Rocky Corigliano: 0:02

Good evening everybody. Welcome to tonight's Rockpile edition. Here we go once again. The Beyond the Game podcast is on the Rockpile tonight. Make sure, if you're following on YouTube and Facebook. Youtube, just hit the subscribe button.

Rocky Corigliano: 0:13

I'm glad I made it down here tonight. My son's game ran over so I was literally running down my stairs here at about 730 to get set up here to go tonight. But I'm excited to welcome another coach. Coach Dean Cooper is going to join me in just a little bit. Spent a lot of time coaching in the NBA general manager in the NBA. I want to get into his experience on the 2006 Olympic team. We'll talk to him about that. Got a book out there. We'll get into his book and much more. So make sure to stay right here, tuned in to the Rockpile here tonight. If you have any questions, comments for Coach or myself, just put them in the chat. I'll try to bring over as many as I can. So without further ado, let's bring Coach on. Coach, let me just straighten us out here. Get us locked here. How are you tonight?

Dean Cooper: 1:03

I'm good, I'm good, rocky. How are you tonight? I'm good, I'm good, rocky. How are you?

Rocky Corigliano: 1:06

Not too bad. As I was just saying as we came on, I'm fortunate enough I just made it here in the nick of time. I was running down the steps and I was looking at the clock the whole time in my son's game. Normally the modified baseball games go at least two hours or seven innings. Well, they got to the top of the seventh and it was right at two hours and I said please just get three outs and let's go, let's go home. So I made it in time, but I appreciate you jumping on.

Dean Cooper: 1:29

Yeah, what? Just for clarity, I played baseball in college actually, so it's funny how I started coach basketball. But like what, what exactly is modified? I'm going to ask the first question of the show Perfect I like it what?

Rocky Corigliano: 1:42

is modified baseball. Our way is seventh and eighth grade. So back here in Rome we have seventh and eighth grade is modified baseball and then they go right to JVs and varsity because we don't have a freshman baseball team here. We're like Rome. Rome Free Academy is like back here. We have triple A, double A's, a, b, c's and D's Gotcha. So we're up in that triple A. We're one of the bigger public schools.

Dean Cooper: 2:07

When you said modified, I actually my mind went to like they start with a one-on-one count or things like that to like speed up the game you know, what I'm saying.

Dean Cooper: 2:21

So I wasn't thinking like I'm really glad I asked now because I wasn't thinking in it. I'm really glad I asked now because I wasn't thinking in terms of age groups at all. I was like where I grew up in Michigan that would be called Pony League, right, when you're 13, 14, 15. So I was thinking modified meaning, like oh, it's a one in one count, or you know things like that.

Rocky Corigliano: 2:44

Yeah, we used to have Pony Colt League here years ago when I was playing and then they did away with that and it's all changed now and I know before we were talking a little bit behind. Before we went live here tonight I had prior to you, I had Coach Darren Alton, who basketball coach, and we got into talking about know his time, coaching and parents, involvement in sports and just where it is today. And I'm excited to have you on because your background you spent time in college. You spent time a long time in the NBA, which we'll get into so you have a lot of different perspectives and I'm excited to to listen to some of your takes. But for my audience tonight that follows the show, give us a little bit about yourself.

Dean Cooper: 3:26

Well, as I mentioned, I grew up in Michigan, in Western Michigan, just outside of Grand Rapids, and played college baseball and, to be honest with you, I sort of got into coaching basketball a little bit on accident. Uh, is I missed playing and it was a way in college. Uh, to keep my uh itch of basketball is I. I sort of just start coaching it as a matter of I missed it and you know it was a little money in my pocket and fortunately, the new coach at the school where I went to college, not far from where I grew up, 30, 40 minutes so he gave me my first chance and as I went through it I realized that my degree is in economics, so I think like an economist and I was going to go to law school. But I realize and I say this every speech I give to kids, sometimes adults too is I stayed in athletics because I want to wake up every day and put my hand in the huddle. It was really that simple. I wanted to have connectivity and a sense of community and compete and lo and behold, without giving you the long story, I was really fortunate.

Dean Cooper: 4:57

Early on I coached in high school, got my first NII job, which is where I played got my first Division I job at the University of Buffalo, which I mentioned to you as before we came on the air and then, as luck would have it, I never thought about being in the NBA and I got. Fortunate, I got a chance to go to the Rockets in 99, which was the dream Charles, steve Francis, coutinho, mobley era, yao. And then I coached there and then transitioned over to the personnel side for a few years. When Rudy Tomjanovich got cancer stepped down from kidney cancer, stepped down from kidney cancer, stepped down from the coaching role and I was fortunate enough to stay in the organization, transition over to the personnel side. So I saw the NBA and roster procurement and evaluating players from a completely different lens, which was a unique experience.

