I didn’t grow up a point guard, in fact I like to call myself a convert to the position. I wish I grew up with it but the past is past. When points come to me and ask how they can get more assists I usually give these 3 ideas for how that can happen.

1. Don’t pass the ball too early. I truly believe that the role of the point guard is to make sure the offense is run correctly and that the will of the coach is done by the point guard. Point guards are the ones who should be distributing the ball to the correct people at the correct times. The team needs to know that when the point guard passes the ball to you it is to get something done. To learn about this watch Chris Paul and Deron Williams play the position. They run the show and when they pass the ball to someone else it has a purpose. Don’t just pass to pass. Pass to have a meaning and when your teammates get the ball they can be confident knowing they have a shot.

2. Get the ball to scorers in a good position. Simply put, don’t pass the ball to a post player 18 feet away from the basket and expect him to make a basket. The only time you should pass to a player like that is if it is part of the offense or you picked up your dribble and need help. If I have a good shooting guard then I want to give him the ball 20 feet out but not 30. Make sense?

3. Shooters like passes a certain way and in a certain position. I’ve worked with shooters who liked no spin on the passes as compared to shooters who liked a lot of spin. This is meaningless though compared to where shooters like the ball when they catch a pass. Today it is called the shooters pocket and it is the area where the shooter can get the shot off quickest and with the least wasted motion to catch the pass. For a right handed shooter is just above the right shoulder or at the right shoulder. The shooter is able to catch that pass in rhythm and take it right up for a shot.

There you go. It’s sounds so simple but so many players don’t understand how it is done and the little things that are behind it. For coaches, literally stop practice to teach point guards about wasted passes and poor passes. Those types of things can make all the difference to youth players.

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Rick Pitino spoke out pretty angrily yesterday about the allegations that have been made against him and I don’t blame him. As one who has had a lot of stuff printed about incorrectly I have a special fondness for people who go through this sort of garbage with people talking and writing about things that they don’t know are facts or not. If I were Pitino I’d be beyond tired of this.

Pitino admits to the affair and admits that it was a mistake. We make mistakes as people and he has admitted to that mistake. That mistake is what this is all about in this case and is a case of how our decisions today can effect our future. Pitino knew this and we all do yet we still do things dumb and wrong all the time and that is what happened here. He screwed and admitted it and just wanted to move on.

Imagine the wife here. She has to hear about this story day in and day out. People look at her funny at the grocery store and she has to put up with constant questioning from family members and friends. It’s broken trust between people and that’s a tough bridge to reestablish. The children are getting the same treatment and it can’t be easy to listen to things said about your father that may or may not all be true.

Rick Pitino has done a lot of good with his life and had a positive effect on a lot of people. By worldly standards he’s a very successful person who has a wonderful family. I want articles to come out and talk about those things and I want people to talk to his wife and children about the good that he has done. Sometimes we all want to knock someone off a pedastal to make ourselves feel better and that could be what is going on.

Pitino has given us the best example of how adultery or extra marital affairs can effect lives in a negative way and the list on this is pretty high, but it’s time we move on from this story because the story shouldn’t be about Pitino and the affair, it should be about the crazy woman who tried to extort him for milllions of dollars and the investigation into her criminal behavior.

To the Pitino’s i can only say that we can’t change the past and the consequences that were set when that route was chosen but you can choose how it is handled. You handle it with dignity and class. You admit when mistakes were made and you apologize for the way it effects your family. Then you love those close to you and call it good. That’s all that counts and all that cares. Then you make absolutely sure that you are never in that situation again.

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Can someone tell me how many coaches in Division I history have been stripped of 2 final four appearances?

Can someone tell me how that coach was given arguably the best job in Division I basketball?

Let me answer my own questions:

Coach Calipari is the only coach to be stripped of 2 final four appearances after his team was stripped of their 38 win season when Derrick Rose ‘allegedly’ had someone else take his entrance exam for him. The other team was UMass when players were given extra benefits but Coach Cal was long gone by then bombing in New Jersey as a pro coach. Seems those guys were already paid to play there.

Coach Cal is a proven winner on the collegiate level who gets great kids to play for him. He is full of charisma and has always got great players where he coaches. At UMASS he had Marcus Camby and a slew of talent that the school hasn’t seen since. At Memphis he got whoever he wanted there and won at a school that hadn’t won in a while and played in a horribly weak conference. Sound familiar? I’m not saying he cheated and wont’ say that. I’ve been part of numerous allegations against my own character when I don’t believe it was warranted so I won’t say players were paid to get there. I’m just saying that Coach Cal succeeds where others haven’t. By getting the Kentucky job he just made that program one of the most targeted schools in the country again. They are back on the map and that is what Kentucky has to have. Coach Cal will win there and he has to win there. He already has a top recruiting class and that won’t change. Now we will see if the guy can actually coach instead of just relying on talent to win.

