The Shintaro Higashi Show - Mat-side Coaching

Episode Date: February 27, 2023

Coaching doesn't end in the dojo. When an athlete participates in a competition, their coach usually is by their side on the mat, shouting out encouragements and directions. This "mat-side coaching" can be the difference in the outcome of a match. How should this type of coaching look like? What is the most effective way to do it? In this episode, Shintaro and Peter discuss "mat-side coaching," and how it should be done. Join our Discord server and start chatting with us and other grapplers by supporting us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/shintaro_higashi_show. Any amount helps!

Hey guys, welcome back to the Shintaro Higashi Show with Peter Yu. Today we're going to talk about mat side coaching. Yeah, this was a suggestion from one of our patrons, Sean. Thanks for the suggestion. Nice. So I think we're talking more about when you go to a tournament as a coach on the mat side. Yep. What do you say?

Do you yell out the technique names or what? Yeah. So Shintaro's been in that position a lot so we're very interested in hearing your thoughts

yes first and foremost please go to ShintaroHigashi.com this is a shameless plug right ShintaroHigashi.com

there's a lot of stuff there you can sign up for one-to-one online coaching with me as well or you can have a scheduled call with me we'll talk like this just like this and if well. Or you can have a schedule, a call with me. We'll talk like this, just like this. And if you have questions, you can ask me directly.

All that stuff. There's videos out there, et cetera, et cetera. All right, mat side coaching. Yeah. So that's a very interesting thing. And I love going to these tournaments. Actually, I don't love going to tournaments at all. But when I go to these tournaments, I love listening in on what the coaches are saying to their athletes.

Yeah. Even when I'm not involved in the match at all. Right. Even when there's no investment. Like, my guy's not just two random people fighting with two random coaches. It reveals a lot about the dojo and then the coach and then the athlete. Yes. I hear things like, just get up or go ahead and throw them or let's go, let's go.

And like, you know, rip it and roar or like snap down and go whatever it is and those things are good you know uh if that that's what the athlete actually needs you know yeah and when you're just listening to that you could always be very critical and be like ah this guy's you know he doesn't know what he's talking about yeah you hear this like taiyatoshi taiyatoshi it's like wait a minute why you know because he's in losing position and the guy already showed that he can counter this thing why would he go for that you know yeah so maybe the coach doesn't have a good understanding of the technique or whatever it is right yeah but maybe there's some things not missing when i'm listening in.

Right. You can't really judge because maybe they've been working on it. Maybe they've been, yeah, exactly. Maybe it's like a code word or something. It could be a code word, probably not, but it could be. Maybe you're like, oh, like, hey, let's do Taiho and this guy,

and then they prepare it together. Yeah. And so there's a trust between these two people, right? Yeah. Hey, man, I know you lost to this guy before, but, you know, and then the kid's like, I really want to throw him Taitoshi. All right, we're going to go for it, right? We're going to go out there and do our best Taitoshi against him.

So maybe, you know, even if the opportunity is not there really, the coach is like, Taitoshi, Taitoshi. And that could be something that the kid could hear and be like, okay, that's good, you know? Maybe. But is that the best type of mat-type coaching? No, I don't think so. The wall would be the best type.

Yeah. I think majority of the mat-type coaching is already done before, right? Right. Like 95% is understanding each other in the gym. Right. Right. Knowing each other's weaknesses. Right.

Yeah. And then sort of having that mental connection and then that trust yeah you know what i mean if somebody's doing judo out there and they're kind of getting a little bit like oh man i don't know what's going on or whatever it is the coach can sort of say like hey this is what's happening you got to do this don't let the hand come over the back whatever it is right and they have plans for each one of these things and things that they say that could trigger certain sequences. Right. Right.

Right. For instance, two guys are doing judo. One of my guys are doing judo. He's getting out gripped. Yeah. Saying don't let that hand come over the back. It's not very helpful.

Yeah. Because the other guy is gaming for that hand position. Right. Right. He's good. He's good at it. Yeah. And if he just focused on not letting him do

it every time the guy gets that hand over the top he's failing right and maybe the athlete thinks oh man i'm letting my coach down right yeah whatever you know i'm failing right but if we have a seat all right don't let that hand come over the back hand comes over the back okay go for your tomonage bailout sequences right Or I just even say bailout sequence. Because if it's Tomonage, I got to hear this too. Yeah, working on it. So it's like bailout sequence one or two, okay?

