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Archive for September, 2008
September 20, 2008 at 7:01 am · Filed under Uncategorized
To be #1, your team has to play as one
How many times have you heard, "There is no I in team"? Still, U.S. basketball continues to be dominated by individual play, which has led to a number of embarrassing upsets on the world and Olympic courts. From middle-school to the NBA, there are no championships without teamwork--and there's no teamwork without good coaching.
Get away from the flash and start building your successful team today with this one-of-a-kind, step-by-step guide that helps you to:
- Communicate the core values of integrity and respect
- Create a vision statement
- Recruit team players
- Develop trust and unity with a buddy system
- Inspire your players to embrace teamwork
- Get your five defenders working as one
- Master winning offensive plays that utilize the whole team
- And more
Customer Review: Badger fan review
Coaches Crean and Pim offer very objective and practical lessons in coaching and leadership. Their approach is both extremely detailed and well organized.
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September 19, 2008 at 1:41 am · Filed under Uncategorized
Customer Review: Some cards not in the book
Overall, this was a great book for finding out the value of my son's card collection since he asked me to liquidate it for him. Quite a few of the cards were not listed, whether they were special insert cards, or whatever, so that was a little annoying.
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September 18, 2008 at 3:48 am · Filed under Uncategorized
The Guide for a Fun and Successful Basketball Season!
Do you need some guidance before you start coaching this basketball season? Coaching Youth Basketball, 3rd edition gives you everything you need to make this season a success. It covers all of basketball's fundamentals and gives coaching tips for every aspect of the game including:
· dribbling and passing skills
· proper shooting technique for all types of shots
· offensive concepts and plays for beginner and intermediate players
· defensive tactics for getting the ball back
· the responsibilities of centers, forwards, and guards
· how to work together as a team
You'll also find template practice plans you can adjust for your own use, step-by-step drills and plays, conditioning ideas, first aid information, and an explanation of the game's rules. Plus, a glossary and skills checklists at the end of the book help you learn and teach the language and skills of basketball quickly and effectively.
Customer Review: A good all around starter book
I was asked to coach my son's basketball team for the YMCA. Not being a big fan of the game, I needed a good introduction and skill fundamentals for third and fourth graders.
The book covered all aspect for someone new at coaching basketball.
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September 16, 2008 at 11:09 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Customer Review: A sports drama brought to life in the pages of a great book
...can there be any better way to spend a few hours of reading time? I have seen other positive reviews of Mr. Guffey's book: they are well-deserved! "The Milan Miracle" is one of those sports legacies as big as the world of sports itself. To think that the characters Mr. Guffey writes about are real--and to know that the story he tells actually happened--makes this book an even more compelling read. With the arrival of the 50th anniversary of this milestone sports event comes another occasion to remind ourselves of the sheer joy provided by the greatest all-American game! Perhaps it is the fact that I live in Indiana that I can relate to this book's underlying themes of fundamental human emotion: through the telling of this true David-and-Goliath story (and a fast-forward to the lessons learned in the meantime), we encounter the doubt, the disbelief, the sheer grace of high school sports the way it existed 50 years ago. If this book merely retold the tale in order to wax eloquent about the 1950's as a "time of innocence," I could not recommend it as highly. But here is a story that's more than a story...it's a history of a simpler time when the values of hard work, perseverance and dogged determination could carry a small-town kid to the pinnacle of achievement. Most importantly, Mr. Guffey's book provides the encouragement that these values still exist--and are worthy of pursuit. There is much to be said in favor of Mr. Guffey's writing style. There is an underlying respect for the characters in this book. Having seen some of the recent ESPN coverage of the 50th anniversary ceremonies, it is evident that many of the individuals Mr. Guffey interviewed are from social backgrounds as varied as their Hoosier drawls. Whether conveying the voices of the townspeople or the Milan players themselves, Mr. Guffey writes with a real respect for the characters. It's an important element of his obvious respect for the "Milan Miracle" and high school basketball in general. I look forward to Mr. Guffey's next work!
Customer Review: How Can You Not Love This Story...??
The one class state basketball tournament. I miss it and I am not even from Indiana. I miss it despite the fact that I have never watched a single game of Indiana high school basketball. I miss it even though in Texas I have never known anything but multi-class basketball. And reading a book like Greg Guffey's "The Greatest Basketball Story Ever Told" is a big part of why I miss the single class tournament. The story of the two-season run by the overwhelming underdog Milan Indians in 1953 and 1954 is not only the greatest basketball story ever, but maybe the greatest sports story ever. Everything I love about small town America is here. The spirit, the hope, the despair and even the pettiness. Reading this book made me wish I was from Milan and made me wish it was 1954. I was fascinated by the follow up stories of the players; each of them a success in life in their own way. I was deeply moved to find out that Marvin Wood, the coach, had lost a battle with cancer at around the same time of the change to a multi-class basketball tournament. I really enjoyed this book. I'll read it again. And when I do, I'll be in the stands at Butler Fieldhouse watching Bobby Plump realize the ultimate high school dream in the ultimate American era. Read it, and you'll know what I mean.