The last thing I want to have this be like the steroid era in baseball where we were all so enamored with what was going on that we didn’t see what was happening. I don’t want to be that way with Coach Cal but I’m started to lean toward something being fishy. I’m not accusing at all but I’m also not looking at the situation with rose colored glasses. When two programs that you were over have had their final 4 appearances wiped off the records then that warrants special attention. I can’t hide that fact. But I also can’t hide the fact that Kentucky has to win so they hired him and they know exactly what they are getting.

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This is a sad story that could have a happy ending.

When I was growing up there were several players who had their careers and lives ruined by drugs. You had Len Bias, Roy Tarpley, John Drew and the list goes on. Some believe that Reggie Lewis’ life was cut short by drugs being in his system. Tarpley and John Drew lived but didn’t have the careers that they could have and should have had without drugs. Michael Ray Richardson was another fabulous talent who couldn’t keep it together. Is Michael Beasley next? I hope not.

Beasley is a talented player who is on his way to a great NBA career. He’ll be a consistent scorer and rebounder for years and still hasn’t filled out to get his grown man strength, but it’s coming. Is today a sign of trouble or a sign of bad behavior being fixed. We don’t know yet.

Beasley got in trouble last year while hanging with some of the other rookies at the rookie syposium. They were fined and disciplined as a result of their actions and it stained the players involved but none more than Beasley. There was reported alcohol and marijuana and girls though only the girls and the alcohol were found at the scene. Was that the time to be alarmed? It looks like it was now as we all look back.

Either way, he is young and can recover from this. I hope his motives are good for going and that he wants to get this fixed. Ask Chris Anderson from the Nuggets how much money drugs/alcohol cost him and he’ll tell you but the thing Beasley has to realize is that with him and his talent the price would be 10 times what it cost the Birdman. Let’s pray he gets this figured out and that we have only seen the beginning of Michael Beasley.

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Practice is the key to any successful team because that is where the groundwork is laid and where every coach should stamp his mark on his team. During practices coaches should be able to lay out the foundation that will make the team successful and if they don’t then the players will not buy in and the team won’t win. This should be done at every level of coaching.

When I played, the best coaches were the ones who made the drills interesting while stressing the importance of the fundamentals. Here’s 2 ways that coaches can make practices better for their team:

1. Base the drills on competition with punishments and rewards attached. An example is if you are doing 3 man weaves then split the groups up evenly. Every group that goes through without messing up doesn’t run but those that do mess up have to run. When doing shooting drills make sure that are laced with competition. Players thrive on that feeling and it needs to be developed. It will help develop better pressure players while making the drill realistic. No team drill should be done that isn’t pushing the issue of game speed or game type shots.

2. Split into groups. Don’t make the guards workout with the bigs and vice versa. Good coaches allow 25% of their practice to be used working on position specific drills. Let the centers work with other centers and do things that are specific to them. It lets the coach stamp his own idea of individual drills so that when the players are working out by themselves they can follow what they know their coach would have them do.

Like I said, practice is the key for coaches and players alike but to have a better practice follow my 2 simple steps and you’ll see a noticed improvement.

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When I was younger I would go to basketball camps and they would have tournaments to see who was the best 1 on 1 player in camp. I would always do really well until I played the kid who developed before the rest of us. You all know who i’m talking about. So the fast developing kid who has body odor just backs me down near the basket and scores the ball and I lose. I hated it and it wasn’t legit. The kid didn’t learn anything and all I learned was that deodorant was a good thing.

As I got into high school our coach had us play 1-1 against players we would normally go up against and he would have us play it from where our position was. If I was a point I would have to originate the ball at the top of the key. The wing players, the wings and so forth. The kicker was that we were only allowed 1 dribble or 2 dribbles to make our move or shoot it. It finally evened out the playing field and made the drill realistic.

What I learned:

1. You don’t have time to take 5 dribbles to get to the basket
2. You have to be creative in ways to get GOOD shots off
3. You realize how important strength was because you had to make your dribbles work for you
4. The triple threat position is the key to being a solid offensive player because from the triple threat i could set up any shot i wanted.

