Special Guest Tom Manning

Count money, man. Money back riches.

I'm trying to try and told him I'm a beast.

But

what's up gang?

Welcome to the grind cast.

Stop an area.

Here. Get ready to do.

Day new day.

What's up gang?

Welcome to another episode of the grind cast.

Get ready.

It's a new day.

We got big permanent house.

Have you all?

And we got Tommy Manning, Tom Manning in the house,

write the name down.

Remember the name.

He's already making big waves in college football.

He's the offensive coordinator at Iowa State right now.

It's not uncommon to see them in the top 10 ranked internationally now.

Watching them beat.

I watched them beat two top five teams in a nation recently in the last few

years since Tommy's been there.

Nobody wants to play Iowa State.

And I don't remember them being this big of a threat until you guys,

you know, kind of came on the scene over there in Iowa.

So first of all, Tommy's a high school teammate of mine.

We won a state championship together.

Tommy was a captain and center on the offensive line.

And just a beast to play with.

What school was it?

It was Ursula.

We went to Ursula together.

But welcome Tommy.

And thanks for spending some time with us early this morning on the grind

cast.

Brother, what's happening?

Nothing man.

I'm excited to do so.

I was I was up ready to rock and roll this morning.

You know, fire it up to get going, man.

We got you and we got perms.

So we're going to be in great shape.

It's certain, man.

Yes, sir.

What?

So you guys went around playing for Ursula.

How was it?

Now you guys want to what 21 years ago?

21 years ago.

21 years late at Tommy.

No.

That was like five months ago.

Seems like, right?

Yeah, it's crazy.

So, so how was it planned with you guys?

Like, how was it planned against?

Eat like having planned with each other?

So I'll tell you first, you know, playing with what Tommy, it was cool

because I didn't realize this until when we played Little

League football, you know, I grew up on the east side.

And until I really found a home, they would, I would play

football on camel.

Oh, hi, where my grandmother lived.

We would use her address.

I played for the little Red Devils.

And we had a bomb squad, you know, we had a good team.

And so in Little League, you know, if you got one star player,

you could kind of really start to dominate, you know, other

teams, one, you know, star player.

So I remember anytime we played Tommy school, he was like me.

He lived on the north side of Youngstown, but he went and played at Liberty,

you know, which was next door.

Yeah.

And so I remember number six, didn't you wear six?

You better remember that.

I still remember that number six, believe it.

Because we were so juiced up, man, they had us watching film like at young,

young kids like overboard, you know,

aggressive football, you know what I mean?

And I'm watching six.

And I know anytime we played Liberty, there was going to be this big ass number six in

the backfield.

They had Tommy in the backfield.

He was the kid that was, you know, we had weight, weight classes.

You were supposed to be under a certain weight.

He would be to do with like trash bags running around and like barely making the weight

like just too big.

And then he's in the backfield.

So he was, he was a beast, you know, at running back, you know, playing when we were growing

up and both of us had, you know, good teams on the literally.

And then we came to high school together and I ended up putting two and two together realizing

this is the same person.

But now he's on the line.

And so Tommy was a grinder, very, very gritty.

You know, he was somebody that was going to play every snap, you know, every quarter,

even if his, you know, shoulder was falling out of whack or, you know, leg was jacked up

like no matter what.

You knew you could count on him.

And if it was only for those three hours, if he couldn't walk for the next week, he

was going to make it for those three hours, you know, to mean somehow.

And so Tommy I would describe as like a hard nose person.

Also was a good balance of leading by example, but also a vocal leader.

You know, I think there's two different types of leaders, sometimes on the team, the people

that lead by example and the people that are, you know, just like that motivation, that vocal

leader.

Tommy, I feel like had a good balance of both of those things.

And then a unique ability to connect with people from all different walks of life, which

I think, you know, came from him growing up on the north side.

So on the north side, you know, where Tommy grew up, it's not all predominantly white

areas.

Actually, the north side was more of an African-American area.

And so he was used to, you know, hang him with everybody.

So he was cool with everybody.

And Ursula was like a melting pot for sports, you know, was, we would have on out of 11

players, we would have, you know, six or seven guys that were African-American, four,

you know, four people, three or four people that were, you know, white people.

And then every once in a while, they threw me in Lewis and the mix.

And we would be the token Hispanic to represent, you know, people out there.

But Tommy would be able to connect with everybody.

And man, it was really a pleasure to play with Tommy.

He was one year below me.

He was a junior when I was a senior.

And I remember my junior year, we were five and five.

And my senior year, you know, going into that senior year, Tommy's junior year, we started

to speak about, we're going to win a state title.

It was never done before in our high school history, even though it was a long tradition

powerhouse, you know, for football.

And we went out and did it.

You know, we went 14 to one, won a state title.

And, you know, I was, I was one of the leaders on defense.

And I, you know, Tommy was somebody I could, I know I could count on to lead, you know,

on the offensive side when we needed to bite down on our mouthpiece, you know, a little

bit.

And so it was cool to play with Tommy and Tommy.

I'm just super proud to have you on the podcast today.

When it comes to after high school, you went to Mount Union.

Mount Union, if you all don't know is a powerhouse traditional powerhouse in Division 3

College football, did you guys win a national championship?

Why you were there?

Yeah, I won two of them there as a player.

