Kevin Orr edit
Fri, Sep 15, 2023 12:14PM • 40:45
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
coach, people, sport, wheelchair rugby, team, athlete, canada, wheelchair, rugby, players, won, years, compete, world championships, wheelchair basketball, person, idea, paralympics, paralympic sport, head coach
SPEAKERS
Paul Barnett, Kevin Orr
Paul Barnett 00:00
Kevin Orr Good evening. My time. I think it's good morning, your time and welcome to the great coaches podcast. Well, thank you for having me. Very excited to talk a little bit of wheelchair rugby with you, or as they do call it in some parts of the world, chess on wheels or even Murderball. But Kevin, why don't you start by just telling us where you are in the world and what you've been up to so far today.
Kevin Orr 00:22
I live in Pelham, Alabama, a little bit south of Birmingham, and I'm originally from Illinois, moved south to get away from the snow. And I've coached wheelchair rugby around the world, I guess.
Paul Barnett 00:33
And you're just back from the World Championships in Denmark. Well, you were coaching Japan.
Kevin Orr 00:38
Yes, we ended up at the bronze medal World Championships, a little disappointing, semi final once again, and credit to the United States for their win over US and Australia winning the gold medal. Overall, it was a great world championships.
Paul Barnett 00:52
And I imagine it would have been pretty fun hanging around Denmark to the beer there is pretty good.
Kevin Orr 00:57
Denmark is a beautiful country and the city where they hosted it and they really embraces Paralympic sport, which is really cool. And the crowds were phenomenal. And to be able to play Denmark and the bronze medal match with a full capacity crowd was just, it was awesome.
Paul Barnett 01:13
Fantastic. Look forward to hearing all about Japan. Of course, you've coached the USA, and Canada. And we're gonna get into all of that as we go along. But Kevin, I wouldn't mind just starting by asking you about the great coaches that you've met. Because if my research is right, you've been to six para Olympics as either an athlete or a coach, as well as multiple World Championships. So I imagine you've seen some good coaches up close, some great coaches up close, and probably some that sit probably below that. So I'd like to start by just asking you, what do you think the great coaches do differently that sets them apart?
Kevin Orr 01:51
Well, I had great coaches when I was a student at the University of Illinois, Ryan Hedrick, who ended up coaching the United States wheelchair basketball team and Marty Morris, who was is a phenomenal Paralympic track coach. And I had both of them as really mentors when I was a student and I wheelchair basketball. And I was trying to track athlete certainly had first hand knowledge of them. And they both had a different style about them. And they were the first two world class coaches really that I met.
And then as my experiences growing through Paralympic sport, really the things that I've learned from a lot of the coaches is really the respect that they have for the athletes, as well as the expectations they have, that a lot of times far exceed what people think they can do. And you see that throughout the world, as far as the great coaches is they see potential in people. And really, they they use their ability to maximize that potential to turn it into whatever the person can be. And that that can be in sport, and that can be in life. And I think the lesson sport really transfer to life. And vice versa.[PB1] [PB2]
Paul Barnett 02:56
Kevin, talking about potential, you have a twin. And my understanding is that your parents raised you exactly the same even though you were born with a congenital condition that meant you didn't have the use of your legs, but it must have growing up with this expectation. Or rather, this view that you can do anything must have really shaped your view when it comes to physical disabilities. Could you tell us about your upbringing and how it's evolved to influence your role as a coach,
Kevin Orr 03:24
