Fundamentals being taught again...

[teammom4]

With everything going on in this Hot month of July, I thought this was an interesting article and probably some resolve to the issues of the selfish, or uniformed player or handler. When I was following the Nike Skills coverage, I found it interesting how much they spoke of instruction. This is very necessary and the lack of it has been a big thorn in David Stern's side for a few years, especially since USA has been getting whipped on.
This is about the boys side, but as someone posted in another thread the girls side is on its way to mirroring that of the boys in many aspects.
When I was at a tourney last weekend, I heard three college coaches conversing about how Jordan messed up the game, they said that kids need to realize they are not him & play ball. This was after watching a girl come down court all alone & blow the bucket trying to razzle-dazzle!!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/05/AR2007070502040.html

My daughter's coach played overseas and he speaks of how they carry it like a profession. It is way more serious there, from much younger ages, and they focus on bball just as much, if not more, than education.
How do you guys feel about this...

[spaldy]

I think the recent success (or lack thereof) of the US basketball teams speaks for itself. On the men's side losing to basketball "powerhouses" such as the Lithuania, Ukraine, Argentina and Puerto Rico speak volumes on where the game has gone. Some of the countries that have beaten us has 1/100th the population and 1/1,000,000th the resources that we do to put together teams.

You also see it at the local level. This weekend I was at the Summer Slam in Elgin and saw some games that were almost unwatchable. No defense, no team offense and bascially just 5 individuals trying to do it all themselves.

While this is the nature of exposure ball it is sad that at this game there were 50+ college coaches and at the game next door that had sound defense and team play there were 5. The level of athleticism and physical size was not that different. Both games had a reasonable number of college prospect players.

Siutations like this are a direct reflection of why we can no longer produce the best basketball team in the world on the mens side and the rest of the world will catch up on the women's side.