PROCESS OVER RESULTS

Coach Bob Starkey always shares so many good things with us on @LSUCoachStarkey.  Here’s yet another… Safe travels this July coach.

http://bit.ly/cb4CBh

Kids who fantasize about playing in The Show dream of batting .350, hitting 75 home runs, throwing a no-hitter, or getting the game-winning hit in the seventh game of the World Series. Not many kids go to the ballpark and dream of having a good at-bat or an excellent workout in the bullpen. Yet it is learning how to readjust smaller goals that makes the mighty dreams possible. The best professional players discover that goal-setting is about taking charge of those elements a player can control. A player cannot control whether he hits .350, but he can control whether he has a good at-bat and swings at pitches he can drive. A pitcher cannot control whether a batter gets jammed and bloops a hit, but he can control whether he puts in effective work in the bullpen and whether he maintains his concentration on the mound.

“Numbers—I never look at them. I don’t like them,” shortstop Nomar Garciaparra told Baseball Weekly’s Seth Livingstone. In September 1980, Kansas City’s George Brett got the baseball world buzzing with the possibility of his reaching .400 for the first time since Ted Williams hit .406 in 1941. The Royals were in a pennant race, and Brett was hitting to win. “Every time up, I was just trying to give out club the kind of at-bat the situation called for,” Brett said. But the night we wrapped up our division, I thought, ‘Hey, I’m close enough. I’m going to go for it. I didn’t have to try to hit .400.’ That was the day things fell apart. I didn’t have many good at-bats when I started concentrating on getting hits.”

Focusing on the job at hand, and on the elements that a player can control, leads to reaching the great goals. Reaching then excelling, in these individual points builds a player’s confidence. The secret is the specifics: do the individual elements correctly and they will lead to greater achievement. The individual, specific goals—journey goals—are what lead to reaching the highest goals—destination goals. Only be mastering the journey goals can you reach the destination.

From Mental Toughness: Baseball’s Winning Edge

by Karl Kuehl, John Kuehl, and Casey Tefertiller

HOOP THOUGHTS: Bob Starkey

Coach Starkey always provides us with GREAT teaching insights and articles on his HOOP Thoughts site.

This is no exception.  Follow Coach Starkey, if you don’t already.

The Ultimate Coaches Clinic

The Ultimate Coaches’ Clinic:  Jeff Van Gundy

Jeff Van Gundy

In 2008, Pat Williams, the GM of the Orlando Magic and a tremendous motivational speaker put out a book, “The Ultimate Coaches’ Clinic.” It is a fascinating book because of the style Pat utilized. He surveyed over 1000 coaches and administrators for insights to what is important to successfully do their job. From time to time I will share a few but it is a great book to own and I highly recommend it. Here are some thoughts from Jeff Van Gundy:

• The players don’t care if you are short or tall, black or white, a former player or not, all they care about is whether you can help them.
• When I was 29 and an assistant with the Knicks, Pat Rileytold me I could be a head coach in the NBA. Then Pat said, “Remember these four things, and you can lead anyone:”
……Competence—know your stuff.
……Sincerity
……Reliability
……Trustworthiness
• John Wooden and Dean Smith were right. Focus on the process and not the result. That is how you get better. The more you talk about winning, the less winning you do.
• Don’t accept in victory what you won’t accept in defeat. You can’t overlook mistakes when you win a game, because they will come back to haunt you later.

The Passing of Myles Brand

Myles Brand: A legacy of leadership

NCAA President Myles Brand, the first university president to serve as the Association’s chief executive and a champion of academic reform, fiscal responsibility and student-athlete well-being, died Wednesday from pancreatic cancer.   Dr. Brand was a tremendous leader who always had the best interest of student-athletes in his mind and one who did a valuable job of steering the entire body in a very positive way.  My family and I extend our deepest condolences to Myles Brand’s family – our thoughts are with them during this difficult time.

It would benefit you a great deal to read the legacy of Dr. Brand from the NCAA website.

OTHER LINKS:

Myles Brand, NCAA president, dies By Marcus K. Garner  The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Eric Musselman’s take on Bill Bellichek

Bob Starkey of LSU Lady Tigers recently shared a great entry from Eric Musselman’s site on Bill Bellichek’s coaching philosophy by KC Joyner. I think we can all learn and apply useful strategies or philosophies no matter the sport.  Coach Musselman’s BLOG is an excellent source of information for coaches, fans, players/student-athletes or parents.

Eric Musselman

One of my goals this year is to travel to as many different successful schools, professional teams, businesses and organizations to observe and learn from the wide variety of successful philosophies out there.  Successful people are successful people no matter the profession.  Success is bread with a variety of traits and to be able to have the time to invest in discovering these systems, philosophies and traits is a tremendous gift.  We can all learn every day.  Those lessons can be applied to coaching, anything. My time away from the court is going to make me a better person, father, husband and basketball coach.

Below you will find Coach Musselman’s thoughts and the original article by KC Joyner.

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NCAA Basketball Fall Workouts

September marks the time when Men’s & Women’s college basketball teams are back in action.  Student-Athletes have returned from home, classes have begun and Fall workouts are underway.

 The NCAA has mandates regarding out of season workouts.  To see a PowerPoint of the NCAA guidelines follow this link: Out of Season Bylaws

 Twitter, Facebook, BLOGS are all jammed with coaches “First Day of”… class, workouts, conditioning, etc stories.

 You can follow any of the links below for stories, tips, video and more…

Try Googling your favorite team name or coaches name and the word twitter , eg. “Joanne Boyle Twitter’” and you will more than likely find a Twitter page and links to notes, video, etc about Fall Workouts.   For Coach Boyle you get:  CalCoachBoyle

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