Stars on Sports Intro: It's time for Stars on Sports! A podcast-radio show dedicated to sharing stories about our athletic program at Lansing Community College. LCC athletics has a strong tradition. 24 national championship wins! Over 170 All-Americans! 19 MCCAA All Sports trophies! Stars on Sports will introduce you to individuals that have contributed to our program success and give you the backstory on what it takes to develop it. We'll also dive into and break down the topics and issues facing athletic departments across the nation and right here at LCC. This is Stars on Sports!

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Stars on Sport. I'm joined by our assistant athletic director, Steven Cutter, and our producer, Jereny Robinson. Today and gentlemen, we're recording this as we start a school year which is always exciting for me, the eve of starting this academic year and on the tail end of the Olympics finishing up. And, you know, when we come into this podcast, it's more than stars on sports. It's us. Stars on sports, not specifically LCC sports, but we try and tie that in. And the message that's hit me after the Olympics and all the things going on in sports is kindness. You know, listen to a podcast this morning and talked about, you know, bring love and be excellent and you'll taste success. And I already shared that with you in the office this morning, but I believe that's true. And then, you know, just in sports, I've told you before on this podcast, you know, it's reality tv. It's better than the Bachelor. It's better than Big Brother. You know, it's, it's real. It's, you know, life. And, you know, but the thing that draws me more as I watch sports is the human spirit. You know, how prevalent that is in athletics and how emotional it makes me or how excited it makes me when I see those kind of things. And, you know, I've always approached it differently, but as I get older and reflect of that kindness on the floor and then off the floor, and we had a great conversation before this podcast started, is where does it fit in? And as coach cut, you know, I believe, you know, kill people with kindness. I hope I model that. I hope I believe it and live it, but I'm a big believer in it. Like, you know, over my daughter's bed, it says, if you can be anything in the world, be kind. And, you know, that's what I want our. My family to emulate and. But when I coach, I'm not always sure I did that, especially during the heat of competition, you know, and even like helping someone up off the floor or picking up a loose ball. And now looking back, I want that encourage that among our teams and try and emphasize it among our student athletes. And we talked about some of the greats before we got on this podcast that were they kind on the floor. Can you be kind on the floor and be successful? Because I truly believe you need to be competitive. You need to that competitive nature, you need that to be successful. And does that contradict kindness or can they work hand in hand or, you know, where'd it go? So, you know, chime in real quickly your initial thoughts on that.

I think kindness is great off the court. I think it's a certain extent to it because you don't want to be disrespectful, like somebody get injured or, you know, you don't want to do something to make somebody get hurt. So. And kindness in regard of playing the right way. But so far as competition, it's like me against you. I hear people that are great friends, but when they get on the opposite teams, they share a joy in tackling or dunking on somebody that they love dearly, which is a part of the sport, for sure.

I believe that the two words kindly and competitive do not go together. And I think in general, with kindness in general, not necessarily just in the sports world, but with kindness, you leave yourself open if you're extremely kind, to being taken advantage of and to getting run over by others that are on the other side of that spectrum. And so you're going to experience some different stuff. So I believe with everything, there's lines in it. And I also, you know, strongly believe that being kind is very important. But when you run into situations, whether it's the competitive situation or you run into a situation where you have some understandings that this is not going to be a good spot for me to be kind because I've already been taken advantage of or I've been run over multiple times, then this probably isn't going to be my spot, that I'm going to be kind. That doesn't mean I'm going to be ruthless. It just means that I'm probably not going to be extremely kind.

Well, and I think both of you hit it. And crazily, I wasn't sure where I felt on this, coming into this. That's why I wanted to talk about it. But you're right. Kindness is different than being a good sport or being respectful, which you should be at all times. Even when you're in the heat of.

The competition, you can compete and be respectful. Those are two separate things.

Right. And I think we confuse kindness with those two things because I'd want you to be kind, but you're right. When someone's right, real competitive in your kind, you probably are going to get run over or taken advantage of and you are competing for probably a score on the scoreboard at that time. And is it easy to turn it on and off when you're on the floor and off the floor? And going back to my coaching experience, that was my motto. Once you step on the floor between these 94 foot lines, you compete. Once you step off the floor, you be nice and you shake hands and be friendly thinking what you just said. Going back to all my examples of athletes being kind, all of on my list are not during competition. They're like during the starting lineup. They're like. The only one I know of now is LeBron James. A couple years ago, a lady that was a concession lady was delivering to courtside seats and it spilled all over. And he helped her clean up and lifted her up while the game was.

Going on, but he wasn't on the floor.

