Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
071 - The Ball Busting Balance
76 Plays3 days ago
In sports, laughter isn’t a distraction — it’s a bonding mechanism. In this episode of Captains & Coaches, Tex McQuilkin dives into the art and science of banter — the playful trash talk, inside jokes, and honest jabs that transform teammates into brothers and sisters in arms.
Tex explores how banter becomes the most fun way to deliver candor. Listeners will learn why the best teams master the ball busting balance: pairing humor with humility, honesty with celebration, and competition with connection.
From locker-room roasts that build trust to coaching strategies that use humor to break tension, this episode shows how great leaders use laughter to strengthen culture, emotional armor, and resilience. Because when a team can joke, they can trust — and when they can trust, they can win.
Key Takeaways:
- Why humor and honesty are essential ingredients in high-performing teams
- How to balance banter with celebration to avoid cynicism
- Tools for coaches to use humor to ease tension and build connection
- Ways to test composure and mental toughness through playful trash talk
Laugh as a team, grow as a team.
Training - Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train
Education - Why They're Not Listening: Coaching the Modern Athlete - http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com
Recommended
Transcript
Podcast Introduction
00:00:05
Speaker
There is no better way to defend yourself against unkind words than to treat them as a joke.
Meeting the Coaches
00:00:11
Speaker
Welcome to the Captains and Coaches podcast where we explore the art the science of leadership through the lens of athletics and beyond.
00:00:17
Speaker
I'm your host, Texel Quilkin, and today is all about the banter. I had the opportunity to go up to South Jersey to meet with CJ Appenzeller and his coaching staff to work on their improvement and working on client retention.
The Concept of Candor
00:00:33
Speaker
While I was there, I got to observe CJ working with professional baseball players, and CJ gave me a chance to speak in front of him. Didn't know what I wanted to talk about, but I've known CJ for a number of years and value and appreciate his ability to talk trash to his athletes, his peers, his friends.
00:00:54
Speaker
And so knowing this about him, observing it with his athletes in real time and watching them push and fight in their training, I decided to give it a label.
00:01:05
Speaker
And I introduced the concept to them called candor. So Radical Candor is a famous book. I heard Coach Greg Williams talk about candor, soldiers to sidelines event.
00:01:16
Speaker
And I love the term. Simply put, candor is honest feedback for your athletes because you care about them.
Banter as a Tool for Respect
00:01:24
Speaker
It's compassionate honesty, truth with care.
00:01:29
Speaker
And if we think about the previous podcasts we've had with David Yeager, we talk about a transformational coach, a a mentor mindset when coaching, you have high support and high expectations.
00:01:44
Speaker
So us delivering this candor, this direct feedback to them, that's a form of ah compassion and care. Now delivering it in a style, in a sense like CJ does with banter and some jokes, now we're really getting and meeting the athletes where they're at.
00:02:01
Speaker
the best locker rooms I've ever been a part of have been that candor with banter. So they are speaking truth. They're just telling it in a joking manner and getting some ribbings to it. So I aim to introduce radical candor to them and the value of them as being assertive leaders in locker room by initiating that candor with their teammates.
00:02:25
Speaker
There's a lot of benefits from this that I'm going to cover, but it Man, they they did an amazing job. They've got an amazing coach, and I'm looking forward to seeing those guys ah succeed in their professional careers.
00:02:38
Speaker
And the the bottom line, the theme, the message that I got the opportunity to deliver to them, laugh as a team, grow as a team. So you develop trust. If I can say one thing to a teammate, does he give it back to me?
00:02:52
Speaker
Now we're starting to develop a bond and I can trust him a stressful situation.
Banter vs. Bullying
00:02:58
Speaker
So there there are many things to banter I'm going to cover. And the the first one banter actually it promotes respect.
00:03:06
Speaker
People are not getting defensive. they're they're not They're able to be coachable and receive a form of feedback. And that's the beauty of it. it's Banter promotes respect versus disrespect.
00:03:21
Speaker
We're not speaking these things in demeaning and have the intent of taking our teammates down. No, we're actually, we want to be playful. We want to have fun. We want their their ah them to play loose.
00:03:33
Speaker
So there is a form of respect in what we're saying. It's not being disrespectful and demeaning. So when athletes joke with each other, it signals mutual trust and a ah psychological safety where we can fail in front of our teammates and they're not going to get after us.
00:03:51
Speaker
They're going to build us back up. So it's it's It's like seniors who are roasting freshmen in the preseason. This is not bullying. This is not hazing. they're They're roasting them. It's a form of affection as a rite of passage to let them know you're one of us.
