Coach's Corner with the Baltimore Mariners' Chris Simpson: Week 9

Published on April 16, 2010 under American Indoor Football Association (AIFA)
Baltimore Mariners News Release


BALTIMORE, MD (April 15, 2010) - I'm just going to put it out there; this is a big week for the Baltimore Mariners.

We've said it in the past, and it still holds true today, we have some unfinished business when it comes to playing the Reading Express. There has been six to seven months of having to chew on our first round playoff loss to them last season. It doesn't taste very good no matter how you try to dress it up. We were out played and we were out coached that game. No excuses. It was what it was.

Moving forward to this season our focus was, and is, to improve our team and organization. The Express have set the bench mark for other teams to reach. They are a solid organization from top to bottom. Our goal is to be better as a team, as coaches and as an organization.

I was pleasantly surprised at how quiet the bus trip home from New Jersey was. This team overcame a sluggish first half against the Revolution and hit their stride in the second half. This team doesn't quit. They have proven that more than once this season. Instead of conversations about our win, the focus was on our upcoming game against Reading. Vince Lombardi once said. "Success demands singleness of purpose."

Our goal is still the same, win the AIFA Championship. Reading is our next step in our journey there. If playing your conference rival isn't motivation enough, then, I don't know what else is. If finishing, what was left unfinished, doesn't have enough purpose in itself, I don't know what else does.

I love this quote from Theodore Roosevelt, "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

We have a goal, a purpose and a focus this week; Beat Reading.

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American Indoor Football Association Stories from April 16, 2010


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