If you read last week’s article (Random Thoughts Series: Make or Break), then this one could also go into the hypothetical series titled “Hypocritical Strength and Conditioning Beliefs”.

This article is coming after Saquan “no-look hurdled” a defender in an NFL game (if you missed it, search it on YouTube – it’s worth your time). It took almost no time at all for strength and conditioning coaches to take the video and use it to sell their programs. This is a CRAZY approach to me (although I’m sure it sells programs, it just doesn’t make sense to me). “If you want to do ‘this’ then you need to follow my program”. Meanwhile, Saquan has probably NEVER trained for that ONE play. Here is where the hypocritical paradox comes in – a strength and conditioning coach says that if you want to do something on a field then you need to buy his/her program (despite the fact that their athletes have NEVER done that move on the field). Conversely, the ONE PERSON ON THE PLANET that has done that move has never done that coach’s program (and has probably never trained for that one specific move – he’s just a freakish athlete).

All professional athletes are outliers. The best of the best are outliers of outliers. There’s a reason everyone was freaking out about the Saquan play – no one has ever done it before. Why? Because there is only one Saquan. You can try to be like him, but you will never be him (he is an outlier in a sea of outliers). In my opinion, most of the time it is a fool’s errand to try to mimic the best of the best. Athletes like LeBron James, Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani, Connor McDavid, Serena Williams, etc., etc. are so far beyond what most people can even comprehend. Yet we see their performances and say “you can be like them if you train like this”. Absolute madness in my opinion (especially because usually these statements come from coaches who have never spent any time with professional athletes, and have certainly never been around the best of the best).

The reality is I do not have a solution to offer in this scenario. I understand having a business means making sales, and usually that comes with controversial opinions and/or a lot of shameless self-plugging. However, I am trying to point out that we should hype up the athletes that we do work with, show the results of our own programs, and appreciate greatness when we see it.