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Parenting is a must-win game. That's true for all of us, including some of the most accomplished coaches and leaders in athletics across the country.
Presented by Black Raven and Little U Productions, Championship Parenting is a weekly master class on parenting and leadership from some of the top coaches, administrators and executives across the landscape of American sports — each of whom have children of their own, and a wealth of relatable stories and insight to share.
Kolby Paxton (00:02.012)
Some of y 'all know him as the guy who lit up Big 12 defenses as a quarterback at Texas Tech. Some of y 'all know him as the guy who threw 83 touchdowns with the LA Avengers in 2007. All y 'all know him as one of the brightest offensive minds in college football. He's the pride of Snyder, Texas. He's the father of Gray and Hayes. Louisiana Tech head coach Sonny Cumbie joins us today. Coach, thank you so much for your time. How you doing,
Sonny Cumbie (00:26.176)
I'm doing well, Kolby I appreciate you guys having me on today and we're right in the middle of our fall camp and so
caught us on a good day. Thursday today is just going to be a true meeting only day and so no walkthroughs or practices. So excited to carve out a little bit of time today and to spend with you guys.
Kolby Paxton (00:44.432)
Yeah, this will come out probably latter part of the month, but just for the audience, we're recording on August the 8th and I was made aware that it's your birthday. So happy birthday.
Sonny Cumbie (00:55.499)
Yeah, thanks. I appreciate it. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Another, another fall camp birthday. And it's always fun to celebrate with your team and with your players and with your coaches. And we do really kind of a tradition where my wife and boys come up usually in the PM meeting with our quarterback group and we have birthday cake and celebrate. And so that's always a fun time. And, know, now, now as, as being the, I was, you know, the offensive coordinator quarterback coach. And so that was really the lane that I was in was with the quarterbacks. And so now
as the head coach, you're broadened out and you're the head coach of everybody. And so, you don't want to show favorites, but we still do it with the quarterbacks just because that's the group that I'm involved in on a day -to -day basis as much as anybody. So that's a fun way for we celebrate it. So I appreciate you bringing that up and you know how it is. Once you get to a certain age, you stop counting.
Kolby Paxton (01:45.36)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but you're still a young man coach. You got a your best years are still ahead of you as a coach and as a dad. No question about that. Well, let's hop into you know kind of your foundation, right? I kind of like to take things in chronological order. So that begins with your childhood. The way you grew up your hometown, your dynamic with you know in the house that you grew up in and you know your involvement in athletics growing up. Take it wherever you want, but just kind of.
give the audience sort of a foundational perspective on Sonny Combi, the adolescent.
Sonny Cumbie (02:20.427)
I grew up in a town of about 12 ,000 people in Snyder, Texas and West Texas. I actually lived in a smaller community outside of that called Ira, Texas. so until I was around the sixth grade, went to school there, it was a six man school. So it was a smaller, fairly small school, but a lot of great people. People in West Texas, I think everyone has heard, you know, just in terms of just how gracious they are, how kind they are, blue collar, work really hard.
My mom and dad both were in the home. I had an older brother and younger brother. I was the middle, three years older, three years younger. So I was right in the middle of them. you know, we grew up out in the country really. And we're outside all the time. We're working, we're playing, we're doing a lot of work. You know, we would play whatever sport it was that season. It was that what we did. So if it was baseball, we were playing baseball. If it was basketball, it was basketball. And if it was football, we were footballing.
That was just kind of what we did in our community and a lot of really good people. Like I said, it was a blue collar community and growing up there, went to school at Snyder High School in the sixth grade, started going there. really, I think as I went through athletics, I was always drawn to sports. I loved sports, kept up with it. I played it, I watched it. Much to the pains of my wife, I have these huge tubwares full of
you know, cards, football cards, it's one those things when you move a few times, you know, you just continue to keep them and you move them and why do you hang on to them? And it's fun though, because now me and my boys can go through these cards, you know, when we have some time and we're going through them and they're asking me, you know, is this guy good? Is this guy good? We're building our own baseball teams out of the baseball cards that we had saved over the years. So, but yeah, so we did that and played sports and, you know, I was always drawn to them.