And so we were really fortunate there, you know, and just like you alluded to, you know,

I ended up going to school there because I felt like it was the closest thing that would

resemble or at least make me feel like that, the unity and the things that we had on our

high school football team, being able to continue that kind of through college.

And, you know, I think I'm one of those guys that I'm not the smartest guy on the world,

but I know what's good for me.

And you know, the environment that I think we helped cultivate our coaching staff, helped

cultivate there in high school, you know, I felt like man, I think could be carried on

into into the college atmosphere and you know, knowing that I kind of yearn for that and

enjoyed that part of it.

That's, you know, that's where I decided to go.

And I knew I wanted to coach football and I felt like now with my limited skill set,

not very talented.

This is probably the best place for me to go where I can be around really high in football

coaches and learn what that looks like.

Yeah, so then from Mount Union, what happened from there?

Like how did you go?

What was the coaching journey like for you from there?

Well, you know, the, the, our head football coach in Mount Union, Larry Carous, who is the

all-time winning is football coaching, college football history and has had a profound

effect on my life.

But his thing has always been in, you know, he's won a million national championships.

It's never been about that, but it's always been about do you have the ability to grind

out good days and, and the elite teams and those kind of things do it.

So really my, my trajectory or my, really my tour of what I've done in a career from

there has just been grinding out days.

You know, when I got done playing football, I became a high school football coach.

I was teaching six grade social studies, which was, it was strange.

It was different for me.

I was in a predominantly white area, which was really different for me, you know, and,

you know, it was a great job.

I loved it.

But I had, I felt like man, I could do this job for 30 years.

And I don't know how many people all really affect.

I don't know if I'll ever really challenge myself.

So I decided I wanted to get in college football.

So I took a graduate assistant job at Emory and Henry College in Southwest, Virginia.

You probably have never heard of it.

Never.

I got a friend named Emory in Henry.

That's right.

That's about right.

And this was, it was culture shock for me.

I mean, it was, it was the South, man, you know, Searsucker suits the whole deal.

Like, it was, it was wild.

And how long were you there?

I was there one year as a graduate assistant, then I was there one year as the, the offense

align coach.

Um, so people don't understand sometimes like when you talk about the grind, you know,

if we could rewind a little bit, you said the grind out the days, you know, maybe explain

what, what that means.

And then also like being a GA is, is a grinding out experience.

It's not highly compensated.

You know, I mean, it's a lot of grunt work, you know, leading up to the, the, the part.

You know, people could look at you and think, oh, man, how lucky he is.

He's getting paid a good amount of money and get to go hang out and, and Florida, you

know, sometimes during the off season, coaching at a big time program.

But did they really look at what you did in the beginning, the sacrifices that you made?

Like, because you didn't get to just skip the line and go straight there, talk a little

bit about that process.

Yeah.

Well, you know, I think the first going back to what we're talking about in, in my union,

I think most interesting thing about their ultra successful.

But, you know, we've never talked about winning championships there.

We never talked about, hey, we're going to go be the national championship, or we're going

to go do this.

I think the biggest thing for us there was it was a one day snapshot every single day,

365 days a year of what do we have to do today?

And I think it's in Vogue, like in sports, to have a slogan, right, win the day and

all that stuff.

And our coach really wasn't like that, not really resonated with me that he was going

to speak to us like men and explain it to you like, no, listen, every day that we're

going to, that you're alive, you're going to be challenged in a variety of different

way.

And life is really all about choices, right?

And we don't have many things that we can control in our lives every single day, but greatness

is a choice.

And we have those little moments every day where you can make the decision, do I want to

do X, Y or Z.

And those things stack up.

And I think his mindset every day of, listen, man, there's going to be days in football

or in life that it's going really good.

And you're going to have a good day.

But most of the days, particularly when you're involved in a competitive environment or in

sports or in business, most of the days, there's more of a challenge and you're going to

have bad things happen.

And you have to make that choice of, am I going to be affected negatively or am I going

to have the ability to just grind out good days?

And I think we all kind of, you don't need to define it.

I think it's all kind of intrinsic, like you know when you're, when it's going bad

and you answer to adversity positively and you can just kind of squeak.

But that is what we felt like was our competitive advantage because when those things happen in

games and, I mean, your level of poise and composure rises when you spend your day consciously

making efforts to change the narrative and change the negative things that may happen in

a day.

So that's kind of how I really, really enjoy that.

What tips would you give or what tips did you learn from, you know, Larry, I believe

you were saying you got some of this stuff from, you know,

when things are going negative in a day, you know, when, when you do have those moments

because I do, I think this is really what starts to separate amateurs and professionals

is, you know, there's a level that people can play at when everything is good.

Whether conditions are perfect, you know, I don't have a code.

I'm not injured, you know, everything's good and, and you're playing at that level.

But really what starts to separate people is how can you play when the conditions aren't

perfect for you mentally or things aren't going perfect in your personal life or what's

going on?

Can I still come out here and perform at a professional level?

What tips would you have for someone that's maybe has that come up in a day and they're

trying to learn how to when obstacles pop up in the day or the day isn't going perfect,

how to mentally grind that out or win that day, so to speak?

Yeah, I think it goes into buckets.

I think the first thing is is, do you actually have the ability to control control the situation?

Right?

Because we can control, we can control.

Right.

We can control.

That's great, man.

Right?

And there's some things that that's going to be how it is.

So when you can't control the situation, it's going to be how your response is.

Right?

