Lessons on communication and thinking from Neil deGrasse Tyson - 1/4

8 lessons field hockey coaches in 4 weeks from Neil deGrasse Tyson's insights on Scientific Thinking and Communication. This is week 1/4.

It’s that evening of the day after, and you’re replaying the match in your mind for the hundredth time. Your striker missed three scoring opportunities you’d seen her convert a thousand times in training. Your meticulously planned press system that worked brilliantly all season collapsed in the second half. After the game, you tried to explain the tactical adjustments to your team, but you could see it in their eyes—they weren’t getting it. You know what needs to change. You’ve studied the opposition. You’ve analyzed the data. You’re right about what went wrong. So why isn’t it working?

TLDR; 

Neil deGrasse Tyson, one of the world's great thinkers, shares his insights in how to think, teach, and communicate more effectively. This series of articles explores eight essential lessons from one of the world’s greatest science communicators that directly apply to coaching field hockey: understanding that being right isn’t enough without effective communication; recognizing cognitive biases in player evaluation; embracing the scientific method in tactical innovation; tailoring communication to different athletes; using progressive teaching strategies; measuring what matters; leveraging body language; and fostering genuine curiosity in your players. These aren’t abstract concepts. They’re practical tools that can transform how you develop players, implement tactics, and build winning programs.
For four consecutive weeks we'll share two lessons each week with you...

When Science Meets Sports

The best field hockey coaches aren’t just tacticians or motivators—they’re teachers, communicators, and experimenters operating at the frontier of what’s possible with their athletes. Yet many of us approach coaching with the same cognitive biases and communication patterns that limit our effectiveness, never quite understanding why our brilliant tactical insights don’t translate to match performance, or why some players flourish under our guidance while others stagnate.

When Neil deGrasse Tyson delivered a masterclass on Scientific Thinking and Communication it wasn’t only about astrophysics, his field of expertise. It’s about how we discover truth, overcome our biases, and communicate complex ideas effectively. These are precisely the skills that separate good coaches from great ones.

In the next few weeks, we’ll explore eight lessons from Tyson that directly apply to coaching field hockey at competitive levels. We’ll examine how the scientific method can revolutionize your tactical innovation, learning from Tyson’s insight that “the scientific method is, do whatever it takes to not fool yourself into thinking something is true that is not.” We’ll confront the cognitive biases that cloud our judgment about players and tactics, understanding his warning that “we all have susceptibility to a certain category of bias.” We’ll discover why being tactically correct isn’t enough. As Tyson’s father told him:

It’s not good enough to be right. You also have to be effective.

We explore how to tailor your coaching to different types of athletes, implementing his principle that “the same ideas, the same concepts, can be framed, shaped, in different ways depending on the audience.” We’ll look at progressive teaching strategies that build understanding layer by layer, and examine how measurement and data can reveal truths about your team’s performance that would otherwise remain hidden. Finally, we’ll check out the power of body language and non-verbal communication, and how to cultivate curiosity in your players so they become thinking athletes rather than robots executing commands.

Today its about the first two lessons we wanted to share based upon the masterclass given by Neil deGrasse Tyson. But make sure you also take a look at these earlier masterclasses:
 →  Jamilon Mülders : how communication will influence your team 
 →  Adam Commens : values based coaching 
 →  Ric Charlesworth & others in Sculpt a winning mindset 

These lessons aren’t theoretical—they’re immediately applicable to your training session tomorrow, your team talk on gameday, and your season planning for next year. Let’s begin… with the beginning.

Lesson 1: “It’s Not Good Enough to Be Right. You Also Have to Be Effective.”

This single piece of wisdom from Neil deGrasse Tyson’s father might be the most important lesson in this entire series of lessons. As coaches, we spend countless hours studying the game: analyzing opponents’ defensive structures, identifying weaknesses in our attacking patterns, developing innovative press systems. We attend coaching courses, watch international matches, and pour over tactical analyses. We become tactically astute, often more knowledgeable than our players about the intricate details of the game.

And then we wonder why it doesn’t work on the pitch.

Tyson explains: “You can say, this is how the world should be, but if you don’t have a tactic, if you don’t have a plan to enable it, to enact it, go home. It’s not good enough just to be right. It has to also work.”

Think about your last tactical adjustment that failed to take hold. Perhaps you identified that your opponents were vulnerable to diagonal runs, exploiting the space between their center-back and fullback. You’re absolutely correct, the video analysis proves it, the statistics support it, every coaching manual would agree with you. But if your players don’t understand it, can’t execute it under pressure, or don’t believe in it, your correctness is worthless.

Effectiveness in coaching requires three elements: clarity in your own understanding, a method to transfer that understanding to your players, and the ability to implement it under match conditions. Notice that being right about the tactics is only the first element—and arguably the easiest one.

Tyson describes his preparation for media appearances: “I do a crazy amount of thinking and preparation. Every time I’m in the public venue. In any medium... There is machinery operating under the hood, within me, that I want to share with you.” He recommends being “ten times more prepared than anything you might invoke, in order to look like you didn’t prepare at all.” Consider every scenario beforehand.

Apply this to your pre-match team talk. You know what you want to say about pressing triggers, about exploiting their weak-side defender, about maintaining width in possession. But have you thought about how you’ll say it? Have you prepared examples that resonate with specific players? Have you anticipated their questions and maybe even confusion? Have you simplified without dumbing down? Have you considered demonstrating visually rather than just explaining verbally?

The gap between being right and being effective is where most coaching insights die. A young coach might watch a professional match, identify a brilliant tactical pattern, and try to implement it with their team the following week. They’re right about the tactic, but they’re ineffective because they haven’t considered whether their players have the technical ability to execute it, whether they understand the spatial relationships required, or whether it fits within their existing tactical framework.

Conversely, an experienced coach might use a slightly less sophisticated tactical approach but implement it with such clarity, such repetition, such effective communication, that it becomes second nature to the players. This coach wins matches not because they know more than their opponent, but because their knowledge actually manifests on the pitch.

Here’s your action step: Before your next training session, take whatever tactical concept you plan to teach and ask yourself three questions:

1. How will I know if the players truly understand this?

2. What three different ways can I explain this same concept to reach different learners?

3. What’s my backup plan if my initial explanation doesn’t land?

Being right about hockey is the baseline. Being effective at teaching hockey is what separates coaches who develop players from coaches who just talk about development.

The legendary Ric Charlesworth, often emphasizes the importance of clear communication as well. He believes that “the best information poorly delivered might as well not be delivered at all”

Never hesitate to Assistant.Hockey more tips about this from the many other coaches we hosted in our masterclasses and workshops. If you’re already a paying subscriber… thank you  🙏  and please read on for the next lesson on cognitive bias. If you’re not yet a paid subscriber, join us to get the most out of what we share here 😉 and  make sure you don’t miss our next posts with the 6 remaining lessons…

Lesson 2: Cognitive Biases Are Sabotaging Your Player Evaluation