The Best Job In The World

Dan Woog, Westport’s favorite story teller, recently published his 17th book, We Kick Balls: True Stories From the Youth Soccer Wars. In it he gathers stories from his almost 40 years of coaching. He shared a few with Y’s Men on February 5.

“Everything I’ve done in coaching has turned into a story…adventures, misadventures, the good, the bad and the ugly.” Most of those he told the group convey life lessons, some he taught his players, others they taught him.

Woog pitched his book to a number of publishers, starting “at the top of the food chain,” with an editor friend, but couldn’t get any interest in “a soccer book.” He responded to every editor “It’s not a soccer book, it’s about growing up, about kids, for anyone who’s had a kid, who’s played any sports, and anyone who’s been a kid.” All to no avail.

So he self-published. Now he trades off doing all his own marketing for the 70 percent of the royalties he keeps. “It turned out to be a great move.”

Dan is a life long Westport resident and a man of many skills - he’s coached soccer at Staples since 1977. And through his blog, “06880,” and “Woog’s World,” a column he’s written for the Westport News weekly since 1986, he is perhaps the unofficial recorder of things important, interesting and unusual in Westport.

As Staples soccer coach he has won four league championships, one state title, and his teams have reached the state final two other times. He’s also been inducted to the Connecticut Soccer Hall of Fame and won a Presidential Honor from the National Soccer Coaches Association of America.

To Woog soccer is a vehicle, a way for his young players learn about life, about the journey as well as the destination - at Staples, and as members of 10 or 12 youth teams have, by traveling internationally. As a coach he is about learning, about problem solving, about bonding with your teammates, about working together to win - and about keeping a life long love of soccer.

When he was named head coach in 2003 he took over a strong team and built on that foundation - making players responsible for thinking for themselves, because, he said, “One thing that makes soccer so interesting is that it’s a players’ game… once the whistle blows the players have to figure out everything for themselves… There are no timeouts, no plays sent in by the coach.”

Unfortunately, “when things don’t work out kids think it’s their fault.”

Woog starts every season with the same goal: win the last game, the state championship. “The last couple of years we’ve fallen one game short.” This year, he said, they played an “amazing” semi-final. With 14 minutes left in the game, and down 3-0, they scored four goals, won, and eliminated the number three team in the state.

Thinking ahead to the final, the players looked in each other’s eyes and said “We’re not losing!”

But they did. They were devastated. They lost to a team not as good as Staples’. “They’re kids, they were still on their high… They felt that they had done something wrong, and that everything they had worked for was meaningless. They didn’t reach their goal, they felt like failures.”

One of the players asked Coach why. “We did everything you asked.” “Sometimes that happens” he answered. “That’s life. You don’t always reach your goals.” He told them the “journey is as important as the destination,” and added that during the journey you form friendships and create memories, and that’s as important as the outcome.

He didn’t get it. “No, we lost.” Woog learned that it takes a while for some lessons to sink in.

He told other stories, one about a player who, during a trip to Denmark, missed the last trolley, then, resourcefully, found his way back to the team’s quarters by running along the tracks and getting in, all sweaty, just before curfew - to the relief of Woog and the other players. The lesson? A team needs smart players, players who can stay in the moment under pressure.

Another was about a Staples team that suffered the deaths of the fathers of four players during one season. The team bonded, played hard, reached the state championship game, but lost. Again, devastating.

After that game the players walked, arms around each other, to one side of the field and back, sobbing. Each player spoke about what the team meant to them. Woog reminded them of the journey and its lessons.

One player, a sophomore who hadn’t played, continued sobbing. “What’s wrong?” Woog asked. “If I had worked harder in practice the stars would have been better and we would have won.” Slowly he came to see that that wasn’t the reason we lost.

“It is these shared experiences that make high school sports so important… that make soccer such a great game and such a great experience,” and Woog said “the reasons I love what I do, that I feel I have the best job in the world.”

Winding down, he offered a personal story, about his coming out as a gay man. It took him a “really long time to come out publicly.” The morning he announced it in his Westport News column he walked into the Staples cafeteria, worried what the reaction would be. “Would they accept me?”

His players saw him, but nobody knew what to say. Suddenly, “after what seemed like ten minutes of silence, but was really ten seconds,” the captain came over, stuck out his hand and said “Great column, I’m proud of you.”

Woog realized he hadn’t given his players enough credit to do the right thing, to really understand the world.

During the day other kids shared personal stories with him - a father losing a job, alcoholism in the family - stuff they realized they had kept inside but didn’t need to. Altogether, “A great day in school.”

Going home, he had no idea what would be on his answering machine. What he heard were messages of support and encouragement. “I realized I had not given parents the respect I should have to do the right thing.”

Then he ended with sad news for American soccer fans. In response to the question “When will the US win the World Cup?” he opined “Not in our lifetime.”

If you don’t read Dan’s blog you should: http://06880danwoog.com.