Yeah, he was, he was. He stopped. I mean, that's the NBA.

So, yeah, just call it timeout. We got a timeout right now.

They might have, but, you know, the other ones were like, examples were like Djokovic playing with a ball boy, but it was during a rain delay. So he was sitting there and, you know, letting him, the kids sit and got him a water and everything. Like reverse roles, you know, soccer players, you know, working with little kids on their walkouts and such. And so many examples of, of athletes off the field. And you know, I'd like to touch on this a little bit because I know your team is really good at this. But signing autographs after the games or being part of the Make a Wish foundation, that our big brother, big sister, are big things that athletes associate with off the field. So, you know, there is a difference. And I know, like, you know, Casey's angel. Am I saying it right? Your team, you know, is a big part of that off the field. But again, you've had them come to our event, they've been a part of our team activities, but it's still, you know, throwing the first pitch, but not when the competition takes place.

Yeah, as I said, I think there's just fine lines for everything. And the kindness is a huge piece. I think that in general, we can live in a pretty incredible world if everybody's, you know, pretty kind to each other. And, and that's a big piece of what makes people happy too, is not only other people being kind to them, but them being kind to other people because it makes you feel better than the 180 of it and you know, being mean or being rude or anything else. And that's why I was saying, like, when you're competing, you can still, you can still be respectful and you can still do it in such a way that you're gonna compete. And, and ultimately, I mean, we could go super deep down this tunnel. I mean, you're, in theory, you're supposed to be competing in life, not just, just on the court. So how do you, if you're competing in life, that becomes pretty hard to flip that switch off from the court and then to life and then, you know, how do you be kind?

Right.

And that's what worries me because we've seen athletes in the past not be able to flip off from the court to life and have off the court issues because of their competitive nature or, you know, even the physicality of the sport. But there is a place for it and it belongs everywhere in society. But I just wonder if it belongs, you know, within the lines of the baseball for softball field on the cross country course where they're running down, you know, I don't know. But again, even in the moments during a competition like LeBron, there's times to be kind, like picking up the baseball and giving it to the umpire or, you know, grabbing the opponent's bat and handing it to them. Some are really good at it, some are, you know, don't have any part of it of doing some of those things. And I don't think it makes them.

You know, which usually goes back to the modeling and the teaching that they've received at some point in their journey is why you see them, you know, do certain things that, that's, that might not have been from that season, but at some point they, they saw caught, were taught, you know, those kind of things where. And so they're doing it.

But I think most of the time it's not taught because it's frowned upon in sport.

And that's what I mean on the other side, it's, it's taught just differently that you don't do that, you don't help somebody else.

Yeah, when I see somebody being kind in sports, I usually worried about that person because usually it's a Psychological thing of. I'm gonna be real nice to you guys.

Funny, I wouldn't think of it that way. I'd think it more. Maybe they're losing.

No, I've done it before. I've done it before. If you know you're better. If you know you're better than somebody like you, I'm about to destroy y'all. I could be like, hey, what's going on, y'all? All right, what's going on?

But I think that's where you see it most. That's actually what I was gonna bring up here is when you. When you're. When the competition is such a varia, it allows you to be. Because the one part I have seen it more in sport is in track, when the event is over or the person so far ahead that they can help the other person or they go back and help the other person. And you see a lot of neat stories in track of people helping others up. But usually the race is decided. It's not at the finish of a close race. And so, interesting point of. Is that, you know, when that talent discrepancy is greater and it allows you to be nice. But we both know that's also when upsets might happen.

Right?

No, I mean nice in the fact that I'm gonna be nice to you, so you drop your guard and I'm gonna get these.

Nice. I got that side of it, too. Yep.

Yeah.

Which also feeds into a question that I use quite a bit and will ask people, and I believe it to be a really good question. But it's what's your intention?

Right.

And they're. They're, you know, not necessarily bringing up something they want, but it's an. It's a different situation. What's. What's your intention here? What do you. You know, and same thing. When somebody's being overly nice, it's kind of like thinking to yourself, and you're. What's their intention here?

Yeah, that's a great point. And if it's not. If it's an artificial intention, then that defeats the purpose of even being kinder or real to begin with. But the intention is really to be that kind of person. I admire that trait. So. But in the middle of competition, it's hard to stop and think of what their intention is. And that's why most competitors are on guard and don't even want to deal with it. They're not, you know, they're focused on the ultimate goal of, you know, competing. But. And so, I mean. And I want our student Athlete to represent LCC. Well, that's one of my main things that I tell them on and off the field and you know, a saying that we've talked about a lot in our office lately is how you do anything. It's how you do everything, which will be a whole nother podcast. But I truly believe that that's, you know, being kind or again, I just don't want to confuse and I think I am a little bit kindness with sportsmanship because they are different. And you know, I'm still trying to think of that great example of kindness in. In sport that can take place. But what about people on the bench that aren't participating actively and such? They still got to be focused and ready to go and to. They're supposed to have roles.