Banter as Stress Rehearsal
00:04:08
Speaker
So we're we're using words in a playful ah manner in a sense where it's around practice or it's in social scenes scenes like of the calf or hanging out with each other.
00:04:20
Speaker
And it's it's representative of that. ah I had amazing seniors when I was a freshman. Excellent group, amazing ah trash talkers with us.
00:04:31
Speaker
And they they aim to to bring us up and level us up through that to show that we were part of the crew. And they knew they had experience for how long a season actually is.
00:04:44
Speaker
Within high school sports, you play it for a particular season, then you change the sports. When you get to college, it's one sport all the freaking time for four years. So in order for us to make it through the drudges of certain lengths of practices or seasons, they kept it light, they kept it fun, and they brought us up to speed on how to do that.
00:05:07
Speaker
Now, there were certain seniors that weren't having fun with it, and they were being jerks. jerks They were abusing their power, and guess what? Freshman class, one of us, a defenseman, he stepped into that player's role, took his starting job, and then that player quit.
00:05:26
Speaker
So he was thought he was really good at delivering, but he couldn't take it. And then that was very representative of the type of athlete he was. He ended up quitting when one of the freshmen he tried to demean took his spot on the field.
00:05:40
Speaker
So it is a sense that it was representative of the character when he would face with challenge, how he acted. um So that that's just one example. So it aims to to build that trust and ah initiate conversation with team members and see what they're made of.
00:06:01
Speaker
In a senior talking to a freshman, it's also an opportunity for you to step into a mentor role and teach them, hey, we're we're just messing around, man, and what it's like to...
Personal Story: Humor in Healing
00:06:10
Speaker
ah to be that so it's a test and a teacher in that sense it's a ah stress rehearsal I like to call it and it builds calluses for competition that's another example I gave to the baseball pros I was talking to where we train we're bench pressing we're dead lifting we're gripping and ripping stuff we develop calluses on our hands
00:06:33
Speaker
Well, similar within the the locker room talk, we're able to develop calluses socially and emotionally for when there are people outside of the locker room that try to drag and bring us down.
00:06:45
Speaker
So we are are getting an opportunity to stay composed when somebody's trying to knock us off our balance, our mental balance.
00:06:57
Speaker
And we're we're training also to perform under that emotional stress. Within practice, when our offense is in defense, we are talking trash to one another.
00:07:08
Speaker
Yes, it's it's playful, it's banter, it's competitive, but at the same time, we're we're going after each other, trying to knock each other off. But there is a mutual respect within that, knowing that if at practice we can push and they push back, when they're going to get tough in game time against another opponent, I trust that if they are pushed, they'll push right back.
00:07:33
Speaker
So it's a sense of a test and a teacher. And I love to quote movies. Think about basketball and the value of the psych out. You get points for psyching another person out.
00:07:46
Speaker
And then ah the departed scene with Alec Baldwin and Marky Mark, where Alec Baldwin asked him, hey, how's your mother? And Marky Mark just completely nails it, gives it right back, is quick with it.
00:07:59
Speaker
So ah using butt banter to test composure and focus before high stakes moments. So if you are a leader on a team, start to test those freshmen, not in a demeaning way, aiming to,
00:08:15
Speaker
Call them out for certain things. So athletes who can laugh through stress can usually play through it. I was a freshman that took everything way too seriously. that was That was my personality. I was quiet. I was lead by example. No questions asked. I'm going to be the first person there and the last to leave. If we're losing a game, I'm going into the weight room.
00:08:38
Speaker
Yes, I had a key. So that that's the type I was. But I had two great teammates that were in my my freshman class, the Twin Towers, we'll call them. One from Southie and one with an older brother who would become famous for the amount of nightmares that he would give athletes that we were playing against heckling on the sidelines.
00:08:58
Speaker
And... These two dudes, they were relentless. They saw how much I cared and they did value that. But at the same time, if I took things too seriously and got angry at myself,
Balancing Work and Humor
00:09:09
Speaker
they were there to have a sense of humor about it and and were relentless.
00:09:14
Speaker
Even so much so, i i broke my leg eight days before our first game my freshman year and the school... before i even went to the hospital to get an x-ray ah before i even knew it was broken they just gave me an ace wrapped bandage and wooden crutches small catholic school in the east coast and so february i'm crutching around on my wooden crutches with my buddies And then I freaking on my strong foot slip on ice, my wooden crutches break, and I fall on my ace bandage broken ankle. It's the worst pain. It hurt infinitely more than actually breaking it.
