Anyone can be negative. It requires very little effort or intelligence. For some, it just comes naturally.
(Gee, I wonder if that statement is directed at Rampage or at his critics?)
Here’s something else to consider; Quinton “Rampage” Jackson is only coaching (if you can call it that) because no doubt, it was a requirement of his contract. That was his first mistake.
To be a good coach, first and foremost, you must be driven to help others. Your motivation must come from seeing others succeed. You are a “people person” who is a combination of being a great listener and being someone who genuinely cares about and is interested in helping others.
Whether you are selling a product, an idea, or even yourself; you must always prioritize the needs of the person that you are dealing with in order to make that other person feel more comfortable with you. It is important that they feel comfortable with you so that they can trust you.
As a coach, you can have all of the technical knowledge in the world about martial arts, but if you are not able to communicate effectively, than all of your knowledge and expertise will be lost.
Rampage is a great fighter, but what is becoming painfully obvious, is that he is not a great communicator.
Albert Einstein once said, “if you can’t explain it simply, than you don’t understand it well enough.”
Patience, respect and understanding are the keys to success when communicating and instructing inexperienced fighters. Screaming until you are blue in the face (or ignoring them completely) accomplishes nothing.
All people are significantly influenced by positive behaviour.
I’m not discounting the valuable and necessary benefits of experience and training when it comes to teaching martial arts. My only point is that those skills are not as important to me as the ability to communicate in a way that raises a person’s confidence and self-esteem.
A fighter that feels good about himself will always produce good results—regardless of the game plan.
So then, what makes a great coach? Is it his ability to build friendly rapport with his fighters? Or is it his ability to motivate his fighters and make them feel great about themselves?
In my experience, anyone can learn the technical side of a sport. Teaching another person to care about and take an interest in helping another person is much more difficult. For some, it is impossible.
I personally blame the UFC for putting Rampage is this position to begin with. It certainly isn’t making him look very good in the eyes of the fans. I just hope that they can all see that it’s not his fault. He just shouldn’t even be there in the first place.
James great piece. I pretty much stated the same thing plus Rampage is GREAT for RATINGS due to his personality more so than his actualy coaching ability.
I was reading this and waiting for you to relate it to Lou Holtz since it is a coaching article LOL.
LOL
Next time!
Glad you liked it! Thanks
well written and thought out piece, nice work James!
Rampage definitely isn't cut out for coaching. He's legendary for having a lax attitude during his own training camps, so why would he suddenly turn into Greg Jackson when he's coaching others?
You're absolutely correct that he shouldn't have been put in this position. But Rampage wanted it just as much as the UFC did, because it's a chance to advance his personal brand. That seems to be all he cares about, and it's working. He's very charismatic and it shows. The problem is that he's coming off badly, but I don't know if that will affect his brand.
I disagree that its the UFC's fault that Rampage is the way he is on the show. They put him on the show because he's one of the most charismatic fighters in the organization and has a natural rivalry against Rashad Evans.
Rampage chose TUF over fighting Machida for the belt so ultimately its on him. He's a sore loser and a bad coach. Squaring off against a patient and stacked “Greg Jackson” team certainly isn't helping him.
As always theres some selective editing that probably makes Rampage look worse than he really is but come on. He's a professional fighter thats been doing this for years. He's had great trainers over the course of his career so one would think that he had picked something up.
Being a top fighter and having great trainers does not mean that you can trasition to coaching.
Not everyone who can put something into practice can explain and break down what they are doing and why. The oppisite is true as well, some guys can explain and break things down but can not perform.
I liked what you had to say, “To be a good coach, first and foremost, you must be driven to help others. Your motivation must come from seeing others succeed. You are a “people person” who is a combination of being a great listener and being someone who genuinely cares about and is interested in helping others.
Whether you are selling a product, an idea, or even yourself; you must always prioritize the needs of the person that you are dealing with in order to make that other person feel more comfortable with you. It is important that they feel comfortable with you so that they can trust you.”
Excellent points on why Jackson fails as a coach. Rampage is a self-centered egotistical prick from what we've seen so far. He's not the type to go out of his way to help others, he's not terribly motivated to see others succeed, he is a people person but not the right kind of people person — he's more about making fun of peole and picking on people than helping others. He genuinely doesn't seem to care, yet he takes it personally whenever his team loses. He shows up late for fights, ignores his fighters and does all the right things to destroy the trust of his fighters. Team Rampage knows one thing for certain: They can't count on Rampage for jack squat! How depressing would that be?
Thanks Pickle.
I used to think that Jackson was just an awful coach.
But after watching him on the TUF show, I can see that he is an awful human being as well. (Note to Jackson: no one respects a bully)
[...] eagerly agreed and in specific preparation for this fight, Jackson appeared for a second time as a coach on the reality series The Ultimate Fighter opposite Evans (epic fail). Both men were initially scheduled to fight at UFC 107, but this bout [...]
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