Confidence can’t be taught; it comes from inside
The self-help industry is saturated with gurus and knowit-alls telling you how to build confidence. The know-it-alls in the newspaper are here to help with everything else.
Skip those quick-read books, podcasts or weekend seminars and just heed this advice: When it comes to developing a skill, nothing beats repetitive practice.
Texas offensive lineman Elijah Rodriguez is a believer. He’d never snapped a foot- For full coverage of Texas sports, go to our home for the latest Longhorns news and analysis.
ball before coming to UT and trained at guard and tackle his first two seasons. In 2016, then-offensive line coach Matt Mattox looked around and noticed the Longhorns didn’t have a competent backup for center Zach Shackelford.
“They had me and him in
January, during winter conditioning, start snapping to each other,” Rodriguez said. “So that’s when I first started snapping.”
On Saturday against 17th-ranked TCU, Rodriguez will make his third career start at center. He’s as confident as ever. If that feeling can manifest itself inside the entire locker room, the Longhorns (2-1, 0-0 Big 12) might have something brewing.
Confidence ebbs and flows with every player and every coach on every sports team everywhere. It’s unmistakable which direction the tide is flowing, too. In Texas’ case, compare the second half of the Tulsa game against the second half of USC. It’s night and day.
You’ll know the Longhorns have really turned the corner when the team plays with bulletproof confidence week in and week out, regardless of opponent.
The Horns had to feel unsure about themselves when they couldn’t score from the 1-yard line against Tulsa. Coach Tom Herman chewed his team out at halftime, and Texas played tight, uncertain football in the second half.
But Texas players were flying around, having fun against USC. The goal-line stand in the second quarter was a pivotal moment in this team’s mental development. Players knew what to do, coaches trusted their players, and Brandon Jones made the game’s biggest tackle by knocking Stephen Carr out of bounds for a 2-yard loss at the 3.
Coaches can beg and plead with players to play with confidence. But nothing will happen until they do it and see it for themselves.
“We’re not a finished product,” Herman said. “We’ve got to enhance and improve it, but it’s confidence — and it’s not arrogance; it’s not cockiness — that I trained so hard and am trained so well throughout the course of the week that when one or two bad things happen to me throughout the course of the game, that’s OK. It’s football.
“I have trained, and my teammates have trained, so hard that we will be able to go on to the next play and the next one and the next one,” Herman added, “and you stack up more 1-0’s versus 0-1’s, and you’re going to come out on the good side of the ledger, for the most part.”
Rodriguez has confidence in his snap. Jones had confidence to read the fourth-down play and make the stop. Even quarterback Sam Ehlinger has found more confidence this season.
Ehlinger said about last season, “Because everything was moving 100 miles an hour, I was more prone to leaving the pocket in certain situations where I didn’t necessarily need to.”
Now he’s more comfortable with his training and knows to go through his progressions. Think back to the final touchdown drive against Tulsa when Ehlinger was 7-for7. That included three check-down passes to Tre Watson. How many times would Ehlinger have checked down last season? Once? Never? Of course, he’d tuck it and go.
In three games so far, Ehlinger has 723 passing yards with six touchdowns and a quarterback efficiency rating of 134.88. He had 1,915 passing yards, 11 touchdowns and a 124.06 rating in all of 2017.
“When you have a substantial amount of confidence in what you’re doing playing the game, you don’t think,” Ehlinger said. “When you have confidence, you don’t really hesitate. Hey, you missed a play, but you have confidence in yourself. It’s not like, ‘Man, I messed up. Oh, no. What’s everyone going to think?’
“When you have confidence, that doesn’t really matter to you. You’re just going, and you play a little bit faster and a little bit smarter on top of that.”
How was Texas so good during the previous decade? Then-coach Mack Brown didn’t have to say too much on certain weeks. Players had incredible confidence.
Granted, a lot of that was because of Vince Young and Colt McCoy. But those Longhorns teams had talent; players believed in themselves and worked various foes week after week.
That’s the feeling these Longhorns should strive to reach. The opponent shouldn’t matter. It just so happens this week will be against the Horned Frogs, who have beaten the Horns five of the last six years. It’s about playing with confidence no matter who’s on the opposite side.
“Confidence is such a large factor in any sport or in any sector,” Ehlinger said. “When confidence is felt throughout an organization or a team, it excels.”