CNN Article on Greatness
Interesting article and very topical around the NEDA headquarters lately.
Here's what I got out of it:
They took the first 20 paragraphs explaining how innate 'talent' is insignificant in how the best of the best get to where they are. Apparently they have a burning fire inside them driving them to improve from a very young age.
Fair enough, I agree with all of that.
What made me shake my head a little bit was the last few paragraphs when they quote - "Some people are much more motivated than others, and that's the existential question I cannot answer - why." So then what is the message? Some people are born with the innate drive to improve, and that is what turns people into special performers.
Well that doesn't provide hope for many people out there. So if coming into the gym and practicing feels like a chore or is boring to you sometimes, you can't be a special player? I need some examples of people turning that switch on later in life and "getting it".
The Michael Jordan story is probably the best example of a late bloomer figuring it all out but I'll bet he had that quality in him before he was cut from his high school team.
Christine and I were watching some middle school kids do some footwork drills in the dance studio that our offices overlook and we could see what every single coach in the world has seen. Some kids were working hard, trying their best and doing every detail their instructor showed them. They were doing when the coach watched, they were doing it when no one was there, they were doing it when no one was cheering them on, or giving them energy. Then on the other side of the room were the kids that were going through the motions. Coach would come over and try to encourage them "go faster", "push", etc., and they would speed up a little bit. Coach turns around and in a few minutes they are back shortcutting their way to mediocrity.
So the question is how do you get it? I've seen people who didn't have it somehow get motivated, but can it last forever? Most people will have a talk with their coach, or go watch Hoosiers and come out of it refreshed and start working the right way, but does it last forever?
The next interesting thing that I took out of this article (and that NEDA has been reinforcing) is that this is now the #1 most important thing in coaching. Teaching skills and movement patterns and decision making and all of that stuff is important, but teaching the mental approach to the game is far and away the most critical thing you can do as a coach.
If this is the number one factor that determines whether or not someone will achieve greatness, then we need to figure out how it works and what we need to do to shape and mold it so that it is a long term fix, not a short term band-aid.
Sefu Bernard just sent around this well written article on the same subject.
New York Times article on greatness
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Another sample practice
Taking a day off from posting today, and I'll leave you with a sample practice from the NEDA program.
On this particular day we were doing a zone atttack progression.
Feb. 27th – Zone Progressions
On this particular day we were doing a zone atttack progression.
Feb. 27th – Zone Progressions
7:20 Shooting progression warm-up
7:28 Movement Prep – partners with loaded movement
7:40 CONDITIONING – sideline passing into penetration shooting
7:45 CONDITIONING – 2 on 2 transition defense
7:53 Motion versus Zone Review
Geography lesson
o Perimeter spots (7)
o Post spots (9)
Concept #1 – “Spacing” - Gaps + Seals/Screens = CREATES SEAMS
o Wide at the wing, deep at the point
o Post player – defense inside “screen in”, defense is outside “ seal up”
§ Combine and “screen in” with “ seal out”
7:58 Games Approach 4 on 4 – TYLER WATCH DEFENSIVE REBOUNDING
No cutting or dribbling – transition defense after shot
Score you stay on offense – first team to 4
* score by passing the ball – pass fakes, move in and out and up and down in gaps to create seams. Make a pass and move away from your pass “offset”
* posts – pop and seal
* Perimeter – who is guarding you, who is guarding your teammate
8:05 Concept #2 – “ Cutting”
Fill a spot someone has just left. Cut behind the defense into space vacated by defender
Perimeters – who defends the first pass? Who defends the post? Who defends the skip? Wing to corner and defense bumps – cut away
Post Cuts – Exit Cut – leave post to become a perimeter. Improve passing angle – 2 seconds in and 2 seconds out
Exchange cut – go hi/lo with teammate (diagonal or vertical)
Vertical cut – go hi/lo or lo/hi with your own cut
Horizontal cut – from right to left/left to right
Influence cut – drag a defender out of position – “seal up”
IF/THEN cuts – HIGH POST READ - if bottom defender covers the wing and partner post is low and opposite of ball – dive front rim. Low post run diagonal cut to high post
IF/THEN cuts – LOW POST READ – if bottom defender covers the wing and middle defender cheats up to guard ball side high/mid post – horizontal cut. Opposite wing can dive rim – fill a spot someone has just left
8:15 Games Approach 5 on 5 – TYLER WATCH DEFENSIVE REBOUNDING
Spacing + Cutting and NO PENETRATION, + 2 for 3 sides to score
8:25 SHOOTING
Perimeters - Skips for threes – keep track of makes and takes
Zara, Yinka and Krysten – post to post passing
8:33 Concept #3 – “Dribble”
Dribble pull a defender further out of position. Concept of filling a spot someone has just left. Cut behind the defense into space vacated by defender. Works well with an exit cut – post and perimeter working together.
