Every coach has the athlete who's easy to reach, and the one who's checked out, arms crossed, wall fully up. This episode is about that second athlete, and why they're usually the one who needs you most.

Tex breaks down the Coach-Athlete Reinforcing Loop, the five-stage cycle of trust extended, coaching delivered, athlete response, outcome, and reinforcement, and explains why it never resets to neutral.

We unpack the five real reasons athletes resist coaching, none of which are usually about defiance at all, and why treating resistance as data instead of a discipline problem changes everything about how a coach responds to it.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training -
15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow
Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

It has to be earned. Not given.

Fairfax Hackley spent 34 years with the Arnold Classic. He trained with legends like Vince Gironda and Steve Maholic. He is the Senior Vice President for the International Sports Hall of Fame, now in its 15th year, inducting names like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Ronda Rousey, David Goggins, and Marcus Allen.

But this episode isn't about bodybuilding. It's about mentorship. It's about standards. It's about what happens when you hit rock bottom and have to decide who you are on the other side of it.

Fairfax shares the story of catching a falling Lou Ferrigno mid-collapse, getting tested by legends who didn't hand out respect, and the moment he had $69 to his name and asked the devil if that was the best he had.

This one stays with you.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

Most coaches don't praise enough. The ones who do often praise the wrong way without ever knowing it.

In this episode, Tex breaks down why coaches stay silent when athletes get it right, the three mindset blocks holding that silence in place, and a concept from neuro-linguistic programming that changes how you think about the words you use around your team. You'll learn the three distinct types of praise (and why the one most coaches rely on is actually the weakest), why an overheard compliment can shape a kid's identity more than anything said to their face, and the warning that comes with that same power: it works exactly the same way in reverse.

Then the episode turns to the trap waiting on the other side of good praise. Drawing on trauma-informed research into performance-based confidence, Tex unpacks how praise tied only to outcomes can quietly teach an athlete that their worth has to be re-earned every single day, and what to do instead so the confidence you're building actually holds up when the scoreboard doesn't cooperate.

If you've ever wondered whether you're praising your athletes enough, or praising them in a way that's actually working, this episode is for you.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

Sean Waxman has spent 32 years in weight rooms, from Olympic weightlifting platforms to high school football programs, and he's convinced we're getting something seriously wrong with how we raise young men.

Strength used to be something you coveted. Now it's treated like a threat. Aggression gets pathologized instead of channeled. And the trophies-for-everyone era has stripped an entire generation of the chance to fail, sit with it, and try again.

Sean doesn't think the weight room fixes everything. But he thinks it's one of the last places left where a kid can fail safely, get pushed by an older guy who's been there, and learn that suffering well is a skill, not a punishment.

In this conversation, Sean and Tex get into:

• Why he left the college coaching track to coach high school football, even for free
• What "the disease of me" looks like inside a 90-kid football program
• How he builds team culture when he's not the head coach in the room
• The cardiac arrest that nearly killed him, and the clarity it gave him about what actually matters
• Why the best leaders on a team are rarely the most talented players

This one's part coaching philosophy, part hard truth, part reckoning with a guy who's spent his whole career in the room where boys either become men or don't.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

You've heard it a hundred times on a youth sideline: "Hustle!" "Not like that!" "MOVE!" And you've watched kids look back with zero idea what you actually want.

This week, Tex breaks down a framework called Coaching in 3D: three dimensions of instruction that eliminate confusion, build confidence, and give young athletes exactly what they need to perform.

Whether you're a youth coach, a parent who coaches, or a high school athlete working a camp, this episode will change how you open your mouth on a field forever.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

Trey Dombroski is a lefty starter in the Houston Astros organization, currently pitching Double-A ball with the Corpus Christi Hooks. Fourth round draft pick out of Monmouth University. Nearly 380 innings of pro experience and still climbing.

But this conversation goes way deeper than stats.

Trey breaks down what the Astros' velocity program actually did for his confidence on the mound, how the pitch clock forced him to condense his entire pre-pitch routine into five to seven seconds, and why flow state is the difference between executing and overthinking. We get into study guide days versus test days, the pitcher-catcher relationship, and why the locker room runs on banter as much as baseball.

He also makes a strong case for multi-sport athletes, calls out burnout culture in youth baseball, and explains why the best ability is still availability.

Oh, and yes, we talk quirks. Superstitions, game day meals, and the routines pitchers swear by and the ones they're trying to let go of.

If you coach athletes who have to perform under pressure, manage routines, and show up for their teammates, this one is for you.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

Six months into a doctoral program in Educational Leadership and Organizational Innovation, and the research is starting to ask harder questions than the coaching did.

In this episode, Tex breaks down research questions from the doctorate worth every coach's attention and reintroduces Social Emotional Learning. Not the K-12 buzzword version. The real framework, five competencies that define how human beings function inside groups under pressure. And he makes the case for why college athletics, built for performance and reshaped by the transfer portal, is not the environment for SEL development and a place that needs it most.

The episode closes with three research questions driving his dissertation in practice: what captains actually know about leading, what program conditions make or break them, and what coaches assume their leaders are ready for that they aren't.

Sports don't build leaders by accident. This episode is about why and what we're going to do about it.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com

Brianna Battles is an athlete, strength coach, mom of two, and the founder of Pregnancy & Postpartum Athleticism. She's coached at the Division I level, competes in jiu jitsu, and has spent her career helping women pursue a lifetime of athleticism. Today she's bringing that same lens to sport parenting.

In this episode, Tex and Brianna break down what it actually takes to raise gritty, multi-sport kids, from how you introduce competition early, to the car ride home after a tough loss, to knowing when to be a coach and when to just be a parent.

If you coach youth athletes, parent them, or both, this one's for you.

Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com

Training - 15 Min Dynamic Warm Up Flow - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/warmupflow Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train

C&C Merch - shop.captainsandcoaches.com