I was surprised to learn that in New York the solution to fixing player's mental mistakes is rather simple. In the event a player should get a penalty, especially one that is untimely and leads to big play in the game, the player is strapped to a chair, eyelids taped open, and forced to watch on repeat the video of Harambe from the Cincinnati Zoo. It may sound harsh and antithetical to a team of gorillas, but the idea is that each player can see the results that can happen from one simple mistake. Letting your kid get to close to the gorilla enclosure could mean death for a magnificent beast, just like getting an unnecessary block in the back while your teammate busts a big gain can lead to the death of a beautiful drive, and in some more serious cases... the death of a season. And perhaps, in my waning seasons, the death of a career. Each NY player has this fear constantly in the back of their mind, and the extreme consequences of screwing up have led us to be a pretty successful team when it comes to penalties. Or so I feel in my heart. I haven't really looked a tthe stats of it.
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