My son’s football team played a very uninspired game last week. A few kids that I had coached in club football came up to me after the game to say they could hear my voice from the stands louder than their coach on the sideline.

As we talked, they told me they were so scared to get an unsportsmanlike penalty, they we playing really timid. I told them I was 99% sure their coach would much rather take a 15 yard penalty every once in a while rather than having to watch the totally lazy effort they gave. Then I told them I would talk to the coach and volunteer to do any running they had to do if they got in trouble for a 15 yard penalty.

In the BYU game, I was happy to see they were as engaged as they were in the game and felt like some of those penalties actually gave them more momentum.