Joe Flacco says the one thing he cares about most when watching young football players is how hard they play, and explains why almost everything else is secondary “When they’re out there putting good effort in, I’m pretty easy. My 13-year-old, he’s not getting a ton of playing time and he’s playing wide receiver. But when he got in this weekend, everything he did was full speed.” “He was going to block the corner. He was going to go in that jet sweep motion as fast as he could. I was super proud of that because you can’t really coach some of that stuff. The only thing I care about is how hard you play and how you respond.” “How many times are you willing to restrap up your chin strap, go hit the guy again, play hard and play fast? That will inevitably be what matters to you as a football player. All this stuff at this age doesn’t really matter other than that.” “How hard do you play? How willing are you to go play with your brothers and sacrifice yourself? That’s football.” “After games, parents get frustrated, this kid needs this, this kid needs that. No, they don’t. All they need to do is sign back up, play next week and play just as hard. If they do that, they’re going to be in a great place.”