And then the competition piece of it was big. You I love to compete. You know, you really wanted to win. You wanted to be the best. And I think that as I transitioned to high school, you know, I still played all three sports. And really baseball was my first love in terms of sports. I loved playing baseball. I invested a lot of time in it. Basketball was a sport I really loved and loved to compete in. But it was more of I did it for fun. And then really my junior years, whenever I started playing football on
Sonny Cumbie (04:39.848)
I was freshman and then JV and then I played as a and then your first Friday night I can still remember that and you know in West Texas and when we played the game and you run out on the field and that's when you knew like hey man this is this is what I want to do this is something different about these Friday nights than these other sports that I've been playing in and so that's whenever that that itch became real and and so I think all of us are you know you're shaped by who you're a coach and who you're around and
And so just was really fortunate to be around so many quality men first off, but then also quality coaches. And that's where, you know, men like David Ball and Bud Burks, know, Roland Herrera, you know, those guys that were our coaches in high school, like really shaped me. And that's where I knew, man, I wanted to coach. Like, I want to do this. I want to play sports as long as I can. But I just love being around them. I want to coach. And then you transition from high school, being around men that...
you know, were really great men in terms of how they lived their life and then also how they coached and we were successful. And then we moved on to college at Texas Tech as a walk on. You know, I had a few offers to go play junior college baseball at other places, a few division two schools in terms of football. I was actually going to go to Tarleton State to play football. I'd committed to them. And then, you know, Mike Leach, that's when he transitioned from Oklahoma to Texas Tech as the head coach. And, and I knew his offense was an offense that threw the ball a lot. And so,
I knew I couldn't run, but I could throw decent. And so maybe that would be a good offense for me to be in. And so I knew, I felt like it was going to be an offense that I wanted to learn. And so in my back of my mind, if I couldn't play, you know, at least I could learn the offense and be able to go on and coach it. And then, and so when Leach went to Texas Tech, you know, I ended up being a preferred walk on there, you know, and, and through the, through, there was a lot of different dominoes that failed that allowed me to be the walk on there in terms of people who helped you along the way.
And there's a lot of backstories to it. The primary one was my girlfriend at the time and now my wife, she was already in school at Texas Tech. And so she was from Snyder. And so I followed her there a little bit, which was a great decision for me in so many ways. And then also there was other people there that were in place that helped me to be a preferred walk -on with Mike Leach and his staff. And then you think back to that staff, the first staff.
Sonny Cumbie (07:05.798)
Whenever we were walk on, know, you had Mike Leach as the head coach. On offense, you had R. Briles as the running back coach. You had Sonny Dyches as the receivers coach. Dana Holgerson as the inside receivers coach. You had Robert and I as the offensive coordinator. You had Bill Biedenboe who was the offensive graduate assistant. You had David Nichol who was a student assistant. You know, on defense, you had Dave Aranda who was a graduate assistant on defense. You know, you had Brian Norwood. I mean, there was just so many quality, quality men.
Ruffin McNeil, I mean, Ruffin McNeil was the assistant head coach and just an unbelievable person and coach. so, I mean, to be around those guys, I mean, it was, you don't realize it when you're in the midst of it. But I think you also look at, and I'm going to leave a few names off of it. Probably I'll forget, but that team at Texas Tech from the time that we were there, it's unbelievable how many of those players have gone on to be really successful coaches or just, and to be coaches.
And I think a big part of it was probably because how they were shaped with coaches. I mean, you got Mike Smith who's in the got Kevin Curtis. I mean, you Wes Walker who played, who's now coaching in the NFL. Cliff, Lincoln, myself, all the guys that played, that are now coaching Chris Kisurks at the San Francisco 49ers who play defensive line. And so there's just a lot of guys, Trey Haverty, coached for a while. so coaching is such a great profession. I equate it to teaching.