One or two, A or B, A or B. And we both know bailout number one might be Tomonage. Bailout number two might be a Shiri Sumigashi. And bailout three is a Drop Sanagi. So we have three of those sort of things in the bag. And we've already kind of talked about it, understand about it it right obviously we don't want him to get that dominant right right dominant grip comes over okay bail out bail out bang tomonaga comes in next sequence the guys other guys probably thinking is that all tomonaga is coming yeah and now it's like all right get back in there fight for position fight for position he's going out there putting the

hands on right maybe he gets, maybe he doesn't. Right. And then maybe he goes for that Tomonage and the other guy almost goes over. So it's not like you can't, you gotta put in the work before you actually mat-side coach. Yeah, mat-side coach,

yes. And then it's trust that their coach really knows what he's talking about. Right. Because if he goes to that Tomonage during that bailout, and he sees that it can be potentially effective. Right, right. That's going to be the plan now, right? Hey, that Tomonage is going to work.

Putting that confidence. Maybe the guy's not even a Tomonage guy, my guy. But the other guy's so inexperienced or hasn't been encountered with good Tomonage before that he doesn't really know how to defend it well. Maybe I already saw before in a different match that this guy sucks at Nwaza, can't pass anyone guard. So now that's like open season for spamming Tomonage. Don't lock up, just go Tomonage, just go Tomonage. Fake Tomonage coach, go Tomonage, go Tomonage. Yeah. Don't lock up. Just go Tomonage. Just go Tomonage. Fake Tomonage coach you. Go Tomonage.

Go Tomonage, right? And then the athlete might be thinking to himself, like, I'm not really good at it, but because he trusts me. Yeah. He says, I think maybe, oh,

Shintaro sees something that I don't while I'm out here. Yeah. I'm going to go for it, right? So that's good matai coaching because there's something that I know about this guy because I've done my homework.

The athlete trusts me. I see something that the athlete may not, right? And now… That's a good point because… Yes. And it's concise, right? And it's like… As an athlete, like, sometimes, especially if you don't have that much competition experience, you're nervous, you're adrenaline pumping, you're not really thinking.

You're like just so spazzy,ada yada but then that's a good mess like coaching like that like very concise to the point you know with trust you can ground the athlete back and then you know and it's like oh you snap out of that survival mode and you are actually playing. Yes, yes, yes. And sometimes it's a confidence thing. Yeah. I'll tell you this, man. I fought this kid, Jake. Yeah.

Right? And he was a student of a guy that was pretty good at judo, you know? Yeah. And there's no way that this guy could have beaten me, really, right? Uh-huh. There's no way, right? Like, I was so much better than him in every way he's a big strong kid yeah and then the kid was timid coming out and i launched him right off the bat bang huge throw was our right uh-huh and then the coach

goes that's all he's got and then like on the side he like he's like you've seen the best of it that's all he's got oh about you yeah and then he's like he's like huh hey just go for stuff man come on slip a leg in and it was so like playful and fun and natural just simply go for it uh-huh and i listened to it i'm like what do you simply go for you little bitch like yeah myself like what do you mean that's all i got yeah it got to you yeah it got to me a little bit and then he like like, slips the leg and goes for Uchimata. And I was like, whoa,

whoa, whoa. Right. And I'm hopping off. All right. Defending it. And then the guy's like, you see,

he's going to fall. He's going to tip right over. Not that good. And then I'm thinking to myself, like, what? You know? And then like,

I score again. And I'm like, this is Yuko days. And I'm like, scrapping with them and like, taking them down and almost turning them, almost choking them, almost all of them. I'm like, you know, and by anybody's standard, like I'm like kindpping with them and like taking them down and almost turning and almost choking them almost all I'm like, you know

In by anybody's standard like I'm like kind of dominating this guy Yeah, but every time like we go out of bounds or something and the coach is like and so I said man you got this You got this you do good man. It's doing good. And he was just giving positive vibes to this kid. That's it. Right, right That good that you got this man positive vibes to this kid. That's it. Right, right. You're not that good.

You got this, man. Like, this guy sucks. Retard. He's terrible. He caught you once or twice. That's all he's got. You've seen all this shit. Get out there.

Come on. You just catch him. You catch him. And then I started getting tired. Oh, man. And the coach was like, he's tired. He's huffing and puffing.

He's out of shape. He's breathing hard. Pulls his head down and the kid got fired up. He like started coming at me like crazy, right? He's like pulling my head down, kicking the kid got fired up. He, like, started coming at me like crazy, right? He's, like, pulling my head down, kicking me in the leg, like, attacking like crazy. And then I got a penalty.

Oh, okay. Passivity. Yeah. And then I'm, like, getting even more tired, right? Right. And he's, like, pulling my head down, pulling my head down. I'm, like, oh, shit, oh, shit, oh, shit. And, like, if you look at the scoreboard, I'm dominating him.