They're supposed to be. But I think in general, if you see competitive teams, the entire team's competitive.

Yeah, I would.

It doesn't matter what their role is.

I would agree. Especially successful team. Just like anything, the more that are of that trait, the better they will be at that trait. And you know, again, it's modeled and rolled and important. But can competitiveness be taken too far and lead to. But then at least the more unsportsmanship then probably unkind.

You get a lot of different things. There's another big word that comes up in its class. Great one. It's being competitive. Maybe the football team wins, has a running clock at after halftime and wins by 50. And that's not. Supposedly it's pretty hard to win big and have class because the scoreboard says something different. But if you're teaching kids how to compete and compete to the final whistle or to the final play or whatever, there's some weird stuff that happens in there and then weird expectations of what the competitors are supposed to do based on the scoreboard. When we teach, don't play to the scoreboard, play to standards. And so if you do that and you're playing to standards and you're playing to the final whistle or whatever it might be, then the scoreboard doesn't matter. But the outside world wants you to pay attention to the scoreboard, which is not a good thing to do when you're competing.

I think that's a great point in the sense of what is class? And can you confuse that with kindness? Because one of the issues I've had with coaches in the past is who's supposed to throw the white flag first. Is it the team down a lot or is it the team up a lot? And I would have different coaches argue Once they show me that they're giving up and my score is good enough to beat them, I will put in my backup. But I had some coach say, no, I'm putting my backups in. The score might come up. And it's class and to. Your point then is once you put in your backup players, do you just take a knee and football or, you know, throw balls, or do you let the backups play? Like, do you down it at the end of the game or try and score? And I think those are arguments. And people get confused with class and sportsmanship and even kindness of the opposing coach.

We had a situation in my tenure here that we were up big on a team. And pretty much our protocol when we get up by a certain number on a team. Is we start when we have one of the more prolific offenses in the country. So we'll score a lot of runs. And when that happens, we'll start. Somebody hits a double in the gap, it's a single. So we're going one base at a time. And unless it's a home run, we, you know, jog around. But anything else is basically a single pass. Ball goes the back, stop, runner on first, we stay at first. And we actually had a situation where we get. We got called classless for doing that. By taking the foot off the gas.

Yeah.

So you can't win regardless.

No, that's where you gotta stay true to your standard. Our softball team had a similar situation. Where they played a team that was in a totally different competitive environment. And, you know, they would have to find ways to get out of innings. And I thought they did it very classy. And I think the other opposing coach did. But instead of, you know, running the score up or, you know, keeping it endlessly going. Cause there are no mercy rules. Well, there are, you know, certain innings. But if you don't get to those innings, then it makes it very long and difficult. So. So, yes, I think that's another argument we have in our environment department.

There's expectations on you to be kind when you're competing. And then the scoreboard says that you're not kind. And then if you go on the other side and you stop competing, then it looks like you're also not.

Like you're being cocky.

You're not competing.

I've seen coaches both ways get in trouble. One for running up the score and one's for not handling it. And that just goes back to another interesting thing that come up is the most obvious things are sometimes the most difficult things. And people think that the easiest situation to coach in is when the score is out of hand. But we both know it's not true because you try again. It's your standard and how you handle or how the. Even the other thing we deal with is it's not just us. We're dealing with an opponent we might not know well, and how do they handle or how do their student athletes respond? And that's, you know, like, you know, our men's basketball coach always, you know, in a close game, calls timeout at the end of the game to remind them, hey, we're going to shake hands with class and we're going to be good sports. Because he knows those can be difficult moments at the end and that this is a whole nother podcast. But I, at one time in my life, I was against shaking hands after the game, but I didn't think people did. Back to your intention. I didn't think people did it. You know, like, we think we're all good sports because we have people. We force people to shake hands at the end of the game when most they don't, they go shake hands. If you don't do it, they usually go shake hands with the people they want to talk to or touch to. And Tom Mizzle was a big proponent. You better at the end of the game, the game's over. You got to learn and you got to go shake people's hands. And I agree with them. And I think, like in hockey, they do it at the end of the series, which is some of the neatest sportsmanship. But for most of the time, some kids haven't let go of the game yet. And two, it's not intentional. They're not doing it.