And then secondly, I think is, and I think this is something that really gets missed,

which I think will kind of lead us in the next thing, but you know, it is, don't skip steps

along your process of your growth and development in your profession or in your personal life.

It's like, if you have a relationship and you don't spend the time pouring in the things

that you need to pour in and learning, man, when there's a little bit of diversity, it's

probably going to, it's probably going to shout it, right?

Well, same thing goes in my profession.

If you don't do the work from day one to wherever you get, man, and you start to become

into, you get into, in the adverse situations, if you don't do the work, there's a thing,

it's a seeded out.

And I really believe in, we have to do everything in our mind, like an art team.

We have to do everything to eliminate our seeded out.

Right?

So if there's doubt in your mind about maybe the way that you have trained, prepared,

and man, it's not perfect, you're going to intrinsically doubt yourself.

Right?

But the guys you look at, like guys like Tom Brady and all those guys, like their level

of preparation is so strong that they are able to have poise and they are able to calm

down because, man, they've created the seeded out in somebody else.

And to me, I think that's like the biggest deal ever here is that we want to make sure

that we're doing our part in terms of preparation.

So you can make great choices to kind of get back to what we're talking about because

choices are going to be ultimately things are going to…

to get you out of bad days.

Tell us about the grind coming from a GA.

For some of the listeners,

they might not all understand what that stands for.

The GA.

And then talk about, all right,

I was the GA at Emory and Henry.

And then how did that process go

to getting to where you're at?

And what are some things that people may miss

when they look at it and they see you on TV

or something like that and think,

oh man, he got it, he got it good.

But missing where you slept as a GA

or what film you had to break down

or what technology you didn't have at that point,

all those small things and decisions

that you could look back on now and say,

okay, I see how that piece fit into this piece of the puzzle

and where most people miss it or quit in this process.

You know, maybe rewind the tape and help people understand

how you went from that point to currently

where you're at right now.

So a graduate assistant,

you know, it's pretty much the lowest level

in terms of on the coaching staff,

those are the guys that they're a graduate student.

So universities or colleges are gonna pay for,

you know, your graduate school.

And in most cases, you're really

hardly able to actually go and get a meaningful degree.

And you're like, you're always on call, right?

You're doing all the jobs that literally nobody wants to do.

That's why they got you there.

And from making copies to washing people's cars,

to, I mean, to videotape pretty much

you're the guy that when everybody else goes home

you know that you're gonna be there for a long, long time.

For other, I mean, you really don't even need

to have somewhere to live

because you can probably just live

at the football building, right?

And so for me, I started as a graduate assistant

in Division Three football.

I made about $8,000 probably my first year.

After two years in Emery and Henry,

I went to University of Toledo as a graduate assistant.

So I was there as a graduate assistant for a year.

Then I was there as the director of football operations,

which really went much better.

I left after those two years,

went back to Mount Union College as a position coach there.

And then after that, that next year,

I got, was fortunate enough to become the offense

align coach at the University of Toledo.

Did that for four years.

Then I got the call to come to Iowa State.

I was the offensive coordinator for two seasons.

I left for one year, went to the Indianapolis Colts,

coach there, and then I've been back here now

for two seasons.

So a lot of houses, a lot of moving.

Yeah, I've been.

Yeah, there's a lot that goes into it.

But I think this is a profession that it's a very interesting

profession. I think number one,

there's a lot of people don't really know the reason

that they get into it.

Right.

And I think you just kind of mentioned it.

I think at the highest levels,

you can make a really good living.

And I think that's, and you can be in your own world,

you can be important and famous in your own world

in the college football world.

And I think a lot of people, particularly young people,

man, I really want to be coach.

I want to coach.

I want to coach.

I want to impact people.

That's what you hear a lot as young people coming in.

And I always ask them, well, great, man,

I got a really good division three job that I can get you.

Well, I don't really want to do that.

Oh, okay.

So you don't just want to coach.

You want to coach and make a lot of money.

Right.

And that's fine.

That's okay, right?

But I think the things that happen on the high end of this,

they give you people the illusion that you, man,

you have to, it's about this, that and the other.

And so for me, it was really never about getting

to a certain place or a certain level.

And our head coach here, and I believe in this greatly,

his thing is that greatness isn't just for the chosen few.

And knowing where we came from,

and maybe some of the advantages or disadvantages

that we had growing up, I felt like, man, I can go do something.

And if I'm willing to do the things

that no one else is really willing to do.

Come on, that's the key right there.

So you're talking about, I'm talking to kids,

they want to coach.

And I got this D3 deal lined up for you.

No, no, no, no, no, I don't want that.

Same in my world.

You know what I mean?

What do you want somebody wants to run the company

before they want to do the, like the studio

or it didn't just get built, right?

Right.

There's a process to how everything happens.

And you can't skip those steps.

And you know, a lot of the guys that maybe I've played with

or friends of mine that there's a part of it was, man,

well, I played with our head football coach.

He was a Miami guys well.

Well, you know, Tommy and Matt, they kind of always been together.

Yeah, we have, but you weren't willing to do the things

and give up things and not be with your family

and not sleep at home and maybe some of the other compress

because for whatever reason,

maybe that wasn't intriguing to you

or maybe you weren't tough enough.

Right.

Right.

And you know, and that's what I think.

You know, like I knew you were going to do something great

because as a player knowing you, like,

you toughness to me and I learned this from Frank Reichett

for with Ian and Apple's coach.