I think of it as that we're in the business of education. so just really that's kind of what led me to one of the coach and a little bit about my background from that standpoint.
Kolby Paxton (08:41.084)
Sonny, we're in trouble because about seven minutes into this thing, I got 25 follow ups from what you just said, and we don't have time for 25 follow ups. you're right. The Texas Tech coaching tree present days is pretty crazy when you take a step back and look at it. I think it has a lot to do with y 'all being ahead of your time offensively down there and folks craving that sort of an approach to offensive football around the country.
but man, I want to, I don't want to overstate this by any stretch of the imagination because, the, the similarities are not, your four inches taller than me, a hell of a lot better quarterback than I ever thought about being, and, know, stops in the NFL, the AFL. so we, you and I are not the same prospect, but there, there are similarities in, in a way that we kind of came up football versus baseball versus basketball in high school.
Sonny Cumbie (09:16.481)
you
Kolby Paxton (09:40.7)
preferred walk on at a big 12 school and kind of the thought process behind that and kind of what led you there. And so I wanna zoom into a couple of things there. First of all, and I haven't had this conversation with anybody else on this platform before, but I think you're great for it. From my perspective, and you spoke to Friday Night Lights, I was a better baseball player than I was a football player. I know that, I knew that then. But I know that objectively, certainly as an adult.
But there was such a draw to the Friday Night Lights. in my opinion, I think it was more than that. And I want your perspective, I'm not here to just give everybody mine. But I felt like, looking back at it, I feel like when you play football, and they take it a lot more serious down in Texas than they did in Northwest Arkansas, but if you're gonna play somewhere in Arkansas, Springdale was the place to play. That's where I went to high school. We had a run there with Coach Miles on where we were.
Sonny Cumbie (10:16.355)
Okay.
Kolby Paxton (10:39.31)
selling out our little Modest Stadium every Friday night. And it's something about carrying the responsibility of, know the whole town cares about the result. You know the whole town's behind you. And the accountability that that forces on a teenage boy at that age, you can't get that in any other sport. And I wonder if that is really the differentiator between football and everything else, just in terms of what a young man can get out of that growing up. I don't know.
I didn't do a great job asking a question, but do you have any insider thoughts on that, generally speaking?
Sonny Cumbie (11:13.313)
You know, I think that like what football brings is it's such a team sport from the standpoint of it takes so it takes 11 people on offense all pulling in the same direction, you know, all unified in their actions and in their beliefs. Every single play, whether you're playing 60 snaps a game or 75 snaps a game, same thing on defense. You know, it's 11 players on the field, special teams. It's the same thing. You're all your 11 players on the field, all trying to do the same thing. And so from an accountability standpoint,
you know, that's there's such a large amount of people that you're all trying to get on the same page. And I think that's what I think with football from the standpoint of the connections amongst the locker room, the connections amongst coaches and amongst the players is just what makes this game so great. And, you know, I think that I thrive personally on account like on accountability and structure. And that's what I think this game provides so many young people is is a
For them, you know, have a coach that is a consistent figure in your life that hopefully is pouring into you, you know, in the right way. And accountability is hard and is uncomfortable at times. Sometimes it's uncomfortable delivering the accountability. It's as a coach and as a leader. But you also have to have the long game and vision and what you're trying to accomplish and how you've seen young men grow and thrive.
from an accountability structure standpoint and being held accountable to themselves and to one another. And so I like this game is we talk about it all the time, just in our college, in our locker room. And it's the same for all the, you know, across the country, but you have 120 young men. And I mean, think about all of the different socioeconomic backgrounds, all the different upbringings, all the different backgrounds that bring us together in a team room is one thing brings us here and it's football.
And this game has brought us here as a tool. And now for us to grow together, to learn, to learn, to love and respect and appreciate the differences of others, beliefs of others. And all the while, I respect that. Sometimes you may not always agree with it, but I'm going to put, you know, my self, whatever, I'm going to put what I hold as the dearest and the team says it's this. So let's go out and be it. And so in terms of the accountability to one another, this game is awesome.
