The Complete Player

I love the game of basketball.  I spend a lot of time each day thinking about it.  I love the strategy, the excitement, the physical fitness involved, and most importantly of all, the development of players.  With this topic comes a big question.  What are the important skills/qualities that a player should work on developing in order to become great?

Before I get into specifics, let me answer this question in general terms.  When you play sports, the analogy I like to use is that of a soldier.  A soldier will be a great warrior if he has the following:
  • Weapons needed to go to battle.
  • The training to use those weapons effectively.
  • The courage to go to battle due to the confidence he has in his training, his weapons and his ability to use them.
How does this relate to basketball?  If you view a game as a battle and your opponent as the enemy, you will have more confidence on the floor when you know that you have more weapons in your arsenal than he does and that you have practiced refining those weapons with endless hours of work in the gym. The confidence that you have gained putting all of the work in, will give you the courage to do what needs to be done to win the game.  Even if that means taking the game winning shot.

So now that we know that basketball can parallel a battle and the player a soldier, let's go into detail about what skills a complete player needs to get in order to be considered elite.

To start with, there are 8 facets of the game that all need to be worked on by players who aspire to be great.  Those eight facets of the game are:
  1. Layups
  2. Dribbling
  3. Shooting
  4. Using both Hands
  5. Passing
  6. Rebounding
  7. Defense
  8. Athleticism
Players who aspire to becoming the best player they can be need to work hard on all 8 of the facets listed.  If I had to pick which ones need to be worked on first, I would say layups, dribbling, and using both hands are the 3 most important followed closely by shooting.  This does not mean that the rest of them are not critical.  It just means that I would start coaching beginners on the first three before  anything else.

We will take some time to discuss all eight of the facets in upcoming posts.  For now I hope this gets you thinking about your game and which facet you may need to work on the most.


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