His saying was toughness is a relentless pursuit

to get better every day and an obsession to finish.

And you know, guys that have that,

like toughness isn't going to a bar and punch somebody into it.

It's all the game.

Well, you can't, you know, it's not good enough.

Yeah, right.

So, but toughness is the guys that have a relentless pursuit

to get better and an obsession to finish.

And, you know, I think the people that you look at that are successful

when you have that real toughness,

it gives you an opportunity to continue to climb the ladder

and get to where you want to go eventually.

And certainly I think in your case, it's held true.

And hopefully I can continue on to kind of move

in that direction and keep doing what I got to do.

Well, talking about playing, you talking about players,

how was it playing with this guy?

And what was it?

What the transition was, did you ever know back

when you were playing with him that you wanted to be a coach?

I knew right away.

You know, for me there was, I don't know what level,

because I believe coaching is coaching.

Whatever level you choose, that's awesome, right?

That's the area you decided to go into.

And we had a tremendous high school football coach

and he had a huge effect on me.

But playing with Simon was, it was really unique

because like, I knew who Simon was going up.

You know, and you know, he was the idiot running around

a little league with his number shaved in his head.

You know, at one point he had like a little Jerry girl.

So like, he was all swagged out.

Always put in the game.

And like, I'm the opposite.

Yeah.

So that's why we're, we mean him got a little yin and yang.

Like he's the, he's gonna, you know, he's gonna have it all on.

He's gonna have 35 wristbands on, you know.

And I'm just gonna go play, that's just how we do it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, but so for me, what were, where I appreciated Simon the most,

you know, was, Simon was a guy that had extreme confidence

in his own abilities that and was able to pull

or place confidence into the people that were around him.

Yeah.

And that's empowerment and it was particularly

from the defensive side of the football

and where I enjoyed Simon, where he made me better

and challenged me was, you know, Simon was gonna run his mouth

and practice, right?

He was gonna, he was gonna, what are the some of the things

he said that got you fired up?

Well, I don't know if you can swear on this podcast or not.

Absolutely.

Yes, you can.

Go ahead, yes, say, Simon's a guy that he's the ultimate

ship talker.

Yeah, yeah.

He is gonna be, he is, so we're parks and offense

versus defense and there's a lot of good players on both sides.

He's gonna, you know, you can barely see him over there.

He's so short.

He's gonna be, he's barking and the whole deal.

And, you know, I loved it because I'm a highly competitive person,

but I think he's the kind of guy that he empowers people

by reaching deep down and finding their competitive spirit

and challenging them, right?

And competition, yeah, a brief success.

So we had a team of really talented people

and then it's run by this guy on defense that,

he has different ways to motivate people.

He's either ripping us on some of the guys, some guys he's pulling up.

And then some guys, like me, he knew that I was gonna bring it every day.

Right.

Well, his way to motivate and kind of get everybody else going

is I'm gonna run him out of him.

Yeah, we can't run the ball against us.

That it, that it.

And I'm gonna, I mean, I'm the same exact way.

So you go show two very different people from very different walks of life,

but we're pretty, we're pretty similar.

We're gonna, we're trying to kill each other every day.

And I think those two, those things really helped.

And then, and I think that probably the most profound effect

that Simon had on our football team was he did allude to it.

We did have a melting pot of people, right?

Kids from all different walks of life.

And I think the thing that Simon did, which is really unique

is he was a guy that brought love to our football program.

And it was, it was a different kind of like he brought,

hey, I love you and we have a desire to be different.

Family side thing.

Yeah, like we're gonna be different than everybody else

because it doesn't make sense why all these kids

from different socioeconomic backgrounds,

from different races, from different ethnicities,

why we should all be so close and be together.

But Simon was a really the ring leader, right?

And there's a lot of great leaders on that team,

but really the ring leader is saying like, no, man,

like that stuff, it's not real.

Like what's real is that I care about you, right?

And we're gonna go do something.

And one of the things that we teach our kids here is,

there's, there's really two kinds of people

when it comes to competitive sports, right?

Or business or whatever.

It's the guy that wants to, you either want to be somebody,

or you want to go do something.

And we prefer people that want to go do something, right?

We don't want to be anybody else,

we're gonna be the best person to us,

and we want to go do something.

I think that's the one thing that Simon really brought

on our football team was he was a guy that was really able

to tap in and say, hey, listen,

I don't care who you are, where you're from,

what you're about, right?

I'm gonna get to know everyone of you guys

and we're all gonna get to know each other

and we're gonna go do something.

Let's go.

It was a very, very driven mindset,

and I don't even know if we knew what we were doing.

Right, right.

It was just, it just felt right.

We did, yeah, it's still right.

It just felt like playing ball and going to go

to somebody's very hands.

Right.

You know, to me, like that team,

there's still so many things that I take,

and I've been in football for a long time now,

that I take from that aspect that I really think

has profoundly helped me.

I was gonna ask you that.

Yeah, it really is.

So some of that, so back in that era,

that helped you along the way.

Like, still now.

Absolutely.

Yeah, so you still hear that fire from this guy

and you have your players going out there and doing that.

Yeah, like Simon's a guy that if he decided

to get in the coach, he'd have been really,

really good at that too.

Yeah, you know, he had been really good at that too.

Maybe I'll come wash cars for you one day

or something and beat a GA and have some fun.

And see what we can, see what we can drum up.

GA for me, I would grind your ass,

I would grind your ass till home.

