Setting rules and then dismissing anybody who doesn’t follow them is not the way to establish discipline in a football program. Anybody could do that. It’s easy. The tough challenge is taking players who lack discipline and finding a way to get them to change their behaviors.
The summer conditioning program plays a big part in instilling discipline and things seem to be going well on that front.
“What showed me we’re changing is the amount of guys I’ve had to punish at 5 a.m.,” Kansas strength and conditioning coach Je’Ney Jackson said Friday. “Like today, I didn’t have anyone. Let’s say we have 100 guys. There will be eight different times per week they have to be somewhere on time for me. So that’s 800 different opportunities for them to miss one of those times. I bet we’ve had six all summer. Six! When I first (returned to Kansas), that first spring, we might have six per week. I went 55 days in a row where I punished guys at 5 a.m. Fifty-five days in a row!”
Tardiness or absence from a class, a tutoring session and a workout are examples of transgressions that could earn a player an early alarm clock setting.
“Coaches are holding them more accountable and they don’t want to come in here and get crushed at 5 a.m.,” Jackson said. “What coach (David) Beaty is doing, it’s working. It really is working.”
All program reversals start with instilling discipline. It’s a first step that must be followed by many, many more, such as improved recruiting, smart game-planning and in-game adjustments.