00:09:53
Speaker
It was so freaking painful. I'm tearing up just thinking about it. And what do my two buddies do? by they just They just start bursting out and laughing at me.
00:10:05
Speaker
Luckily, the athletic trainer was not far behind us leaving after that practice, and she helped me up and was able to to get my foot right.
00:10:16
Speaker
Very painful. ah but they were able to balance the pain out with laughter and I could see the humor. If I was on the other end of this, I would certainly be laughing. So they they were able to ah use humor in my most painful moment of my entire life to help ease the ease the tension.
00:10:35
Speaker
And over time, I was able to find that balance between the hard work mentality with the knowledge that we were we were just going to have a great time together. So it if you have that lead by example, that hard ass, there is an opportunity to break them and bring them into the fold of being a good teammate. So ah ways to accomplish that is balancing your ball busting with celebration.
00:11:02
Speaker
In my experience, why someone is so task oriented, they have a sense of accomplishment by checking all those boxes or they're looking for acknowledgement by working so hard so now if we're able to acknowledge what they're supposed to do and provide a sense of humor with it it's a big win so banter without celebration that becomes cynicism uh Banter is an opportunity for us to accelerate the bonds and believe that we're responsible for each other's success.
00:11:36
Speaker
So anytime we have ah a big win or a celebration with the teams that I coach now, I have a sense of humor about it. Some some ah playful banter worked within it.
00:11:49
Speaker
I've worked with and I've had generations of coaches, parents, bosses that they believe withholding praise and recognition is what builds humility.
00:12:00
Speaker
And yeah they don't acknowledge those wins or what the the box is being checked because that's what we're supposed to do. I disagree with that. We want to acknowledge, and if you want to maintain humility with them, then apply a sense of humor with it and celebrate the wins, good reps, small breakthrough, big game, and continue to show how much you care with some humor on top of that.
00:12:27
Speaker
um So that that's an opportunity for us to break through to the very task-oriented hard asses and get them to see this value of
Building Trust Through Humor
00:12:37
Speaker
banter. Because sometimes the the athletes that joke around and be playful at certain times, that kid doesn't get included.
00:12:46
Speaker
Aim to bring them in as a coach, acknowledge their work, and celebrate with some fun ah fun stuff. All right. So continuing from the the coach's perspective, banter is an opportunity to release tension. It's a great tension release tool for a coach.
00:13:05
Speaker
Most of our feedback as coaches, 90% of it is corrective. Fix your stance. Do this. Rewind in that film. What were you thinking there? So...
00:13:17
Speaker
Banter is an opportunity for us to then have that 10% be so valuable and still show that we're connected and care. And without humor, our coaching and direction, it feels heavy-handed, one-sided, and banter will help keep the tone light between the whistles and resets that athlete-coach connection when we need it.
00:13:41
Speaker
ah making self-deprecating jokes. if If I'm doing a demo, it's I usually only have to be good for one, two, or three reps and joke and say, I still got it.
00:13:53
Speaker
Or if I have to do a good rep during a demo, I find the heaviest dumbbell in there. I do it for one. and to show off. So having humor within my demos of movement, that eases the tension, ah certainly when I'm teaching.
00:14:09
Speaker
It helps build rapport too and shows humanity and models an emotional balance versus trying to be the hard-ass coach all the time. There is a break in case of emergency during a halftime. If you're not playing loose, if you're not playing to your full potential, and we're not even close, I'm talking down five, eight, 10, there's still a chance that we can come back I feel that's a good time for humor.
00:14:42
Speaker
If we're close, then I'm going to stay locked in and focus on the the task that or we need to complete, one, two, three things. if it's If it's still in grasp, but we need to play fast, we need to play loose to accomplish this, then I'm going to break out the humor at halftime um and go from there.
00:15:04
Speaker
So one example of that during our first lacrosse game last season, what I did team we certainly should have been beating, we were losing.
00:15:15
Speaker
I let them know that the average person makes three to four mistakes every single day. And guess what? And called out five dudes on the team that they're already done for the day.
00:15:27
Speaker
There's nothing but green lights moving forward. So that was a sense of humor Break glass in case of emergency to get some smiles out there and let them know, hey, this is the first game of the season and we got a long way to go, but let's crawl back and make this a great story. That's another thing I love to tell them.
00:15:46
Speaker
This is going to make a better story. That's a positive reframing. it's It's fun and sense of banter that helps them understand when they do tell the story of this big comeback, it's going to be in a ah playful manner. so that That's one sense from a a coaching perspective I love to throw out there.