Come on, that'd be great.

That'd be great.

The, you know, coaching young people,

you know, I think, you know, is something that's unique.

You know, you know, a, a mentor of mine

has been coached, Tressel.

And what I've pulled a lot out of coached,

Tressel was here in business,

I've tried to develop a young culture,

not necessarily always young and age,

but you got at least be young in the way that you think.

Very similar to coaching because if you're, you know,

35, 40 years old with kids and all that,

you can't be so separated from the 18, 19 year old

that you can't relate to them.

So you have to stay with some form of a,

of a young thinking just like Vivo was with us,

you know, in high school and stuff like that.

So coaching young people,

what tips would you have for someone that coaches young people?

Maybe tips you would have for me or some of the listeners

that coach young people, whether it's in sports

or in business, any tips, leadership stuff

that you could give us.

Yeah, I think the first thing to steal from coached,

Tressel, who used to say it all the time,

is that the kids don't care about how much you know

until they know about how much you care, right?

That's coached, Tressel, like 101.

And here's this thing I think that gets,

gets kind of funny with, with leading young people,

is, you know, adults,

they don't give young people the credit they deserve.

Young people are really, really smart.

And they're barometer to tell what's real and not real

regardless of what their education may be or where they're from.

Like they know real and authentic

and they know people that are faking it.

And so I think the first thing,

if you're gonna lead young people is,

you better be yourself and you better be authentic.

Sure.

And the guys that try to fake it, man, like,

hey, I'm gonna, you know, they try to talk to kids

in a different way.

That's, it doesn't fly.

The second thing is, is how do you establish trust?

Right?

Trust is a really hard thing to establish with people.

But you do it by example, by speaking to them,

you know, with the truth

and by trying to show them ways that, hey, listen, man,

I am here for you and I'm consistent in your life.

So young people are very willing to trust

if you give them those opportunities to trust in you.

So like, I would say this in leadership,

obviously we know it's really about relationships

and with young people, that's even more important

than man just out there in the regular workspace.

But with young people,

I really believe that, I guess the saying,

everything matters.

So if you're trying to lead young people

and you're talking about it,

one way and you're living different. Like they pick up one right away, right? If you do

one, if you say one thing and then man, you change that narrative to something else, like

young people pick up one right away, like really intelligent people. So for me, the, like,

it's really about, I'm going to earn your trust by doing the right thing. Okay? And I'm going

to earn your trust by being authentic to who I am. And man, from there, bleeding them

is really easy, right? It's leading yourself and young people are going to follow on that path.

But I think being authentic, like, it's okay to be corny with them. I think sometimes people

when they lead, when young people, they want to, man, I'm going to try to look cool and I'm going

to, I'm going to have cool, like, I'm going to be myself. And sometimes I am a little corny.

Right. But that's just how it's going to go. And they're going to love you for it or not. Right?

So to me, it's just about, and understanding too, that young people do not have a,

in the, we live in a world of instant gratification. And there's social media and there's

things and they think that it just happens right away, right? Whatever it may be. And trying to

teach those people that there is a process, right? The same way it's going to take me time

to earn your trust is the same way that everything else in this world is going to have to happen.

There's going to be a process to everything that you do. And the sooner we can understand that,

the better we're going to be. Love it. Speaking of process, you know, part of the process is, you know,

you've won more games than you've lost. But when you take a loss, you know, and you got critics,

you know, you got people pointing fingers, you got people talking shit, especially when you're

coaching at that high level, you know, you can't keep 100,000 people happy or, you know, millions of

fans that are, you know, Iowa state fans happy. There has to be some critics, you know, to mean

in some mental thoughts or feelings, even from the players, if you take a loss or maybe back-to-back

losses, talk to us about maybe blocking out the critics or how you've handled the critics and how

you've bounced back from losses. Yeah, I think the first thing is, is the media of the critics,

you have to establish in your own mind that they don't understand what you do from a day-to-day

basis, what you have sacrificed and what you do every day. So they don't know, right? So you can't

blame them, but they don't know you, right? They know what they see or what they think they see on

the weekends, right? So our opinion of it, and Coach Heycock, who is with Coach Trussle for a long

time, I think, and you may have heard this comparison, but the critics, the media, all that stuff,

it's poison. And if you, the good media, right, that they tell you you do a really good job,

that's poison. The bad media, when they tell you to do a really good job, that's poison. It's all

the same. And the more you drink it, the quicker you're going to die. Both poison. It's a both

point. We've got double points. Wow, right. So, but it's, so you don't listen to those guys, right,

when they tell you that you did really bad, right? Like, okay, cool man, right? You don't know.

So you shouldn't listen to them when they do, when they tell you that you do really good, right?

Because they don't know. And it's not for like, what is it, what are, what are critics, right? Like,

what are, what is the, when the media writes something bad about you? It's not the intended audience,

isn't you. It's for the people to read, right? So if you're reading it, you're crazy, right? Those

people don't know what you do anyway. So and it's easy to say that. It's still hard though.

Right. Of course, a human element that is a challenge. But I think you always got to go back to,

am I doing everything in my power to help our kids be successful, right? Am I doing everything in

my power to make sure that man, I can lay down at night and look at, you know, look at the man in

the mirror and say, man, you did everything you possibly could, right? Under your, the best of your

effort to give our team a chance to win. Okay? Man, I said it as hard as I could. I went through

our game plans hard, we could. I treated the people the right way this week. If you can do that,

the rest of it all falls in place, right? Like because they don't, it doesn't matter. Like they

can say whatever you, whatever else they want. And then, you know, again, I think like,

my dad used to say it. And when I was a kid, I thought it was the cheesiest and corneous thing of all time.