Yeah. And I'm listening to the coach of the other kid. Yeah. shit oh shit oh shit and like if you look at the school where i'm dominating him yeah it was like and i'm listening to the coach of the other kid yeah as he's getting to me right you know it's like holy shit and then this kid like yeah who was in your corner my dad what did he say something like yo this is you know

you I don't know I can't even remember because the other coach was getting to you you don't even remember it was good yeah

he was probably saying something like Uchibara Domuchimara yeah and like yeah Uchibara was there yeah

but it's like I wasn't like even in the right mindset for that right oh man i didn't know what i needed at that time yeah but i don't know man if i was in the coaching seat i probably would have been like hey man don't listen to that guy you don't listen to me you got it you're doing great catch your breath take it take this exchange to grip and back out to catch your breath collect yourself you. You're in the lead. Burn some time doing the waza. Probably would have been a great advice.

Yeah. A good coach would recognize that he or her athlete is, like, getting tired, nervous, whatever. Yeah. And then I remember it was, like, a minute left or something, and I was, like, panicking. I wasn't even losing. Yeah, you were winning.

Yeah. And then the way this coach was talking to his guy, he was, like, hey, you got this, dude. You got this. You got it. and I'm like thinking to myself like in what world would he have this match

like yeah you know and then I threw him hurray free pull but like still but I was like I was really

oh man you're getting me nervous I was like wow and then you lost by penalty or something okay and you want to know

what the coach said to me after the match what did he say he goes you know you know what the coach said to me after the match? What did he say? He goes, you know what your problem was, kid, to me? I was a younger kid. Oh, dang.

What? And he goes, you gave him too much confidence. You didn't throw him right away. Okay. That's what he said. And then I was like, I was like, you know,

I was trying. Yeah. You know, he's like, eh, you know, you should have just bought him right away. You gave him too much confidence. Oh, my God. Now he's coming for you. Yeah. You know, he's like, yeah, you know, you should just bomb him right away. You give him too much confidence. Oh my God. Now he's coming for you. Yeah.

Now he knows he can beat you. Oh gosh. It got to me a little bit. I was like, huh. And then I thought to myself, I don't want to fight this kid again. Oh,

yeah. He's become your boogeyman. A little bit. I mean, you know, like there's very huge skill gap there between me and that kid. But like still, you know, like that. But I was like, I remember thinking now, like that was good coaching.

Yeah. That was straight good coaching. That's a great example. Yeah. Yeah. So like knowing what the athlete needs. Yeah. Sometimes it's like poking at the other person's insecurity and mine was gas. I had a bad gas tank then.

Yeah. Because I was, you know, hanging out with them. Yeah. Sometimes it's like poking up other person's insecurity and mine was gas. I had a bad gas tank then. Yeah. Because I was, you know, hanging out. Yeah. My cardio was never that good. I'm a short twitch guy, fast twitch guy. So like, you know, knowing what your athlete needs is good. I'm sort of not clear what I'm saying right now. I'm like telling random stories here.

No, I think that was a great example because that kind of ground everything to reality. So basically, the work has to happen on the mat during practice. You got to work on your thing and then you have to have a good relationship as a coach and as an athlete. Then, as a good coach on the math side, have to recognize because of all the time you spent together you know what the athlete yeah that is like basically oh you know not enough gas or he he has that second wind coming all the time and then you gotta make sure man it's like almost like the athlete a lot of times due to inexperience or just adrenaline pumping can't really do a smart like match management

the coach is actually facilitating that match management kind of you know shouting very short things you can't go on a dissertation on how the other guy is like showing him tai otoshi and then you gotta do it no nothing like that

you know it's a balance of like technical advice letting the athlete know that you see something yeah you know

some of it is from homework from that day you know the other kids you know girlfriend just broke up with him so

tell him no one loves him yeah well like giving him the right encouragement because you know sometimes you go out there and you're stiff and you're kind of like

stagnant and you play like locked up judo and how do you break an athlete out of that you know hey loosen up might not help

yeah that's not really everyone wants to loosen up they know they know that they should they should loosen up how do you break them out of that

you know you gotta know your athlete. I think more pointed directions. Like, oh, you know, it always helps me, like, when you're on my side, when I was competing, like, kind of you yelling me, like, which hand, like, in grip fighting. Because I always tend to, like, drift away trying to, like, just dive in for throws. Yeah, man. And yeah and sometimes you know you got to be realistic and when you have a guy you know it's

like you're probably not gonna beat this guy but you know let's hope that he does something then yeah capitalize on that you know right like uh there was a story about you know somebody who was an underdog at the olympics or something and it's like, you know, the coach is like, I was like in the, in that world. And I heard like, oh, you know, like, you're probably not going to beat this guy if you lock up with him

and stand up with him. Maybe he goes to his back for a tomonage or something and you pin him. Yeah. Maybe. You have a shot. And then, you know,

let's hope, let's just hope he does it. And then the guy goes for a shittysumi and you could see. Oh, I remember that. And then the guy's like, you could tell let's hope. Let's just hope he does it. And then the guy goes for a shitty sumi. And you could see. Oh, I remember that. And then the guy's like, you could tell the Russian was like, oh, shit. Oh, shit. Yeah.

