if the U.S. wins it all, it will not qualify as a miracle. We are not likely to see anything quite like it again. And there will never be another coach like Herb Brooks.

I will never forget the impact the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team had on our country – or the impact the coach, Herb Brooks, had on me.

On Dec. 13, 1979, my best friend was heading home from hockey practice up north, when he was killed in a car accident. I found out the next morning, seconds before my Huron High School hockey teammates and I walked out onto the basketball court for our first pep rally. What started out as one of the happiest days of my life, had suddenly become the saddest.

I didn’t come out of it for months. But when the 1980 Olympic hockey tournament started, I watched every second of every game – I was transfixed by this team and their coach –  and that’s what brought me back.

Fifteen years later, as a sports reporter for The Detroit News, I decided to write a story about Mike Ramsey and Slava Fetisov, who were bitter rivals in Lake Placid Games, before becoming great friends playing together with the Red Wings. To round out the piece I knew I had to call Herb Brooks, who was famously impatient with sports writers.

When I reached Brooks at his home in Minnesota, he spent the first ten minutes chewing out my entire profession, from our lack of credentials to our lack of accountability, before he answered any of my questions. I stayed calm throughout, but after I hung up the phone, I looked down, and saw that my hands were shaking.

When the story came out, I sent Brooks a copy, then nervously called him a week later to get his response. I talked to his wife, Patty – a warm and generous soul – who told me, “Well, he didn’t throw it against the wall, like he usually does. So that’s a good sign.”

A year later, I called Brooks for a story on Russian hockey, and when that one came out, he asked if they could reprint it in a hockey magazine in Minnesota. After that, we talked every few months, and we would occasionally meet up in rinks from Ann Arbor to Nagano.

Our relationship deepened in 2000, when I took over my old high school hockey team, which had not won a game in a year-and-a-half. Making matters tougher, I was the worst player in school history. (I am not bragging. These are facts.)

But I had the best group of assistants in the state, plus a secret weapon: a world-class mentor in Herb Brooks. I stole from him shamelessly – and it worked.

In our second year, we got to the regional finals – but we had to face our Soviet Union, Trenton High School, which has won 12 state titles. Three weeks before the regional finals, they had smoked us, 10-1.

I knew we were better than that, but I also knew we needed a boost. So, the day before the game, I called Herb Brooks. He said, “Johnny, just tell ‘em this: Above all, you have to believe. If you don’t, you don’t have a chance. But if you do, anything is possible.”

I passed on Herb’s words to our players, who had heard me talk about Brooks many times. Our guys played like they were on fire, without any fear whatsoever, but we fell short, 3-2. Still, their fans gave our players a standing ovation. Back in the locker room, I told them, “We might have lost, but you did something more important: You dared to believe you could do it.”

The next year, Herb and I started working on his autobiography. But three months later, Herb died in a car accident.

The next season, my last in coaching, we traveled to Trenton and we beat them in their building, 4-3.

On the bus ride home I wanted to call Herb Brooks in the worst way, just to tell him: We believed.

About the author: John U. Bacon lives in Ann Arbor and has written for Time, the New York Times, and ESPN Magazine, among others. His most recent book is “Bo’s Lasting Lessons,” a New York Times and Wall Street Journal business bestseller. Bacon teaches at Miami of Ohio, Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, and the University of Michigan, where the students awarded him the Golden Apple Award for 2009. This commentary originally aired on Michigan Radio.

Julia Friedman, a member of the Sharks team coached by her sister Rebecca, scores a run. (Photo by Louise Chang.)

We were in the field and there was a runner on second. I yelled a reminder from the dugout that we could only get an out at first base. The batter hit a soft grounder right to my shortstop, who fielded it cleanly and made a perfect toss to the third baseman.

The two girls looked quite pleased with themselves. It would have been a textbook play – that is, if anyone had been running to third base. Despite our extensive discussions in practice of what makes a force play, some of the girls still seemed completely confused. I felt that no matter how much I tried, I was doing something wrong as the coach. I felt like I was in over my head and worried that I wouldn’t be able to help the girls. I began to wonder if I had made a mistake taking on a team as head coach.

My dad had been my sister’s Ann Arbor Rec & Ed softball coach since first grade and all I had asked was if I could help out occasionally. He instead offered me the head coach position and a group of 16 nine-year-old girls. Having absolutely no coaching experience, I thought the job sounded like fun and relatively little work. I accepted eagerly.

When it came time to start preparing for my first practice, I began to realize that it might not be as easy as I had anticipated.

Coach Rebecca Friedman with Katrina Sadis. (Photo by Wendy Binkley.)

It was five minutes to 7 p.m. and I was standing at Winchell Park going over again and again in my head the drills and stations I had planned for the Sharks’ first practice. How am I supposed to keep 16 fourth-grade girls focused for an hour and a half? What if they don’t like me? What if they ask questions I can’t answer? I knew my concerns were typical for a first-time coach, but this made me no less uneasy. I worked hard to appear as collected as possible for that first hour and a half and, to my surprise, got through it without any major train wrecks.

