How to Be Like Mike

Read anything good lately?

I have. I’m reading Allegiant now, the third book in the Divergent trilogy, and if you haven’t read them yet, I suggest highly that you take your rump to a bookstore today and buy all three because they rock. But then again, I am an English teacher. And you’re a tennis player, so a dystopian text about a girl and a guy who fight for survival throughout the novel may or may not “float your boat,” if you will. BUT, let’s talk some more about books.

Books are inspiring. So are blogs. Maybe that’s why you are reading mine—you want to be inspired. I can provide that, but there is so much more in the world that can inspire you, and a lot of professional tennis players have written books that can make a world of difference in your outlook on tennis. Because, who are we kidding, if we all weren’t crazy coo-coo birds, we’d all be professional tennis players by now, right?

Obviously, you’re thinking, now, she’s going to tell me all the tennis players that have published books—Open by Andre Agassi, which is shockingly both sad and disturbing, so I don’t always suggest it, Winning Ugly by Brad Gilbert, which is a personal favorite, yada yada, but actually, I’m here to suggest, and to talk about, a book that I’ve just recently discovered, called How to Be Like Mike, which is about Michael Jordan. Yes, the basketball player. Because, at the end of the day, tennis isn’t like basketball, but, the mentality of an athlete is the same, whether it be basketball, tennis, cricket, golf, football, or hockey.

I like the concepts in this book already: how influences make a difference in athletics, or the concept that people do what people see, which makes who is your leader and who is your role model and coach important (Seminole High Performance, by the way, has the most passionate staff—we care about tennis, and nothing else. There are a lot of coaches out there that are in coaching for the wrong reasons—sometimes a means to an end, sometimes something as silly as outperforming others. But at the end of the day, what matters is who truly cares about tennis, and about kids. I know that I could write a novel about how much I care about kids, and how much I am devoted to the art of education and learning, how much of a nerd I am, and how much I adore the two things I teach, tennis and English. I could write a second and third novel about our other coaches that I work with, and it’ll be all this gushy stuff about how much of a role model they are to ME as a coach and how much I can see, day in and day out, that they truly care not only about winning but about making a good person, first and foremost, out of the player that is on the court. Whew, that was a bit of a digression...).

Other concepts in this book that I like include a chapter on leadership, which starts off with “Good leadership does not just attract followers. It produces more leaders.” As much as I can drone on about these subjects, which I plan on unpacking as I work through these concepts myself in future blogs, I suggest that you also pick up this book and see what it can do to you. A writer is always going to have their own opinions, their own style. You may like my style, but you may also really jive with the style of this author—my job, and the end of the day, is to inspire, even if that means that you pick up another author.