Coaching Legacy: The 2-4-12 Method is the story of a Coach, who held his team to The Standard of The Game.
When Greg Loveless took over his daughter's 10U recreation-league softball team, with ten players and no coach, he had no way of knowing it would grow into the Wind Warriors, a program that would compete at the National level, because he built on this powerful truth: "All great achievements pass through the uncomfortable."
Years later Greg became the Head Varsity Fastpitch Softball Coach at Blue Valley High School in the summer of 1999, one year after they lost three players in a car accident. In Greg's first season the varsity players dedicated the season to their lost teammates and friends, 2-4-12. They wanted to honor 2-4-12 by winning the Conference Championship. Their plan was to hang a Conference Board on the wall in the gym. They would then honor 2-4-12 by hanging three ribbons on the Board, one for each of their lost teammates and friends, 2, 4 and 12.
"As the season progressed I soon realized my players were willing to do things that no other team had ever done before. The origin of this motivation came from the simple fact that "We can't bend death." Death is final. These players had faced the reality of the finality of death. So in the loss of their teammates and friends they were forced to face the world as it is not as they hoped it would be. This same reality was transferred into The Standard of The Game. As a result they dealt with The Game as it is not as they hoped it would be. This was the Legacy of 2-4-12.
In the end it was the most basic of correlations. Those teams and players who pointed to some aspect of The Standard of the Game as unfair, who whined to their parents that the Team Rules and Standards "were unfair", these were the teams and players who fell short of The Standard of the Game. In so doing they failed to meet their goals because they were trying to Bend The Standard to where it felt comfortable, rather than meet The Standard and in doing so touch success. On the other hand, those teams and players who were willing to do whatever was necessary to meet the Standard of the Game, no matter how uncomfortable this might be, these were the teams and players who not only met, but they often surpassed their goals.
This Legacy was passed on to future teams and teammates empowering them to overcome illness, injuries and accidents they would face, both individually and as a team. Whether it was pitching with a swollen hand, pitching with a 100-degree fever, playing through the fatigue caused by Lupus or playing and pitching through the excruciating side effects of chemotherapy. This is only a glimpse of what they were willing to do to "Take Care of Their Teammates and Friends." Here they would not only Meet the Standard of the Game they would also Meet the Standard of Life. And it would be here, as they met the Standard of Life, that they would touch the Eternal.
Told by the Stories of his players who lived it, this book traces the rise of a team that learned to base its play on "The Standard most likely to defeat champions." Part memoir and part coaching philosophy, Greg uses the stories of his players, who follow his "System of Success" and who "Take Care of One Another." It is through this journey that the players become something larger than a roster. Coaching Legacy reveals the 2-4-12 Method that turned ordinary practices into a culture which then transformed ordinary athletes into a family.
It is this that reaches far beyond the season and still lives in the hearts of everyone who wore the uniform and met the Standard of the Game.