The girls seemed enthusiastic for the most part and generally listened without my having to grovel. I had learned my first lesson: If I acted as though I knew I was in charge, the girls would listen, but I needed to add a little more conviction to my normally soft voice. I felt guilty at first using anything other than a soothing tone, but I quickly learned they could handle something a little harsher. This proved to be at least somewhat effective, especially with the small blonde girl who seemed determined to convince me she could throw just as well sitting down as she could standing.

Coach Rebecca Friedman leads the Sharks in a stretching exercise. (Photo by Louise Chang.)

At 8:30 the girls packed up and headed towards their waiting parents. “Thanks, Coach!” a few of them called out. I guess that’s when it hit me that it was my team. I felt an immediate attachment to each of the girls.

As our first game approached, I encountered the wonderful behind-the-scenes coach’s responsibilities. First, I had to e-mail all the parents and let them know when and where to be for each game. I seemed to be constantly using that e-mail list throughout the season.

Making the lineup turned out to be much more time-consuming than I had anticipated. I had to balance the innings the girls were in the infield, outfield, or on the bench; I couldn’t have a girl “cheer” two innings in a row; and I couldn’t have anyone sit twice before another player sat once.

The Sharks weren't happy with their bland white T-shirts – they later decided to tie-dye them red and blue. (Photo by Wendy Binkley.)

I also had to accept that while putting the best players at the busier positions might win more games, it wasn’t exactly in the Rec & Ed spirit. When the jerseys arrived, I had to distribute them, doing the best I could to give each girl the size she ordered and a number she happy with. The girls weren’t too happy with the boring white jerseys we were assigned, so we decided to tie-dye them, making us the coolest looking team in the league.

When it was finally game time, the nerves that had subsided after that first practice returned. I saw flashes of my team being demolished every game, with angry girls and parents blaming me. It turned out I didn’t have to worry. The girls played far beyond my expectations, fielding balls I was sure would roll between their legs and catching throws I thought would fly beyond them.

I coached first base when my team was at bat, and gave each girl a high five when she got a hit. I loved their look of excitement when they realized they had done something well. We won that game 30-24. Yes, this is a softball score. Although I hadn’t done anything on the field, I felt a huge sense of accomplishment, with a lot of relief as well.

My nerves were gone after that and I enjoyed practically every minute of coaching. After the team won the next two games, I was feeling good about our undefeated record. It didn’t last. With half the team missing, we lost the next game. I took it harder than the girls. We won the next two but then set into a rough patch, losing three games in a row.

Katrina Sadis gets ready to run as Rebecca Friedman coaches from beside first base. (Photo by Louise Chang.)

I went into the last game as nervous as I had been for the first. We were playing the Cardinals, an intensely coached team that had lost only one game all season and had wiped us out the previous week. My girls were completely oblivious to the fact that, with five wins and four losses, our winning record was at stake. I tried to convince myself it really wasn’t all that important. But … I really wanted the win.

I tried to keep low expectations and just hoped that some of the lessons I had been drilling into the girls’ heads all season would stick. Maybe they would actually run through first base without staring at the balls they had just hit, or would catch the ball with their glove facing up instead of flopping it around upside down.

The game was close and nerve-wracking throughout. My girls were hitting well, executing plays we had gone over in practice, and, for the most part, throwing to bases where runners were actually headed. But the other team was doing the same. We went into the last inning tied. My girls scored four runs. However, at that age, four runs can disappear before you know it.

Their first batter hit a pop fly right to my second baseman. She held out her glove and the ball fell right in – and to my surprise, stayed there. One down, two to go. One batter got on base but we got two quick force outs to close them out. We had won. The girls started jumping and screaming with excitement. I had to force myself to act mature and not join in.

Isabella Binkley, left, claps after Samantha Restorick doused the coach with water at an end-of-the-season celebration at Dairy Queen. (Photo by Wendy Binkley.)

After the game I handed out participation trophies to each girl. Even though they still would have received them if we had lost each game, I loved how excited they got when they saw the box of shiny plastic statues.

After making the girls sit through an end-of-the-year speech, I decided to celebrate at Dairy Queen. Eating our ice cream, having staring contests, laughing together, and even having a cup of ice cold water poured over my head on DQ’s back benches is one of my favorite memories of the season.

It was the last time I would be surrounded by a sea of blue and red tie-dyed Sharks. I was sad that the season was at its end. I wanted a few more games to see how much more the girls could improve, and how much more I could show them. I made sure to give each girl a hug as she gave me her last high-pitched, “Thanks, Coach!”

A team photo of the Sharks. (Photo by Wendy Binkley.)

About the writer: Rebecca Friedman, an intern with The Ann Arbor Chronicle, will be a senior this fall at Huron High School.

• fame and glory
• cash money
• fruit confections
• fear of humiliation
• a brand new car

Plus, I’d like to thank Dawn on behalf of The Ann Arbor Chronicle for walking the course with me during her team’s race at the Priority Health Cycling Classic on Sept. 7 and providing much of the insight that went into The Chronicle’s write-up of that event.