I think it's an old school thought process with shaking hands. And you think about the mentalities with societal impacts on it with shaking hands and how to shake hands and the impact that you can have by shaking somebody's hand.

Yep.

So it's one of those things. But if you watch a handshake line, nobody shakes shaking hands. It's knuckles or any or other things. Yeah. So it's, it's kind of missed at this point. And it, you have to be really careful in those lines because that, that game just ended. There's things that can happen. Usually it's what's said and something is said and then something can happen after that. And I think there's a large diminishing return for that because the players that do want to show respect to each other, you will see after games, winner, win or loss, you'll see players talking to each other that they want to talk to. And I think the handshake lines are absolute eye wash.

I agree. Go ahead.

Well, so.

All right. This is good.

I don't think so, because I had a real good situation. Close game. My best pair had the ball. Refs was not that good. It was like teenagers, and they wasn't calling good fouls like that. The other coach knew that. So my player had the ball. I knew he was about to get a bucket. He had his player intentionally file my kid. Parents went wild, and game ended. Running clock. The kids is hurt. I could see the kid, like. So I had to, like, stand up, stand up, get in line. So they had to learn. To me, in life, no matter how bad somebody, like, treats you, you gotta learn how to forgive and move on, because if not, it's gonna affect how you conduct yourself. So I had. I had to suck it up myself, too. I was furious. But I got in that line. I shook his hand, Had a conversation on the side after that, and he apologized to me. But I'm like, you teaching your kids a bad lesson to fight dirty in order to win.

And I agree with you, Jurnee. And I think that Tom Izzo's stance, too, that the game is over, put it behind you and shake their hand. I think where Coach Cutter's coming from is that's not. We're not teaching kids that. Not. You're not. I mean, you showed your team how to do that. Most kids, we just line them up and they walk through and don't say good game or do anything. So back to.

That's not happening. In baseball, the coaches, typically, after the games are over, always meet, almost always meet behind home plate and shake hands.

So it's more like a modeling thing. Y'all modeling that.

And like you said, then the kids that know each other do it. It's just.

It's super.

We got called out on it in baseball.

Super transactional with the players, and the ones that want to connect will connect. And I think you just run into too many things that are being said.

And I agree. And I think if we could get to the point where they. If we could get. Make it a meaningful exchange at the end, it would be good to have hands shakes. And that's what I think where the hockey series does. Because the series is over, they played four or seven games. They legitimately want us a good game. But in too many times, I don't.

I don't think that. Are they doing that after game one?

No. That's the neat thing about hockey. They do it at the end of the series. And I don't. They don't do it during the regular season. So my point is, if we could teach them the intent of that message and why we do it. And I know that's what Tom Izzo wants to, but in the end, it's happened so quickly that I'm not sure the benefit meets itself, because I'm not sure the intent there is the lesson of, hey, you just played hard, Go respect that opponent. Most are just walking through the line and just want to get out of there.

Got you.

But I agree, if we could teach them at the end of the game that life lesson and you know, you didn't do enough or you did do enough, now go shake that, it would be meaningful. I just don't think that happens enough. And I think the actual opposite happens of too many other things happen that people aren't in that spot. You were there, you were aware. You handle the situation. But too many don't. We see, that's where, you know, incidents happen and leads to much bigger issues.

It's all about the makeup of your team, too, because, like, what you were saying about taking a gas off, like, if I was a player and you took the gas off of me, that's disrespectful because I'm like, yo. But that means you saying I'm less than. So I don't want that. But some people, they get mad when you're over, like, you dropping a lot of points on them. Yeah.

When you're up by 30 and then you're up by 40.

But I think that you got. That's the makeup of your team.

But that's the problem is coaches. But even in your instant, you just shared about basketball. It could be just one kid that had a bad game that's frustrated that you might not be aware of. You usually can tell in between, you know, games. And even our basketball coach, it's usually close games, he calls it just to remind them. But you can even have that in the blowouts. But you know your coaches know your team, but do you know the other team and are you aware of who's mad? And most of the time you do. And even some sports, they shake the hand of the official, which I think is crazy. I'd like to get in the official out of there.

So I think thank you is super beneficial for the officials. And those thank yous don't always have to be at the end of the game.

They can be at the beginning, the.

