In my role as the blog master of the entire universe I get the priviledge to try out a lot of products and items that people want me to talk about and mention.  2 specific products that I’ve used recently I had to give a shout to. 

I grew up a point guard and consider myself a gunner at heart.  I never saw a shot that I didn’t like.  Recently I was able to try out what is called the Get It Up Shooting Hoop.  I loved this thing.  One issue I have working with players is the inability to understand how important your elbow is to your form.  A correct shot has the elbow going ‘to the ceiling’.  This hoop creates that because it gives you instant feedback on each shot.  The shot with arc has a greater chance to go in and this product promotes that.  I recommend players using it for foul shots to ensure the proper repetition before moving it farther and farther away from the hoop.  I learned it does adjust in height and I loved it.  Thanks to Barry Hecker for creating this.

I get asked all the time which video series a player should get because there are so many of them out there and I always recommend the Better Basketball Series.  They have a dvd devoted to just about every topic out there and they are all very good.  I really enjoyed the Better Basketball Defense DVD and have already used some of that in my coaching exploits.  I never realized how much time I spent focusing on offense as a young player and this set helped me to realize that I should’ve focused on defense because I was and still am a very poor defender. 

I don’t do these very often but I was very impressed with these two products and wanted to make sure that I mentioned them in my writings.  I’ve been doing some product reviews for other things as well that can be found on www.hoopskills.com in the training articles section.

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I recently wrote something about Kelvin and his latest recruiting incident at Indiana and I went back and read it again and I don’t think I did it justice.  This man needs to resign. 

Kelvin Sampson can’t recruit another player at Indiana, especially a top recruit, without everyone thinking that he crossed a line to get there.  The reputation is stained and is staining Indiana each day he has a job there.  I don’t know Kelvin personally and I’m sure he’s a great guy.  But he needs to do the right thing and step down and earn his way back.  It’s a shame that Matt Doherty gets run out of North Carolina and has to start at the bottom again and this guy gets free pass after free pass.   

Kelvin’s assistant recently resigned over the issue and isn’t that kind of backward.  The guy trusted with the program has an assistant who recruited some of their best incoming players and did so by making some illegal phone calls.  The head coach was in on at least 10 of those calls yet the assistant is forced to resign?  Makes no sense to me.

As a sidenote, I’ve noticed lately that more and more high school kids are committing to schools earlier than ever before.  Already we are seeing kids that have committed to colleges and these kids won’t graduate until 2009.  Sophomores making life choices is an amazing thing.  Don’t get me wrong, I believe that people with strong support systems can make this choice at a young age but it is going to lead more and more to football type recruiting.  In football you have strong commits, soft commits until signing day approaches.  In basketball there are 2 signing days each year and that helps but the earlier the commitment the better chance that the kid will rethink his decision.  Illinois has 4 commitments already for players that are going to be there in 2009 and 2010.  As an Illini fan, I’m very excited about that but it makes me a little leery at the same time.  After all, I am a Cub fan and I see the worst in things sometimes.

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