Dean Cooper: 6:07

Then I went back to the coaching side and to Minnesota and Portland and then, ironically, I just went back to the Rockets. For two years I still had my house in Houston with Kevin McHale, so then that was during the Harden era. So I was there in two pretty good and completely different eras and I was also. We were the first team to truly play the analytics in the NBA and I think we had a big impact on how basketball is played, not just in the NBA from an analytic standpoint, but it's filtered down into college and then became a G League head coach. So I did have some head coaching experience in Utah and then went to the Bulls and then back to college for a couple of years and then the last couple of years I've been doing consulting with teams.

Dean Cooper: 7:05

I do some tv stuff for espn plus. Uh, I got some kids that I uh young players that I work with boys and girls around here. I live in nashville, as you can probably yeah, just some eyes from my background here, um, and yeah, and then I uh you, and then I just stumbled on this book and that we mentioned and we can talk about that in a little bit.

Rocky Corigliano: 7:31

So that's the cliff note version of my journey and while doing some research tonight and I was looking through some of your your past and I was watching a lot of your interviews and one of your interviews really stood out to me the most and it was actually, I think, almost about a year ago this week. You went back to your high school and you I think you spoke in front of some kids and you got impact on you when you were younger were right there and that means a lot to me because I'm from Rome here. Rome, new York, and giving back to my community has been really special to me in a town that's been so good. But to see your passion and how much it meant to you to go back home and give that talk, can you just kind of share that experience? What was that like for you?

Dean Cooper: 8:24

Yeah, I mean, I've been back there several times actually, in giving speeches, In fact, in 2013,. I was fortunate enough they actually asked me to. They must have been really looking for low-hanging fruit because I gave the commencement speech, but yeah, I was fortunate. That class, it's pretty cool. It's run by one of the football coaches. His name's Joel Matz and he's been there forever. They actually have a coaching class in high school and it's really as much about coaching as it's about leadership. And that particular day last year in fact, you're right, it was almost exactly a year ago that time I've spoken at it a few times my high school baseball coach, who had a huge influence on me, don Momber, and my high school catcher and one of the guys I first started coaching with, dan Scholten's, and they were all sitting together and, yeah, I mean it was impactful.

Rocky Corigliano: 9:39

And when you look at you know your time and you got you coached in college and then you went to the NBA and I think one of the things that's fascinating about the college game and the nba game today is you know, I've been watching these games and it's like we're shooting 40 53s a game. Everything's played from the three-point line now that old school, you know the big guy back and down into the basket. I feel like those days are long gone. But for what was the biggest transition going from the college game to the NBA?

Dean Cooper: 10:08

Yeah, I tell people this all the time. College coaches get a little offended when I say this, because I had coached like 13 or 14 years before I got to the NBA and I'd been around. Yeah, I coached in college. Pat Knight Coach Knight's son is, uh, probably my best friend and I'd been around indiana a lot. So I'd been around like significant coaches and I tell them all the time what's? They asked me what's the first thing you learned when you got in the nba? I said the first thing I learned I knew nothing.

Dean Cooper: 10:45

It's just a different game and it's a different like.

Dean Cooper: 10:49

The NBA is all.

Dean Cooper: 10:55

The closest thing to just being a basketball coach and I think probably NF I have some buddies who are and or were NFL assistants as well is it's the closest thing to just being a coach, because you don't have to do all the other stuff, including being an NFL head coach or NBA head coach, where you have all these ancillary duties that you have to fill Like you just go in and every day and I don't just mean like tactical basketball in and every day and I don't just mean like tactical basketball, it's tactical basketball and, uh, being a coach as far as like leaning into your group of players that you have, um like in the NFL they have position groups right, so it's kind of naturally divided.

Dean Cooper: 11:42

In the NBA, you generally get like three or four guys that you work with the whole year, and so it part of it is when I say, just being a basketball coach is like you don't, you don't think about any of the ancillary stuff. It's like it's a, it's tactical, and how do I get these guys to be the best, for these three or four dudes to be the best version of themselves?

Rocky Corigliano: 12:07

Well, I think it's like the NFL, right, we saw Coach Saban step away. You know this NIL in college. You know we're seeing more of the college guys you know jump to the NFL and you know when we talk about basketball I love Brad Stevens and all these big jobs in college that came open. I said if I'm any college athletic director in the country, my first call is to Brad Stevens with the Celtics. But then I look. Exactly what you're saying is these guys want to stay in the NBA because they don't have to deal with those types of headaches in college. And I feel like we're going to start to see more of that, where these guys in college are going to jump to the NBA if it's an assistant coach in position, just because of that NIL and how it's impacted college sports.