Bang, pass pin. It's like, holy moly. You know what I mean? But it's like, you know, I remember when, like, Eugene drew Bobby Lee at the Nationals. Oh, I remember. I remember. Eugene's like, yo, so. What?

I was like you know this is gonna be this is gonna be might be quick not easy yeah I remember when you

when you came back from that draw and then you were telling us about it like oh my god Eugene drew Bobby Lee yeah

I couldn't even like fake it I was like oh man I don't know if you have much of a chance here I'm sorry

he's very good I've worked out with him many times. Good luck. Yeah. Great experience almost, you know. You shouldn't kind of like, a lot of coaches would kind of go against saying something like that. Yeah.

You know, but, you know, managing emotions is another thing. You know, some people get, you know, I say something like that to Yujin because he's so stoic, right? Yeah, yeah. I would never say something like that to,ujin because he's so stoic. I would never say something like that to a Tarazzo. I shouldn't say that about specific names. I would never say that to Tarazzo.

If you were to drew somebody like that in his division, you know what I mean? A lot of encouragement. It depends on the person. For me, I'm like Tarazzo too. I don't think I would have liked it. I would have been a I was like oh shit like I didn't

I would have been a little bit more encouraged man yeah I would have given much more direct like hey man this is what we gotta do here

right we gotta get this hand out and we gotta go for this thing you gotta just enforce that and then you do it consistently just keep going for it

and then maybe you'll catch him with this thing one or two things and these are the things that I think you can catch him with you know I would stick to that right stay away from the wazza

stay away from this stay away from this, stay away from this, drop the nagi, don't go into the Georgian, don't go hit the head. Bobby Lee, yeah, he's known for his,

like, choke or something, right? Yeah, I'm not saying Bobby Lee versus Taraz is in a different way of class, but like, yeah,

no, Bobby's good. He's very good. You know, he's very good. The old legend in, you know, the national level judo, right? So, you know, Eugene, my cousin, I know Eugene very good. You know, he's very good. The all-around legend in, you know, the national level judo, right?

Yeah. You know, Eugene, my cousin, Jerome, I know Eugene very well. It's like, hey, man, just go out there and do your best. And, you know, he got thrown right away. It's okay. It's fine, you know? And then, but everybody sort of has a different way. And there's guys who can't listen to technical advice when they're out there.

I've had guys like that, you know? Hey, put your pulse and go here and sleeve. And then, or even like, hey, you know, this guy is going to fall. He's so responsive to your, whatever it is. If you fake fall to go backwards, you're going to hit him with Ochi. But there's guys who just aren't coachable there. Yeah. So how do you deal with that?

So zoned in, yeah. Yeah. So like maybe majority of the technical advice has to be sort of in the beginning. Yeah, before he or she steps on the mat, yeah.

Yeah, and I've had guys who are like, kind of like, a little bit like, Osoto's there, I guarantee it, Osoto's right there,

go for Osoto. And then the guy's like, I'm trying. Ah, come on. And it's like, yeah, it's like,

okay, you know, all right. Keep trucking. Yeah. Do whatever you want, okay, you know, all right. Keep trucking. Yeah. Do whatever you want, Ben, you know? Yeah. I think that's another thing.

Like, you got to build, you got to kind of build up that relationship before maybe, you know, I mean, frustration will happen during the matches. But how do you, you got to work with the athlete to manage that aspect of the game properly. Let me tell you something about Matt's eye coaching too. Yeah. Managing referees. I don't want to say managing referees. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

But being a professional. Yeah. Is a big part of this, right? Because if you have to match like, oh, and you're like fighting tooth and nail for every call, right? That was entire, what, that was, I'm sorry. What are you doing? You retard ref, whatever it is, blah, blah, blah. Right. And now all of a sudden the ref, you have a bad reputation. None of the refs like you. And they're supposed to be objective, but every time they see you in the coaching tier, they're going to be like, you know what? This guy in a suit, he's got such a pain in my ass.