Sonny Cumbie (13:40.004)
And there's a lot of it that, know, just from a functional standpoint on every, like when you're watching a game, you know, you have to have everybody on the same page from that standpoint. But I don't think that the plays and the schemes and the calls, they don't have a great chance of coming to life like you want them to as a coach. If there's not a strong accountability structure placed on the foundation of your team and your locker room and your players to one another. so, and ultimately I believe it becomes an account. It starts from the accountability to yourself. And we try to.
We'll clearly define those expectations, clearly define those standards within our program of what we're looking for. And so I think that's the great thing about football. And then it's once a week. every day is a build up to that Friday night. And you get closer and you get closer. And then you love the Thursdays and the camaraderie of high school, the pep rallies on Friday mornings or Friday afternoons. then
Kolby Paxton (14:32.944)
yeah
Sonny Cumbie (14:35.012)
you know, that downtime between the game or that bus ride, you know, and there's just something so rich about those freaking yellow dog bus rides, you know, that you look back on and now, and you don't even realize, man, these are, it's awesome. You're, you know, you're carrying your pads on the bus and the windows down for your AC and, you know, it's just, you're with your boys and your guys that you've grown up with since kindergarten. And so to try to capture all that, it's really challenging in the college aspect now with.
know, transfer portal and NIL and things like that. you're still trying to capture the accountability piece. And that's what I think this game is so fun. And I think it catches a lot of people in the excitement. And because you're one time a week, man, it's a huge buildup, especially now on the college level, the NFL level. And now everything trickles down, you know, from a high school level. have, locally, have talk shows on the radios. You have newspapers where you're to.
Anyways, that with each day, there's a certain build up to Friday night. And then in the college game, you have college, the TV shows and everything. It's just so much, it's just built up for a one time week where you're gonna get after it. And so I think that's one of the things that draws a lot of people to football.
Kolby Paxton (15:45.456)
Yeah, now I agree with everything you said. You got two young boys, mine's a little younger than yours. I'm already, I firmly believe everything you said to be absolutely true. And I want so badly for my son to get to experience it. But I also am self -aware enough to know that part of the reason I was so drawn to sports in general, but football in particular, was that my parents didn't
It wasn't forced on me. It was up to me to want it, to love it, to play it. But I know what it feels like and I want my son to have that experience. Everything you just said, the bus rides, Friday night lights, the weekly build up, the camaraderie with the team. But he's four and I'm not an idiot. What has been your approach to trying to expose your boys to the sport in a way that is, their interest but doesn't feel overbearing to you?
Sonny Cumbie (16:15.673)
Mm.
Sonny Cumbie (16:43.779)
Right, that's a challenge, you know, and I think that the same, Kolby, I, you know, I wasn't pressured, you know, from a parent standpoint of you have to play and you have to achieve and you have to do this. It was very much of, hey, if you want to do it, we're all for you. We're going to support you. But, know, the only thing I remember the most from that standpoint is you're going to finish it. Like if you choose to do something, like you're going to finish it. And then if you don't want to do it next year, then you don't do it the next year.
But with my boys, I have an eight -year -old Hayes and an 11 -year -old Gray. And both of them are in, it's great age that they're in and it just gets better and better. Kolby, the older they get, I mean, just the more fun they get and the more joy they bring. And I think that it does go by very quickly. The thing about this job, and I think, know, in this, like our job is very time intensive and there's a lot of jobs that are time intensive. And I think that from a parent standpoint, I want my kids to number one,
know that I love and accept them for who they are and really for who God has placed me to be and that's to shepherd them. And he's given them to me and I want them to know if they want to play football, great. If they don't want to play football, great. If they play and they do really well, great. And if they don't do well, great. I just want to accept them and I want them to feel that. I want them to feel it more than I say it.
