Episode 460: The Mental Habits of Elite Coaches | Rustin Dodd & Elise Devlin
Episode 460: The Mental Habits of Elite Coaches | Rustin Dodd & Elise Devlin, NY Times, The Athletic
Podcast accessible on: iTunes | Spotify | YouTube
Something Rustin Dodd says in this episode has stayed with me since I first heard it. There are coaches who make players work harder. And there are coaches who make players better. Those are two different things. The first is difficult. The second is rare. And almost everything about how the second kind of coach operates is different from what most of us were taught.
In part two of JP’s conversation with Rustin Dodd and Elise Devlin of The Athletic’s Peak, the discussion moves from habits and rituals into something deeper: what the coaches who actually change people do differently. Dan Quinn’s player PowerPoints. Lisa Bluder and Caitlin Clark. Tara Vanderveer on why tough conversations only land inside real relationships. And a John Harbaugh frame on accountability that is worth writing down.
If part one was about the tools elite athletes use, this one is about the kind of coach who can actually help athletes use them.
TOC 3-2-1
3 QUOTES WORTH WRITING DOWN
“Being a coach that can get your players to work harder is easier than being a coach that can make them better. At the most basic level, it’s giving people confidence.”
— Rustin Dodd
“When you are losing a lot of energy and you have not a lot left, take what you do have left and give it to other people and it’ll come back to you multiplied.”
— Elise Devlin
"Optimism is really contagious. Even if you don't feel optimistic in the moment, just give what you have and it'll turn real."
— Elise Devlin
2 QUESTIONS FOR YOUR TEAM
Q1: Think about a player you know well enough to coach hard — and one you don’t. What would it take to close that gap this week?
Q2: When did you last own a bad day in front of your team? What did that cost you — and what did it build?
1 RESOURCE TO GO DEEPER
The Inner Game of Tennis by W. Timothy Gallwey
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Making Athletes Better Is Different from Making Them Work Harder. Curiosity shows up across every elite athlete Rustin and Elise have profiled. Kobe Bryant called it the number one trait of a great teammate. It isn’t a personality quirk — it’s a practice. Coaches who model curiosity, especially after failure, give their athletes a frame that outlasts any season.
The Deeper You Know Your Athletes, the Better You Can Lead Them. Elise competed as a D1 swimmer at Northwestern but says she learned more as a journalist. Not because the experience didn’t matter, but because she never had the language for what she was going through. That gap between doing and understanding is exactly where coaching lives.
Tough Conversations Only Land When the Relationship Is Real. Elise adopted 10-15 minutes of morning silence after realizing she had never given her brain space to process. No phone, no input, no agenda. Just quiet. The neuroscience backs it up, and the practical reason she kept it is simple: it works.
Coaches Need a Support System Too. Olympian Olivia Smoliga approaches every failure with childlike curiosity — not dwelling, not bypassing, but investigating. Most athletes either get stuck in failure or rush past it. Curiosity is the third option, and the one that actually extracts the lesson.
Ownership Is a Leadership Skill. David Ortiz answered “what makes you feel successful?” with one word: gratitude. Buzz Williams writes four to five letters a day. JP ran a gratitude session before a national quarterfinal. Gratitude helps athletes bounce back faster, reconnect to purpose, and release what they’re carrying.
Curiosity Is a Long-Term Coaching Practice. Rustin’s biggest insight from years of sports journalism: people respond. Elise cold-emailed Michael Phelps. Mark Cuban replied in an hour. JP’s former player remembered the 17s he ran in practice and used that memory to push through a brutal stretch at Google. The coaches who reach toward their athletes in hard moments are the ones who get remembered.
ACTION ITEMS FOR LEADERS AND COACHES
LEARN ONE THING ABOUT AN ATHLETE
Pick one player you know the least about. Have one conversation this week that isn’t about sport. Find out something real. This is the starting point for everything else Elise found great coaches do.
HAVE THE HARD CONVERSATION
Identify one athlete with whom you have genuine trust. Have the hard conversation you have been avoiding. Relationship-backed feedback doesn’t just land better — it lasts.
TRACK YOUR ENERGY THIS WEEK
Before your next three practices, rate your energy on a 1-10 scale. After each session, ask honestly: what did my athletes feel from me today? Own the days where the answer is hard.
AUDIT WHAT YOU CONFRONT
John Harbaugh via Rustin: Confront everything, never anyone. Look at a recent conflict in your program. Were you confronting the problem or the person? That distinction changes everything downstream.
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