Two-hour interview and changing lens

Chris Malleo is a former Northwestern University and professional football player. After retiring from paying, he became head coach at The Peddie School in New Jersey, and led a perennial underachieving team to a #1 national ranking through a system of culture, belief, and standards. While at Peddie, Chris hired an incredible coach named Frankie Kineavy. Frankie was non verbal, and had suffered from cerebral palsy since birth, yet soon Chris, his staff and his players realized that while Frankie was not your typical football coach, he was one of the best leaders any of them had ever met. Chris tells that story in his new book The ChairLeader, a best selling book on leadership, connection, and courage, featuring a foreword by Hall of Fame coach Jay Wright and endorsements from bestselling author Jon Gordon, Clemson Head Coach Dabo Swinney, and Jersey Mike's Founder and CEO Peter Cancro. In our discussion, John and Chris discuss his journey to becoming a coach, the incredible impact Frankie had on the Peddie program, and the leadership lessons that he retells in his book.

Connect with Chris at www.ChrisMalleo.com

BOOK A SPEAKER: Interested in having John or one of our speaking team come to your school, club or coaching event? We are still booking Spring and Fall 2026 events, please email us to set up an introductory call John@ChangingTheGameProject.com

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This week's podcast is brought to you by our friends at Sprocket Sports. Sprocket Sports is a new software platform for youth sports clubs. Yeah, there are a lot of these systems out there, but Sprocket provides the full enchilada. They give you all the cool front-end stuff to make your club look good– like websites and marketing tools – AND all the back-end transactions and services to run your business better so you can focus on what really matters – your players and your teams.

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