You know, any like ambiguous call, could it go this way could it go that way they're gonna give it to the other guy because they hate your guts you know and i've made that mistake plenty of times really yeah yeah in the beginning especially because i didn't know a lot of what i know now and when i first started coaching guys and taking people to tournaments i was just sitting the side and yelled like a lunatic. And my biggest thing was like, as soon as somebody would throw somebody, I would call up,

right, if it was my guy. So if it was a Wazari, boom! And if my guy was throwing, I would immediately, and if the other guy threw my guy for a Wazari, I would boom! Immediately, I would down, immediately say, you go. And I would like downgrade it real quick.

And then I used to influence referees a lot like that. Oh, okay. Okay. Yeah. And then sometimes it'll get waved off, but sometimes they're like, ah, don't bother with it. Yes. And I knew this, right? And then the referees were like, don't coach the refs.

And then they got really strict about doing that kind of a thing but i did it anyway and then i was not very favored well with these people you know and then you know there was some friction there right because i would argue back and then i would argue calls and all the stuff and you know you're there for the athlete right and sometimes there are egregious calls and sometimes you know uh there's more than you can do not fighting these small calls right yeah yeah you know you gotta see it in the long term like it's yeah i'll give you another one i remember this exactly i was watching this guy he was doing drop set agi yeah and the guy was doing drop sanagi just bailing out bailing out bailing out yeah yeah so the referee gave the shido gives the shido and now all of a sudden the

coach is going nuts like arguing this penalty right right right oh he's robbing us he's going for sanagi whatever it is and it's kind of like you know is that the best use of your your voice right you should be telling maybe he should have been coaching the athlete. Athlete probably could have been, you know, because he's scared, right? He's like trying to bail out tonight. He's like, fake Sanagi, go Koji. Go Tomonagi instead because you don't get penalty

for Tomonagi bailout. So you just don't. Right. Right? That's a huge, like, thing. Like a trick. Yeah, it's a trick. It's a hack.

Yeah. You know, if you drop Senari for a bailout, if the guy doesn't get off balance, you're going to get penalized. Yeah. Tomonage? Yeah. Until the moon comes home, like,

you'll never get penalized, you know? Right, right. Like, hey, hey, you know, don't do drop Senari. Do Tomonage instead, dude. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then you see that this guy has good nuwaza because you've never seen him before. He almost passes, almost pens it. Like, okay, forget Tomonagi instead, dude. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then you see that this guy has good nuwaza

because you've never seen him before. He almost passes, almost pins him. Like, okay, forget Tomonagi. Let's go Tsubigayashi now. Tsubigayashi. Let's spam Sumi. Right? Yeah.

Let's spam Sumi and then, yeah, still. You know, you could potentially get passed, right? Yeah. But, you know, that's better than fighting with the ref. It can actually do something about this, you know, if you directly have him. Yeah, you know that's better than fighting with the ref it can actually do something about this you know if you're directly here's another one you know like uh you know one man the guy's kind of tired just grip fight put him to the ground and just like sit and turn him the walls and just put a lot of pressure on him get in time yeah yeah don't try to score we'll just

take him to overtime we'll take him to golden score right right keep cool on the pressure and just break him one day you know what like four minutes in five minutes in just stay level-headed he probably can't throw you that well you know keep going for these and pressure in the walls and that's their new strategy you know uh you're not gonna be able to throw them right it's a legit legit strategy you know like that's better than like screaming at the refs, you know? Yeah. Yeah. So there's a lot of pieces of this, mat-side coaching. I anticipated it to be a lot shorter, this episode, but, you know. No, this is good. You pulled out a lot of stories from your little story bag.

Yeah. And it's tough, man. Like mat-side coaching too. I know I'm like talking as if like, oh, my mat-side coaching is great. But honestly, man, it's like you have a match going on. You have another match going on, keeping track of 10 athletes and doing this. And then sometimes it's like, yo,

can you sit over there in that guy's athlete's chair? And, you know, it helps and it doesn't. You know, some people feel very like sad when you don't sit in their chair. Some people need you more. Some people need a little bit more emotional support going in, validation. It's really a lot to keep track of. So much can happen.

So much can go wrong. But I would say 90% of it is really knowing your athlete. And then it happens way before you even step foot on that mat. Yeah. That's the most important part. Yeah. It really is. You can't just turn someone into a super athlete by mensai coaching.

No. Yeah. Cool. But it helps if the guy trusts you and listens to you. Yeah. Yeah. You can pull a fast one. Yeah.

Yeah. Cool. All right. right well that was a good conversation uh anything else nope that's it thank you guys for listening as always all right yeah thanks for listening guys and we'll see you guys in the next episode