The Emporia Gazette

February 13, 2012

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Sometimes coaches come up with some pretty dumb ways to motivate their players.

Former Royals manager Tony Pena once showered in his uniform during a losing streak. Didn't help much, the Royals lost 104 games that season.

Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy tried to defend and motivate his back-up quarterback last season when he told the world, “I’m a man! I’m 40!” His quarterback transferred, but Gundy did become a YouTube sensation.

I used to coach sixth grade boys in basketball and would give out a Gatorade for every charge taken in a game. My plan backfired. My kids flopped more than European soccer players. But they were well-hydrated.

My high school basketball coach was the king of delivering awkward motivational speeches. One time we returned back to school late at night from a tournament, and he took us to the middle of our gym, killed the lights and told us we were down in a dark, grubby, stinky hole and we needed to climb out. Then he went into something about how we needed to work together — maybe climb on each others’ backs to get out. I don’t really know; I had tuned out at that point and was probably debating pizza or a sandwich for a late-night snack.

The goal of every high school team is to get to the state tournament. Our state tournament was played in Emporia (still is) and that’s where we wanted to end up at the end of the season. Obviously, to get there we had to win and we all wanted to win. We didn’t need a rah-rah speech.

But Coach wasn’t convinced. He thought he needed a schtick to really get our attention. So he told us about Emporia. He told us about playing in White Auditorium and what it was like to be on that stage, surrounded by all those people and how loud it could get there. And I would actually get kind of excited when I thought about it. Obviously, I wanted to get to state. Obviously, I liked winning.

Then he’d talk about the smell.

“Emporia stinks,” he would say. “When the bus approaches Emporia, that Emporia smell from the Tyson factory starts to hit the nostrils, and boy oh boy, is it a repulsive smell.”

Coach’s face would start to scrunch up and then he’d get this sly smile.

“Ahhh, I love that smell,” he would say.

Here’s where coach failed to get me excited about going to Emporia. I don’t like bad smells. I don’t seek out bad smells. I even go out of my way to avoid bad smells.

A couple weeks ago a buddy in the business called me and told me about the Sports Editor vacancy in Emporia. He thought I’d be a good man for the job. He thought it would be a good opportunity and nice place to live.

Immediately, I thought about the smells — or, more accurately, the smelly speech.

I had been to Emporia a couple times during the state tournament my sophomore year. All I remembered was White Auditorium, Braums and silly speeches. But I agreed with my buddy and decided to give this smelly city a shot.

As I drove in for my interview, I somehow avoided any smells — I think they’re avoidable, I’ve found the town to smell quite pleasant thus far — and I saw an older, quaint downtown that reminded me of Lawrence (I’m a KU alum). Then I parked and went to pay the meter and was thrilled to find out 10 cents accounted for two hours. Two hours! I spent the last 13 months in Denver and in Denver, 10 cents will get you six minutes. After a trip to downtown Denver, I couldn’t do laundry for a month.

After almost a week on the job, I think I’m going to enjoy life in a smaller town (not that Emporia’s small — it's just, you know, a lot smaller than Denver). The people are friendly, the food is good (I’m especially impressed with Bobby D’s), the teams seem to be successful and the smells are tolerable.

If the coaches can avoid silly speeches about bad smells and dark places, I think I’ll enjoy this town. I know my change jar will.