“[Eddie]Van Halen was not just an awesome guitarist. He developed a repertoire of techniques that transformed the way that the guitar was played.”
—Steve Waksman
NPR music
You’ve heard about the 10,000 hour rule, right? It’s the theory developed by Dr. K. Anders Ericsson and popularized in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers: The Story of Success. The essence is that to reach expert level of performance it takes on average 10,000 hours of deliberate practice.
Much has been said about the phenomenal guitarist Eddie Van Halen since he died this week. One interview that stuck out to me was with former Van Halen lead singer David Lee Roth who said that Eddie Van Halen was a 30,000 or 40,000 hour guy.
Let that sink in. It’s one thing to put in a decade of work to reach expert level, but imagine what it would look like if someone but it 30,000+ hours into their craft. Perhaps something like this…
While some compared Eddie to Jimi Hendrix or Les Paul, he was also called the Bach of the electric guitar. That causes me to think of the song Cathedral from the 1982 album Diver Down where Eddie made an electric guitar sound like an organ.
And if you’re thinking “you can’t teach that” consider this quote:
“I’m not self-taught anything. I’m the result of instructors, teachers, professors, a couple of probation officers, and so were the Van Halens [meaning brothers Eddie and Alex]. And you hear it in the music.”
—David Lead Roth (the original lead singer in the group Van Halen)
TheRothShow #27
I saw Van Helen in concert my senior year of high school in Lakeland, Florida. It was 1979 or 1980 making those guys around 24 or 25 years old. I can’t remember seeing any live band it my life that was more electrifying—that exhausted more energy on stage. (I never had the opportunity to see James Brown, Michael Jackson or Prince live.)
Bruce Springteen’s Born in the USA 1985 tour would be close, but Springsteen was already on top of the world. Van Halen was just breaking away from being an opening act and ready to make their mark on the world. (This was pre-MTV so you made your mark selling records and with your stage performances.)
In January 1984 Van Halen released the album 1984 which eventually sold 17 million copies. It only reached #2 on the charts because Michael Jackson’s Thriller album owned the entire year. (But as a side note Eddie Van Halen played a solo on Beat It from the Thriller album.)
January 1984 just happened to be the month that Howard Schnellenberger reached the pinnacle of his career. As the head coach of the Miami Hurricane football team he defeated the #1 ranked (and highly favored) Nebraska Cornhuskers in the Orange Bowl.

Schnellenberger took a program than was almost disbanded in the 1970s and helped turn it into the most dominate program in college football from 1983—2001. The school won five national championships in that time and once had a home winning streak of 58 games. (Still an NCAA college football record.)
Schnellenberger unfortunately chose to leave Miami for the USFL following his team winning the National Championship. He had various levels of success at other colleges, but Jimmy Johnson, Dennis Erickson, and Larry Coker continued the Hurricane national championship tradition.
But Schnellenberger is considered the architect who laid the foundation for not only Miami’s winning tradition, but for largely what college football looks like today. A long way from “three yards and a cloud of dust.”
If he’d of had of stayed at Miami there’s a good chance—to use Bill Simmons’ analogy—Schnellenberger would be on the Mt. Rushmore of college football coaches.
But I’d like to spotlight what I’m guessing was the 30,000+ hours Schnellenberger put into coaching. He was an All-American end at the University of Kentucky in 1955. Started coaching in 1959, was the offensive coordinator under Bear Bryant as the University of Alabama in the 1960s won three National Championships.
He then coached in the pros and was on the coaching staff under Don Shula during the Miami Dolphins’ undefeated 1972 season when they won the Super Bowl. He was also the head coach of the Baltimore Colts and joined the Hurricanes as head coach in 1979. Meaning when Miami was named national champions in 1984 he’d invested 35 years of his life in football.
And here we are 36 years after that Miami—Nebraska game and #7 ranked Miami plays the #1 ranked Clemson tonight. Schnellenberger wrote the book Passing the Torch: Building Winning Football Programs… with a Dose of Swagger Along the Way. And if the turnover chain or the touchdown rings come out tonight, know that there is a touch of Schnellenberger swagger in those jewels.
And regardless if the Hurricanes upset Clemson or not, I hope the 86-year-old Schnellenberger goes to sleep tonight with a smile on his face knowing that the hours he invested in others and the game leaves a lasting legacy.
P.S. As I’ve written before, I was briefly a walk-on at UM on the 1981 team and one of my fondest memories was hearing Schnellenberger’s mesmerizing voice of authority in the locker room. (The only conversation I recall having with Schnellenberger was when he asked me “Where are your people from?” I had never heard that phrase before and it sounded like poetry.) I remember having a discussion in 2007 about wanting to do a documentary on Schnellenberger, but was thrilled when Bill Corban and Alford Spellman created The U that was part of ESPN’s 30 for 30 series.
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