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I B TeMchgniy- Wednesday, October . 0 25, 2006I
Wednesday, October 25, 2006 - The Michigan Daily 5B
EMMA NOLAN-ABRAHAMIAN/ Daily
Since Harden arrived at the University, the use of sports psychology has
grown in both men's and women's sports.
The University of Michigan
College of Literature, Science, and the Arts
presents a public lecture a
PSYCH
From page 7B
people who are still learning a lot about the world
and about themselves, we want to help them to work
through that constructively in every way we can,"
Courant said in a phone interview this month.
Many athletes consider Harden the ideal pathway
to that growth. But he many never have even come in
contact with the University had he not said "no" to a
legend.
Saying no to Bo
Greg Harden was working in a nearby hospital-
based alcohol therapy program. His work involved
counseling of patients. He had never worked specifi-
cally with athletes before and never intended to do so.
One day, out of the blue, Harden received a call from
the University football team's physician. The coaches
and administrators were concerned with alcohol abuse
on the team and wanted Harden to come in to deliver a
presentation on the dangers of alcohol.
In Harden's mind, such an approach would be plain-
lyunsuccessful.
"To make a long story short, I convinced them that
doing a 45-minute lecture was not the most effective
approach to 18 to 22 year olds," Harden recalled. "So
(Former football coach Bo) Schembechler wanted to
know who the heck it was who had the nerve to say
'No,' so that's howI began."
Seeing Harden wasn't about to budge, Schem-
bechler asked what he would do differently. Harden's
suggestions must have been convincing, because he
soon became a regular consultant for both football and
basketball.
His relationship with the Athletic Department
remained strictly as an outside consultant until the
early 1990s when Joe Roberson, who would soon
become Athletic Director, was impressed by one of
Harden's presentations for coaches and administra-
tors.
"Before I became director, I attended a substance
abuse meeting that was being managed by Greg," Rob-
erson said. "It became very clear to me that Greg had
other talents and that there were other things he could
contribute to the department just from that experi-
ence."
After that presentation, Roberson invited Harden
back to his office and they talked for a long time about
the Athletic Department's resources for student ath-
letes.
For Roberson, it wasn't enough that student-ath-
letes had access to first-class training facilities and
academic instruction. Roberson and Harden agreed
a better support network needed to be put in place to
help student athletes get through the toughest part of
their Michigan experience: being a college student and
an athlete simultaneously.
The conversation so impressed Roberson that he
was convinced that Harden could be an even more
important resource for the department.
Initially, Roberson had Harden exclusively educat-
ing student athletes about drug and alcohol abuse,
but it soon became clear that Harden could offer the
department many other advantages.
"I think we started with him working for us SO
percent of the time and then moving up to 75 percent
before I left (in 1997)," Roberson said. "He was play-
ing a very significant role in a lot of ways in the depart-
ment"
Once he was an official employee, Harden based his
program off of the corporate employee assistance pro-
gram he was familiar with from his past work consult-
ing corporations. In the system, the coach focuses on
performance and the support group is attentive to the
daily living problems athletes might encounter.
"So, what I'm suggesting is your athletes turn out to
be - my God -like humans," Harden said.
And so, under that simple belief, Harden set up his
shop of mental magic and began transforming those
athletes who struggled with the pressures of college
athletics on top of college life into the performers who
win national championships in maize and blue.
Harden made a difference in the life of athletes, but
according to Roberson he also helped change the cul-
ture of the Michigan athletic department.
One of Roberson's fondest memories of working
with Harden came from their collaboration on the
department's first substance abuse policy for athletes
in the early 1990s. Prior to that time, coaches had
delineated their own rules for their individual teams
and some had done a better job than others.
"Part of the problem was becoming one of 'This
coach doesn't enforce this and that coach does,' "Rob-
erson recalled. "It was Greg's role to try to bring it all
together (to form the department's substance abuse
policy)."
It was in forming the policy that Harden forced the
department to take a stand against serving alcohol at
department events.
"We stopped serving alcohol at athletic sponsored
events," Roberson said. "We did it as a symbol. We
were telling our student-athletes, 'you can't drink,'
or 'if you get in trouble because you're drinking it's a
Once athletes accept
the fact that they can
only control their own
performance, the dif-
ference can be stun-
ning.
much worse problem.'
"It didn't seem right that we'd use the money that
was being generated by athletics to buy booze."
Roberson was impressed with the way Harden
dealt with individual athlete's issues, too. Before
becoming the athletic director, Roberson had read
an NCAA study that alarmed him and led him
to consider Harden a necessary resource for the
department.
The report stated that college athletes had lower
GPAs, more psychological and social problems and
substance-abuse problems than other students.
"Greg played a significant role in helping these
young people avoid those tendencies," Roberson said.
According to Harden, the key for an athlete to beat
those potential downfalls is to control the mind. To
do that, athletes must win the battle that rages within
their own head.
Winning the competitionbetweenthe ears
Once athletes accept the fact that they can only
control their own performance, the difference can be
stunning, Harden said.
In recent years, swimmer Chris DeJong, golfer Amy
Schmucker and tennis player Kara Delicata have been
some of Harden's most prized successes in controlling
the controllables.