Dean Cooper: 12:49

Yeah, I think there's some truth in that. I think it's, you know, obviously, when I got in in 99, it just wasn't the case. Wasn't the case. I also think that I'm going to come back to the. I'm going to come backwards around to another part of the question that you just asked me, but the NFL and college football.

Dean Cooper: 13:16

The reason that I think we've seen coaches go back and forth and have similar levels of success and able to manage it is, for the most part, in the NFL there's more games, but the routine is exactly the same. It just lasts four weeks longer, right, but it's still one game a week. It's you know, just one is played on saturday, one's played on sunday for the most part. The hardest thing, honestly, when I got to the nba besides the language and our same game is like you go from 30 games to 82 and it's like drinking out of a fire hose, Like I tell people every day, like coaching the NBA is like taking a. Every day is like a final exam. You learn, learn, learn, regurgitate, Learn, learn, learn, regurgitate. And I think there hasn't been a lot of college coaches successfully transition to the NBA, not because they're not good coaches. I think there's two reasons One they generally take over bad teams. Right, they don't get the opportunity Like. Brad Stevens is a great coach, but when he made the transition he went to a fairly functional team.

Dean Cooper: 14:48

Agreed and that's not to take away from him, but the other thing that they have a very difficult time with is managing the schedule. It is a complete. You don't get three days to prepare for a game, or four days. It's back-to back or one day in between. It's a totally different life cycle and how tough.

Rocky Corigliano: 15:13

Yeah, no, completely makes sense. And I think some of the best coaches I mean I look at a guy like Coach Patino, who didn't have the greatest success in the NBA and here he is back in the college game having, you know, a lot of success at uh, at St John's. You've coached a lot of different personalities and some big name players and I want to get into your Olympic time in 06 here in just a second. How tough is it to to coach the different personalities in the NBA? You got these guys making millions of dollars and you know whether you're an assistant coach, head coach. What separates a lot of the really good Well, obviously you have to have talent.

Dean Cooper: 15:57

We can just say that If you're just saying, make that a standard, you can't win if you don't have a good enough talent. Especially in the best leagues in the world whether that's soccer or hockey or the NFL or baseball or any other professional sport is you have to have good enough talent to compete. But I think where they do separate themselves is sort of what I just mentioned is their ability to manage egos and manage the locker room, like that's what the best head coaches do. Now I get this question a lot from coaches, from podcast hosts, from just people I interact with. They'll often ask me like what is it that NBA players care about? You're like how do you coach them? Nba players care about You're like how do you coach them? And so you're talking to a, a guy who grew up in mid, in the upper Midwest, just outside of Grand Rapids, in a town of 4000 people. I didn't play in the NBA, I'm a six foot one, you know baseball player, and what I tell him all the time is this and I think this is true from talking to some of my other buddies in other sports that have coached in the NFL, major League, baseball, things like that.

Dean Cooper: 17:25

Those players don't care if you're black, white, purple, orange, fat, short, tall hair. Purple, orange, fat, short, tall hair, no hair. Here's what they. They don't care about any of those things. Here's what they care about. Can they trust you? Are you gonna lean into them enough to build up trust with them and put chips in your basket so that, on the days that the tough conversations have to be had, you have credibility?

Dean Cooper: 18:01

The second thing they care about is are you competent? Can you tell me how tonight we got to get ready to play Boston in game four of the playoffs, or we got to get ready to play San Antonio in game seven of the regular season, or 14, at shoot around? Are you competent and are you putting me in the best position to be successful? And then, third, they got to know that you're in it for them and their best interests and not for yourself. If you have those three components your background, if you played, if you didn't play, your ethnicity, your religious beliefs, your hair no hair, losing hair. So your hair, no hair, losing hair they don't care Glasses, they don't care about any of that. Those are the three things they care about.

Rocky Corigliano: 19:01

And you've been around a lot of great players. And again, I want to get into the Olympic team with you here in just a second. But you know, when I look at the game today, you see some of the great players and you know you've got LeBron at age 40 40 and you've been around a lot of good players. What makes some of those guys that you've been around in the lebron james of the world great players? What separates those guys from some of the rest? And there's a lot of good players in the nba, but there's only so many great ones well, you're outside of athletic talent, right?

Dean Cooper: 19:30

you're not talking about things that god gave them?

Dean Cooper: 19:33

I I'm assuming you're not talking about that because there are some things like yannis is like part of what he has he didn't earn. Part of what lebron has he didn't earn. But the things that are in is the really great ones is their attention to detail and their investment into being great in all aspects of their approach, whether that and this is pretty well documented with LeBron, I think, just because of social media amount of money that he spends a year on his body maintenance is unbelievable, like millions of dollars, right From therapists to nutrition to, you know, sleep hygiene. Sleep hygiene doesn't cost you anything but from a financial standpoint. But lack of sleep hygiene for some of these young guys and some of them have been I'm not going to name them, but have been well documented when they come in the NBA.