Middle, you know, different areas where there's breaks. But the thank yous go a lot farther. And once again, you, you put yourself in uncharted territory when you've got players shaking officials hands because you can't. You don't know what everybody's intention is. Everybody's intention is to be kind. And that's the world we're living in. That's perfect. That's incredible. And that's going to help the officials kind of put past the Jim Joyce kind of stuff with Galarraga. Perfect game for the Tigers. You put that kind of. You can kind of put that stuff behind just a little bit. But not everybody's intentions are the same.

Yeah.

And I've shared this before on a podcast. Competition brings out the best in product, the worst in people. And you're right. Through a heavily competed environment, you don't know what the intent is even at the beginning of games. Now you watch some basketball team go shake the opponents of other coaches. And some coaches put their assistant out there, some don't put anyone out there. So they end up shaking the hands of the officials. And so you're right. I'm just not sure the consistency or the right message is there. I have seen at my previous job, our coach taught kids how to shake hands and you could tell. And I enjoyed shaking. Your baseball team does it and our wrestling team at Mason did it and they shook it professionally and meaningfully, which went a lot farther when you were shaking hands. But it's back to the modeling and the leadership of knowing who your team is, the manage these situations. But in the end, I'm hoping you're right. It's about class, it's about sportsmanship, it's about being competitive within those frameworks. And in the end, kindness, I think, carries over onto the field, but more importantly, off the field, in the world.

Yeah. So I think it goes to the home. Yeah. Because when you under pressure, who you really are will show.

Yep.

When you squeeze not only who you are, but how you've prepared.

Yep.

No, good one. That's good. Another prime pass. So, okay, so those people that are still listening at the end of our podcast, as we wrap up summer, you know what's your favorite spot? A couple years ago, I went on vacation down south and sent a picture to one of my kids of a beautiful sunset. And they replied back with a beautiful sunset in the state of Michigan. And I'm thinking, why am I going south when there's so many great places in this state? So our family Started exploring different areas and so, you know, open up this summer. A lot of people come to Michigan in the summer, or hopefully you've been able to explore some areas that do you have. And it can be locally. I mean, there's some. We're. I mean, I forget the crazy stat of how close we are to a lake in Michigan. Like under 10 miles, I think. So do you guys have a favorite spot in the state that you like to visit?

Okay. Favorite spot in the state this year has been. I just bought a house. So traveling and doing a lot of things is on the low end. So my favorite spot right now has been the bike trail in Lansing.

Okay, good one. And they're really building that up and trying to make it more user friendly. But do you have a spot maybe growing up that you'd like to go to or go visit.

Downtown Detroit? This was always a good thing. Like good memories of my mom. So I just like going out there, seeing my city.

Okay.

Spending time, remember going to.

And they've worked hard at building that up too. So.

Yeah. Base. My first baseball game watching out there. Tigers.

I remember my first Tiger game.

Yeah.

Love it.

The random homeless guy trying to sell me a flag. Like, just good memories.

Yeah. That is all part of the environment. Yeah. What about you, Coach?

Well, I'm originally from the West Michigan area. And in the West Michigan area we have Lake Michigan. We have the beaches and it's. It's certainly an area that. But it's full of tourism and so certainly we have. I have some favorite spots and whether it was in the Whitehall area, Muskegon, Pint Water, Silver Lake, those areas. But yeah, definitely getting a pizza from some of the great pizza places around there and going to the beach and having dinner with the family and stuff. I mean, it's. That just. It's hard to beat. It's really hard to beat.

And that's the best thing about this state because I've had good experience going to the east side Detroit or I went to Port Huron at part of our league now with SC4 and you know, the bridge to Canada and where Lake Sinclair and Lake Huron, me and then going to the west side. My family lived in. My family lives in Grand Haven. That's a great area. But even going farther north, you know. You know, I think. I hope that my kid, one of my kids haven't been on the Mackinac Bridge yet, but I think that should be important for everybody in Michigan. I'm not. I haven't gone. I've been to up a couple times, but people just love going up there. But I hope that sometime you get to experience that because this state has it.

Mackinac Island.

Yeah, right. My favorite area would probably be the Glen Arbor area. I went to Sleeping Bear Dunes a couple years ago and I just loved that.

Got careful there.

Right? I hear you. We've talked about that story. But anyway, good stuff. You know, we deviated from food. You tried to bring pizza back into it because I had a snack question. But we'll do that next time. So until next time, be kind and Go Stars.

Compete.

Stars on Sports Outro: Stars on Sports is recorded live at the WLNZ studios. Engineering and production assistance are provided by Daedalian Lowry and Jereny Robinson. You can listen to this episode and other episodes of Stars on Sports on demand at LCCconnect.org to find more information about our athletic program, visit LCCstars.com thanks for listening. Go Stars!