Sport’s All-Time Innovator

A person’s legacy is often measured by whom he or she touched and developed along the way.  Bill Walsh enriched not only hundreds of people as a mentor but an entire sport through his passion and vision. 

Bill Walsh could have been a CEO or Chairman of any major corporation, fortunately for football; he chose to be a football coach.  When everyone thought football was all about brute strength, he thought of it as a choreographed dance.  When everyone sought the biggest and strongest players, he found the smartest athletes.  When everyone else resorted to yelling and screaming at their players, he cared, listened, and taught. Rather than copy everyone else, he recreated the way the game was played. When everyone else struggled using conventional coaching methods, he won championships.

It was my second day on the job at the NFL, as the Director of Youth Football Development.  Imagine my surprise and excitement when I was handed an airline ticket to San Francisco and told that I was going to visit with the legendary, Hall of Fame Coach, Bill Walsh. Widely recognized as one of the most successful coaches in the history of the game, leading the San Francisco 49ers to three Super Bowls, and mentoring some of the very best coaches such as Mike Holmgren, Dick Vermeil, George Seifert, and Pete Carroll, to name just a few.

Fresh from the world of soccer, I was brought in to turn around youth football’s low participation numbers.  Organized youth soccer had been launched in the 1970’s and already had millions of kids registered to play the game every weekend.  Youth football could account for only a fraction of the participants compared to soccer, despite the most recognized organization’s 70 plus year history. It was my task to make the sport more contemporary for millions of potential young athletes, and I knew it had to be unconventional in order to attract more kids to the game.

I will always remember that it was Bill who gave me the encouragement that second day on my new job to be innovative within football’s traditional system.  He told me to create programs that always had a child’s well being in mind.  Years later, after numerous conversations and visits in which I bounced new ideas and concepts off him, ground breaking programs such as Junior Player Development, High School Player Development, and NFL Street Unplugged were born.   All three programs have made a huge impact on attracting hundreds of thousands of additional kids to football.  All three have revolutionized the way kids are introduced, learn, and play the game.  So many great football minds advised in their development, but it was the support and feedback from one of the greatest minds in sports that gave me the confidence to introduce these programs into the traditional setting of the NFL.

This past Monday, July 30th, Bill Walsh passed away.  But his spirit and innovation will always remain with the game of football; from the elite level of the NFL to the first time a child picks up a football.

- Scott Lancaster, July 31, 2007