I have an older brother that's really close in age as well. And having an identity when both my brothers don't have a disability. My mom and dad really never treated me as a child with a disability. And early on, my mom got me out with swimming and really just tried to whatever my brothers were doing really encouraged me to try the same things. My dad was runner up in state and wrestling. So I guess he was my first kind of mentor as far as sport because you know, he had a high level in high school and really learning from those kinds of trips was important. When I swam, I'd be the person kind of looked at differently, where all I wanted to do is compete like my brothers and whatever sport that they got involved with. Sometimes there were safety concerns. Growing up, I used crutches and braces to get around most of the time, instead of using a wheelchair, but really whatever my brother's trying to pursue is right there along with him if they played basketball, I ended up being the manager of the basketball team that they played football. I was the manager of the football team, you know, they were involved with swimming, wrestling was the first sport that I that actually got to compete where I convinced my mom Hey, my brother's we're doing it. I want to give it a go. So they reluctantly my mom said, Okay, join the dandy Highlanders, which was a club in the suburbs of Chicago. And they just took me on as what weight class are you going to be in? And it really taught me as a person based on my weight class and not my disability. And that meant a lot to me because my brothers never treated me differently. It was other people that I always tried to eat differently. And then the coaches that I had with the dandy Highlanders, they're like, Hey, we just want you To compete in whatever weight class you're going to compete in, and then let's go and then figure out how we're going to how we're going to do the sport. And to me that was a big step. As far as that goes. I ended up wrestling until my sophomore year in high school. And then I learned about wheelchair racing. And it was the 1984 Olympic exhibition, wheelchair races of the 1500 meter and 800 meter where I learned about the University of Illinois. And then I guess my life changed because I had something similar to me and I can explore the things just like my brothers were pursuing their dreams in sport, and, and probably even took it a step further. And it was really an encouragement when I would try something. They they wouldn't let me quit. They wouldn't let me focus on what I couldn't do. It was always well, what can we do and that that was even in backyard. I mean, I grew up in this community of Algonquin, Illinois, and small neighborhood, a lot of kids my age, we would play tackle football in the backyard, we would play baseball, we play whatever games that kids play, I was included with everything. It wasn't, well, Kevin can't do this, or Kevin can't do that. It was alright, let's just go out and play. And even when you'd select teams, I was selected like you do in your neighborhood, it's like, I'm gonna take this kid, or I'm gonna do this, whatever I was always selected, probably last. But I learned from that as well as that, hey, you know, it was about your ability to play or perform whatever task it was going to be, because that's how selection was done. And that that meant a lot to me. As far as they weren't trying to exclude me, they were looking at me for whatever abilities and I also was involved with academic kind of thing. So like I did scholar bowl, and I did some of those kinds of things. And those things, I would be selected almost first because of the academic abilities that someone had. So a lot of times it was more about the ability to perform a job than it was about whatever kind of situation was that people could different. And that's really what my brothers and my mom, it was all about an I Can attitude and not what you couldn't[PB3]
Paul Barnett 06:55
tell you. You competed as a parent athlete yourself. And you take this I can attitude, you head off and become a coach. And in 92, you found the Lakeshore demolition with just five players. But in seven years time and 99 that team wins the first national championship, and then goes on to win five consecutive titles. And I'm really curious, Kevin, when you started that team, and you were starting that club, what were some of the early decisions you made that ultimately drove the success that you enjoyed?
Kevin Orr 07:24
As a 22 year old coach, I had the opportunity to start a wheelchair rugby team, which actually got involved. When I was a student at the University of Illinois, they had started a wheelchair rugby. And when I moved to Birmingham, one of my goals was to actually start a wheelchair rugby club, I did my internship in 1990, I was involved as a wheelchair basketball player in one national championships at the University of Illinois, and I was in Paralympic bronze medalist in 1980. And a lot of people looked at me, starting from my sophomore year in college from a leadership standpoint, I mean, I was named as a captain of our team early on, and I always wondered, well, why, but people would follow what I would do. So when I started the team, when I was 22, a lot of people wanted to follow along what what I was trying to accomplish.
