Your athlete is being pulled in different directions. Through the years, athletes who want to make their travel, high school or middle school teams need to have a dedicated plan to get there and to mitigate a disappointing basketball season. Here are 3 tips for your athlete:
- Lean into failure: the fear of failure will deter players from getting ample experience and skills they need to progress. We see players avoiding their weaknesses and playing free due to the fear of spending time on the bench. However, it is the failures that will shape and provide the necessary experience to become better.
- Patience for unlocking of new skills: players’ development is often stunted when they try to master one thing at a time. Often, by progressing to a new set of skills, the characteristics needed for a skill can be “unlocked” by improving other skills. This is not an overnight process.
- It’s about playing the long game: It’s hard to not focus on the current season or results. However, it is important to focus on the long-term plan, health and improvement of the player. The best players at 10 are not necessarily the best players at 18. Year over year improvement is
what matters. To that end, it is important to recognize that more teams=more games= less time to train on the fundamentals. Schedules get squeezed. At the youth level, training should be top
of mind and the games utilized to add competition and added experience. Don’t sleep on the training.