Dean Cooper: 20:43

The guys that are gamers that are staying up till two, three, four o'clock in the morning and then think that they're going to show up and function the next day in the NBA. They're going to show up and function the next day in the NBA. That's just. It's like all those things they invest in their performance when they're not on the floor, whether that's nutrition, whether that's body maintenance, recovery you can go right down the list of things and then there's their competitive drive. I mean, you know, like the one thing you didn't want to do when, like early on, like if you, if one of the young cats made Dream mad, in practice that was not going to be a good day for that guy. He might score 12 times in a row just to embarrass the guy, you know. So I think that's part of what sets those guys apart, man, and like the ability to go through minutiae, like Michael and Kobe I didn't coach them, but I watched them closely. Steve Nash, like the minutia and the ability to go over and over just monotonous things is incredible actually.

Rocky Corigliano: 22:09

So how'd you get your start in the NBA? How'd you go from college to the NBA?

Dean Cooper: 22:13

Well, interesting story. So Jim Boylan, who is now with the Pacers, and he grew up fairly close. He grew up in Grand Rapids. I grew up just outside of Grand Rapids. He's a few years older than me and then so I knew who he was. He played on some really good teams. He actually played at university of maine, but he also played on his high school team, was uh like guard thompson, who played at michigan, and then his high school coach is who I coached with at aquinas. So we kind of started to get to know each other.

Dean Cooper: 22:45

So I went to houston a couple times when I was coaching college during the playoffs and I got to know Rudy Tomjanovich. With Jim We'd go out to dinner, have lunch or whatever, and yeah, like I said, I had no intention. And then I just got this random phone call one October evening at 10 30 at night and it was Jim. This is just how it happened, to see, not exaggeration. We were starting practice the next Saturday. It's in the old days when everybody started on October 15th and I went home from the football game there was a night football game and my phone rang my course my landline and I picked it up and it was Jim and he said hey, what are you doing? I said, well, I just got home from the football and he just goes. Good, don't leave, I'm calling you back. Click, that was it.

Dean Cooper: 23:43

And about 10 minutes later the phone rang and it was him and he said hey, uh, I got Rudy here. He wants to ask you a question. So I thought it was a joke and sure enough, rudy was on there and he said hey, coop, we have a video coordinator slash scouting position open, are you interested? Now it's like 11 o'clock at night, and my answer Rocky was coach. That's like asking me if I at night, and my answer Rocky was coach. That's like ask me if I want to wake up and breathe tomorrow. So that, obviously. And so he laughed and he said well, give me your, your boss's phone number and I'm going to call and ask him for permission and he to interview you. So he called them. They called me back at about 12 30 in the morning.

Dean Cooper: 24:37

I was on the phone with uh um, the uh administrative assistant secretary, and she was booking me a flight for for the next morning to go to austin to spend four days at training camp. And in the four days I was at training camp. Nobody asked me a basketball question, not one. All they wanted to do is know is could I fit the culture? And they were going to teach me whatever I need, which was good because, like I said earlier, I thought I knew about basketball till I got in the NBA and I got down. Knew about basketball until I got in the NBA and I got down there, and it was amazing because I had to learn a different language. It's like imagine being dropped into the middle of Spain or Germany or France and you got Terminology all different.

Dean Cooper: 25:29

Yeah, and you don't. Like it wasn't the summer, no one had time to like give me a training course, right, like I was just immersed because games in those days you played eight preseason games. They probably already had played like three or four. No one had time to sit around and explain language to me. I just for three months I didn't know what anybody was talking about.

Rocky Corigliano: 25:57

You know what, though? I think that's fascinating because even in the real world today, like I always say to my team, I'm like I'll hire somebody that doesn't have the experience because I'll teach them. You know that I just want to see if they fit the culture, and I think that's what makes a lot of good coaches great coaches is they can teach you the X's and O's right. It's tough to mold somebody that fits the culture that you want to bring in and fit. I think that's a fascinating story.

Dean Cooper: 26:24

Yeah, yeah, I'll tell you a truth. So I could, rudy's like my dad slash, uncle slash, mentor, slash big brother he wears all these hats for me but and I'm not going to say the school, but the year before they called me, I was there for the playoffs and I had a. I was coaching at University of Buffalo and I had an opportunity at a young, pretty young age maybe 28 or nine to go and be a head coach at a division two school and I asked Rudy a question about. Well, I asked him a lot of questions, but in in the conversation he said something that stood out at the end of it we're at this place called Demasi's Greek restaurant and he said if you don't remember anything else, I tell you, remember this. When you get to be the boss, involvement equals commitment. If you get people involved in what you're doing, they will be committed to it. And I thought, oh, that's kind of cool advice, you know, committed to it. And I thought, oh, that's kind of cool advice, you know. And as I I end up not deciding, it wasn't the place that I wanted to be, so I stayed at Buffalo, fast forward a year and a half. Um and uh, we had a I was with the Rockets for and a lot of people have platitudes and things they say but they don't live them right, like in my book.

