S B Coaches College - Hard 2 Guard Newsletter: Player Development Newsletter

·A Quick Word: Mindset

·Interview with Robb Rogers

·Books

·Nutrition

The winter issue of United States Olympic Committee features an article written by Carol Dweck, the author of Mindset, about the that same subject. In the book and the article, titled “Mindset: Developing talent through a growth mindset,” Dweck distinguishes those with a growth mindset and those with a fixed mindset:

Those with a fixed mindset believe that their talents and abilities are simply fixed. They have a certain amount and that’s that. In this mindset athletes may become so concerned with being and looking talented that they never fulfill their potential.

People with a growth mindset, on the other hand, think of talents and abilities as things they can develop—as potentials that come to fruition through effort, practice, and instruction.

In many ways, the current basketball system fosters a fixed mindset because recruiting and exposure dominate high school and college basketball. Rather than focusing on the development of new skills, these levels now center on showcasing skills for the next level. Players care more about showcasing their talent than improving it.

Three years ago, I and my business partner, Ceasor Dennis, ran a free clinic for high school players. After watching the guys play, we spoke to them and tried to advise them. I spoke based on my experience as a college assistant coach and he spoke based on his experience as a high school player being recruited by Division I colleges, as well as a big brother who helped his brother get recruited. We did not believe that there was a Division I player in the gym, yet several of the players believed that they were DI prospects.

One kid was trying to map out his summer plans between his junior and senior year. He spoke to several AAU programs and told us about the different offers, the promises, the gear and the big tournaments that he would play in. We told him that he was not good enough and none of it mattered if he did not improve. We offered to train him and get him ready to play in two exposure camps in July.

He ignored our advice. He joined one sponsored team for the first couple weeks of the spring and never played. He quit and joined a more local team and played behind another player. He never stood out on his AAU teams. He chased different teams and different events all summer and never really got a look. Meanwhile, he did not do the things that he needed to do to improve and give himself a chance to play at the next level: he did not improve his flexibility, his lateral quickness or his explosiveness; he did not engage in deliberate shooting practice to refine his shooting stroke and make his shot more consistent; he did not play outside his comfort zone to develop a more all-around guard game by scoring on penetration and different finishes in the key. He remained the same as a good, not great shooter who was not a good finisher and was not particularly explosive or physically strong.

I don’t know if his mindset held him back or if he was too easily swayed by the marketing pitches of AAU coaches who promised him scholarships and told him what he wanted to hear – that he was good enough – rather than the honest truth, which we supplied.

Research has repeatedly shown that a growth mindset fosters a healthier attitude toward practice and learning, a hunger for feedback, a greater ability to deal setbacks, and significantly better performance over time.

Coaches and players underestimate the importance of a player’s mindset, but, to me, there is almost nothing that is more important. A player who is unwilling to go outside his comfort zone is never going to improve, and those who have a hunger for feedback seek more instruction and advice. Most importantly, however, is the ability to deal with setbacks.

In today’s society, parents often seem intent on preventing their kids from facing failure or obstacles. A Nation of Wimps touches on this phenomenon. When a player sits on the bench, parents blame the coach or pull the kid from the team and transfer schools or switch club teams. My sister is a teacher and whenever a kid gets a bad grade, the parents blame her, rather than asking their kid why he never does his homework. Parents are so protective of their kids that many kids do not learn how to deal with setbacks, challenges or adversity.

Unfortunately, nobody makes it to a high level of anything without facing obstacles or setbacks. Those who succeed are not the ones who face more pleasant experiences or lack challenges, but the ones who develop coping strategies that help them persist when they face setbacks. Developing a growth mindset is one of these strategies.

Imagine Michael Jordan when he got cut from the varsity team as a high school freshman. If he had a fixed mindset, he might have believed that he lacked the talent to become a great player. Without that belief, his motivation likely would have suffered and he would not have worked as hard. With a fixed mindset, he may have lacked the coping strategies to handle the setback of not making the varsity team. With a fixed mindset, we may have never had a Michael Jordan.

Instead, Jordan possessed a growth mindset. When he was cut, he did not believe that he lacked the talent. Instead, he became even more motivated to learn and develop his skills. He worked harder. When people criticized him for not being a good shooter, he worked on his shot in the off-season until he became a very proficient three-point shooter. He did not believe that he lacked the talent. He always believed that he had the opportunity to develop his skills. This belief stems from a growth mindset.

Fixed Mindset: When faced with setbacks, run away or conceal your deficiencies.

With those rules, it is obvious to see why people with a growth mindset excel while those with a fixed mindset often do not maximize or fulfill their potential. The key to becoming great at anything is a willingness to learn, to work hard and to confront deficiencies.

While the system leans toward the fixed mindset with its emphasis on showcasing rather than developing talent, individual parents and coaches can create an environment which fosters a growth mindset with their kids or players.

Praising children’s or adolescents’ intelligence or talent puts them into a fixed mindset with all of its defensiveness and vulnerability. Instead of instilling confidence, it tells them that we can read their intelligence or talent from their performance and that this is what we value them for. After praising their intelligence or talent, we found that students wanted a safe, easy task not a challenging one they could learn from.

We found that praising students’ effort or strategies (the process they engaged in, the way they did something) put students into a growth mindset, in which they sought and enjoyed challenges and remained highly motivated even after prolonged difficulty.