The feeling part of it is in my body language, my eye contact, my intentionality of my time when I'm with them and irregardless of a result of anything they choose to do. And so from a sporting standpoint, that's the approach that I say and I want to live it out. so my 11 year old is really heavy in basketball. I think they're around football so much. He has a very sharp mind for it.
you know, and I want them to be around our practices as all of our coaches kids, you know, I think fall camp's the best because they're not in school. And so typically they get to be around our practices and they can help out, you they can snap balls during offensive drills, you know, they're on the field, they're chasing guys around. And so I want them to be a part of what we're doing. And from an athletic standpoint, I just, you there's a, I think they naturally like, I can sense the competitive nature that they have and their want to win. But I also,
Sonny Cumbie (19:01.926)
Want to understand to like that. It's really hard to be successful in anything in sports. And if you want to be a really good basketball player, you better practice. And it's like we go out to the golf course and they get frustrated because we play twice a year and they hit the ball crummy. And I'm like, guys, you should expect to hit the ball crummy in golf. Like you never practice. You need to understand like this is the most humbling, hardest game there is. And you have to practice.
Kolby Paxton (19:29.734)
Sonny, I still practice and I practice and I still hit the ball like crap. So, you know.
Sonny Cumbie (19:32.317)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's what I tell them. It's like they're my father -in -law's played golf his whole life and he's got a lot of really good rounds and lot of blue bat rounds and then it's just a hard game. And so, you know, my eight -year -old, made, he was in, he played some, some all -star baseball and, and, so he's starting to get, I think that it's for him. He was starting to get excited about it and getting into it. And so, you know, I'd always have the temper like those car rides home, car ride homes after practice. I just try to throw it out there. Like we're talking about it. And now I just try to preface the hate.
If you'd like for me to help, I'm here to help. If you ever, would you like any tips, would you like for me to talk to you about your fielding? And no, I'm good. so try to steer the conversation towards not practice or the result or let them bring approach me with it. so I want them very much. And this is Kolby too, what's so interesting is they have been so fortunate to have great teachers.
here and in Lubbock and in Fort Worth like and and and and then and now as they've gone into sports here just phenomenal basketball coach for great phenomenal baseball coaches for Hayes and what is very great rich for me to sit back and see is the impact that coaches and teachers have already had on my child and and and how important that is Because they enjoy playing the sports because they have a coach that makes it enjoyable holds them accountable
makes them listen, makes them pay attention. There's things and things they have to do. But at the end of the day, they want to get in that car. They want to go home. And they, when it's said, Hey, let's go to practice tomorrow. It's not a fight scratch claw to get a man. Like they go in, they want to do it. And I think that's the thing at an early age, man, you just want kids to enjoy it. You want them to have fun with it, learn the proper ways. And I think sometimes there's kids that you can tell at an early age that maybe they're fired, stoked pretty quick for it. And, and they have a high talent level or, you know, whatever it is and they want to.
pursue it a little bit more than the others. I think it is also too, at some point when it's age appropriate to realistically have the conversation of, right, if you want to pursue this, you have to put some work into it. Because it's just like anything that you do. If you're going to play the piano, you're to have to practice playing the piano. You're not just going to show up on the recital, and it's going to sound real good.
Kolby Paxton (21:42.513)
Yep.
Kolby Paxton (21:52.405)
It'll be nice if it did. No, I think that's a, that is such an important point to me. Cause I think, and really the premise for what we're doing with the show is, it's not to say, parents who don't have the background in sports that Sonny Cumbie has, like you don't know as much as him, so you need to learn from him. It's not like you,
Sonny Cumbie (21:53.754)
Yeah.
Kolby Paxton (22:19.876)
You got to put your kid in sports because I played sports and you played sports. And so we think it's in my opinion, it's that combination. You need strong parents. You need that back, that backbone at home. but I, I feel so strongly that you also need those outside influences of the coaches that you grow up with and play with, throughout your childhood. And you know, if, you love it and you're good at it, obviously into college and maybe beyond for you, I'm, I'm interested to know, you know,
at any point in your life, it's pretty, you listed off a murderous row of coaches in Texas Tech, And Lincoln Riley and Ruffin McNeil and Sonny Dykes. And we had Sonny on the show and he was talking about just watching an interview with Bob Stoops and something that Stoops has said about, always is gonna, like the one thing he took from that, one of the things he took from that was that Bob always would take his kids to school.
