Guess you need to "define" evaluate an athlete's performance first 

What exactly do you want to evaluate ... his physical performance ... how deep in the "red zone" did the athlete go .?? Or is it in the area explained by Christopher McCrum??

Dear Assche,

I mean that how well or poor did athlete perform relative to the other past weeks/months, (in team or individual sports), and the extent to which athletes had progress in the tactical, technical, physical and  psychological domains over the past weeks/months.

I suggest: (1) Take each component separately, then (2) consider what is the most valid and reliable test available for that component, plus (3) what is practical in your given situation. 

If using ratings from observers or from the players themselves, ideally look for other sources to validate these ratings.

Best wishes, Robin  

Dear Robin,

Other studies, generally, focused on actual results obtained by athletes (Reeve & Deci, 1996), subjective perceptions provided by the coaches (Mouratidis, Vansteenkiste, Lens and Sideridis, 2008) and the results of competitions (Gillet, Vallerand, Amoura, Baldes, 2010).

But which one reflex better results of performance.

For example: I want to measure social-context determinations (by coaches) on motivational regulations and performance among athlete students, So, to do this which kind of the above forms are preferable to measure performance (rather than performance as an outcome or self-reports), and why? 

?!

I'm not sure one method of evaluation is better than the other.  It depends on the study and the question asked.  I can tell you currently I am working on a study in which we want to assess athlete performance, and we have chosen to use both objective performance data, as well as coach evaluations.

Dear Frederick,

Thank you for your answer.

Its a good idea to measure both objective performance and coach evaluations, but which one can perfectly reveal athlete` performance.

Let me introduce about my research question:

How coach`s autonomy supportive can predict athlete`s performance among college athlete students, by the role of motivational regulations (intrinsic - extrinsic motivation) mediation?

I want to design this model base on self-determination theory.

Hence, in which way I can reveal better results. Or how you want to show athlete performance in you research? and which one you want to relay on?

Any help will be appreciate,

As I see it, from my 20 years in coaching and research, performance is an evaluation of training. The performance is regardless of sport a synthesis, and based on theory of complexity, (see economic research for this explaination, can also use Boompa and Haffs, training pyramid) the domains of physiology, biomechanics, tactics/cignition and psychology all interact in performance and is influenced by situational characteristics. Therefore training is har d to evaluate based on performance. First you need to understand the the variables making up the specific domain for the specific sport, then you need to understand the interrelationships between the domains in the sport, and thirdly understand how situational factors influence the variables within the domains and thus affect performance in a given situation. It is much easier with closed/cyclic sports where you easily can measure outcomes, more difficult in open-chaotic team sports. 

The use of subjective evaluation based on coaches opinions seems extremely shaky. First the intent of the coaches being a coach, then based on Cushions stuff with soccer coaches and Goffman´s theory of dramaturgy, it seems that coaches have little self awareness and act more to re-create a culture of coaching rather than improving performance. Although this is different for different sports, there is still a lot of culture going on in coaching - that is to say, the belief that this is the way we coach i.e. skiing is very much in place   

Dear Buhre,

Thank you so much for your explanation. Your experience might very useful in my research.

So, which kind of evaluation do you prefer to relay on? actual results obtained by athletes or the results of competitions. But, sometimes the results of competition is hard to evaluate, due the long-terms of leagues.

Any explanation will be appreciate.

To add to the other interesting comments you have received so far, I think it also depends if your study focuses on athletes from a particular sport or if it brings together athletes from different sports. Objective performance in different sport is really difficult to compare. You could:

1) establish objective performance criteria with coaches involved in the different sports and assess these criteria at various point in time. This could help you create progress/regression scores that you could compare between sports

2) focus on individual sports that have objective performance measures (performance time, scores, etc.) that you can easily compare from one competition/tournament to the other (again, if you have multiple sports you can create a progress/regression score)

3) gather physiological data or results of physical tests

4)  although coaches assessment of their athletes might be influenced by various factors, I find that it still provides useful information about athletes progress. Coaches know their athletes well and are supposed to be experts in their sport...

Having been a coach involved in training and evaluating athletes, I can state from experience, the only subjective evaluation by coaches that provided realistic, reliable information about an athlete's performance came from a coach with whom I had the opportunity to personally validate the information provided by the coach. Once a coach had proven his ability to properly evaluate the athlete's performance, I would accept at face value, his statements. Unfortunately, in the vast majority of situations the evaluation of the coach was skewed by personal feelings, etc. causing the evaluation to be better or worse than the true abilities of the athlete. Therefore, before accepting a coach's evaluation a level of reliability and validity for the evaluation must be achieved, this requires you to be able to determine these things on your own to validate the information provided by the coach.

If the purpose of your investigation is to provide information for training and coaching athletes, subjective information may or may not be reliable and valid. You must have an objective means of measuring your target behavior or outcome, and that requires objective measures of performance. Specific tests of functional aspects of performance will, with an adequate understanding of the relationships of the variables being studied, provide better information about the characteristics under consideration than the best subjective information about the performance of the athlete from all but the best coaches. In my experience, probably less than 10% of coaches, are capable of valid, reliable subjective evaluation of training, coaching, or performance. Therefore, your best information will come from hard, objective measures.