You know, every day before we go do anything, you know, you go to a game or whatever. And he would say,

hey, listen, do your best and have fun. And I thought it was the cheesiest, corneous thing,

growing up, now that I'm a little bit older, like it really still comes down to, did you do your best?

Like did you, did you try to do everything you could in your power to do your best, you can't

and try to have a little bit of fun doing it. Simple. Yeah. I think that's what I'm really good at

doing. I might not be good at everything, but I'm really good at trying really, really hard.

And I'm really good at having some fun. We both, that's something we both had in common as I think,

you know, with our size. And I see, you know, last time I saw you, you look like you were

skinnier, but you know, I remember you were, you know, you were a lot bigger. You know, to mean,

like playing old line, you know, to mean you had to get up to 250, 260 sometimes. And I think I

saw you, you know, at like 190, you know, or something like that, you know, to line and try to get

skinny. A lot of my friends I played college with that were like 300 pounds. They slimed down

and a lot of the skill players that were skinny. They got fat, you know, so it's it's confusing.

But I know me and you were both, we would both play bigger than our size. You know, we would make

ourselves bigger than we were. We would play bigger than we were. We would put extra effort in.

And as a coach, watching players and being around other coaches, what stands out to you of what

has separated the the greats? You know, maybe you see people that come in with equal amount of talent

or the person that you that you recruit that has, you know, high levels of talent. And then you

have somebody that's a walk on or somebody that maybe was a, you know, barely got a scholarship

to play. And then four years or five years plays out. And one of them has a, you know, a better career

or coaches that were really talented that didn't go as far. What things stand out to you about the

ones that make it and elevate their game versus the others? Yeah. First one, I think is focus

that the people that, uh, man, that that that end up doing it and doing it at a really high level,

they have the ability to separate and ignore the noise and have a leap focus on what they're done.

Right? So in order to be focused, obviously, you're going to have to have some goals and things that

you, you already know, but focus is the first thing. Most people that are super talented, right? They,

I shouldn't say most people, but a lot of people that you see, man, maybe they don't reach their

potential that are super talented. They don't have the ability to ignore the noise and they can't

focus on one of the things that are really, really important for you to continue on. And it's just

like anything else. If you're really focused, if you're, you're really talented and you say,

hey, I'm going to go play in a national football. Are you, are you really like because you're talented?

Well, yeah, why are we always talented? But do you have the focus to say, hey, listen, okay,

I got to understand I got to do this, this, and this. And it's going to be really, really hard for

a really, really long time. But I can set my mental parameters on these X, Y and Z to make sure I get

there. The second thing is I think they have the ability to, and the phrase we kind of use around

here is they win in the dark, right? They're willing, like we talked about the sacrifice of, I mean,

they're willing to do those things that no one else wants to do when no one else is watching

the way that they carry themselves away from maybe their practice field or whatever they're doing

at home. Do all the things that I do, my, the way that I eat, sleep, take care of my body, all

those things. How do those things line up, even as a coach, as a player, but those guys have elite

focus, they're really willing to, to win in the dark. And I think the third thing is is intelligence.

Right. And not saying IQ, like man, I'm smarter than that. But I think the people that have separated

themselves that I see, they have a real judgment on what their actual intelligence is. Right. They're

not sometimes really smart people think they're even smarter than they are. Right. Sometimes

people that aren't real smart, they don't really understand it. Not real smart. But I'm talking

about intelligence where do you have the ability to self reflect and say, hey, listen, I'm really

smart in this section, this, this, and this. But I need a lot of help in this area and this area.

And people that are just intelligent enough to say, man, can you help me grow in this area?

Right. I think that's a really, really big thing because when you have the ability, with your

intelligent in my mind, you have the ability to auto correct. Right. You have the ability to listen,

hey, man, I know I'm not doing this right. I got it. Okay. Good. I'm humble enough.

I'll take humility. Got to have that humility because you could, you could be intelligent when an

ego and not want to ask questions. Absolutely. Right. And a lot of those intelligent guys,

man, sometimes they're, they're so smart that they think they can't learn anything. Right. Right. So

I think just having a realistic idea of who you really are. One of the best part of placing the

NFL right now, one of the best players that I've been around wasn't really the smartest guy ever.

Okay. But he was really, he really understood, man, I do not, here's some things that I really

I'm going to struggle with. Right. So I need to get help in these areas. So I can continue my focus

on the things that I got to work on. Right. I got on my crafts and all those kind of things. But

I think that's really big. And then I think the last thing probably is just, you know, there are,

there are authentic people, but they're willing to learn and grow. Right. And guys like the guy

that I worked for Coach Campbell, he's had a lot of success at a really young age. And every day,

he's trying to find a way, how do I move the needle forward? Hey, man, man, what is it? How do I

make sure that my priorities are right or my players are doing this? And how do I get better? What's

out there that we can get better? Like, right now, right now, in our deal, we are in a phase of

professional development. Well, we just had the best season in school history. Right. We just

went to the festival. And we're spending four weeks on how that heck can we move the needle forward

for our football program? But how is coaches can we move the needle forward for us? And our personal

growth, maybe it's from an ex and old standpoint, maybe it's just from whatever other standpoint.