Sonny Cumbie (23:07.886)
Mm -hmm.
Kolby Paxton (23:19.354)
no matter what. He's a head coach at the University of Oklahoma, but he's always dropping his kids off at school. And that was like the moment for Sonny when he realized, okay, I can do this. I can both parent and coach. You've been, I mean, you play for Mike Leach, Tommy Tuberville, Cliff Kingsbury, Gary Patters. I I could do this all day. Who have been your biggest influences, your biggest mentors in terms of you developing your own style for leadership and subsequent to that parenting?
Sonny Cumbie (23:49.268)
You know, I think that, I had, you know, this was really advice that I was given is no matter what you do choose to do, if you want to be a good dad, you can be a good dad. If you want to be a good husband, you can be a good husband. You know, the the quantity of our time.
It's all different and different professions, but the quality of your time that you spend with your kids and obviously, first and foremost, your spouse is up to us. And so that's where within our program, you want to be able to have your family's a part of what you do every single day because it's so time intensive. And guys, for me, guy like Neil Brown at West Virginia, worked with him at Texas Tech as an offensive coordinator, probably one of my best friends and very influential in terms of.
of that, those types of thoughts. know, as a player, you know, I think you, you take a little bit of everything and, know, in terms of like offensive football and practice dots and offensive thoughts, you know, lot of what Mike Leach talked about just in terms of having players that have clear minds and fast legs and being really good teachers and the repetition of what you do and how you set up your practice. You know, I think that when you're out there, you work, I worked for Gary Patterson and from an organization standpoint and structure and
and the hows and whys of what you do from a football standpoint. He was a lot like Coach Leach defensively. Obviously their personalities are very different, but like the ultimate belief in what they did and why you do it and understanding the hows and whys of how you practice things and how you structure things from a program standpoint. think Cliff Kingsbury is innovative and creativity on offense in terms of not being afraid to try new things, you know, from an offensive standpoint. You know, I think very much
you know, impacted me from our time together at Texas Tech. And then, you know, I think Matt Wells did a great job of leading a staff and having your family around, had, you know, and really led us coach as coach. And so you take, you take a lot of things from each coach. And so, you know, I think that, you know, probably one of the biggest impacts on my time was at TCU with Gary Patterson, with that coaching staff, you know, obviously playing for Coach Leach. And then, you know, being around guys like Neil Brown, you know, being around
Sonny Cumbie (26:00.872)
My guy, like Chris Thompson, who's the offensive or the tight ends coach, assistant head coach, deputy head coach at Florida State, who has been a head coach at Abilene Christian in the state of Texas. And so those guys were really impactful for me as a coach in terms of how you operate your program. And then ultimately what fits my personality and what fits my belief system. And it's like, you you go through and there's probably a bunch of different.
Yeah, there's a bunch of different flavors of ice cream that people like and then they're all good and then they're all very successful for Bluebell. All right. But, you know, at the end of the day, I like dust chocolate and that's where I settle. You know, they've got the ooey gooey butter cake right now that's kind of in my wheelhouse and I like that. But I always settle back to dust chocolate because that's what works for me. And that's just my personality, my taste buds. I think.
Kolby Paxton (26:48.56)
I gotta send that clip to Bluebell, see if I can get a sponsor for the podcast. That was good, we'll do that.
Nah, well, perfectly said. Perfectly said. Do you think, is it a one -to -one, apples to apples, so to speak, your approach to parenting versus your approach to coaching, or is there nuance to that? And maybe that's a dumb question, but just in terms of your philosophy, your discipline, all the things that you just said, do you feel like you treat your boys and your actual sons and the boys on your team more or less with the same approach, or do you have to differentiate a bit?
