UK high jump coach banned for 3 years for saying, "I don’t give a sh**t that you are crying, I couldn’t care” & other mean things

The pussification continues. You can't say sh!t to athletes or they go cry to their mommies. There is a reason the military trains soldiers the way they do; because it works. Telling a high jumper that their run up is sh!t is direct and pertinent information. Using 20 extra words to soften the tone so their feelings don't get hurt is unproductive and a waste of time. People need to man the f**k up!

I mean, it sounds like this guy just sucks at his job. He probably lacks self-awareness and has a hard time talking to people. I think banning him is just another way of saying he's incompetent at his chosen profession.

Can criticise this as the world gone soft or woke or whatever, but if I acted how this guy did at most of the office jobs I've had in life I'd have been asking to get fired. Maybe would have gotten away with it depending on who heard about my behaviour but I'd definitely be sweating the conversation with HR. Why shouldn't professional athletics hold its coaches to professional standards?

Guy admitted to most of it too.

There's a very high-profile guy in my profession who was recently fired from his job.

In his case, there's a long string of documented sh1tty behaviors. If you point at any single thing you might say 'I can't believe someone was fired for this' (and he's got a bunch of defenders who do this). But if you look in aggregate, it's clear that this guy was just a menace who had a negative influence on many many people around him.

So I don't know about this particular coach's case but I think that very often in these situations you should bear in mind that people lose their jobs because of a long accumulation of bad behavior instead of just one thing that is clearly a fireable offense.

Hopefully the athlete who reported this is so damaged they never compete well again. The pussification is disgusting.

did you ever notice only successful coaches get banned? it's as if their methods ACTUALLY WORK.

As someone who has been coaching for 40 years, sometimes you need to be "mean" to wake the athlete up

if you sugar coat everything, you only end up with a chocolate covered turd

I mean, if it were a no name coach who never achieved anything it wouldn't make the news would it.

"Coach Jim of the the Highgate Harriers, renowned for coaching Jack Smells - a 3:09 marathoner and strava local legend of 3 segments, has been suspended for calling a doctor an fudge twit" -- not going to get a write up from the guardian or make it to LetsRun is it?

Only banned coaches to make headlines will be coaches who were good enough to coach athletes who are themselves making headlines.

This is sensible. As a pretty close analogue, I'm a writing teacher. I hope I'd get fired if I let loose a "what the f*** is all this passive voice about, you f***ing r*****!?!"

If you’re incompetent and/or a dick, people will fire/stop hiring you. There’s no need to ban someone for being mean.

Young people in the UK have to have classic children's books rewritten with offensive words like 'fat' removed. God knows how they are going to cope over the next 50 years facing nuclear confrontations with China and Rissia, climate change, AI singularity, religious and ethnic civil wars in the UK and Europe etc etc.

You, my friend, are an ablist

So, we can all agree that the coach is a trash human. He may be great at his job, but trash as a person.

The issue I have is that the athletes do not feel empowered enough to say, "piss off, I'm finding a coach that is good and respects me as a person". Which would either destroy his career or force him to change his behaviors.

Instead, we have to wait until complaints are gathered for a few years and go through a dog and pony show by an organization that wants to pretend it has the moral high ground.

Some people seem to enjoy their idols being trashed. Really, go see a psychiatrist. I haven't seen anyone point it, but there should be more about the question "is it tolerable to insult athletes?"

If it is chronical, isn't balanced with compliments, is only the proof of an obviously toxic relationship, then the coach is most certainly faulty. However, if once in a long time partnership, the coach gives you a rough wake up, it's not yet bullying. But for anything in the middle, with more or less self-awareness from the coach, the cases are much more delicate to judge, but I find it hard to overlook the issue, and perhaps ruin athletes mental and physical health.

He's, conservatively, one of the three best high jump coaches on the planet, since Wolfgang retired. Say what you want about the extremely uncouth things Caan said, but don't discount what he's produced. He builds tremendous youth jumpers and Grabarz, Lake and Gold medalist Marco Fassinotti all owe his teachings a tremendous amount.

Two things can be true: he can be an ass , and he can be a good coach. Your shallow conjectures are embarrassing.

A coaches job is to get the best out of their athletes. On what planet is insulting someone, mocking them and ignoring their emotions the correct way to handle a situation. This coach clearly has no clue how to deal with his athletes and should not be coaching. Verbally attacking someone does not make you "a man" or "tough" it makes you an a-hole. Why would anyone want to run/jump for a horrible person like this?

Here is what many people choose to ignore. You DO NOT coach an event you coach people. If he can't do so without being an a-hole than no, sorry, he is not a good coach. He is merely a good technician

Correct. But how many good technicians are there?

I found another article on him. He's VERY accomplished.

The 56-year-old has coached many of Britain’s best high jumpers such as London 2012 silver medallist Robbie Grabarz and former and current UK record-holders Isobel Pooley and Morgan Lake, plus Tom Parsons, Emily Borthwick and Brendan Reilly.

The ban doens't hurt him too much as he's currently coaching in the Middle East and will be eligible by the 2024 Olympics as it's backdated.

athleticsweekly.com

High jump coach Fuzz Caan banned for misconduct - AW

Three-year ban for man who guided careers of Robbie Grabarz, Isobel Pooley and Morgan Lake after verbally abusing athletes

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