Teach Decision Making and Taking Advantage of the Advantage

We as coaches have to teach skills.  We have to teach how to shoot, pass, dribble and proper footwork, among other things.

One of the most important things that we must teach is decision making.  Basketball is a reactionary sport.  We have to teach them how to read, react, and make great decisions.  You have to be able to play and make choices – all of the time.

17:00 – We run plays to create even a small advantage – a late closeout, and out of position defender, an opening on a back cut or back screen, the defense in a scramble rotation.  What we have to practice every day is how to take advantage of that small advantage and score.  We have to teach them to play in those situations, what to do and how to attack.  How can we turn our small advantage into a big advantage?

A Humble Mind

A Humble Mind

You cannot grow without a humble mind.  You can’t receive advice or constructive criticism or instruction (that can really help you) from your coaches, teachers and parents if you don’t approach it with a humble mind.  You have to approach every class and practice like, ‘Man, I could really use this this. I NEED this.’ 

A humble mind is a mind that knows that it can learn from anybody at any time.  A humble mind knows that it needs to be a lifelong learner if it wants to be the best that it can be.  A humble mind knows that it has to keep working hard, consistently and every day, to become the best that they can be.

If you think that you already know everything a coach or teacher is trying to teach you, or that you don’t need to hear this lesson because you already know it, or you think this drill is for somebody else because you can already do it, then you will miss out on something that could have really helped you; as a student, a player, and as a person.  If you think that you already know everything, you will miss something that could have changed your life.

We all need it all.  We need everything.  We need as much teaching and constructive criticism and practice as possible to become the best that we can become.  We need to be reminded of this every time that we have a chance to be reminded.  We benefit from being told, even the simple things, over and over and over again. 

Only a humble mind can be taught anything.

Only a person with a humble mind can receive correction.  We have to want to grow.  We have to want to learn.

Don’t think more highly of yourself than you should.   Don’t have an exaggerated opinion of your own importance.  When you do, you stop growing because you stop learning and improving.

When you don’t have a humble mind and you start to think more highly of yourself than you should, you start to look down on other people.  You start looking down on your teammates, your classmates and even your coaches and teachers.  When you start looking down on others, you start to have critical and judgmental thoughts about others.  You start to slow down, or shut down, your ability to learn, grow and get better.

A humble mind doesn’t think lowly of itself.  You should always value yourself and see all of your gifts, your talents, and your abilities.   You should love yourself in a balanced way, but you should never think that you are better than anybody else. 

You could be more talented than somebody, but that doesn’t mean that you are better than them.  You might score more points, run faster, and/or make better grades than somebody, but that doesn’t make you better than them. 

A humble mind allows you to trust the process of doing what it takes, over time, to get the results that you want.  Of course, we all want to start on varsity as freshmen and get D1 offers immediately.  Many of us want all of the glory, the trophies, and the love and attention immediately.  But, having a humble mind will allow you to grow the right way by learning a much as you can, working as hard as you can for what you want, and over time, you will achieve what you want.  Having a humble mind will allow you to build and stand on a foundation that won’t break under pressure.

A humble mind is a mind that wants to learn as much as you can and wants to work as hard as you can so that you can become the best that you can.

Character Drives The Process Which Drives The Result

Character drives The Process which drives The Result

Results > What you want to accomplish
The Process > The work you put in, over time, for the results you want
Character > Who you are as a person

Focusing on building character will help your athletes embrace the process more which will lead to better results.

Who you are as a person will tell how hard you are willing to work (the process) for the results that you want.  Build, grow, and developing character will help you work harder, better and smarter through the process of achieving the results that you want.

Of course every team wants to go undefeated and win their championship, but above that, every team should want to strive to maximize their ability.  Everyone will experience loss, and while nobody wants to lose, losing isn’t the worst thing in the world.  Worse than losing is wasted talent.

John Wooden once defined success as, “Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best you are capable of becoming.”

Becoming the best coach, player or team that you can become is more important that just winning.   Becoming the best parent, the best teacher, or the best leader that you can become is more important than winning or test scores.  “Do your best” isn’t just some mantra we tell our kids before they go play their u9 soccer game; it should be our mantra for life.  Win or lose, if you prepared the best you can and did your best that should be satisfying enough.

Teams should work together to be the best that they can be as a whole.  We are all limited and imperfect, but together we can be whole, limitless and fully capable to accomplish anything before us.  To become the best team that you can be, everybody has to work hard, do the right things, and do them the right way.  That is what is called ‘The Process.’  The process is doing the right thing, the right way, over time.  The process drives the result.  How hard the team works and how well they work together is the process.  What the team and the players do every day is the process.  Practice, film, the weight room, conditioning, diet, the classroom, etc. is all a part of the process.

How well they do those things is driven by the character of the team, the coaches, and the players.  Your character is who you are, what you do, and how you do it.  It is who you are as a person.  Your character drives the process.  Your character drives how hard you are willing to work.  Building and improving character will improve your work ethic (the process) which will improve your results. 

If the goal of the team is to maximize its ability, the biggest way to do so is to build up the character of everybody in the organization, from the coach to the players to the managers.

Brett Ledbetter Follow Up

This past week for our professional development leading into the new school year, we were blessed to have Brett Ledbetter come to talk to us about the importance of building character in our kids and athletes in helping maximize the ability of our teams.  The link to his power point can be found here: please click here

We were asked to answer survey questions about his visit, and below are the questions and my responses so that I can remember to ignite commitment, get kids to their sweet spot, frame struggle as development, and measure commitment level of out athletes.