And the idea was, I didn't want to start a rugby club just to play the game is that, hey, if we're going to compete, let's compete, let's pull out your potential. We had some guys that they just wanted to do. It was a social kind of deal. And there's nothing wrong with that. But I had to make a decision is do I want to be an athlete? Or do I want to be a coach and it was kind of a, it was a tough time for me because you're my expectation were that I was going to go to Barcelona and follow up the bronze medal performance and soul and continue competing. I'd even consider going back to school and get his degree and do some of those kinds of things. But I had an opportunity to work with children, I had an opportunity to work and start a wheelchair rugby club and do the things that I've always dreamed of opportunities that I wish I would have had when I was a younger child. And really that was what I tried to teach to people is that you have this opportunity [PB4]
I had two young men on my team. One guy is actually a month older than I'm putting we were young at the time, he was a division one basketball prospect, you know, he had been recruited by Nolan Richardson and Dean Smith and some of those guys six foot a powerful word from Alabama. And then he was in a car accident, and he was playing wheelchair basketball and I had the opportunity to meet him and get him involved with wheelchair rugby. And there was another guy who was six foot six was playing community college basketball, and he was pro motocross racer, and he broke his neck in a pre accident before a race. And it was a quad and the idea is okay, so I had the six foot six and a six foot eight guy. It's like, man, we can make this Yeah, it's one of those things that you look at human potential and you go Alright, these guys had the they had the caliber to compete before they were injured. And now it's my responsibility to get them back doing what they were doing prior to their injury. And really that was the impetus to start the team and building the team. It was about high performance and getting people back to doing what they do. You and even just having five players, it's like, we've got to figure this out. And we would go play the best teams and we'd get blown out by those teams. But the idea of how to play the best teams is I wanted to learn what does it take to be the best, and our players that get frustrated, I'm like, Just keep learning, just keep learning, let's take it all in and then started 92. And then we made our first nationals and 96. Now we just started working our way up the ladder, and I can be fairly intense as far as as a person. And you know, there are some other players that hey, I want to come for you, I want to so it's like, okay, if you want to come play, you know, these are the expectations, the expectations were the same. Regardless if you are a new player, and elite player, whatever is that I think being fair is the best way that you can be a coach. And it's like, Hey, we've got a train, you've got a, you've got to look at your nutrition, you've got to get the right equipment, you've got to do all those kinds of things. And I'll help where I can. But it was setting an expectation about who you were what you wanted to be.
The other cool thing about the word team, it's something I'm probably most proud of. It isn't about the championships, it isn't about anything. When I started the team, there's only one person on the team that was in, he was getting his master's degree. The other players were just living on Social Security. I don't like I can't do anything. When I left the team in 2009 every player was working or going to school. So we had 18 players on our roster. And all of them were succeeding in life. People were getting married people were having families, people were doing, they were doing life. And to me, that was the biggest thing that wheelchair rugby could do was you had people that were they didn't think they could do anything. And then you do this, this sport. And that's the cool things about Paralympic sport. It success breeds success is another one of those words that I like to follow is that whether he's successful on the court, you're successful in life, if you're successful in life, you can be successful on the court. And it just, there's the transference of all those abilities. And sport teaches that as a lot of people in this sport, and this podcast will know. But I think that's one of the cool things about the team is that as we started building success in life, that expectation about hey, we can better we can be better. And it actually made people want to I always had some hills that we would train do some, some Pong. And I would have to encourage them to do it. They were like, are we gonna do hills today? Are we going to do this today, you know, just trying to pull the bar higher. And that was the Lakeshore demolition team was special. And I think, you know, winning five championships in a row and 10 National Championship appearances in a very short period of time, I think we had nine championship appearances in a row than a year off. We ended up third that year. And then the next year, we ended up second. So we had a string where I think we appeared in 12 national championship finals in 13 years, which was, it's about excellence, but it's excellence on and off the court.[PB5] [PB6]
Paul Barnett 12:51
Kevin, you said something fascinating at the start of your answer, then you said you didn't know why people wanted to follow you. Have you figured out after all these years now, why it is that people are attracted to your leadership style.
