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| Basketball Coaching
Myths That Stifle Improvement & Realities by Sidney Goldstein Copyright © 1996 & ©2002 by Sidney Goldstein |
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| Basketball as a sport has been hyped almost
beyond recognition by sportscasters and advertisers. What was
once considered a fun, learning, and healthy activity for kids
has now turned into a contest to win the most games and gain
the most publicity. The big losers in this situation are not
only the kids we coach, but also us, the coaches, because we
are relentlessly inundated with materials and ideas from publicity
and sales-driven entities. Without thought and information to
the contrary we incorporate their ignorant perspective into our
own. However, if you know the underlying myths and absurdities
widely promulgated that inhibit your growth as a coach, you can
achieve more than you ever dreamed. Myth number one is that
basketball fundamentals are only for sixth grade girls; that only coaches at the elementary level need
to teach shooting, dribbling, passing and so on; that players
without these skills need to go back to their elementary school
and learn them; and that it is an insult to the intelligence
and integrity of any coach to teach at that level. I have news for those who think like this! Fundamentals are the building blocks of basketball. Everything done in a game depends on the execution of basic skills. Proper execution of team skills depends on fundamentals, not how well you practice plays. Here are some examples that can be used to demonstrate the flawed reasoning in this myth and many others. When a player flashes into the lane for a pass there are a myriad of skills involved like faking before the cut, cutting, jumping to the ball, catching, and pivoting to name a few. More sophisticated skills like looking for a place to cut, communicating with the passer, and timing are other skills involved in this seemingly simple play. Not being able to timely perform any one, only one, of the basics will prevent proper execution. Another example: the success of out-of-bounds plays is not determined solely by where you line up and send players, but by how the players get there, and by how well they fake, cut, communicate and so on. To successfully teach players, coaches need to work on each fundamental, not throw zillions of skills at players in one fell swoop through working on predetermined plays or plays with limited options. If you break each team skill into its component individual skills and then break these down further into learnable, doable steps you will achieve incredible success. When players are fundamentally ready they will learn team skills in minutes, rather than hours, days, weeks, or never. The publicity oriented folks not only do not recognize basic skills as important, but they also do not recognize players as students learning a game. Myth number two is that fundamentals are easy to teach and learn, and team skills are more difficult. Nothing could be further from the truth. Any grandmom could become expert in teaching team skills in weeks, whereas you need more knowledge of, and interest in, basketball to teach fundamentals. Fundamentals are difficult to learn and players usually learn slowly, but they learn well if properly taught. We only need to look at the best players on earth in the NBA to see that when coaches neglect fundamentals, players never improve shooting, foul shooting, dribbling, passing or boxing out. Myth number three is that you can't teach many skills like shooting and dribbling. Coaches who regularly go the NCAA's tell me that. This is nonsense! However, in once sense they are correct: you can't teach what you don't know. Teaching individual skills is very difficult and, of course, if it is traditional not to bother, then why should the coach break his neck trying. Chances are that players won't improve enough to win more games. Again, it is much easier working on easy team skills, if you don't know how to teach the more difficult fundamentals. Another myth is that the most skilled players are the best players. Unfortunately, you need more than skill to be a good player. An 80-year-old sharp shooter will not be effective in a game because he/she can't move fast enough. Conditioning, strength, quickness, and agility are additional requirements for a great basketball player. Skill only goes so far. And, most of a coach's practice should involve improving a player's athleticism--conditioning, agility, quickness and so on. Another myth involves the importance of plays.When I started to study basketball, I found many books entirely devoted to offense, describing at least five zillion plays. Surely one of these must work well all the time! The problem is that practicing plays is, for the most part, a waste of time. Coaches often don't understand why the play won't work in a game: the kids run the play in practice and then they can't do it in the game! The problem is that players need to react to the defense each time down the court. The most important part of offense is learning how to take advantage of the defense. And to do this players must properly execute fundamentals like cutting, faking, coming to the ball, communicating, looking, passing and so on. If each skill was taught separately, players could and would synthesize them into plays without much assistance from the coach and without much practice time on plays. Starting with plays is as helpful as reading the last sentence in the book. Another myth is that repetition yields improvement, practice makes perfect. In a way, this is correct. If you do something 100 times incorrectly, then you become expert in doing it wrong. To do things correctly and improve you most do it properly each time. One example of this involves foul shooting, where players make 40 in a row in practice and then shoot 20 out of 40 in a game. The problem in this case is that players should practice shooting like they shoot in a game only two shots in a row after sprinting down court many times. Of course, shooting 40 in a row while well rested doesn't help. |