Dean Cooper: 28:01

I talk about like culture isn't banners and and sayings above uh door posts and things like that. So it's, it's a, it's a way of life, like all that. A way of life, all that fluff stuff. It looks good, but you better live those things. I'm at the Rockets for like 10 days literally, and we have this emergency meeting after practice and we have a chance to trade dream, and so Carol Dawson, our GM, lays out the scenario and Rudy and Carol then start to go around the room and ask everybody what they think. Well, they get to me.

Dean Cooper: 28:50

I've been there 10 days. I've been there 10 days. I'm like coach, I I don't really think I'm equipped to to. You know, see, if we should move on from he's. And he said this. He said I want you to know, I want you to tell me what you think, because you don't have any scar tissue or any emotional things from the other things that the people of here have, from any interaction with any player, and rudy was would always give his uh opinion in those situations last, because he didn't want to influence, he didn't want to have and I can talk all day long about biases, it's part of what I study he didn't want to have conformity effect, where you're afraid to say what you think because the boss already has an opinion. And I reflected back on that, on that comment about involvement equals commitment, and I was like this guy lives what he's saying.

Rocky Corigliano: 29:57

Well, you talk a lot about, um, I know you get involved in, and I think, one of your podcasts you talked about emotional intelligence and and I've been reading a bunch of stuff on that type of stuff. Um, so I know that's big, but but the book that you have, uh, the book fail. Um, it's like a playbook. Right, you taught there it is. Yep, I got to, I got to order mine. What's really neat is some of the guests that I've had on everybody's an author. They all wrote books. So I'm going to literally have about a handful of books that I'm going to have to go through and read. So I got to make. I'm going to do a lot of reading here pretty soon. But you talk a lot about in the book, about dysfunctional teams and toxic behaviors. Talk a little bit about the book and how did you come up with the name and when did you decide you wanted to write a book?

Dean Cooper: 30:42

So, yeah, I'll give you the. I'll try to shrink this down as much as I can. So, for I'm a, I'm a big reader, eh, and I walk about six miles a day, sometimes a little more, rarely less. And while I'm reading, as much as I love music or while I'm walking, rather, I don't listen to music I listen to books. Besides reading itself, I listen to books and I listen to podcasts.

Dean Cooper: 31:11

And most, most and a lot of that for about the last six or seven years has been around emotional intelligence. I I'll do a plethora of things, but the bulk of it 80 has been around behavioral economics and emotional intelligence, because it was a way for me to invest in myself. I'm pretty much like this. Anyways, it's my personality. I'm passionate and I have a high care factor. Coaching I'm like this, especially in the NBA. There's 82 games. You can't be all over the board. Those guys will just tune you out. All over the board, those guys will just tune you out. But I think coaches are in dire need of it and I think we're not good at it, myself included.

Dean Cooper: 32:04

So I decided, besides the consulting, I wanted to have a product where I could go in and do workshops or seminars with athletic departments and it applies to all sorts of any business. But I thought, you know I want to swim in the pond. I know best, first right. That only kind of made sense. So where can I go four or five hours, talk to them about how to create healthy culture, maintain healthy culture? What do those look like? Create vertical alignment, create productive feedback loops, you know, not operate on biases, not operate on result bias, not operate on availability, heuristics and all these things. So I'm out, I'm done with the product. I'm out on my walk and I think to myself you know everybody John Gordon, malcolm Gladwell, john Maxwell, stephen everybody goes in and tells people how to succeed. Aside from my resume, which is somewhat unique, what's going to separate me?

Dean Cooper: 33:15

And it just came to me, I'm going to go and tell people how to fail. No one talks about that. They tell you how to fail forward. They tell you how to rebound from failure. They tell you how to not be afraid of failure, but no one tells people just hey, if you want to fail, just do these things. And it will be unusual. And I'm kind of sarcastic. I got a satirical, sarcastic personality and so I just started going through the alphabet. It's an alphabet book, it's an A to Z book, like A is avoid, you know, and there's here's a list of things of avoid difficult conversations, avoid holding people accountable, avoid setting clear expectations. You know B is blame, you know C is complacency, g is gossip. So I just started writing down all these dysfunctional and toxic behaviors that hold teams and organizations back, and I try to do it in my personality, which also just happens to lend itself to look, we can take the edge off, uh, addressing these behaviors, but these behaviors need to be addressed.