Kevin Orr 13:04
I still don't know. I know, I scare a lot of people away. There's a lot of people that when they talk to me, they think I'm yelling at them. I'm a very direct person. I'm very straightforward. I have no filter, I'll tell you exactly what I'm thinking. So I got a wonder, Well, why do people follow me? Because a lot of times people want a they want to sugarcoat and answer. They want people to tell you what you want to hear. And a lot of times I'm the person that's exactly opposite is I'm going to tell you what I think you need to be doing. And it may not be the softest hands really here. So I'm still fascinated that and then as my career has progressed, I mean, whether it'd be the local Lakeshore team and then coaching the US team and then doing wheelchair track at the international level, then Canada wanted me to be their head coach there for seven and a half years. And then Japan wanted to be their head coach. And the irony with that is that was the US coach and lost to Canada, then the Canadian Peters and asked me to be a wheelchair track coach for the US was with them for four years. And then the team that I lost to in Athens asked me to be their head coach. And then ultimately, the team that I lost to in Rio was Japan. And then they asked me to be their head coach, and then we won a world championship in 2018. And I mean, it's been a weird for sure is that you know, I'm not sure why people are drawn to what I do or how I respond or how I act. I'm still fascinated. I've read leadership style books, and I've tried to change but I am who I am. And I guess I'm trying to learn and try to be better but at the same time it's it's been fascinating for sure.[PB7]
Paul Barnett 14:39
Well, let's keep going with the story because you've raced ahead a little bit there, but I think there's a few things I'd like to ask about the journey of those stepping stone. So from the lecture demolition, you end up coaching the USA national team, you take a silver medal at the World Championships and a bronze at the two 2004 Paralympics. But then what's fascinating is, you will let go, but I've read where you talk Tibet, that thing, a good thing in the broader context of wheelchair rugby. Can you tell us why you think that or why you thought that at the time?
Kevin Orr 15:09
Sure. Well, the US when I took over the team had never lost a major international competition and wheelchair rugby relatively young sport. I mean, it was founded in 1977. It had its world championships first World Championships in 1995, as part of the US in 1988, then actually, in 1996, it was an exhibition sport at the Atlantic games, where the US won gold, and then they won in Sydney. So they had to back to gold. They won World Championships in 9588, and that I was the next coach. And we ended up losing to Canada and lost to them and pool player then ended up losing to them in the final, which is shown in Murderball, then ended up losing in the semi final and Athens let go and us was they were the team to beat and everyone was kind of in awe and shock of that. And I was the young 34 year old coach that I got, right I was the scapegoat, the reason why we lost but for the sport itself, I think it was good because of the US it just continued. I don't think it would have drawn the interest around the world. And the growth that it saw after that is that teams actually thought hey, we can win and we can do things. The other thing that occurred at that time is that other other countries really started working with their sports systems, high performance systems.
And Powell, Zimmerman ASCII, who was the president of the at the time has called the IW RF international wheelchair rugby Federation. He told me that when he put the metal around my neck to silver metal around my neck at the World Championships when we took silver, he says this is going to be something good for the sport. And I'm like, Man, I want to check this metal in the ocean. I don't want to see it. But I was right. I think the idea is that the growth of the sport the international game, I think has benefited from the diversity of that and Athens Games being won by New Zealand. I think it made a connection with with World Rugby with the sport of able bodied rugby because you had these Zealand who personally has been a powerhouse in rugby. Now there's a tie with wheelchair run. And there's a tie with fifteens rugby or whatever is it that got some relationships going on that end sport and now there's a more formal relationship between World wheelchair rugby and World Rugby. The person who was the CEO of world wheelchair rugby came from World Rugby. So the idea of losing a game had a lot deeper connection than I think most people in this sport probably don't even realize.[PB8]
Paul Barnett 18:12
So after that loss, the master coach Peter Erickson then asks you to join Team USA and we've got an interview coming up soon with Peter and he really is a guru of athletics coaching in both wheelchair and non wheelchair. So Peter asked you to come along and be the wheelchair racing coach in the lead up to the 2008 Summer Paralympics. And I'm wondering, you know, you've gone from one sport to another, how did you adjust your coaching style moving from a team to more of an individual sport?