Sonny Cumbie (27:23.583)
Well, I think you differentiate a bit. You have the same standards. You have the same discipline. You have the same accountability structure. But I know my 11 year old is very, he's different than my eight year old in terms of how handle them. And so I'm going to approach them differently. And it's the same with your football team is where there's guys that can handle, know, hard coaching and there's guys that don't like it. And then
Kolby Paxton (27:37.318)
Yup. Yup.
Sonny Cumbie (27:50.405)
I think at the end of the day, I've tried to grow as a coach and a communication standpoint of having conversations and being a better teacher. That's kind of the thing that I'm on now. It's just like, is being a better teacher to our players and then also to your kids. And sometimes, I think one thing as a parent to always, I think to keep in the back of our minds is our parents, our kids, they're sponges.
And whether we think that most of the time we feel like they're probably not listening to us. They are listening to us and they most definitely are watching us and they are observing. And I think that there's so much to think about on that as a parent, but just like they listen to everything you say, whether you're talking to them. mean, they're like, me and my wife were trying to have a conversation and they're in two rooms over. And then all of sudden my 11 year old comes in and he say, Hey, what were you talking about with so and so in the football team?
So I was like, hey, we'll talk about that. But they listen and they observe body language and they observe interaction. And I think that that's the same with your players. Our players are very, very discerning. They listen, they observe, and they watch. And I think at the end of the day, we all want someone who is genuine, who truly cares about you, and that care shape surfaces in different ways in different days.
That's what I think we all want. And that's what I our, that's what I want my boys to feel, seen, valued and heard. I want them to feel loved because they're my child and all the other things, you know, we have to fight through and go through and see in terms of achieving and, you know, not and failure and, know, and, that's where as a parent too, that it sits you, you know, you're, sitting there watching a baseball game and, know, your kid may make an error and man, you're just so like.
It's like a kick in the stomach, man. You're just like, because you want it so bad for them. you know, know, know, that's that's like seeing them fail. But I think like standing back and seeing how they process it, you know, in a healthy situation, you know, obviously, if there's something dangerous going on, you got to intercede and help. But I think in that and like in seeing them try and fail, try and fail and just watch, OK, how are they going to process this?
Kolby Paxton (29:46.0)
Yeah.
Sonny Cumbie (30:07.908)
How are they gonna handle it? Because that's what is important that they go through it on their own and then we can come in later and if they want, you know, and try to help and walk them through that. And it's a little bit the same with our players is, you know, you sit back and watch them practice. You sit back and sometimes things happen and then, okay, let's see how they're gonna react to this on their own because I'm not gonna be out there on Saturday. Like I can't be out there correcting them. I can't be out there holding their hand every single step of the way. So.
And I think you very much have to practice those things if you want them to react in a way. And then you go back, you watch the film and you train them and you're, this is how we need to react to be successful.
Kolby Paxton (30:48.476)
I think that's a great place to land a plane. I've mentioned this before and I'll mention it to you because you're uniquely qualified to offer up any insight here. My son, again, he's four, yours are eight and 11. One thing I've observed with him is we watch a lot of Texas Rangers baseball. We were 15 minutes from the ballpark, so I take him up there all the time. he thinks because Corey Seeger,
hits home runs anytime he's paying attention. That that's what he should be doing in the backyard as a four year old, right? And I'm like, nah, man, just hit off the tee. let's, what, he doesn't want me on a knee. He really doesn't want me throwing underhanded. He wants me throwing 90 mile an hour fastballs and he expects to deposit those about 400 feet away. And, and when he does it, one of my challenges thus far has been managing his frustration. So your boys, not only are they around,
Sonny Cumbie (31:19.016)
Mm -hmm.
