Time & Perspective Quote by George Allen, Sr.

It lands like a tautology, but it’s really a coaching creed: stop fantasizing about outcomes and start controlling what you can control. “When we get to the future” is Allen’s way of yanking attention back from the scoreboard, the standings, the press clippings - all the seductive noise that tempts a team to live in a time that hasn’t arrived. The second clause, “I’ll determine the future,” isn’t mystical; it’s managerial. He’s saying the future isn’t a prediction problem, it’s a preparation problem.

That’s why the line works. It’s blunt, slightly comic, and authoritarian in the way old-school football leadership often was. Allen asserts agency as a kind of discipline: you don’t “plan” your way past uncertainty, you earn your way there through repetitions, film study, and decision-making under pressure. The grammar even mimics the mindset. The first half delays gratification; the second half claims responsibility. It’s an impatience with hypotheticals dressed up as confidence.

The subtext is also about hierarchy. A coach is paid to absorb ambiguity so players don’t have to. “I’ll determine” signals control, but it’s also a promise: follow the process and I’ll carry the burden of the unknown. In a sport obsessed with “next year” narratives, Allen’s line cuts against the cultural addiction to forecasting. It’s a refusal to let tomorrow become an excuse for today - and a reminder that, in football, the future is usually just the next series.