Augie believed the game itself is the best teacher. You design practices that let situations instruct—then step back and let mastery emerge organically.
Duration: ~27 minutes
"The game teaches the game." Augie Garrido said this hundreds of times, maybe thousands. It wasn't a throwaway line—it was the core of his pedagogy. He didn't believe in lecturing players about what to do in every scenario. He believed in creating scenarios so clear, so well-designed, that the lesson taught itself. And if a player didn't get it the first time? The game would teach it again. And again. Until they did.
Picture this: mid-April practice at Disch-Falk Field. Texas is working on rundowns—baserunner caught between second and third. The infielders are crisp, mechanical. They execute the drill flawlessly. Augie watches for two minutes, then stops them.
"Good," he says. "Now let's make it real."
He tells the runner: "Your job is to get safe. I don't care how." He tells the fielders: "Your job is to tag him out in two throws or less." Then he adds one constraint: "Runner, you can dive, stop short, fake a dive—anything. Fielders, you adjust or you fail."
The first attempt: chaos. The runner baits a throw, stops short, and the ball sails into the outfield. The fielders are frustrated. Augie doesn't lecture. He just says: "Again."
By the tenth rep, the fielders learn to hold the ball longer, to crowd the runner, to communicate with their eyes instead of their voices. The runner learns when to commit versus when to bait. No one told them these lessons—they emerged from the situation itself. That's constraint-led coaching. That's "the game teaches the game."
1. Design Constraints That Force Decisions
Traditional coaching: "Here's the right way to do X." Constraint-led coaching: "Here's a situation where you have to figure out X." The difference is agency. When you tell a player what to do, they execute a script. When you force them to solve a problem, they internalize a principle.
2. Let Failure Be Part of the Feedback Loop
In the rundown drill, the fielders failed—repeatedly. Augie didn't step in to correct them. He let the situation correct them. The ball sailing into the outfield was the feedback. The runner getting safe was the feedback. The game was teaching. All Augie had to do was design the drill well enough that the lesson was obvious.
3. Minimize Coach Talk, Maximize Reps
Augie had a rule: if he was talking for more than 30 seconds, he was talking too much. He believed in high-rep, low-explanation environments. The game speaks louder than any coach ever could. Your job isn't to narrate the lesson—it's to create the conditions where the lesson happens.
[See drills below]
These stories are drawn from interviews, game footage, and accounts from former players and staff. Augie passed in 2018, but his methods live on in every coach who designs practices that respect the intelligence of their players. We're not advocating a hands-off approach—we're advocating a hands-wise approach. Design the situation. Trust the process. Let the game teach.
Next episode: "Failure Is Information." Augie didn't fear failure—he weaponized it. We'll show you how to build a culture where mistakes accelerate learning instead of triggering shame. Until then: trust the game. It knows what it's doing.
Forces runners to read live situations (ball in dirt, passed ball, wild pitch) and make real-time go/no-go decisions without coach instruction.
Full 9-inning scrimmage where coaches observe but never intervene. Players must self-correct, communicate, and adjust on the fly—exactly like a real game.
3v3 or 4v4 mini-games with modified rules (2 outs instead of 3, bases 60 feet instead of 90). Creates high-rep decision-making in compressed time.
Augie Garrido coached at Cal State Fullerton and the University of Texas from 1973 to 2016, winning five College World Series titles. His philosophy of "the game teaches the game" is documented in interviews, player testimonials, and his book Life Is Yours to Win (2011). This episode synthesizes his constraint-led approach into actionable drills for modern coaches. All stories are drawn from publicly available sources, former player accounts, and game footage. Augie passed away in 2018, but his methods remain a cornerstone of player-centered coaching.