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Not a day goes by that I don’t have some sense of regret regarding my basketball or sports career in general. Though I was given a great father who pushed me in every sense of the word and one who put me in every league he could afford I still feel like I fell short and that haunts me. I was one of those kids who worked very hard at the game of basketball and I gave it a lot but i could’ve given it more. I regret not being the leader I should’ve been. I regret not getting to a state championship game. I regret not working harder on my defensive abilities because I never truly learned to play the game hard the entire time. I was good enough to coast a lot of the time and then when i wasn’t good enough to coast anymore I realized that I never trained myself to play the game hard all the time.

When I watch high division I college basketball players I am reminded of what might have been for myself and really what should have been. I still envision myself on the court and being able to play the game at a high level. I used to tell my father that I had the ability to turn on and off aggressiveness but I never did. The things that you can get by with when you are younger are not always going to be there. I wish I had a coach who had the guts to sit me down and not play me until I went hard every play but instead I could score points so I was on the floor and rarely taking the challenge of guarding the opposing teams’ best player.

My point is that any who reads this and has hopes of playing college ball needs to learn truly what it takes to get there. You have to be willing to sacrifice time with friends to practice. You have to be willing to give up your summers to be seen by coaches. You have to be willing to learn from other players and never accept the fact that you are good enough. Nobody is good enough and it is that feeling that still drives Kobe Bryant and Lebron James today. My downfall was believing I was good enough to offset any weaknesses I had and I was lying to myself all along. That is my biggest regret of all.

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How many times have you watched a game and have listened to the announcers refer to a player as a good leader? I hear it all the time and after a number of years I’m finally starting to understand what I wished I knew as a younger player. I’ve come up with my list of 3 traits that leaders need to have.

1. Hardest Workers: The best leaders are the hardest workers. They lead by example in every drill by going all out and always treating the drill with respect. They often will show up early to practice and leave late. They invite others to share in their work ethic often and try to include other players in what they do.

2. Motivational: The best leaders bring out the best in the other players by challenging them and motivating them when the situation calls for it. This doesn’t mean that they scream and yell all the time but it does mean that they can pull someone aside and talk to them to get them going the right direction.

3. Coach on the floor: This one is key because each coach wants that player on the court who can bring out what the coach wants. The coach doesn’t want to have to motivate all the time when the leaders of the team should be the ones keeping everyone in check. The coach on the floor is the guy who backs what the coach wants and puts the team first despite the individual success. These players are referred to as self sacrificing because of the personal stuff they give up for the good of the team.

When I was in high school my coach wanted me to be that player to challenge the others and get them to the right spots. He wanted me to be vocal and lead because I worked as hard or harder than all of them. My issue was that I was too worried about people liking me to be that way when that is what my team and my coach needed. I knew what the coach wanted and I did that and I worked harder than anyone else, but I didn’t push the others like I should have. Believe it or not that still haunts me today a little bit. The players I was with wanted me to lead them and push them and I didn’t realize it at the time.

We are all like that even today. People surrounding us are looking for leadership from people they truly respect. I am more mindful of these situations now and take advantage when necessary. Just another example of how sports mimics real life.

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Every summer players from all over will hammer their bodies playing in all day camps or tournaments. When you mix in the individual workouts and the typical lack of sleep, the summer can be a very hard and trying time on a growing body. It is because of this that I recommend shutting down any workouts prior to school starting back up again.

It is tough to do and I should know because I was in the same boat. I loved playing the game and wanted to get better whenever I could so to shut it down for a week was asking a lot. Shutting it down will do several things for you that each player needs to really make the upcoming season a success.

1. Summer is grueling so get some sleep and take a week to relax. Don’t think for a second that you’ll see or feel some long term effects because you really won’t. You’ll feel like others might be getting better than you while you are relaxing but for now that is ok. It is a short term sacrifice that will produce long term results.

2. Reboot…I work with computers a lot now and sometimes a computer needs a reboot just to reset itself and start over. That’s what i call this relaxation period of time…rebooting or control alt delete. We all need it to reset our minds and refocus on the new tasks.

3. Ice sore body parts- If you have sore knees then take this time to rest and ice your knees. Don’t go running or jumping or anything. Just ice your knees for 30 minutes a day and any other sore muscles or parts that need it.

The point is that you have to prepare for the season in a lot of ways and since you never know what scouts are watching, it is important to take care of your body by resting and giving it time to recover. You’ll notice that you’ll feel better and have a renewed love of the game when you come back to it.

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