Performance Enhancing
March 11, 2008 02:51 PM | General
March 11, 2008
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Ten years ago the average college football fan would have been hard-pressed to name their favorite team’s strength and conditioning coach. Today that’s certainly not the case.
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| New strength and conditioning coach Mike Joseph explains an excerise to a player during winter workouts last week.
All-Pro Photogrpahy/Dale Sparks |
Whether because of self-promotion or through legitimate performance on the playing field, strength and conditioning coordinators around the country are now being second-guessed just as much as the coaches up in the box calling the plays.
If a team blows a couple of games in the fourth quarter then it’s because the strength coach doesn’t have his guys in shape. See a bunch of players wrapped up on the sidelines with pulled hamstrings then it’s because the strength coach isn’t working hard enough on flexibility.
Can’t make a fourth and one at the 30 then it’s because the guys up front aren’t strong enough.
West Virginia’s new strength and conditioning coach Mike Joseph is well aware of the fact that he is replacing a guy in Mike Barwis that has been looked upon favorably in a profession that lately is growing in prominence.
“I think our field has progressed to the point where it is more of a high-profile position. There is more importance put on it,” said Joseph. “Before when a lot of my mentors started it was basically an extra position on the football staff that kind of went out and trained the guys. They were football coach/strength coaches. It wasn’t a specialized field.
“In the last 10 years I think the field has become a lot more in-depth, there are a lot more certifications, and a lot more emphasis placed on it because athletic departments and coaches see the importance you get out of training athletes properly,” Joseph said.
Joseph, a former football player at Fairmont State, has learned from some of the best in the business starting with Al Johnson at West Virginia. From there he went to work with Dave Lawson at Eastern Michigan before spending the last four years at Notre Dame working with Mickey Marotti and Ruben Mendoza. Marotti now heads up the strength and conditioning program at the University of Florida.
“The weight component is probably the easiest thing. Anybody can make anyone stronger,” Joseph said. “The idea that you can make someone faster, more athletic, more flexible, more injury resilient, more powerful and more explosive … all of that encompasses the total package. I’ve learned a little bit from everybody I’ve worked with and I’ve also taken things that I didn’t agree with and added some of my own things.”
Today strength and conditioning coaches aren’t just lifting coaches, spotting guys on the bench press and getting them pumped up for big lifts. Now they must also serve the role of psychologist, nutritionist, mentor, tutor and motivator.
“Science is science and everyone has to have the base knowledge,” Joseph said. “Obviously some people are more knowledgeable than others but great strength coaches are great coaches in general – they understand how to motivate that kid who doesn’t want to do a certain thing.
“Everybody can take great work-ethic kids and they’ll do whatever you want no matter what. Kids that have to do things they don’t really want to do all of the time you have to motivate them and make it so they can see the end point to reaching their goals,” Joseph said.
Perhaps the most important aspect of the strength and conditioning coach is the fact that they have access to their athletes virtually 365 days a year. The other 10 coaches on the football staff are limited in the amount of time they can spend with the players during the course of the year. Joseph believes strength and conditioning is more about performing on the field than it is running a low forty time or benching 225 pounds 40 times.
“If it’s not making you a better athlete than the weight training program is detrimental,” Joseph said. “For football things are geared toward speed, explosion, power that we can translate onto the field.”
The players have already noticed one small difference between the coaching styles of Joseph and Barwis. Joseph takes a much more technical approach to each lift.
“If you talk to any of the guys on the team they will say everything has to be done the right way,” Joseph said. “One reason is for their safety. If kids get injured in the weight room then there is something wrong because we’re taking them away from the field.
“All of these guys coming in are fast but we want to increase that and make them even more efficient and not decrease their speed over time as we add more weight and more strength,” Joseph said.
By and large, Joseph says the current players on the team have been receptive to his training program. He believes that will continue to evolve as they become more accustomed with his way of doing things.
“Overall the players have done well. It’s been a pretty good transition. No matter what – it doesn’t matter who comes in or who leaves some kids aren’t going to be happy with everything,” Joseph said. “They have worked their butts off and across the board the entire team is full of great athletes.
“The guys have a great athletic base. The most important thing is that the kids realize that Mike Barwis has a certain coaching style and I have my coaching style,” Joseph said. “I am very direct with them. I will never show false enthusiasm toward them. I am who I am.”
Because West Virginia operates unique offensive and defensive systems, Joseph says the team’s physical training is probably a little different than a team like Wisconsin that is geared more toward power football. And because different positions require different skill sets their exercises are also adjusted accordingly.
“Weight room is weight room. To say you have specific lifts for a specific offense is absurd. Everything we’re doing is going to enhance what we do on the field. You take a school like Michigan … 10 years ago their linemen were geared toward size and pushing people off the ball,” Joseph said. “Our linemen are geared toward a fast-paced game running up and down the field. They have to be in great shape. I’m not saying they can’t be big, explosive and powerful but they have to be able to run and move.”
In the same light, quarterbacks aren’t being asked to perform the same exercises the offensive linemen are doing.
“Each position is geared toward their skill sets. Quarterbacks aren’t doing anything explosive over their heads that could cause any problems with their shoulders,” Joseph explained. “DBs aren’t going to do the same amount of weight that linemen do.”
After an initial evaluation at the conclusion of winter conditioning Joseph says he will sit down with each position coach at the end of spring practice to develop specific summer conditioning plans for each player based on that player’s physical needs.
“After spring we’ll have a good measurement of what we need out of our guys,” he said. “There may be a handful of guys that need to get leaner or another group of guys that might need more hip work or more core work. Then we will gear our program toward each specific need of that individual.”
Perhaps the best way of evaluating the performance of West Virginia’s strength and conditioning program is by simply not having to evaluate them at all.
“If you don’t hear from me, the coaches are happy and we’re successful on the field then I’m obviously doing my job,” Joseph said. “If you start seeing a lot of injuries, if you see a lack of conditioning - a lack of speed - then it’s going to come back on me and I will fully accept the blame.
“Again, I’m not the one putting in the work in terms of the sweat, doing the runs and the lifts … yes, I am doing the program but these kids are the ones coming in here everyday doing the work.”
