Nate Baker's Newsletter #126 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers This Isn’t Getting Better Anytime Soon. June 20, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 5 minutes Player development is at an all-time low. I’m watching it at the top-level showcases, our national teams, and our professional leagues. We are not developing players. And it’s manifesting in a very poor product. I...
12 days ago • 7 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #125 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers 10 Questions Directors Have to Solve This Offseason June 13, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 5-6 minutes The match on the weekend is not just an end… It’s a beginning. It has a finite nature. At the end of 90 minutes, there is a final result. But the match is more than points in the standings. You see...
19 days ago • 4 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #124 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers Fired. Shaking. Lost… And What It Taught Me About Support. June 6, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 4 minutes Nine years ago, my wife found me hunched over in the booth of a restaurant. Shaking uncontrollably… Six months before, I was passed over for promotion to head coach at the school I was at. I...
26 days ago • 5 min read
You didn’t get into coaching just to win. You’re here for something deeper. To shape lives. To build people. To make the kind of impact that shows up years later... Off the field, out of the spotlight, when no one’s keeping score. But in today’s coaching culture, that purpose gets buried. Under pressure. Under noise. Under a system that values winning over long-term development. And if you’ve felt that tension—you’re not alone. That’s why I created the Becoming the Developer Coach Mindlab....
30 days ago • 1 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #123 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers 14 Reasons Coaching Education Must Change For You to Grow May 30, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 4 minutes 70% of my learnings in the game have been self-taught. Intuitions, iterations, and self-directed learning that moved me toward a greater understanding. Another 25% came from learning from others...
about 1 month ago • 5 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #122 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers Coaching on Empty: 7 Ways to Save Yourself Before Burnout Hits May 23, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 5 minutes It was almost 10 p.m. when I pulled out of the parking lot. Training had just finished. Field lights turned off. Gear packed. And I was cooked. Not just from the session. Not just from the...
about 1 month ago • 5 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #121 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers The Secret to Successful Coaching Isn’t Really a Secret May 16, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 5-6 minutes After the dynamic warm-up, I had the boys line up so I could get a count. “Thirty-One, Thirty-Two, Thirty-Three, Thirty-Four…” 34 players at training. That’s not the usual. We have 24 rostered...
about 2 months ago • 4 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #120 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers 60 One-Sentence Lessons Every Developer Coach Learns (Eventually) May 9, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 4 minutes I wish I knew these 20 years ago, but they had to be earned (not learned).These are 60 core lessons that no A-license course is prepared to teach. These are the hard lessons earned carving...
about 2 months ago • 6 min read
Nate Baker's Newsletter #119 "The coaching education newsletter for those dedicated to helping their people pursue their potential." The Culture Rep Essential Reading for All Developers The Playing Time Paradigm (And the Cost of Misunderstanding It) May 2, 2025 | Read on my website | Read time: 6-7 minutes Playing time matters—but it’s not the same thing as development. And yet, across our soccer culture, we continue to confuse the two. (And for clarity’s sake, playing time = match minutes)...
2 months ago • 7 min read