The Coach is the System: Replacing Chaos with Clarity on Court

Kyle LaCroix

Every coach has their quirks — the way they feed, speak, organize a warmup. But underneath that, there’s something deeper that determines success: structure. Not the drills themselves, but the intentionality behind them. Not just what we coach, but how we coach. That’s the system.

And for far too long, many coaches have tried to run programs on personality alone. On energy, experience, instinct. But charisma is not scalable. What’s needed — and what the best coaches build — is a repeatable system. Remember, good players don’t adapt to a system, good systems can adapt to a player. 

With that said, in this article, I want to make a bold but necessary claim: The coach is the system. If your players are confused, inconsistent, or disconnected, it’s rarely a player problem. It’s a structural one. And that structure always begins with the coach.

I’ve spent two decades coaching across individual players, private clubs, national conferences, and elite academies. I’ve coached from inside the storm and helped coaches rebuild from the ground up. The difference between burnout and sustainability? Between chaos and clarity? It isn’t just a better forehand. It’s a better framework.