Here’s why “footwork” training the way you perceive it isn’t transferring to sport.
“What if I told you the ‘footwork’ in the random, chaotic, unpredictable environment that is sport, is predicated on REACTING to an opposition or boundary.
And your kids ‘footwork’ coach prescribing him pre-determined, predictable, closed fOoTwOrK drills aren’t transferring.”
-Ray Zingler on X
I write about this relentlessly, not because I am trying to educate sports performance coaches on what they already know, but to challenge parents and athletes to think, understand, and make calculated decisions.
Think about any sport, football, soccer, lacrosse, you name it.
Does a Wide Receiver get to “go wherever he wants to go” while running his route? Or does he have to organize a plan, rapidly adjust, and react to a defensive back whose sole goal is “disallow the receiver in front of me to go where he wants to go”.
And then what about after he makes the catch? Can he just aimlessly run where he wants to?
Or does his “footwork” require him to randomly react/evade a Free Safety coming down hill on the in-route he just ran, salivating at the mouth to introduce him to CTE?
He’s got to react, right?
Let’s go to soccer.
If a defender is using leverage and trying to pin you to the boundary, can you just keep going on the path you want to, or must you react accordingly to the oppositions? If you don’t, you get cracked or turn the ball over.
Lacrosse? As an attackmen, do you think you can just bully your way through a straight line and rip a shot at will? Maybe in 5thgrade, but as early as HS and especially in College, poles are hungry to knock you into a different dimension. You must, and you guessed it, react and evade defenders.
Let’s step away from sport and move to the speed & agility or dare I say “footwork” realm.
Do you think having a “coach” have you perform some bullshit ladder footwork drills before moving into sport specific movements is going to transfer?
Think about it.
“1 foot in, 1 foot out, 1 foot in, 1 foot out, 1 foot in,1 foot out, NOW GO DO YOUR <INSERT SPORT THING> (still against no defense lol)”
Can you imagine doing that in a live sport setting.
In seconds a defender would introduce the back of your head to the turf.
“Footwork” training the way you perceive it, is bullshit.
It doesn’t transfer.
Stop buying cheap drills and start buying real performance training that actually transfers.