Our personal lives. So I think we understand that that's really, really personal growth and

continued development is huge. I found it to be huge. I think people stop trying to improve

sometimes when they start seeing some victories. Talk to me about the grind, you know,

the just the hours. Like for me and you to do this podcast, I got up at four so I could work out

all that. I was excited to get on here and see your face. And we started at 7.30 in the morning.

That's the only time we could really find the time to do this. Talk to me about what it's like to,

you know, what are the hours like that people don't see in order to have the best year in school

history? It's not a nine to five deal, you know, to have those relationships and you have children

and you have a wife. How do you grind it out? How do you make that all work? What is it really

require in the form of time and effort and energy to coach at that level? Yeah, you know, I think

that the one reason I like college football, I think there's different calendars, right? There's

season, there's out of season, there's recruiting, there's, you know, there's a different section.

So the year's never the same. But for instance, if you're looking at what it's like in the season,

I mean, you're roughly going to spend 100 to 110 hours a week probably. Come on.

That's the grind. Yes, sir. That's the grind. I mean, like you really don't, you know, like I'll

get here on Sunday mornings, you know, be here till 10 o'clock and then you go Monday.

Monday is a really big game planning day for us, right? So I'll be here as early as I can get here

and then we'll stay till as late as I possibly can stay, you know, I stopped sleeping in the office.

That wasn't good for me. But then Tuesday, we kind of do the same Wednesday. We cut back a little bit,

but I'll still be there till 9, 10 o'clock and night, you know, until we get there 5, 5, 15,

you know, Thursday's a little bit earlier, you know, so my short day would be Thursday.

I used to be, we get there 5, 30 in the morning and I get to go home at 6, 6, 30 at night.

That's like our, that's our short day, you know. 13 hour day. Yeah, that's a quick tour of that.

Yeah, I got you. Yeah, Friday, you're going to Sanito, tell before the game and then, you know,

Saturday, you're planning a game and then going home, usually watching the videotape and starting

all right back over. So it is a grind during the season, but that's what we love to do. Right.

And that's, that's to us. We are ability to grind as a coaching staff. We still feel like is our

competitive advantage because, you know, we haven't hired a lot of guys that were like nobody

on our staff was born on third base. Like everybody has a very similar story of they started here

and then they did this. We're a bunch of kind of a bunch of nobody's. And so our competitive advantage

is, man, we feel like we can work harder than anybody else or we can work smart in anybody else.

And we've really had to be intelligent with that because we have burned ourselves out of time.

Right. Right. And, but in the season, that's just the way it is, you know, where,

what's really hard about the grind part of that is, yeah, you do, you still have a wife at home

and you still have kids at home. And number one, I couldn't do it without her. Right.

But you have to make the seconds count. So when you're, when you're not here at work,

you're coming home, you're exhausted, but you got to grind it out there too. Right. Yeah.

You know, and then when you, and then the off season is a little bit easier. You know, I mean,

there's, there's portions based on a couple of, you know, man, recruitings this, it gets crazy

sometimes. A lot of travel in the off season where there's a block of four or five weeks and

then there's another block where, man, you're really, really traveling all over the country and

night, you're never home and all that kind of stuff. But we try to do a really good job in the

off season of kind of calibrating ourselves a little bit. So it's, you know, we're, we're spending

a little bit of time at home, but it is, it's a grind. Shout out to your wife, man, in the support.

You know,

It takes a special woman to support the grind.

I got one, I got lucky that way.

You got one.

I think the people that I've seen that have had that level of success, and also been able

to make it all work and everything at home on and off the field have that support system,

that person, that spouse that understands it and holds it down.

Also, what have you seen from your wife that stands out?

I've seen other people not get to support and it killed their career.

Just the nagging at home, I had a friend of mine.

I'm not going to say who, but I had a friend of mine tell me one time, and it's the person

that loves marriage, believes in the Lord, loves people all that.

But he said, I just realized sometimes if they can't get the support, I don't know which

one it is.

I don't know.

Either you got the wrong wife or you got the wrong job.

I don't know which one it is.

Maybe you got the wrong job and you need to do something else or maybe you got the right

job and you made it bad.

I don't know.

But I know to have the success that you've had over there consistently, it comes from a lot

of that being able to do what you can do is having that rock, having that person at

home that is not beating you down constantly and understands the moving process.

All of that stuff, my friend just got the coaching job for the chargers.

You and I were talking about Brandon, Staley.

I've watched his career bounce from John Carroll to all over the place, the Chicago to Denver,

to this place, to that place.

I know he's moving around a family and kids and stuff that people don't see.

What things stand out to you about your wife's support?

That's important.

Yeah, the first thing is what has really helped us is that this is the only thing that she

knows.

She started with me when we couldn't do anything.

She supported me through the whole way through it.

She butter, we were going to get married.

So we were going to get an engagement ring.

I had to bring her to the place to go buy it.

She had to pick it out and buy it because I couldn't buy it.

This is the thing that she knows.

That has made everything probably a little bit easier.

She has...

Came up in it with you.

Yeah, she's kind of what we do.

We've lived in eight, ten houses and however many years.

I think the first thing is that number one, I think she keeps me grounded.

I always laugh.

She's not impressed by me at all.

I always say she actually hates me.

She thinks I'm a joke.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, wait.