How do you ignite commitment levels inside the classroom (or with teams)?
We try to identify what the individual goals of each of our kids are, we try to give them the road map on how to achieve those goals, and we give constant and consistent feedback throughout the process on how they are moving towards those goals.  It is cliche, but we understand that the relationship with the kid/athlete is very important, so we make sure that everybody in our program has a meaningful relationship with at least one coach on our staff.  We also identify which kids we need to monitor more closely and talk about how we can do more and be better for them individually.

How do coaches/teachers undermine their athletes/students from getting in the sweet spot?
One way is coaches/teachers don't have high enough goals for the student.  Another way is the coach/teacher tries to push the kid without building the relationship first.  Its hard to push these kids into their sweet spot without first having a relationship.  Also, its important for these kids to hear and understand the why.  They don't always automatically understand that you are trying to get them to their sweet spot; they just think you are being mean. 

How do you frame struggle as development?

In my classroom with the subject that I teach, struggle is a way of life for my students.  They have always struggled with Math, which is why they are in my class.  From day one, we acknowledge the struggles that they have and we own it.  But we also talk constantly about how important it is to fight through the struggles.  We talk about how everybody has struggles in their life and stuff that they don’t like and stuff that they aren’t good at and that sometimes those things are the same.  But we also say that we have a job to do, and that job is to show up and do the best that we can, and if we do that over the course of the year, we can celebrate by passing the STAAR test.  We don’t run from the struggle in the classroom because we can’t.  We are going to face it every day.  We treat it as part of the process and something to learn and grow from and through.  If we can get through this struggle, we can get through much more as they get older.

Being in such a tough district last year in athletics, we talked about it all of the time.  The number one way we frame struggle as development is telling them that struggle is development and that you can't grow to your full potential without struggle.  Struggle is the biggest part of getting out of your comfort zone, and getting out of your comfort zone is the fastest, most effective, and most sustainable path to growth.  Communication is the way that we frame struggle as development while also communicating with our students and our athletes that we care and that we will give them the tools to be successful and that we will go through the journey with them.

What are the signs you can tell someone's commitment level? 
We can tell how committed someone is a few different ways.  Of course, if they are willing to come in early or stay late is one way to measure commitment.  Also, if you see growth in areas that you have identified as weaknesses and you can tell that they have been working on improving those weaknesses, that is a sign of commitment.  Being willing to spend time outside of school or practice is a major sign of commitment because it takes more than practice or class to become the best that you can be.  The questions that they ask is also a way to measure commitment.  Committed students and athletes will ask questions when necessary because they want to know how they can be better and they want feedback.  However, its important for the coach to create and environment where the student/athlete is comfortable and confident enough to ask questions.  Eye contact and engagement in class and practice is also a major indicator of commitment.  Are they focused, engaged, and attentive in instruction?  Are the locked in?  How locked in are they?  Those are ways to measure commitment as well.

An Ear To Hear | A Teachable Spirit | Be Humble Enough to Learn

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An Ear To Hear

A Teachable Spirit

Be Humble Enough to Learn

As school starts, these three things are important for any student, kid athlete, teacher, parent, coach to remember.

Have an ear to hear and listen to learn when your coach, teacher or parent is talking.  There are two types of students and athletes – the ones who really listen to the coach and learn what he is teaching, and the ones who aren’t.  The ones who are bought-in and the ones who aren't.  The student-athletes who are bought-in and intentionally listen will perform better every time.

Have a teachable spirit that is willing and eager to learn and apply new things that will help you and that will make you better.  A teachable spirit means that you are willing to learn new things, and that takes being humble enough to know that you don’t know everything. 

Be humble enough to learn because there is always a chance to get better and to learn new things if you are willing to be taught and you have a teachable spirit.  But you have to first know that you don’t know everything and that every situation is a chance for you to learn something new.  Be thankful when somebody takes the time to teach you something new that will make you better.   Be thankful enough that you pay attention to what is being said, think about how you can apply the new information, and try to use the new information to the best of your ability.

Have an ear to hear new things that will help you, have a teachable spirit that will help take in new information.  To do this, you must be humble enough to know that you don’t know everything and you can improve and get better. 

Manchester City Circle Warm Up

I have always been fascinated with the footwork of soccer players.  Soccer and basketball really do complement each other in terms of strategy, conditioning and footwork.  You have to play in space, move together, and be able to win your one on one matchups within the team concept. 

One thing that soccer players do is have really neat warm up drills that teach the proper footwork that they apply in games.  Below is a video posted from Manchester City.  It’s a good 5 minute warm-up that can be a switch up from what you do every day in practice.

This coach uses 26 cones for 18 players and he goes through a series of movements around, through, and over the cones.  He will give a movement, like bunny hops over the cones, and on his whistle, the players will either run to the center of the circle or to the outside of the circle and back.  They did 2 sets of each exercise, and each exercise lasted about 15 seconds.  Enjoy the video and the list of movements are below:

- Jog
- Zig-Zag
- Rainbows
- Bunny hops
- High kicks/shuffle back
- Trunk twists
- Close the gate
- Open the gate
- Forward and backwards
- Kick-backs