So You Want To Be A Hockey Coach

Before really getting into this topic, I’d love for anyone interested in eventually becoming a hockey coach to read this article: “The journey of Yankees minor league coach Ari Adut“. It’s not a hockey story (obviously), but it surely can be helpful to those considering a career in coaching any sport.

I think it awesome that the article begins by pointing out that “College baseball has become a type of breeding ground for cutting edge training methods, and many of the Yankees new coaches have come from the college coaching ranks.” I think other North American sports, including basketball, football, AND HOCKEY began bringing in coaches from the colleges long, long ago. That’s not to suggest that every aspiring hockey coach has to work at the college or university level, but…

It should also be noted that Adut wasn’t an outstanding baseball player. Would it have helped his cause if he was? Ya, I’d say it would have made it easier for him to prolong his playing career, and gain exposure at some higher levels. However, even the lack of talent didn’t hold him back.

One thing I found very interesting — and worthy of pointing out here, is that, “He continued seeking out opportunities to play and crossed paths with some of the names that would go on to play a major role in his coaching development.” Yes, the more connections he made on his way up the baseball ladder, the more folks might be able to help him sometime down the road.

And that brings me to a bit of advice that can’t be avoided… I mean, there’s no telling how much Adut was paid in any of the earliest gigs, and it’s quite likely he may have even been paid close to minimum wage. Hey, it was the experience, knowledge and great connections he was looking for during those early years, and not striking it rich.

I read nothing about family commitments in any of his story, and that can be an absolute biggie. Let’s face it: a wife, kids, a family dog, and even a mortgage can weigh heavily on career decisions, and the likes of those things can even trap one to working within a certain radius.

This aside… I was once offered a hockey job halfway around the world. By that time in my life, I was firmly entrenched with all those things just mentioned above, and it was easy for me to take a pass. Had I still been a single guy with no real ties, it would have been very easy to take a chance.

As we can see, Adut kept pursuing his education and his chance to play for as long as possible. And with that, his experiences, knowledge and list of connections grew.

Making some of my points even further, it’s noted that, “he was traveling around the central and southwest part of the country on long trips to small cities and towns. While playing several months a year he reconnected with the coaching staff at Los Angeles Valley College, and was offered the chance to help coach.” Then, once the door started closing on playing opportunities, “Adut turned to coaching and teaching at Los Angeles Valley College as he had also earned his Masters Degree in Kinesiology.”

Aaaah, yes, Kinesiology and likely most of the other sciences involved in high level sport coaching.

“He began to put the different training techniques and practice situations that his teams were doing on social media and generated a small following. He was unware that this content had drawn the interest of major league organizations.”

In a way, the rest of this story is history — except for one more point: Along the way, Adut also became fluent in Spanish, which likely opened the doors to twice as many future coaching opportunities. Suggesting that he probably was fairly footloose and fancy free (or likely not encumbered by a family, a mortgage and more), he was able to accept his first pro ball assignment as a hitting coach at the Yankees’ facility in the Dominican Republic.

Lastly, let me paste in a part of that article’s last paragraph as a lesson to anyone interested in working his or her way up a coaching ladder: “Ari Adut’s journey to the Yankees system is a lesson in hard work and accepting new challenges, lessons he will certainly be imparting to the players he’s helping on their own developmental paths.”