Kevin Orr 18:41
Well, it's funny because I started in individual sport, really, as a track athlete. I knew Peter when I was an athlete, I mean, he coached against me so I knew him. But really what he was looking for as he was looking for mentors, he was looking for people to mentor athletes make them feel at ease, you know, a lot of them have their, their own personal coaches to prepare them for the games, but at the games, basically, you know, it's a coach's responsibility, okay, I've got to get you to staging I gotta get you into the call room, I've got to get to the warm up track, you know, do a couple starts, make sure your equipments in order and doing all those kinds of things. So the idea is just given some words of encouragement by Peter asking me to come it showed me that that being a coach wasn't necessarily having to be the tactician. You didn't have to be the physiologist, you didn't have to be those kinds of things. All those things are helpful. Sometimes it's given an athlete a pat on the back, give them a look in the eye and say, hey, everything's gonna be alright, go out and get them. And that's kind of how my experience was there. [PB9]
And he was there just a couple of years and then triangle actually came in. So having Peter and then having Troy. Troy was the coach at army. But going back to Peter some of the cool things that he had his he had the other coaches that he brought him as he brought in what Kim Cruz he brought an L joiner and he brought in Kelly Carter, so you had two Olympic gold medalist. You had a collegiate coach, he played Did he was a track athlete at Auburn got to know him really well. So he was bringing IT professionals to bring some legitimacy to Paralympic track. And it's great to walk him is still involved with Paralympic racing is one of the Paralympic track coaches and being able to sit in the same room and go to coaches meetings every morning and talk about, hey, we want to make sure that we're getting our athletes there on time, make sure that everything's covered from whether it's from recovery, whether it's from just preparation, and just making sure that we're taking care of the athletes. Those are things that really Peter taught me as a wheelchair track coach, and Troy really helped maintain that. I mean, he kept the relationship with the Olympic coaches, as well as the Paralympic coaches, he would have some other coaches come and meet the Paralympics. And that was a change of the times for Paralympic sport because when I competed in Seoul, I mean, good luck. I was fortunate that my coach Marty Morris was there, he wasn't my personal coach at the Paralympic Games, we had other coaches that were assigned. So I kind of learned what I needed to do as a coach from what didn't happen when I was an athlete. And then having Peter just encouraging, hey, we'd have a staff meeting, make sure you take care of this, make sure that you have this going get your athletes to the warm up, make sure that you know that they're taken care of. And that went a long way. And then when Troy came in, he's like, Oh, well, we have this Murderball coach with us. And it was just like, I was part of the fraternity and I'm like, sometimes I still don't feel like I belong. But those great coaches they just made you feel like, Hey, you have something to contribute, and we want to hear it.
Paul Barnett 21:31
So you go from Beijing, and then you become the head coach of Canada. More success follows the silver at the 2012 Paralympics and gold at the 2015 world wheelchair rugby challenge. And I'm wondering what changed in your leadership style in this second time as a National Head Coach,
Kevin Orr 21:48
that evolution I think as a coach has been, when I was the coach of the US team, I thought I had to be in control of everything when I went to Canada even going from track because I learned a lot from Peter and from Troy how to kind of manage coaches. So when I was the Canadian coach, it's like you're putting other professionals in place is you want to let them do what they do well, so it was less micromanagement of so if we had a massage therapist, if we had a trainer, we had a Exercise Physiologist, if we had an analyst, whoever was with us is instead of me telling them what to do, I was more into learning what they were doing to how they could benefit our team as opposed to meet telling them what to do. So the idea was that it was a more open style of coaching. I think, ultimately, you know, I handled things when we are on court, a lot of times behind the scenes, they would just kind of do. It's like, Hey, you guys do what you do. And I don't have to put a hand in everything. And it was it was comforting. And actually, I've evolved even more now. Because when you can let people do what they do well, then they're valued more they're valued, the better they can work for the athletes. And ultimately, that's what our job is, is to let the athletes perform at their best. And by having less control or I've got to have every hand in this. Yeah, you have expectations on the athletes. But overall, if you express that expectation is they can also come and share. [PB10] [PB11]
The other thing that we did with the Canadian program is not only looked at the coaches that we had, but we had access to some of the hockey coaches and players in the world. So I had an opportunity to meet the women's coach. She's got a winning coach. And then we had Canadian so I met with her because they went with the expectation that they were supposed to win they didn't and they went up and and they won. So when I first came on board as the Canadian coach we ended up not performing very well at World Championships I was with that team. I'm with her and then we had some of the female players from that team that came in met with our players so they can meet player to player I met coach to coach and we talked about what do you feel and how did you go through this a lot of the very similar kinds of things that you deal with that was one of the again it was taking less control of the situation was okay, what kind of things do we need to do? What kind of things don't we need to do? And then let's let the players do what they do. And I think that's when we allow that to happen is where our success came is we ultimately ended up with a silver medal ended up as the the second team in the world that I've coached to to get back to number one in the world and that was to 2015 was a special year I mean we won the World wheelchair rugby champions we want her a Pan Am Games beat the United States we came from behind we're down by four men came back to beat them by three in the Gold Medal Match under a pack crowded in Toronto, which was great having a home crowd. Zach middle was on the front page of the newspaper on the Toronto newspaper the next day and to me the height of Paralympic sport. When I started coaching the Lakeshore team. Part of it was hey, I want to push it's not only pushing your athletes but I want to push the sport I still want to push the sport to The pinnacle of sport if people can revere wheelchair rugby like they do football around the world premier league, you know, and they go oh wow, you know these guys start calling people by their first name if you can say Zack or Riley or you can OBU they start con guys and wheelchair rugby by their first name, which a lot of people wheelchair rugby. They know who's that and they know Riley are no questions asked. The idea is that Hey, make them a worldwide name. The end of the Pan Am Games for Canada and 2015 the headlines Zach stole folks and it shows Zach carrying the flag for Canada. That was a special special moment for me because it was not only winning the gold medal, but it was identifying it. Canada had put wheelchair rugby on the front page of the newspaper. Because of the performance. Zack had a tremendous games. To me, that was pretty cool young kid. I mean, he was still he's still young, but really just coming into his own and caring game Canada pretty special time.
