How to help others and article on Alabama's Brock Bennett

Here is an article from the Tuscaloosa News on how to make a difference for those you parent, coach or mentor. It is a story of never giving up and working for a dream. click here. (I will also send out an email on how you can help those in Tuscaloosa affected by the recent storms).

In athletics we read and hear about athletes from many different backgrounds. My usual interest is how that athlete or coach achieved success. Not a great play, a fantastic game or remarkable career, but what made them. I want to know the back story. I like to know Paul Harvey’s “Rest of the story.” Here is an article to encourage you and maybe someone you work with to not give up. It’s a great “rest of the story.”

Brock Bennett is the starting catcher for the University of Alabama baseball team. He is also on the “Johnny Bench watch list” this year (as he was last year) as the top catcher in the nation.

Most of us come across individuals who make a profound impression by their sheer effort, attitude, and perseverance. It may even be by how that person can focus completely on a task or goal.

We get chances in our journey through life to come in contact with special people that are able to make an impact on how we look at things. It may be from one brief encounter. It may be from a relationship that goes back many years. It could come from watching someone from a distance. Whatever the case may be we can be impacted from a variety of angles and in assortment of ways.

I was privileged to coach Brock at Greater Atlanta Christian School in Norcross, Georgia as a part of our basketball program. He came from a very good family and was a polite and mature young man for his age. Although basketball was not his main sport he gave 100% when he was with our team. I left to come to Belhaven before his senior year of high school so I was able to coach him from the 9th grade thru the 11th grade.

Finding out that he made the baseball team at Alabama I was happy for him, but never imagined he would end up having this kind of career. My wife has kept up with Brock’s family and been to see him play numerous times over the last couple of years. With our basketball recruiting schedule in the spring there has usually been a conflict which has kept me from seeing him play.

My wife does a much better job of keeping up with other people especially former students. Brock’s fiancé’ is a former student of hers also from Atlanta so there is a lot of communication through Facebook, text messages, emails and phone calls. We look forward to seeing him play at the SEC tournament in a couple of weeks.

Brock has changed the way I look at athletes and young people because of how he has made himself a player. Maybe he is the 1 out of 50 that would make it, but he is still that one. “Never giving up” is quite a motto to have and to live by in my opinion.

I wish I would have taken more time to enjoy the “Brock’s” that came my way through the years of coaching and teaching. You never know what you might miss and who you might miss on as far as potential.

I know I’ve missed my fair share of “Brock Bennett’s” in my teaching and coaching career of over 20 years. I wanted more than anything to be the kind of coach that was there to have an arm around the kid when he struck out on those opportunities in life or missed the big shot. Most of us as coaches and teachers get into the profession for that reason.

Life can get in the way. Bill need to be paid. Kids need to be fed. Deadlines have to be met. Our employers have expectations. We sometimes make the wrong thing the first thing instead of making the most important thing the first thing. We put tasks over relationships instead of relationships over tasks. The goals we have set for ourselves get further and further away and sometimes the stress increases. Our comfort becomes more important than our purpose. Our meaningfulness gets lost in our business.

There is a Brock Bennett out there waiting to be coached or encouraged. Someone for your to say, “You can do it” or “Atta boy”. That kid is waiting to be told they are valuable and are worthy.

I see more young people today that are insecure and it makes them have that inner struggle more to be comfortable in their own skin. We all have someone that is waiting to be encouraged by us, somewhere, somehow. We need to take the time to support and believe in them like someone and somewhere believed in us.

It doesn’t mean they have to reach the exact goals they have set. They don’t have to be given everything they want in life, just because they ask. It doesn’t mean they are entitled to have certain things. What it does mean is that they are given a chance to believe and have someone believe in them.

Be that person that believes in others. It could be your own child, friend, or possibly other family member. Be the type of person who will believe the best in someone else and what they have to offer. We have enough people that don’t believe in others. We need more people to find and encourage the “Brock Bennett’s” in our world.

Give your kid or one you work a chance to succeed. Brock put the effort in and made himself stronger, faster and a better baseball player. No one told him to invest the time and get up early. No one made him lift the weights and have a special diet. He did that on his own because he knew the price that had to be paid. Like most I would not have thought what Brock has achieved was possible. With his size and with the stiff competition I would have thought the road would be too hard. What he had inside is something that can’t be measured.

In the profession of coaching and teaching you never know what can happen when you work with young people. Watching Brock has taught me to not doubt those with big hearts no matter the size on the outside.