In 2003, Harden's guidance returned diver Jason
Coben to his expected level of performance.
Following his breakout junior season in which he
won a share of the NCAA Championships in platform
diving, Coben struggled with the added pressure of
being the best in the land.
"I was getting really angry at myself and my coach
s the old baseball proverb
goes, "if you ain't cheating,
you ain't trying." That's just
the way it is. It's the way it's always
been and the way it always will be.
Forget Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron,
the hidden ball trick - pretend-
ing the throw the ball back to the
pitcher only to lure the base runner
of the bag for an easy out - corked
bats, steroids and pine tar are the
real legends of Major League Base-
ball.
Baseball is a game that has been
plagued by the likes of these per-
formance-enhancing tools since it
was first played. And most recently,
Tigers' veteran ace has joined the
esteemed group of players taint-
ed through the assistance of said
tools.
The 41-year-old Rogers entered
this year's post-season with the
Tigers boasting the highest earned
run average of any picture in the
majors (and for those of you who
don't follow baseball, that's not
something to brag about). He had
never won a playoff game before
this post-season where he has
been, essentially, the most domi-
nant playoff pitcher in the past
decade.
This had to come from some-
where. How can a smooth-tossing,
41-year-old completely turn around
his career and become so dominant
in a sport that praises power in
all the game's aspects (power hit-
ting and most importantly, power
pitching)? And so the investiga-
tions began.
Maybe it was his veteran atti-
tude: His role as mentor to a pri-
marily young and inexperienced
pitching staff led him to up his
game to an extraordinary level.
It's possible, but it seems highly
improbable. Or maybe these young
guns finally taught an old dog some
new tricks. Again, unlikely for a
200-plus win pitcher.
Next the speculation turned to
the primal scream therapy Rogers
seems to go through every night
on the mound. He's frequently said
that he decided to use his emotions
rather than restrain them on the
mound. This seems rather plau-
sible. A player finally pumping all
By Chris Gaerig
of the adrenaline into his pitchers
rather than snuffingit out. But then
again, it's a long stretch to get from
this to his absolute dominance over
the teams he's played this October.
But then a solution finally pre-
sented itself Sunday night when
Fox cameras found a glossy, amber-
colored blotch on Rogers' pitching
hand. It was obvious that the pitch-
er was using pine tar: a banned sub-
stance that gives pitchers extra grip
and the ball extra movement. And
unless you've been under a rock for
the last three days, you've heard
all about how it played out and all
of the speculation. So there's really
no point in discussing all of the sur-
rounding circumstances. What's
more interesting, is looking at why
baseball has such a history of cheat-
ing and performance-enhancing
drugs.
No matter what anyone tells you,
baseball is the most difficult sport
to play. Hitting a ball about the size
of your palm, with a bat equally as
thin, traveling 90-plus MPH from
60 feet away is near impossible. On
pitches thrown in the upper 90s,
the batter has to decide whether
he will swing before the ball has
left the pitchers hand. If the hitter
manages to get the ball on it, they
have eight players in the field wait-
ing to throw him out. There's a rea-
son hall-of-famers only hit three of
10 times.
So players have been pumping
themselves full of steroids for years
and corking their bats (to reduce
the weight of the bat and give it
extra spring). It's obvious why the
hitters will need these drugs and
aids. But why do the pitchers need
them?
Think about it: If a hitter does
manage to put the bat on the ball,
it's going to go sailing. Hitting a
pitch back from home plate at more
than 100 MPH is going to do some
damage - either to the pitcher him-
self or the scoreboard. So the pitch-
ers have decided to even the score
and give themselves the advantage
again with the aid of pine tar and
scuffed balls (also adding move-
ment to the pitch).
And not only is this cheating (by
hitters and pitchers) widespread
in the baseball community, but
it's simply accepted as part of the
game. Whether anyone wants to
admit it or not, everyone does it.
The only reason the baseball com-
munity gets so upset when scandals
break out about Barry Bonds or this
recent Rogers debacle is because it
tells everyone how the game actu-
ally works. Everyone who didn't
know these things occurred now
knows they occur. America's favor-
ite pastime is a game built on false
pretenses - sort of, anyway.
So Kenny Rogers might have
used pine tar. But it's nothing all
the other pitchers haven't been
doing all along (there was defi-
nitely a reason Cardinals' manager
Tony LaRussa didn't want Rogers
inspected ... his pitchers employ the
same techniques). But again, all of
this is speculation. Because as Rog-
ers's teammate Todd Jones said "it
could've been chocolate cake." For
all anyone knows, it could've been.
No one ever challenged Rogers
about it. One thing we can be sure
of: Rogers definitely looked like he
was trying.
Cheating isn't easy anymore
0 0 6 0
KEMAL DERVIS
Administrator
United Nations Development Programme IM -
The Ch allenge o Multila
Political andelEconom ic N,
October 25, 2006
4:00 pm
Joan and Sanford Weill Hall ww ordL
Annenberg Auditorium
735 South State Street
Ann Arbor, MI
Reception to follow
This lecture is made possible by a generous gift from the Citigroup Foundation
I19URU fAOCIOBER 6.2006 4:30 PM
EAS1 HAI LLAUDUTRIUM#1324
*aosP ,
FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL (734) 615-6449
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