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Thursday, December 13, 2018

Basketball: Constantly Edit Our Process

"You're not paying for all of the words that the author put on the page; you're paying for all of the words the author deleted...the author gave what works room to breathe."- Dan Brown


"Protect the process." We cannot achieve mastery without investing time. (Above, Dan Brown from MasterClass)

Coaches, "edit and delete." We don't pay homage to every drill we ran last year...or fifty years ago. 

We "edit" on the fly during games (tactics and personnel) and we transform in the background, via strategy, preparation, and practice. 

Winning doesn't mean that we're doing everything well; losing doesn't mean we're totally off track. Stay with what's working; abandon what's not

What are we working to accomplish? We need clarity. We and our players should recognize the purpose of an activity. 

Editing practice often means doing more of what's uncomfortable for players. I put struggling players into situations giving them problems (usually pressure) to desensitize them. But do it in a way that we're not showing them up



I want elements from each of the above in every practice. Sometimes, we can combine elements. For example, we could start and ODO (e.g. offense-defense-offense) segment in shell. Or start ODO in a full court press to work on pressing and press breaking. 

Practice outline 12/12.

Constraints are critical. Limit areas of play, dribbles, or insist a ball reversal and paint touch before a shot. They DON'T know how to play. They'll never have the playground education we had. 


Keep editing. That's protecting our process. Make it better every day. 

Lagniappe 1. Dan Brown shares that he learned from Steven Tyler of Aerosmith about a meeting weekly, where every member brings an idea that might be terrible. They call it, "dare to suck." Nine of ten ideas are bad, but sometimes brilliance emerges with a platinum song.  

Lagniappe 2. BOB "Twins"


Not ready for prime time...