Paul Barnett 25:57
So from Team Canada, the story gets even more interesting because you're now the head coach of the Japanese team. And you do this from your home in Alabama, while the Japanese players themselves are spread all across the country. I'm wondering how do you manage to build a connection with such a dispersed team? Well, wheelchair
Kevin Orr 26:17
rugby, so United States, Canada and Japan, they all operate decentralized training systems. So now what I'm doing in Japan really isn't much different from what I did in the United States because players when they were the United States, when I coached them, they were all over the country. And then we would get together for monthly training camps. Same thing in Canada as players were dispersed all throughout Canada and would try to recruit all throughout Canada. And then moving to Japan. It was the same thing is the biggest difference was the language and it still is I can speak and understand a little bit of Japanese now. I mean, I've been with the team for almost six years now. The humble choco Ducky, we're currently maths I means I understand a little Japanese. But the idea is getting players to understand what are you supposed to do for your decentralized training and giving them a roadmap because times in Paralympic sport the people don't know what to do. And the idea is just trying to help did that in Canada. So basically replicated what I did in Canada and doing that now in Japan. And really, recruiting has been the biggest challenge. Well, recruiting for Paralympic sport is always a challenge because you're trying to find people that are targeted disability groups for your specific sport. So and then if they're not taken by another sport, because there's only a finite number of people with disabilities. So you're looking at, they can be competing in athletics, they can be competing at swimming, they can be competing in a number of sports. So the idea is getting the right people that have the kind of mindset to play wheelchair rugby is another part of that and then trying to find high functioning people. And one of the ways to recruit was going to be using the Paralympic games that were held in Tokyo last year. But then when no crowds could come its challenges. I like to like with Zack in Canada as an example, it took four years for me to actually get him to come to a training camp, Shane Smith, who is part of their roster, I started recruiting him in 2009. He did not actively become part of the program until after I left. So seven and a half years later. I mean every time I would go to Toronto, I would call him I would I would encourage him. And then he's like I want to play wheelchair basketball. I want to be the on the national team and I work with the National Team wheelchair basketball is I'm not going to strip your program of trying to rob players. Let's try to find the right fit. And speaking of that, there's a bunch of player we did a Bocha exhibition at a prospect camp. And Alison Levine, who is at our prospect camp, she tried Bachi she went from wheelchair rugby to Bochy, and became the number one player in the world and Bocha. So the idea was not to just rob the system, but in Canada, the populations 35 million, so the number of people with disabilities is going to be significantly less than it would be in Japan or the United States. So athlete transfer is a big part of Paralympic sport. You know, so me coaching wheelchair racing or wheelchair rugby or whatever sport it is, the idea is that, hey, you're trying to find talent that fit for particular sport. So with athletes dispersed throughout Japan, the idea is that, okay, let's get them to train let's get them to understand what we're doing. And then when we get together with camps, is we can just focus on tactics we can focus on, we don't have to work on conditioning, we don't have to work on how's your body going, because they should already have that part. And you can work with personal trainers and kind of sub that out for lack of a better way of saying it is that they can work on the motor. And then when you get them together, and then you can work on the brain. You can get them work in synergy wise and it can be somewhat of a sports psychologist, and that sometimes is is the role that I play is that hey, I'm the tactician, and I'm the I'm the person that is really just trying to get them to perform with whatever lineup is going to make them do the best that they can be.