Dribble push – as perimeter pulls a teammate into space created behind – push another teammate through to fill space on second side of floor.
Freeze dribble – perimeter player pentrate at inside foot of next defender to create shot for next offensive player. Post screens in next defender – post and perimeter working together.
8:40 Games Approach – 4 on 4 – TYLER WATCH DEFENSIVE REBOUNDING
+3 for anything scored off the concept of penetrate/rotate/pass/pass
SLOW DOWN
8:50 Scrimmage – TYLER versus MIKE
9:00 Cool Down
· 4 minute free throws
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Mental Training
Mental Toughness. All coaches want their players to have this skill. Some kids seem to have it, and other kids don't. I think it is one of the least taught non-basketball fundamentals there is.
A lot of coaches have had sports psych people come in and do classroom sessions with their team, or take them on team building events designed to introduce them to the fundamentals of mental training skills. That stuff is always great and wonderfull, but the real mental training interventions need to be made on the court by the coach.
My work here at the NEDA program has been so beneficial to see how coaches implement mental training into their practices.
One of my favorite mental skills that we have talked about is the IPS, or ideal performance state. Most of the work I had done in the NCCP courses about it were very much based on handouts and things to do outside of practice to see how you prepare yourself for competition. The focus here has been to trim that idea down and just talk about "it".
Everybody has coached a practice where the players had "it". It might have been for a whole practice, it might have been for just one drill, but everyone had seen it when all 12 players have been competing, focused and energized.
So how do you get it? That's the biggest question. A great start is analyzing the last sentence of the previous paragraph. "When all 12 players have been competing, focused and energized.
Mike McKay calls them "ICE goals" - Intensity, Concentration, Enthusiasm
Intensity is the physical side of performance. Working hard with full effort until the last whistle.
Concentration is the mental side of performance. Having your mind on task and focused.
Enthusiasm is the emotional side of performance. Giving energy to others in the group.
In order to be at peak performance, these three areas need to be engaged. When your team has it, you will do well. When they don't have it, what can you do to get it back? The first step to take is to identify in practice when you have "it" and when you don't. Then you can begin to figure out what to do to get things back the way they should be or how to stay there.
Billie Jean King once said that she had won matches in which her physical and her emotional side were on but her mental side was lacking.
She also won matches when her emotional and her mental side were on but her physical side was not.
She said she never won a match when her emotional state wasn't right.
My apologies to Mike Mckay for "borrowing" all of this material from our conversations.
A lot of coaches have had sports psych people come in and do classroom sessions with their team, or take them on team building events designed to introduce them to the fundamentals of mental training skills. That stuff is always great and wonderfull, but the real mental training interventions need to be made on the court by the coach.
My work here at the NEDA program has been so beneficial to see how coaches implement mental training into their practices.
One of my favorite mental skills that we have talked about is the IPS, or ideal performance state. Most of the work I had done in the NCCP courses about it were very much based on handouts and things to do outside of practice to see how you prepare yourself for competition. The focus here has been to trim that idea down and just talk about "it".
Everybody has coached a practice where the players had "it". It might have been for a whole practice, it might have been for just one drill, but everyone had seen it when all 12 players have been competing, focused and energized.
So how do you get it? That's the biggest question. A great start is analyzing the last sentence of the previous paragraph. "When all 12 players have been competing, focused and energized.
Mike McKay calls them "ICE goals" - Intensity, Concentration, Enthusiasm
Intensity is the physical side of performance. Working hard with full effort until the last whistle.
Concentration is the mental side of performance. Having your mind on task and focused.
Enthusiasm is the emotional side of performance. Giving energy to others in the group.
In order to be at peak performance, these three areas need to be engaged. When your team has it, you will do well. When they don't have it, what can you do to get it back? The first step to take is to identify in practice when you have "it" and when you don't. Then you can begin to figure out what to do to get things back the way they should be or how to stay there.
Billie Jean King once said that she had won matches in which her physical and her emotional side were on but her mental side was lacking.