If you have a player with a fixed mindset, before you work on his physical tools, you have to change his mindset. The mental has to come before the physical so that he gets outside his comfort zone to improve.

This week, I have an interview with Robb Rogers, an accomplished veteran of the performance training industry with over 25 years of coaching experience in the high school, collegiate, and professional ranks as well as in the private sector. Robb is the Tactical Strength and Conditioning Coordinator at the NSCA World Headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colorado. For more information please visit www.sbcoachescollege.com or www.myfittube.com.

BM: Plyometrics is one of the buzz words in performance training, especially for teenage boys dreaming of dunks. How do you train today's athlete who plays basketball year-round, often on multiple teams, without over-training?

Rogers: Jump Training or Plyometrics is an excellent way to increase vertical power and jump. However, when young athletes are competing and practicing for 8 + hours each week, then the need for and efficacy of jump training is contraindicated due to the age, ability, strength and volume of training the athlete is already enduring.

When plyometrics are introduced, the athlete is first taught to jump down and trained to absorb force. This prepares the tendon, muscle and neural system for the loads and volumes to be handled later in practice and competition. Once the athlete is accomplished in absorbing force (stopping strength – both slow in squatting and leg press and fast in jumping down off of boxes and squatting the landing) then the actual jump training is mixed into the training routine. This is generally in the off-season.

When children are young they innately will jump down off of furniture, stairs and bleachers as our genetic systems are set up to have us learn to absorb force at a young ages. Not until late elementary age do children begin to be concerned with how high they can jump up as they are more concerned with how high they can jump down. So during the competitive season when many hours are devoted to practice and competition, more is still better, but it is more rest and recovery while the leg training is focused on force absorption in single leg and double leg hip, knee, ankle flexing patterns at slower speeds. Exercises such as leg press, lunges, step-ups and short box single leg step-downs are better for muscle strength which in turn saves the tendon from taking too much load, which can result in tendonitis or jumpers knee, a common ailment in growing youngsters that play too much, prepare too late and recover too little.

BM: For players looking to improve their vertical jump, is plyometrics the answer?

Rogers: Plyometrics training is an excellent tool to utilize as a part of the training process. However, if the athlete is not very strong or stable on one leg, the chance of tendon problems as well as ligament injury is increased in practice, competition and training. As the athlete reaches the growth spurt which covers 12 – 24 months, the risk of injury increases due to the changes occurring in lever lengths, the general fatigue that occurs due to rapid growth and the ability to stabilize through the core, hip, knee and ankle is made increasingly difficult. At this point, strength exercises that stress the stability aspect of training are paramount to include in the training process. Single leg balance or pistol squats with multi-direction swing leg excursion/reaches for multi-planer strength and stability as well as core exercises on a stability ball are a critical part of the exercise prescription plan for remedying the strength with stability problems of emerging athletes. The rapid growth changes that occur are the reason for the inability to stand straight with decent posture as the intrinsic muscles of the spine are stretched and stressed beyond their capabilities to fight gravity for extended periods of time.

BM: How do you balance workouts with plyometrics, strength training, Olympic lifts, agility, etc?

Rogers: Exercise prescription balance during competition is done by restricting the volume of resistance, jump and agility training as much of that is accomplished during the practice/competition sessions. Intensity of the sessions is maintained up to about 90% of normal but the overall volume of training is restricted by 1/3 to ½ of what is normal for an off-season training session. As far as balancing the proportion of each in the overall plan of training it will depend on the individual athlete. If the athlete is weak, more strength is needed; if the athlete is non-elastic (a slow or strength jumper) then more jump training is needed; if the athlete is elastic and has some baseline strength, then Olympic and/or resistance jump training can be included. That is how the exercise prescription plan is laid out from an individual perspective. There are several tests that are used to more objectively determine the needs of individual athletes, but that is beyond the scope of the question and answer format.

Next week, I will have Part 2 of the interview with Robb Rogers as he discusses lateral power and core strength.

·Developing Basketball Intelligence: Through drills, situations, instruction and questioning, Developing Basketball Intelligence demonstrates how to teach game awareness and basketball intelligence. DBI explains the basic tactical skills of every offense - from pick-and-rolls to 3v2 fast breaks - but moves beyond the skill execution to the all important perceptual, anticipatory and decision-making skills which separate the expert performers. Developing Basketball Intelligence teaches tactical skills, but also develops the characteristics of a high basketball IQ player, players who: * choose the best option in less time; * adapt to ever-changing situations; * possess good spatial awareness; * know the right play at any moment relative to the time and score; * and more. Developing Basketball Intelligence is a tool to develop your offensive system as a coach, and to create a learning environment which enhances your players' understanding so they can read and react and adjust and adapt on the court.

·Cross Over: The New Model of Youth Basketball Development, 3^rd Edition: Cross Over covers Athletic, Tactical and Technical skill development through four distinct stages with over 125 drills. Cross Over is an entire development program for a child, coach, team or organization to take players from 8-18 years old. Cross Over differs from other basketball instruction books because it develops a philosophy of development rather than just describing drills.

In this Weeks Newsletter...

A Quick Word

Interview with Robb Rogers

Books

Nutrition