Kristianstad Stadium

Here are some pics of our home stadium in Kristianstad.

First Practice

We had our first practice Tuesday evening. It was a good turnout and i was very pleased with the effort and execution for the first day. I met the team at 6:00 in the clubhouse and introduced myself as Head Coach (kinda weird) and then talked about expectations for practice and games. After, I handed out playbooks and then started install meetings for the offense. We went over Inside Zone/Izzy Check and 4 Quick passes Hero, Tree, Slants, Shoe(Door). We had a condensed field and had to share it with the U17 team but it was good to be able to work with some of the younger kids.

I was very anxious to see the talent level of my guys. Especially the QB. He has a lot of responsibility in this offense and if we are going to be successful he will need to be a major factor. I was very happy with his performance. For the first time running my offense he is by far the best QB in terms of composure, confidence and control that i have ever had on day 1. He took charge from the first snap and with no hesitation. He made mostly the right reads in Izzy Check and i Never had to correct him in the procedure of what to look for. It was a very good practice in that regard.

Talent wise we have some talented players but lack depth at almost every position. It was disappointing to see that the defense didn't have a great turn out but i imagine once we get the full field and start our full practices then it will get better. The overall age of the team is very young. There is a wide range of experience, we have a couple of guys with a lot of experience but for the most part the team is made up of 19-22 year olds. But i am very pleased with the team I inherited.

The defensive coaching staff got together last night for a meeting and dinner. I like the personalities of the guys i am coaching with. The defensive coordinator is Coach Bill and he has a firm grasp of what he wants to do on defense. I think he and i will get along very well this year, I like him a lot. I will definitely push him to expand on what he is doing and challenge our guys to do more defensively.

I have a very short video of part of practice. we are working on our Quicks

First Day in Sweden

 I am in Sweden, got an ok night of sleep. I was very exhausted after a very long flight. My studio is in a great location right between the stadium we play and practice at and the city center. The city center seems very cool. Lots of older buildings and there is no car traffic through the center, only foot and bicycle. There is a huge grocery store 2 blocks away.It is like a smaller version of a Walmart but the food section is bigger. The President of the organization Anders Klang. They call him "Big Boss". He and an other Board member, Karsten Stromberg, took me shopping and got some stuff for the apartment and some groceries to get me started.


Visa större karta

After I went out to pizza with Karsten and his family. He, his wife, and daughter and son. His son is actually one of my players on the Senior team. He plays WR. But looks more like a TE. Pizza was good, a little different from the US but really how much different can a pizza be. The only weird part was that it had ranch dressing squirted on it. It was like they cooked the pizza and then just squirted ranch out of the bottle all over the pizza. I'm sure some of you ranch lovers would have enjoyed it. Not sure if that is a Swedish thing or just the pizza i ordered.

We have a fundraiser bbq today for the youth program in the city center. They are cooking up like 400 hot dogs. I am going to be stopping by there later today.

Here are a couple of pics from the city center. I spent a couple hours today walking around. What a very cool place. It was very busy. Lots of people walking around enjoying the sunshine. Which i hear is the first good sunny day of the year. I guess i brought the California sun with me. There are lots of cool shops, cafes, markets. There is a small square in the center that has a little farmers market. This is a very cool town.

Karsten is Q'in up some dogs on the grill. I think we sold like 400 dogs. I got to meet a handful of players today. They are all very excited to start practicing. We are going to have a great season. The guy to the right with the hat on is Lucas. He is "Big Boss"'s son and an offensive lineman on my team.

I Need Help finding some Good Books

So I have been looking for some quality reading material for my trip. I will be gone for 6 months and only practicing 3 days a week will leave me with a lot of free time. I will definitely be doing a lot of sight seeing and short day trips but on a budget i think catching up on some great reads would be ideal. I have short list of books that i am thinking about bringing. most of them are football related. If you have any suggestions let me know. I am open to any and all genres. I love old war stories.

• Concept Passing: Teaching the Modern Passing Game, by Dan Gonzalez.
• Swing Your Sword: Leading the Charge in Football and Life, by Mike Leach and Bruce Feldman.
• The Bunch Attack: Using Compressed Formations in the Passing Game, by Dan Robinson and Andrew Coverdale.
• The Hurry-Up, No-Huddle: An Offensive Philosophy, by Gus Malzahn.
• Farnsworth’s Classical English Rhetoric, by Ward Farnsworth.
• Developing an Offensive Game Plan, by Brian Billick.
• Football Scouting Methods, by Steve Belichick.
• The Complete Handbook of Clock Management, by Homer Smith.
• Uncommon: Finding Your Path to Significance - by Tony Dungy.
• Playing for Pizza - John Grisham

2 Weeks til Sweden

Officially today is the 2 week mark until i leave for Kristianstad. I have just about everything ready to go. My Condo is subletted and i have all my papers in order. Now all i have left to do is go to Tahoe and blow it out one last time and then pack and go.

3 weeks til Sweden

Well it is late on a Monday night. thought i would get a blog started to chronicle my time in Sweden as the new Head Football Coach of the Kristianstad Predators. I will try to keep everyone up to date with photos and stories of the season and my adventures. I am very excited to get to Sweden and start coaching. I believe this could be a break out season for the Predators.