Hoops

Matthew Dellavedova +/- stats

Statistics such as +/- in themselves used as a singular component combined with other variables and evidence based figures that include information analysed from intangibles and those efforts we can't often present in simple form is what should be considered to complete the picture.

IMHO, the +/- is a good starting point, then we include the one per centers, the impact a player has on the opposition, how he makes his team mates better, what he does off the ball and other factors like attitude etc...

Delly is proving he is what he is, a damn good basketball player and one who makes his team better when he is on the court, period!

The +/- stats just prove it as a starting point, but are not the defining or final picture, they are part of the overall equation.

Is a guy who just keeps chucking up shots while playing no defense, yet racking up stats the best player on the team? Probably will look flashy and get good numbers, but we gotta delve deeper I believe and studying game tapes is the only way to do this because the game is so quick...

Oh, and I forgot one more really important factor, IMO anyway...

Junior coaches down here seem to be, by and large, more concerned with their win/loss ratio than with development and teaching of the game for mind.

Confidence in coaching will reflect the confidence in playing! Spare us from the unsure, uneducated, angry coach, please...

Ask yourself (if you are a junior coach), do you sub a kid for a mistake instead of letting him/her work it out?

Do you yell at a kid for their mistake instead of teach them how to correct?

Do you give up on them to bring in the next big thing so you can win now, or encourage them to keep trying and not worry about their errors too much as they are learning the game to improve down the track?

As a coach, do YOU have a fear of losing that grips YOU so hard that YOU forget to loosen up and focus on the courage and risk taking needed to win?

Team rules and running YOUR plays is important, but... Building confidence is also letting all your kids shoot it occasionally, letting them drive and take it to the rim, letting them go coast to coast, encouraging them to dunk and to perform their spin moves, but not giving them a bake when it doesn't always come off...

If we want our juniors not to be robots and fearful of expressing themselves on the court, then we have to adopt a coaching approach which is less about flogging them, or punishing them and more about encouraging and developing them, IMHO!

Some of us say, 'where are the players with style?'

I ask, 'where are the coaches with style?'

Interesting how this post has drifted onto the topic of 'junior Australian player's shooting techniques'

Since we have done so, I will add what I have observed over the years of watching Australian juniors at all levels.

But first we must understand that Delly is one of our juniors and has come through our program, secondly that he is an Aussie kid and not born in the USA.

Why is this significant? Well, if we care to have a think about our Aussie juniors (boys in particular) and think about their general skill sets growing up in a footy/cricket dominated world we will better understand what I mean...

Your average garden variety Aussie boy will grow up playing back yard cricket and footy in the park, he will learn to bowl, mark, kick, hand-ball, (pass in the case of rugby) and do all these things with style and on the move, just like his idols playing in the AFL/NRL etc...

In the USA kids will play backyard gridiron games, and throw a baseball with dad, but by and large a huge swag of them will pick up a basketball and go one-on-one with their mates.

I am generalising, of course, but this shot technique issue is more than just something we need to teach our kids, if we are to compare our juniors with those from the USA it is a cultural difference and something they are brought up with.

In the USA and in Europe basketball is huge, the kids will look up to their superstars and copy them, imitate their swagger and style, the way they shoot and move on the court!

Now back on topic, what I have seen here is less emphasis on the individual technique and more on the results or the stats. Not saying it is wrong, we just don't have enough coaches who can take the time to spend on a kid one-on-one to correct the techniques early enough, and we all know how hard bad habits are to break.

Then, once the kids are in their late teens, we may be stuck with the style or technique of the individual, too hard to change it unless it is completely wrong and someone is dedicated enough...

Our juniors are talented and dedicated, but lets remember it is not the main stream sport here and the money, facilities, coaches, support is not as broadly available for basketball as it is in some sports.

All things considered, I think our juniors are doing very well and on the improve, just the same...

^^^ Yes he is that one and the same person.

Maybe the AIS takes the view that they don't want to screw with anything which caused them to pick up the player in the first place.

Perhaps they'd rather take a 40% flawed shot than take it apart and rebuild it into a 60% shot, kind of thing.

014, such wisdom. What stat line would you prefer? PPG? Lol

It is also apparently good for upsetting anonymous posters who may think they know something about something but may not be intelligent or knowledgeable enough to realise it yet...

Always thought Kyrie was overhyped.

The over-commercialisation of his game through the Uncle Drew advertisements was one factor.

Mad handles but some people forgot that it takes more than flashy.moves to get wins in the league

Actually, it is a brilliant comparison of something often overlooked by the average basketball punter...