Rocky Corigliano: 34:41

That's how it happened yeah, that's great because I've had a lot of um. We've done some youth sports panels, um on my, on a couple different podcasts and, and one of the things I mean. I grew up with a dad who, as many of my listeners know it, coached high school football for over 35 years and my sister's coached high school field hockey for over 25 years. She played at central Michigan. I've coached high school football.

Rocky Corigliano: 35:07

I spent some time coaching AU basketball, which was an experience in itself, and I and I think one of the things that I was taught growing up was it's okay to fail, learn from your mistakes, how do you overcome it. And I think that's a lot of the problems right now with the youth sports at any level, not even just youth sports. We don't want these kids to fail and a lot of the parents don't want their kids to fail. You have to experience some failure along the way, even in the real world. Right, it's okay to fail. How do you overcome it? How do you work through that? I think that's a huge thing right now going on in youth sports that you know in the panels and coaches that I've talked to, and we got to find a way to get through and overcome that stuff.

Dean Cooper: 35:50

Yeah, I agree, and that's not exactly what my book's about, but we can say on it by the way, central Michigan's like 50 minutes from where I grew up, so now I grew up just a little bit between Grand.

Dean Cooper: 36:02

Rapids and Mount Pleasant. Yeah, so go chips for your sister. But you know, I think in that regard of failure, I think you're 100 percent right. I could go on. I don't have children, my wife and I don't, we don't. I don't have children, so it's often really easy for me to tell people how to parent, however I do, I don't think parenting is a lot different than coaching, like failure needs to be a part of it. I could sit on here for four hours and talk to you about my philosophy on helicopter parents and not allowing kids to fail, or just even play outside, for that matter. I mean, I could go on and on. So you probably don't want me to do that, but I'm not a fan of everybody gets a ribbon. I'm not a fan.

Dean Cooper: 37:11

You know, I grew up in a family of 11 cops, like you know. Eventually it grew a family of 11 cops, like you know, you meet, you know, and it eventually grew to that. But my dad, my, so, and it was a pretty straightforward and you know, uh, no one wants to fail, um, but there is a way to bounce back from it. In that regards, like I said, it's not really what my book's about. It's more about toxic behaviors. But what you're talking about is, I think, trying to protect kids and protect their egos and not have setbacks in my opinion, and not just my opinion. I do do a lot, I. I'm a big listener, I'm a big reader. This isn't just dean cooper's opinion. There's some, there's some basis to it is, although it might protect them on the front end, we're ultimately, later in life, setting them up for failure that they're ill-equipped to deal with because they haven't learned those mechanisms of failing at things early on in life. And now it becomes catastrophic. It becomes catastrophic.

Rocky Corigliano: 38:38

Yeah, and Dean, that's a great message too, and again, I people can use that here in the, in the real world, not just, not just sports related. I wanted to jump. I keep saying I want to jump to that Olympic team in 06 that you were, that you were part of. I got to ask you what was it like to be around coach K?

Dean Cooper: 38:58

Yeah, it was amazing. Uh, that was my yeah was my yeah, that was the uh, that's a bittersweet memory, to be honest with you. Um, because it was great being around him. I had brief interactions with him because, uh, it was shortly after I had transitioned to the personnel side, so obviously I would had been to games at Duke and evaluating their players and having to make calls and get background information and things like that. But working for him and doing all the game preps that was my job was put all the film and the game preps together and go through those with the assistant coaches who were Coach Boeheim, mike D'Antoni and Nate McMillan, who I eventually worked for in Portland with the Trailblazers. It was an amazing experience and just to see how he went through his process and just the knowledge that he had and then just being part of, you know, usa basketball was unbelievable and I would be remiss if I didn't say this.

Dean Cooper: 40:09

And I'm going to say this I'm going to like I'm the dick for a meal of basketball, just so you know Like I get choked up. But I'm going to try to say it without I'm going to I'm like I'm the dick for meal of basketball, just so you know like I get choked up, but I'm going to try to say it without and I'm not embarrassed by it, like it's who. I am, man, I, I, I'm, I wear my emotions, I'm okay with it. Makes all. It makes other people a lot more uncomfortable than it makes me. But you know, I didn't serve, I didn't become a police officer. So when I got the opportunity to do it, I thought in my head, I thought, oh, this is pretty cool, I'm going to. This is a chance to serve my country.