Many myths involve
sport's mottos. Every one I have heard
is antithetical to common sense and coaching. No pain, no gain" is one that causes many unnecessary injuries. You don't have to push kids or people to do more than they should on an athletic field. Kids, even adults, always do more than they should, not less. Kids will gladly break their necks at practice. Your job as a coach is to prevent them from doing so. You need to slow them down, teach them how to pace themselves and get in shape properly. You don't want players (or yourself) putting in that one big effort that will put them out of commission for a week or month. Any type of conditioning or training takes time. You can't cram it in all at once. Just like learning anything, you need to do a little each day. This is how anyone gets the most benefit. Another sports motto, "Winning is the only thing," maybe true if your job as a professional coach depends on it. Most of us are not in pressure-cooker situations like pro coaches. If we work with kids, our objective should be to make sports a fun, learning, and healthy activity. We don't need reckless abandon to recruit the best players, cater to them, and neglect the others. We don't need to put only our best players in the game, benching all others in order to win. Winning only means that you scored one more point than the other team. It does not mean that players learned, improved, or played well. It doesn't mean that you, as a coach, have done a good job. Real winners work with kids, not use them to satisfy their personal winning aspirations. Several other myths involve inspiration. One is that coaches need to get their players up for the game. If you ever coached or breathed air outside a vacuum you know that kids are always up. Kids are especially happy when they play sports. If your kids are depressed then maybe they need a psychiatrist; maybe you need one too. As a player I can't remember any time I was depressed for more than 3 seconds regardless of the score. So, why do you need to get players up? As a coach I found I needed to do just the opposite-I needed to regularly calm and focus players on the job at hand. Another myth involving inspiration is that inspirational time-outs or halftime talks can greatly influence the play of a team. Nonsense. Players need specific information and ways to do things, not uplifting speeches. An uplifting speech can't teach players, only working on fundamentals will do that. Leave inspirational talks to politicians; coaches need to teach. There are several myths that involve shooting. One is that players need to spend a lot of time shooting from great distances which includes foul shooting for younger players. The problem is not their aim or the arc of the shot, it is their shooting technique, the mechanical movements of the fingers, hand, wrist, arms, and body in the shooting process. To improve shooting at any distance players need to work on shooting technique and then shoot from one foot before going to greater distances. Even then, players must practice from long range in a game like situation, not 20 in a row. Shooting zillions in a row from one spot destroys technique because a player will develop a technique du jour that will not be available on game day. Foul shooting percentages in the NBA reflect poor practice technique. Another example involves forcing young players who are not yet strong enough to shoot from the foul line. Practicing from this great distance will surely cause their shot to fall apart. Players need to work at shorter distances till they are strong enough to shoot at longer distances. All players need to develop and then practice technique everyday. Only if players improve technique can they permanently improve shooting. Another shooting myth is that shooting is mental. Nothing could be further from the truth, unless you consider feeling good when shooting well, or feeling bad when shooting poorly relevant. Shooting is 100% mechanical, not mental. Players need to work on each mechanical movement separately before shooting from one foot. Then they eventually need to advance to shooting under game-like pressure. In all, players need to practice shooting at three levels: 1) technique level the mechanical movements; 2) practice level applying technique usually from one foot; and 3) game level realistic shooting practice. Working at all three levels yields permanent, not temporary, shooting improvement. If shooting were even partly mental, then regular psychiatric visits would help. I have presented some of the myths passed down from one generation of coaches to the next and from coaches to their players. None make sense, and most importantly, none help. If basketball were viewed as a fun, learning, and healthy activity for kids, not entertainment for fans, these myths would be more obvious. If coaching was viewed as teaching, not an ego trip involving beating other teams, then every coach at every level would have interest in the basics of the game. By dispelling myths and hype I hope that "basketball" can get on with the important business at hand - teaching and playing the game - not cashing in on the success and ability of a few stars. Your comments are welcome. |
