Read and reread great books, like James Kerr's Legacy, the story behind the New Zealand All-Blacks rugby dynasty.
Kerr shares powerful lessons including "leave the jersey in a better place" (be responsible to those before you), "sweep the sheds" (humbly care for the locker room), and "Champions Do Extra."
Sometimes less is more. Usually not...
Who are paradigms of extra and what do they say?
Kobe Bryant took a thousand shots a day for a hundred days in the summer. In The Mamba Mentality, Kobe Bryant wrote, "A lot of people say they want to be great, but they’re not willing to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve greatness. They have other concerns, whether important or not, and they spread themselves out. That’s totally fine. After all, greatness is not for everybody."
Larry Bird took five hundred free throws before school. But Bird wasn't all about individual scoring. "Passing is more of an art than scoring. My feeling about passing is that it doesn't matter who's doing the scoring as long as it's my team."
Bill Bradley, the banker's son, wasn't the most athletic player, so from age 12 practiced three hours daily weekdays and eight hours on Saturday to build skill. Bradley said, "When you're not practicing, someone somewhere is. And when the two of you meet, assuming roughly equal ability, the other person will win."
What is your extra?
- Read another chapter.
- Do five more sprints.
- Watch additional video.
- Write another paragraph.
- Study a new and an old concept (see below)
Lagniappe. Split the post (multiple options)
Lagniappe 2.
It's game uplifting, 2 floormates, when Bigs sprint the floor, in Off. transition and follow up a miss shot, w/ a rebound basket. These impactful plays are 1) effort 2) toughness 3) character foundational. Is that you?
— Gordon Chiesa (@gchiesaohmy) October 27, 2021
Years ago, during a ten-year consecutive league championship run, an opposing coach told me, "Melrose teams are hard to beat because you have five girls running hard all the time."