Dean Cooper: 40:49

Well, what I realized through the process because we went overseas it was actually in Japan, but we played in other places before you get there, and one of the places that we played was in Korea. And we are in Seoul and we went to a base in Seoul, basically on the outskirts of seoul, and did our thing and practiced, and all that two days later we were supposed to go to the base. That's seven miles south of the north korean border, and there was a, an issue, and they weren't going to let us go, and the player said no, no, no, no, no, we're going. And this is when these guys were all young Dwayne Wade, uh, lebron Carmelo, chris Paul, uh, shane Battier. Those guys were all pretty young.

Dean Cooper: 41:54

We had a couple older guys on the team Antoine Jamison, and a couple older guys too, but the players said no, no, no, no, we're going. And when we got there and it was a totally different experience, the level of what was going on compared to down in Seoul was, and at that moment I realized I'm not serving my country at all, I'm representing it and there's a big difference. So it was pretty humbling.

Rocky Corigliano: 42:36

And you've been around a lot of great moments in sports as a coach, a GM, the front office and all that and I can't imagine, as you're talking about representing the United States with all these countries, did it hit you at one point when you looked around and said I'm here at the at the olympics representing the united? I mean, that's a huge moment. I don't think it gets any better than that yeah, it was the first.

Dean Cooper: 43:02

The first time it was actually the world championships in 2006, but not the olympics, but the the first time that they played the national anthem. Mean, for a guy who's already emotional, you know, it was. I mean, I was, I wasn't. I didn't have tears, rocky, I was bawling, bawling, you know.

Rocky Corigliano: 43:30

So when you look back and you've had a long and you've had a great career and, like I said, you've been in the NBA, you've been in college, you've been in the front office If given the opportunity again and you might have had some opportunities, would you get back into the coaching?

Dean Cooper: 43:44

Yeah, I mean I don't think I said this on the air, I think I said it before we came on is, look, I stayed in athletics because I woke up every day and I want to put my hand in the huddle and I want to be part of a tribe and a community and things like that, and I really enjoy the things that I'm doing now.

Dean Cooper: 44:09

I like consulting, I love doing the TV and, you know, working with kids, but I miss, I miss being part of being part of something where you go in and you problem into them and you know, just kind of my I got an NBA friend that happens to only live about 15, 20 minutes south of me here, named Bob Thornton, and we talk about it all the time Like he's retired, but truly retired, but played and coached in the NBA for a long time and you just chop it up, as he likes to say I'll use his term just going in the office and and chop it up and those are.

Dean Cooper: 44:59

Those are things I miss, you know, um, to be honest with you, like I miss the games cause I'm competitive, but I miss practice and being in the breakfast room and the lunchroom and I don't miss the bus. I do kind of miss the plane. I hate the bus, I don't know why, but but yeah, those are the things, besides the fact of walking out on that court and and seeing if we we have, if our best is better than your best tonight. Yeah, I, I miss those things and I, I uh want to do it again and I'm hopeful that I find the right place and the right place finds me so last couple things I have for you is how can?

Rocky Corigliano: 45:45

how can anybody listening tonight or on a replay? How will they be able to find if they want a copy of the book?

Dean Cooper: 45:51

Okay, you can go to uh, my website is space for F? O R curiositycom, uh, and you can find the book there you can read. There's a section about, like just my personal history, kind of my journey, what I'm about, and there's a place on my professional journey. I write up a blog on there that I update every Thursday, which is all based around. Well, most of it it's called Nuggets and Reflections. So the nuggets are like things I've read or done that have some real like back. There's a lot of things that back it up. Most of that's based around behavioral economics, emotional intelligence that we touched on. And then I just sometimes, a couple of times, I'll do reflections where I'm just reflecting on things and it's about a five to seven minute read.

Dean Cooper: 46:49

I try to keep it to around 500 words and it's it's only meant to to stir your curiosity. It's not the answers. I don't want to give all the answers. I don't want people to go on there and feel like they have to read for a half hour. I want to just give them an appetizer where they go.

Dean Cooper: 47:06

Yeah, man, this is something that I can dive into and maybe make myself, my organization, my team better. You know, I think that I said this on a podcast I was on the other day is people ask me you ask me like if I had to point out something in my career that I'm the most quote unquote proud of, is that Olympia being part of the USA team. Unfortunately, I've never won the last game of the year never, um, because I haven't won a championship, and that's something I still want to do. But besides that, what I what I'm really proud about is I was raised and continue to be perpetually curious, and I think it's important. I think once you, once you quit being curious and trying to figure out ways to be better, like you know it's, it might be time to shut it down, and I'm not sure that day will ever come for me.

Rocky Corigliano: 48:12

So, Dean, the last thing I was going to ask you is for the listeners tonight, and again on the replay, what would be the message you want to leave? Um, the listeners tonight.