Paul Barnett 29:51
Kevin, I've heard you say that wheelchair rugby has helped people change their perceptions and expectations. And I was wondering if you had any advice for other people When it comes to trying to change the perceptions or expectations they have the people they're leading.
Kevin Orr 30:05
Again, I think that's one of the things that makes me a little bit different is that when I see a person with a disability, especially the people that qualify for wheelchair rugby, I need to be able to play wheelchair rugby, you have to have usually a cervical spinal cord injury, you have to have impairment in your upper and lower extremities. So maybe not hopeful hand or arm function, maybe no trunk function or minimal trunk function. So that would be considered more severely disabled. And a lot of people in the general public would probably go up poor people. And, and I don't, I guess the way that I was brought up is gotta teach an I Can attitude. So the idea of sport. One of the fascinating things that got me into wheelchair rugby was when I was an athlete at the University of Illinois, we trained at a PT jam for the university, and people would come in to work out who had disabilities, so not only athletes, but you would have other students with disabilities that would come work out. So there was this one guy who's a little bit older than I was, he was a veteran, and back in school after he'd had a spinal cord injury, so he had a high C five spinal cord injury. And he was a power chair user. And with my good old humor, I'm like that electric chairs gonna kill you. You know, people call it a power chair. But I'm like, I had to use the hey, this electric chairs gonna kill you. And yeah, he take two pound weights. And he'd be doing this kind of stuff. I'm like, What's that doing for you? Yeah, I'd see him because I'd work out he'd come into work out. The key is is he was consistently coming in when I was there. So encouraged him to try a manual chair. So the first time that he tried a manual chair, they did a two man lift and put them in a chair. And it took them about 30 days to go from baseline to baseline. And then a little bit after that time, for about a year, you know, he'd come in push, so we'd get wheelchair basketball, we'd have volunteer to come and get on his chair, he gradually started getting go. And that was about the time that the University of Illinois in a wheelchair rugby program. And this gentleman started playing. And we started basically passing the ball and pushing and doing all those kinds of things. Long Story Short with him is eight years later, he had made the US team and wheelchair rugby as a point five, so he competed on the World Championship team in 1998. But that's not the most impressive thing with this guy is that he was a power chair user who drove his car from his power chair. So he had a chair that would drive in and lock in and he would drive his his van with that when he graduated from the University started selling durable medical equipment. And he was down at a wheelchair rugby tournament when I first started coaching in South Georgia in Valdosta, Georgia. And in order for him to get there, he had to fly into Atlanta. So he was living in the Chicago suburbs. And he flew from Chicago to Atlanta. And then he rented a US portable hanger trolls used a manual chair. And this is a guy that was a full time power chair user pretty dependent. And then he's going from using a being fully dependent on that power chair and needing someone to help him get around to this wheelchair rugby, teaching him that he could be independent. And so he's doing a sliding board transfer into a rented a Ford Thunderbird using portable hand controls. And I think if it hadn't been for wheelchair rugby, this man would not have been there doing that.
And to me, I think those are things that a lot of times, especially in the Paralympic realm, sometimes people think they have no hope and sports allows us to teach people what they can do and they go wow, okay, I can do more than what I ever thought I could do. And they can excel at it too. And then they can compete at a high level. So I mean, it's it's so much more than just It's a play this great game. And there's that side of it too. So it's not all about being an inspiring kind of person. It's about excellence.[PB12]
Paul Barnett 35:07
You talk so eloquently about human potential and this whole concept of an icon attitude, which I can see connects to the way you were brought up. So given maybe just one final question, and before I ask it, I'd like to read a great quote from you, if I could just to give it context, you say, whether it's doing kids programs, or teaching world class wheelchair rugby, the idea is you're trying to bring out human potential. So whatever the circumstances, if they were in a car accident, had a spinal cord injury, or had some sort of amputation, the focus is, what did you do before? Let's get that going? I think it's a great quote, because it sums up this whole philosophy you've got about just getting on with it. So I guess the question is, in the distant, distant future, when you've probably coached another couple of countries at the Paralympics, what would be the legacy that you'd like to leave behind as a coach?
