The benign hermit/lord supreme of the fieldhouse has spoken! Head football coach Gregg Miller has allowed his pupils to gaze in his depths of wisdom for the past three years and now, I, one of his reluctant charges, is willing to speak. Straight from the horse’s mouth, I present to you, Millerisms!

“You want to talk about fair? Why don’t you ask the rabbit being chased by the wolves how fair life is?”

One of the first things drilled into our minds was that life was not fair, and that we weren’t expected to ask for fairness. This helped me and my teammates not complain about whatever happened to us and keep chugging along. Nothing in life was ever going to be fair because fairness is human concept, and nature will never operate along human lines.

“You’re going to get behind in a football game. You’re going to get ahead in a football game.”

Miller preached that we weren’t suppose to let our surroundings dictate how we played the game. If we were down by four points, we were to play with a level head and not panic. If we were absolutely slaughtering someone, we weren’t allowed to let our focus slip for a fraction a second. You have to take the hits and the blessings with the same demeanor.

“You don’t get your identity from the scoreboard.”

Coach would tell us this both as a compliment and as a challenge to us. We learned that we weren’t merely what the scoreboard and our record said we were. This was to be applied to not just look at things at the surface level. Just because someone is great on paper, it doesn’t mean that they are going to be all they’re chalked up to be. Also don’t discount someone for the same reasons.

“Cool man cool.”

This is a term for anyone who tried to to make looking cool more important than actually working hard and succeeding. It doesn’t matter if you have all the flashy doo-dahs and have a lightning bolt on your socks and wristbands, if you can’t perform when the lights come on. A knife works best when it’s not made fancy and flashy. It might still cut the same, but you spend more worrying about it looking nice than working with it.

“Thugs, lovers and thieves.”

Thugs, lovers and thieves was the reputation of the team up until the point that Miller arrived. One of the first acts Miller did was tighten the standards of the offseason. This cut down the number of guys who were only there to say they were part of the team. The ones who stayed had to put way more effort than before.

“You stick a turd in vanilla, it’s still a turd!”

If you take a turd and put it in vanilla, even though it smells good, it’s still poop. You can’t hide behind words. Your actions will reveal your character. If you talk a big game but can’t back it up, you’re just a coward in a man’s hide. You can dress someone up and give them all the opportunities in the world. But if it comes down to the wire and that person chooses to waste the opportunities, you have yourself a vanilla-dipped turd.

“AD/SU”

This acronym stands for Attention to Detail/Sense of Urgency. This was the mentality we’re supposed to have while undertaking any task. You pay attention to the details and small things while also working with a mindset of needing it to be done quickly. If you stick to that, all the big concerns will fall into place.

“Break through the wall.”

You find your limits and instead of collapsing when you reach them, you keep trying to push them farther back. When the day comes that you surpass what was your limit, whether that be bench press or studying, you pat yourself on the back and keep pushing forward to find the new limit. Once you find it, you repeat the process every day. When you make that a habit, almost anything is possible.

“That’s a real neat deal.”

Now, that just explains it all, doesn’t it?