Dean Cooper: 48:21

Yeah, I think just what I just touched on. I think it's really important to be, to be curious, like go out and like I'm a big, I'll give you a just a fear. For instance, like, uh, I'll give you just a few. For instance, I read all types of stuff and all over the board I have certain things, anything I think can help. My coaching and development obviously is a big part of it, but I cold call people. I'm not afraid to. Now I have a little bit of an advantage because if I leave my background or my credentials or email them, I get it Like I'm not. I have a little bit.

Dean Cooper: 49:00

Maybe I'm going to say this carefully because I don't want to sound egotistical I might have a little bit better chance of getting somebody just because of things I've done or a place I've been, but like, for instance you'll probably appreciate this, having played and coached football Kevin Kelly, the no-punt guy that won all the championships in Little Rock at Pulaski Academy. I just cold-called him. I knew it was based on math, I believe in the math and the guy's one of my great friends now but I knew there was something to learn from him. I don't know anything about football. In fact, I tell him all the time don't teach me about football. I just want to turn on the Michigan games and the Lions and just enjoy it as a fan.

Dean Cooper: 49:46

I don't want to go into analytic mode but like him, like the women's coach who was the former women's coach at Florida Golf Coast, who's now the head coach of the Atlanta Dream, annie Duke, the card player Just call people, man, if you want to know something. What I tell young kids the answer to every question you don't ask is no. What's the worst they can say?

Rocky Corigliano: 50:17

No.

Dean Cooper: 50:18

And every question you don't ask is no, no different than Rudy Tomjanovich would say the only bad ideas are the ones that don't come out of your mouth. There will be a lot that come out that don't work, but the only bad ones are the ones that you keep to yourself because you're afraid to speak up so I gotta leave you at this.

Rocky Corigliano: 50:37

So here's what a real short story. So my brother-in-law is from montague, uh, michigan, oh yeah and um. He went to central michigan as well, and my brother-in-law and I are diehard michigan football guys. I'm a gonzaga basketball fan. I love mark few and the zags always have, always have liked them.

Rocky Corigliano: 50:57

My wife is a diehard ohio state fan oh my lord so we have the um down in my basement here we have the house divided flag and uh. So I had bragging rights for the last four years. But she got the bragging rights this year because they won the national championship. But we go at it During the football season. I got to say she got me tickets to Michigan-Penn State last year down at Happy Valley, which was unbelievable to watch. But the Michigan ties are deep in my family so we love. Michigan here.

Dean Cooper: 51:28

Yeah, that's awesome, it's funny. My wife will tell me and I know this about myself you want to talk about emotional intelligence and bat at it. She'll say you get more upset during the Michigan games than you ever get in any game you've ever coached. I'm like, yeah, I will not watch the Michigan games in public, I won't do it. I watch them at my house.

Rocky Corigliano: 51:52

My brother-in-law watches them in his basement. He don't even leave the house because he's out. My sister leaves the house because she doesn't want to listen to him yelling and screaming. But we have Michigan ties, my jersey's down here, everything. So we're big Michigan fans, which is awesome. But, dean man, listen, it's been awesome. I feel like I can talk with you all night. I really appreciate you taking the time to come on with me and I hope hopefully you enjoyed it and I'll jump on and order the book.

Dean Cooper: 52:17

Yeah, well, first of all, I appreciate you having me on. Like I mentioned, I've listened to bits and pieces since we connected of your podcast. I think you're doing a great thing. I think you're hitting a lot of topics that that matter and hopefully people are able to absorb some real truths about some certain things and the good for you and wish all the best and, um you know, hopefully this will, um, I'm hopeful this isn't our last interaction. We'll we'll have a friendship that can move forward, cause I I really I believe in what you're doing and I think you're doing it for you know, the purity of the right reasons to do them.

Rocky Corigliano: 52:58

Well, I appreciate that. Yeah, definitely, let's stay in touch and we'll do it again.

Dean Cooper: 53:02

All right.

Rocky Corigliano: 53:03

All right, dean, thank you.

Dean Cooper: 53:04

Thank you, have a great evening.

Rocky Corigliano: 53:06

You got it. Let me just fix there we go, there we go. So that was a great. That was, uh, coach dean cooper, and thanks for for him taking the time to come on with me tonight. Really enjoyed that great background. Um, I'll post his website. I'll post where you you can purchase his book. Nba assistant coach was on the 2006 team with Coach K who was the head coach of that world team, united States team, part of the front office, gm. A lot of coaching experience and I was doing a lot of consultant work now. So hopefully you enjoyed tonight. I'll post the next guest here in just another week or so. I'll let you know on the Mohawk Valley Sports Watch if we'll be airing this weekend or not. But again I appreciate everybody for tuning in tonight. And on the rock pile, as I say, the rock pile is where dreams become reality. Have a good evening everybody.