I didn't tell anybody to tell you anything good.

She's like, no, I don't know.

He did good.

But she's got a really great sense of humor in that sense.

And she really enjoys the people.

And as much as you can get them involved in your work as well.

She's going to be involved in our players lives because it's really important.

It's really important to make sure that we have our kids at our football facility and

we really help work on that and family environment.

But I think the biggest thing is I'm so fortunate because I was able to find and marry a woman

that number one is independent.

Her identity is nothing to do what I do for a living or me.

She's an independent and strong.

She's got things that she does and she wants to do.

And go ahead and do them.

And then I'm really fortunate that she takes care of these kids and really is a great

mother to them.

But the biggest thing I think is it's like everything else, especially in this deal.

The ego is still the enemy and still the thing that kills.

And a lot of times in this profession what happens is the good buzz.

The ego with coaches and the ego that kids carry down into and through their families.

And it becomes a whole different thing.

And a lot of times that's a big problem at home.

But if I come home early, my wife's like, what are you doing here?

I got home early.

Don't you have it at the same age?

I thought something was wrong.

It's just how it is, man.

It's just how it is.

What's one of the wildest plays that you've seen, man?

The wildest plays, that's your yeah.

Well, I've seen some crazy ones.

I probably go back to Mike Capicello, a common place at Ersland Freshman team.

Yeah.

But I don't know.

I've seen some crazy ones.

I've seen at one point, I think it's a leader.

We picked off a pass.

We're running it for a touchdown.

They've picked it up and we're sorry, we're running for a touchdown.

I mean, that was a part breaker.

I'm not that one.

But if you get any trick plays, firm, like, let me know, you draw it up when I'm not

going to something.

I can think over here.

And firm call the play.

Hey, what is what is called, firm, the firm play?

The firm play.

Yeah, wrapping it up, you know, last two quick questions.

Who are the most three most influential people that have had an impact on your life, you

know, maybe in leadership or coaching?

And why?

What did you learn from those people?

Yeah, I think the three most influential people, like, in, in, I'm going to answer this

kind of as, as one like, I think my mother and father or none count that as one could

have them allowed to.

Right?

Yeah.

You know, I think when you talk about what's still, what is the foundation of anybody that

is going to be successful?

What's still your work ethic?

Right?

And do you have the ability to transcend where you, your, your talent levels are because you're

willing to work hard in everybody else?

And I think growing up in a house that that was really important watching my father do

it, watching my mother do it.

And then doing it with, by still treating people the right way, huge, profound influence

on my life.

Secondly, I think in really it's really the coaches that I had because I think outside

of my parents, Jim Vivo, Larry Carrus, and then the guy who worked for now, Matt Campbell,

those are all guys that there were the reason why I wanted to get into coaching because,

you know, those guys really helped me as a young person really saved my life probably

just because they gave me a purpose to do something.

And on top of that, I think, you know, I owe them so much in my own profession from, not

only from a professional development standpoint, put me on a career path, but also from like,

man, the learning of the tactical side of football, the learning of the techniques out of

football, and then learning how to do it the correct way with, with, with, with great

character.

And I think those guys are, and then, and lastly, I pride my wife, Sally, that, you

know, I mean, just what we're just talking about, being able to, a, put up with me like

in general, and then, and then, I mean, I mean, I mean, I mean, I mean, it's, it's

all now.

And then, I mean, and then on top of that, you know, I think when you look at just, man,

what is required of this job and raising the kids, like, it's a challenge, you know,

and so I think those three people probably, just seeing the way that they've handled themselves

and really have helped me, that'd be probably my answer.

Love it, love it.

So, last, you know, if, if people are looking to athletes are coming to look to, to play

it at Iowa State, you know, what you guys have just, like you said, one of the Fiesta

Bowl, I've watched you knock off some, some powerhouse teams, you're putting people out

in the NFL.

But what, what can they expect coming to Iowa State, you know, if, if they're looking

to go somewhere and they want to come play for you, what, what, what could they expect

to come, coming there?

And then, how would someone be able to, to, to follow, you know, I know you don't have

a lot of time for that stuff, but, you know, maybe social media or something, if somebody

wanted to follow, you know, you, or your, your program, how would some of our listeners

be able to kind of, you know, follow your journey?

Yeah, I think if you, if someone was interested in, in our program, what you get, I think

we're a little bit different than everybody else, we're, we're not a football factor, and

we don't want to be a football factor.

You know, we are still about developing a culture of high character young men that have

a passion to play football and want to have a lot of fun and get a meaningful education.

And it sounds cheesy and sounds corny, but you can win that way because we're doing

it right now.

You think if you can't in our place, you'd see like, man, these guys, they work now.

Like, they grind and they're great human beings.

But as far as it to follow me, I think I'm at Coach Tom Manning on Twitter and, and, and

Instagram, but Twitter is the best way at Coach Tom Manning.

You can send me anything, you know, video and all that kind of stuff right through there.

That's probably the easiest way.

And we're always looking for good players.

So let's go.

Love it.

Appreciate it, man.

Thanks for joining us on the Grime Man.

Super proud of you, man.

Keep up the good work.

Tommy and anything that I could do for you.

Let me know, man.

Thanks for your time today on the Grime cast.

Thanks for joining us on another episode of the Grime cast.

Get ready.

It's a new day.

Count money, man.

Money back riches.

I'm trying to try and told them I'm a beast.