Kevin Orr 36:01
I hope it's not just me, wherever I've left, I've left the program in good shape. So when I coached the US team, James Gummer was the head coach for 16 years. So leaving a legacy of excellence where where I left when I left Canada, Patrick cote who was my assistant, so James gombert, was my assistant in the US, Patrick cote was my assistant in Canada, and he's continuing to coach and continuing the legacy in Canada. A lot of the players that I've coached have gone on to coach other people, but it isn't always about it's about mentoring people to bring the next people up, because it's more than just, it's more than just us. So if you're going, Okay, what? Well, he's won this championship, he's won this world championships, he's won this Paralympic medal, he's done. All those kinds of things. The idea is, whether it's a child, if we can teach people to be if they can mentor the next one, and they can bring in the next one, [PB13]
David Wilson is also another coach on the Canadian team. And, and he's a person, he can find the next superstar in Canada, potentially, he'll go to a rehab hospital, a lot of times, when a person has a significant injury, or they have a disability, a lot of the healthcare system while they are really focusing on is, this is what he can't do, or these are things that you're gonna have to modify, whatever. And if you have a person that can go into the room and say, Look at all this look at look at these things that you can do. To me, that's the legacy that you want to leave behind is that it's it's you're giving people you're giving people hope it's one of the things that sport does. I mean, you'll you're hoping that your team wins, you're hoping that your team succeeds. You're hoping that the team? Yeah, it's, it's, it's about living to the best of what you have. I mean, a lot of times, not everyone's gonna go, I haven't won a Paralympic gold medal. But I don't think that defines who I am. The idea is that, you know, by having successful human beings who have mentored to be the best that they can be, if they're reaching whatever their potential is, if they never make a national team, if it's just getting out of the house and going to work if it's just going, you know, being able to get out of bed, in some cases. I mean, to me, that's, that's what it is, if it's giving people hope that they can do something, I think those are some lasting legacies that you have. Some of the other things too is pushing our sport and Paralympic sport. I think it's our responsibility is a lot of times people think, well, you know, we want to see, is it a great to see them competing. One of the things that you may not know about me is I was the person that introduced the shot clock and the 12 second rule of wheelchair rugby. And I made a comment at a general assembly in the United States that said, this is going to encourage more people to want to watch the game it's going to and then someone said, Well, what people I said, Well, that's that's your limiting, you're limited on what you can see the sports potential be and then to see a packed house in Denmark last week, maybe 1500 Screaming Danish people cheering for Denmark in our bronze medal match. They came there to watch sport. And you know what that 42nd clock with the 12 second rule of the excitement of the game, the people are watching sport a sport and to me that's a legacy. That's what the Paralympic movement is about it. You know, one of the I guess one of the new mantras of world wheelchair rugby is we want to win. Or they said we're not here to inspire. I think inspiring isn't a bad thing, necessarily. If it's encouraging someone to reach whatever their human potential is. That's good. But yeah, people want to win.
I want to see people win at life. I want to see the employability of people with disabilities go up. I think people that are involved with athletics are higher likely to be employed than people that are not but I think the unemployment rate of people with disabilities is still probably around 80%. The idea is that said and I think sport actually It teaches people of what they can do. And that's a legacy that I hope to continue to push is, hey, we want to see people work. And we want to see people being productive members of society, people getting married people having families doing those kinds of things. I mean, it's so much more than sport, although it's great to win at the highest level on top of that, but again, it's about pushing people to what they can achieve.
Paul Barnett 40:22
Kevin, it's, it's a great answer. It's so inspiring this idea of mentoring to bring the next people up and and helping people reach their human potential. I think that's a great place for us to finish. And I just want to say thank you for your time tonight and hearing your stories. It's already taken you to three countries and I'm pretty sure there's more ahead of you. So thank you so much, Kevin.
Kevin Orr 40:42
Thank you very much.