Sonny Cumbie (31:26.007)
You
Sonny Cumbie (31:33.252)
You
Kolby Paxton (31:46.172)
you know high level athletes division one college football players on a daily basis, but their father is a very accomplished athlete and so I wonder how you manage or if you have to their frustration when When they fail and they and they feel like it shouldn't be that difficult because they see other people make it easy Or they see clips of you on YouTube going for 4 ,700 yards
Sonny Cumbie (32:09.705)
Well, first of all, what a great place to take your son to globe life and to watch the game. I mean,
Kolby Paxton (32:13.596)
Yeah, yeah.
Sonny Cumbie (32:15.169)
My boys, we've gone there a handful of times, you know, and they just, I mean, it's unbelievable. It's a great place. And I'm laughing and because Kobe, these are the same, my eight year old is same way. I mean, they, and then in my 11 year old in basketball, I mean, it's spring can crank three pointers, right? Let's not work on layups. Let's don't work on bounce passes. Let's don't work on defense. Let's don't work on free throws. Let's just jack up three pointers. Cause that's what you want to score points. And you watch Steph Curry and do it. And then in baseball, it's the same thing. It's,
You play MLB the show and you see the slow -mo where the guys, he's slow -moing shortstop, like he's throwing and it's a freaking rocket. And so now I can't get my eight -year -old to step and throw the ball when he builds a grounder. He wants to throw everything three quarters underarm and falling away. so I think I like to try to show them videos. I know like when Caitlin Clark was having her run in the NCAA tournament, there were videos of her practice.
Kolby Paxton (32:58.972)
Ha
Kolby Paxton (33:03.942)
Yeah.
Sonny Cumbie (33:14.13)
her daily practice routines and daily practice habits. And the Olympics are going on right now. And I think it's still from an age appropriate standpoint when they can like wrap their mind around it. Like guys, like this is an emotional to watch these Olympians win the gold medal. Like they have spent their whole life trying to do this and they've done it. And then some have it, you know? And so it's an emotional, that's why the people get emotional on the Olympics is.
is that is the best in the world, but they have, they've sacrificed a lot more than we know and from their time. And so I think that's just the, like what I think I always, you know, I try to ask my 11 year old, you know, and to my eight year old still, you know, he's still working up to it, but it's like, what, you know, how did you expect that to go? You you've, you've practiced zero times and you know, the game, you know, and so, it's, easy to say all this to me and you on a podcast and then they just get, you know, they just get frustrated because they want to hit home runs and they, they, they want to do the things that are flashy.
And I think it's, you know, at some point too, you're able to just break it down and because I'm like, you man, let's hit up, start off the tee. Now throw it to me right now. And I'm like, okay, all right. He wants to be out here with me. So I'll throw it to him right now. And here we go. And then I can't get him to load up off his back foot, you know, it's just like, you know, but you know, they're out there with you. And I think at some point they, you know, they, that it's better than not.
Kolby Paxton (34:18.288)
Yep.
Kolby Paxton (34:25.916)
No,
Sonny Cumbie (34:37.022)
I think just trying to explain to him how hard it is because Corey Seeger's done this a million times in his life and there is a lot of work that goes into it. But I think he always, always try to land the plane. Like you said, it's from like, man, I love spending time with you. It's the best part of my day spending time with you. I want you to know it's really hard. And then I think try to show them different. And I think like you said, like you have other coaches and other people that can also speak the same thing, the same message.
and to tell them that it takes a lot of time and energy to do something. Anything that you want to be successful at, it's going to be really hard.
Kolby Paxton (35:13.158)
Beautifully said coach, Louisiana Tech head football coach Sonny Comby, man, you've been really gracious with your time. There was a lot here. I feel like we could have gone for a couple of hours. So maybe I'll catch up with you later. We'll see how it's going. Trying to get that throw from short to be more fundamentally sound down the road. But I thank you for your time this morning, man. And best of luck to Louisiana Tech football this fall. I'll be watching the rooting for you guys.
Sonny Cumbie (35:38.439)
Thanks, Kolby. Now, I appreciate you having me on and I'd love to be on again. And I think, like you said, we could chop it up for long time, but I appreciate it. And it was good to visit with you and hope to see you later on.