As the season progresses, you want to see your players getting better. To that end, you should be measuring each player’s progress during football season, and sharing it with them. Here are the reasons why this is so important.
It will show your players that all of the hard work that they put in is worth it
Training — especially during the season — is hard. This can be extremely draining, and make a player not want to push himself — or worse, quit. By seeing that every sprint, power lift, drill and plyometric is developing his abilities, he will be more motivated to push himself as hard as he can.
It will give your players specific goals to pursue
Sometimes an athlete might not be pushing himself as hard as he can, but not realize that he isn’t. With a clear goal in sight, each one of your players will push himself beyond what he originally thought his limits were.
It will help guide you in the right direction for maximizing your players’ development
In addition to helping to motivate your players, showing their progress during a football season will also help you to be a better coach. As you analyze each player’s’ progress, you will be able to identify what areas you need to focus on the most. For example, if your measurements show that a wide receiver’s vertical leap is increasing rapidly, but their broad jump isn’t keeping up, then you know that you need to find ways to enhance this capability at a faster rate.
It will help you find things that are wrong with your players’ regimen
What is wrong with your players’ development plans? You can get frustrated with a lack of progress with your players, especially if your players are working hard, so you don’t know why this is happening. By showing yourself the right information, you can clearly identify where a player’s development plan is lacking. For example, if a player is not building enough explosive power in his upper body, it may be because he is lifting too much weight to properly develop his muscles. Reducing the weight so that the player can implement proper form and execute more repetitions may be the key for more development.
By showing yourself what you need to know, you will be able to create better developmental results for your players.