She also won matches when her emotional and her mental side were on but her physical side was not.
She said she never won a match when her emotional state wasn't right.
My apologies to Mike Mckay for "borrowing" all of this material from our conversations.
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Good Day
I thought we had a very good drill today in practice. The NEDA wing players were grouped together today for about 30 minutes to work on some common weaknesses that the group possesses. Coach Greg Francis and I talked a little bit after a recent game about some of the shortcomings our wing players have, and we turned that into a drill for today.
We had six players and after doing some work on throwing and catching some hard passes, we went into a 3 on 3 drill.
Our observations from the game were that our girls were taking a lot of shots over help defense. We would have no trouble getting by our own player, but when the next level defenders would come to help, we would try to take some tough contested shots. Usually the correct read when you draw help is to kick the ball to the open player (with a few notable exceptions, such as late game/shot clock situations, against a player in foul trouble, etc.)
So the emphasis in the drill was that as soon as a help defender took a step to come help, you had to kick the ball out. We made the girls play pure pass & cut offense so that we could get more opportunities to work on reading help defenders on penetration.
The second observation that we worked into the drill was that any time our perimeter players caught the ball, they would go into the classic stand-up-straight-with-the-ball-over-your-head-and-watch-people-stand-there stance. As soon as one player holds the ball like that in motion offense, half of the floor grinds to a halt.
The addition to the drill was that a player who caught the ball had to either shoot, pass, or attack the rim with the dribble or it was a turnover.
The post drill debrief showed that the girls had taken away a few important lessons from the drill. Their feedback was that they had the most success when:
1. They had good spacing.
We had to address this point a few times in the drill, especially after a penetration. If the penetrator doesn't sprint out to the 3 point line after kicking the ball out, the other two players only have the option to shoot or pass.
2. They kicked the ball before the help got to them.
If they waited for the defense to get to them and then picked the ball up to try to make a pass, it was too late. When they made the pass on the help defender's first step towards the help, it gave open shots and closeouts to their teammates.
3. They caught the ball like scorers.
This one is critical, and something I'm going to make a point of watching from now on. If you don't catch the ball like a shooter, no one is going to play you. You don't have to shoot it, you don't have to drive the ball, but the difference in making your defender play you like a scorer and play you like a passer is a significant one.
These were good learning points for the girls, and I think with more emphasis, they can become habits.
I'm going to have another large layoff inbetween posts, our March break starts tomorrow
We had six players and after doing some work on throwing and catching some hard passes, we went into a 3 on 3 drill.
Our observations from the game were that our girls were taking a lot of shots over help defense. We would have no trouble getting by our own player, but when the next level defenders would come to help, we would try to take some tough contested shots. Usually the correct read when you draw help is to kick the ball to the open player (with a few notable exceptions, such as late game/shot clock situations, against a player in foul trouble, etc.)
So the emphasis in the drill was that as soon as a help defender took a step to come help, you had to kick the ball out. We made the girls play pure pass & cut offense so that we could get more opportunities to work on reading help defenders on penetration.
The second observation that we worked into the drill was that any time our perimeter players caught the ball, they would go into the classic stand-up-straight-with-the-ball-over-your-head-and-watch-people-stand-there stance. As soon as one player holds the ball like that in motion offense, half of the floor grinds to a halt.
The addition to the drill was that a player who caught the ball had to either shoot, pass, or attack the rim with the dribble or it was a turnover.
The post drill debrief showed that the girls had taken away a few important lessons from the drill. Their feedback was that they had the most success when:
1. They had good spacing.
We had to address this point a few times in the drill, especially after a penetration. If the penetrator doesn't sprint out to the 3 point line after kicking the ball out, the other two players only have the option to shoot or pass.
2. They kicked the ball before the help got to them.
If they waited for the defense to get to them and then picked the ball up to try to make a pass, it was too late. When they made the pass on the help defender's first step towards the help, it gave open shots and closeouts to their teammates.
3. They caught the ball like scorers.
This one is critical, and something I'm going to make a point of watching from now on. If you don't catch the ball like a shooter, no one is going to play you. You don't have to shoot it, you don't have to drive the ball, but the difference in making your defender play you like a scorer and play you like a passer is a significant one.
These were good learning points for the girls, and I think with more emphasis, they can become habits.
I'm going to have another large layoff inbetween posts, our March break starts tomorrow
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