00:16:06
Speaker
And then the last tip here for team environments, I want to invite banter in. if we're I know laughter lowers egos and barriers and it builds unity.
00:16:20
Speaker
So think about the different team building tasks that you've experienced that brought your team together. I would like to keep those as movement-based as possible so they're connected to a skill that's related and connected to our bodies.
00:16:35
Speaker
So this could be top golf. It could be bowling. It could be ah line dancing. So everybody sucks at that stuff until they don't.
00:16:45
Speaker
We get an opportunity where even coaches step out there and show them what a piss-poor golfer I am. I'm a phenomenal dancer, though. so I love to show off in that sense.
00:16:58
Speaker
But the the bowling as well. Bowling, not my strong suit. I love to get the lightest ball and just whip it as hard as I can. I should work on technique, but I want to just take the six pounder and and blow some stuff up.
00:17:12
Speaker
But I work humor into that. You're going kids that suck and they're learning to laugh at their own mistakes. It's similar to how we want to to run certain practices or if they're taking it too seriously, then hey, look, we're just having fun here. It's movement.
00:17:30
Speaker
if there is a ah If there is a kid that needs humbling within our team, this is an opportunity for them to have some fun, i give some trash talk, receive some trash talk, and then bring it down.
00:17:45
Speaker
But then i as a coach, as a leader, can step in and then help them realize that the connections to the field or the the court or their actual sporting arena as much as I can.
00:17:57
Speaker
so Everybody stepping into an environment, movement-based, that they suck at, it is a trust multiplier. We're all vulnerable vulnerable, we're learning, and we're laughing, and that that just builds trust across the team.
00:18:15
Speaker
So, ah yeah, pickleball, bowling, dance, golf, where you you may have some studs on there, but they're usually the the mystery stub let let stud, like the the backup quarterback that's amazing at golf.
00:18:28
Speaker
He's got too much time on his hands. He should be practicing more football, right? So then i I turn his skill, his amazing skill at this random sport, into some more humor, right?
00:18:40
Speaker
um So this also starts to build inside jokes, shared stories. we We went ice skating one year in my college, went in
Banter and Emotional Resilience
00:18:51
Speaker
D.C. so they had the Washington Capitals practice rink that you could rent. Well, we rented as a team.
00:18:57
Speaker
It was hilarious. you had amazing. And then i've told i've I've told the hilarious story of one of my teammates, Latimer, ah just staring down dudes in his underwear and a shirt that says every dog has a day.
00:19:09
Speaker
Well, he was terrible at lacrosse. But guess what? We all step into this practice arena for the Washington Capitals, and we're all sucking at ice skating, and Latimer just kills it.
00:19:21
Speaker
Just doing amazing speed skating, amazing. acrobatics and just blew everyone's mind nobody knew now he's making us all look bad and and and idiots so uh inside jokes my my teammates and in those environments we're not focused on our sport it allows teammate teammates to to let their guard down and create this this secret language of trust and inside jokes and my my hammers my teammates hammered me
00:19:52
Speaker
on a lot of different things and that people would later try to use as ammunition against me as an athlete and even in the professional world. My height, my Hobbit-esque features, how much I sweated, and guess what the the trash talk I heard from sidelines in the games.
00:20:13
Speaker
Hilarious. Number 14. Why is your jersey soaked? Did you get a swirly at halftime? A la... Lynchburg College, where they had couches on their sports track that surrounded the field.
00:20:28
Speaker
You had guys just yelling at me sweating through my jersey. Well, I had heard it a thousand times from my friends that then prepared me to just turn and laugh and give the frat bros a thumbs up. Like, that's a good one.
00:20:43
Speaker
So preparation, trust, camaraderie, so much good is is coming from banter. It's a balanced test for you as a coach.
00:20:54
Speaker
So ah i'll I'll throw some questions out there and you can even extend these to your team. But who can you joke with and still know that it it's it's it's love based, it's compassionate with the the the humor?
00:21:09
Speaker
Who needs a little bit more celebration than sarcasm?
00:21:16
Speaker
How can you as a captain or coach use humor to connect with your team, not control your team? And great teams don't just talk, they laugh, roast, and rise together.
00:21:32
Speaker
That's all I got for today. Shout out to CJ. Shout out to all my teammates for giving a hard time and helping me develop those social emotional calluses.
00:21:44
Speaker
I appreciate each and every one you That does it for now another episode of the Captains and Coaches podcast. If you want more, i throw up all of my notes into the newsletter, detailed tools for how you can apply that. Head to captainsandcoaches.com.