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September 15, 2008 at 7:58 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
What can the film Hoosiers teach us about the meaning of life? How can ancient Eastern wisdom traditions, such as Taoism and Zen buddhism, improve our jump-shots? What can the "Zen Master" (Phil Jackson) and the "Big Aristotle" (Shaquille O'Neal) teach us about sustained excellence and success? Is women's basketball "better" basketball? How, ethically, should one deal with a strategic cheater in pickup basketball? With NBA and NCAA team rosters constantly changing, what does it mean to play for the "same team"? What can coaching legends Dean Smith, Rick Pitino, Pat Summitt, and Mike Krzyzewski teach us about character, achievement, and competition? What makes basketball such a beautiful game to watch and play? In Basketball and Philosophy , a Dream Team of twenty-six academics trained in philosophy--also diehard hoops fans--proves that basketball is the thinking fan's sport. Whether you play basketball, coach it, or just love to watch it, this book will forever enrich your understanding and appreciation of the game.
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September 14, 2008 at 10:37 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Being a spectator is much more fun when a person fully understands the game. With the help of Basketball Made Simple: A Spectator's Guide new fans will comprehend all the action in this fast-moving and exciting sport.
This book introduces the reader to the basics of the game including:
*The latest rules at pro and college levels, for both men and women
*Tips for watching games
*Strategies simplified
*A way to decipher basketball statistics
*Basketball personalities of the past and present
It also familiarizes the fan with the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the newly formed women's leagues, covering the teams and star athletes of the WNBA and ABL (American Basketball League). The book also maps out the road college teams must follow to get to the NCAA Final Four. Even the existing fan can use its up-to-date presentation of the most important statistics.
A complete glossary and index makes finding information a snap
Makes a great gift
Pocket-sized - take it to the game
Latest rules for pro leagues and college presented in easy-to-read tables
Customer Review: basketball made simple
Very easy to read and understand. I enjoyed the stats. on the major stars. Highly recomend!
Customer Review: Short but helpful guide
I bought this book as a gift but learned alot from it myself. I found it quite helpful. Some things in the book were hard to find, such as the explanation of different zone defenses for NCAA. Once found, I did learn something! The explanations were short and to-the-point. There were some pictures and diagrams, but mostly the book is text. I was hoping for more pictures. The book covers both NBA and NCAA basketball. Overall, not a bad place to get started with basketball!
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September 13, 2008 at 11:27 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
When a fight broke out between the Houston Rockets and the L.A. Lakers one night in 1977, All-Star Rudy Tomjanovich raced to break it up. He was met by Kermit Washington's fist, which delivered one of the most ferocious punches ever seen in sports. The punch dislodged Tomjanovich's skull, and required years of surgeries and therapy to get him back to normal. He was never the same again. Washington was an average player for the Lakers, 6 foot 8, and one of six athletes in the history of the NCAA to be both an academic all-American and a basketball all-American. By all accounts he was an exemplary man, but the split second in which he threw his fist toward Tomjanovich devastated his reputation. Every team in the NBA has refused to hire him in any coaching capacity. Tomjanovich, on the other hand, is a star: head coach of the two-time world championship Rockets, and coach of the 2000 gold medal US Olympic team.With his unique insight, style, and bone-deep knowledge of basketball, John Feinstein finally reveals the truth of that night, and how it changed basketball forever. Through this one cataclysmic event he casts a light on the NBA's darkest secrets, exploring race, violence, and how one mistake has haunted two good men for 25 years.
Customer Review: Redundant and Bloated
Feinstein is a fine writer but you wouldn't know it from this. This really should have been a retrospective article in Sports Illustrated, not a full-sized book. I often thought there were printing errors in my copy because I was reading similar passages over and over. But no, I suppose Feinstein needed to get a decent sized book so he did what he had to do.
But at least I have a better overall view of Kermit Washington. He's a really great guy in many ways, very charitable and caring. The problem is he's handled just about everything relating to "the punch" poorly. He blames another player, tells Rudy how much he's suffered in a rare meeting, sues the NBA, etc. etc. I think it was John Lucas who advised him to take responsibility and move on, not say "I'm sorry, but...". Unfortunately, Washington hasn't taken this advice. I hope someday he does, because there's no winning when you look for excuses and scapegoats in something horrific you've done.
Customer Review: "I'm sorry, but..."
It has been almost thirty years now (December 9, 1977) since a single ten-second snippet of NBA history forever changed the way that the game of professional basketball is played. On that evening in Los Angeles, Houston Rockets star Rudy Tomjanovich was almost killed by a single punch thrown by Kermit Washington of the Los Angeles Lakers. In the immediate aftermath of the incident, no one realized the tremendous impact that Tomjanovich's injury would have, not only on the lives of the two men directly involved, but on the league itself. John Feinstein's The Punch explains how the paths of Rudy Tomjanovich and Kermit Washington crossed that night in what was really more an accident than a fight and how they have become forever linked in the minds of basketball fans, something about which neither man is happy.
In one very important sense, the NBA of the 1970s resembled the game of hockey as it is played in the NHL. NBA teams depended on superstars to score points and to convince people to buy tickets. Team owners and managers realized that those superstars needed to be protected because their injury or ejection would make or break a team's whole season. For that reason, NBA teams almost always had someone on the floor to serve as the team's enforcer, someone who would make sure that their superstar was not injured in a fight, someone who would often fight the superstar's fight in his place, in fact. Kermit Washington, a fine player in his own right, also served as enforcer for the Los Angeles Lakers and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
Washington found himself coming to Abdul-Jabbar's rescue again on that fateful night, something he was used to doing on a regular basis for the hot tempered Abdul-Jabbar. As the players were running from one end of the basketball court to the other, Washington noticed that Abdul-Jabbar was becoming frustrated with the pushing and shoving he was receiving under the basket at the hands of Houston's Kevin Kunnert so he stayed close to the two men rather than running to the other end of the floor. Tomjanovich, Houston's team captain, noticed from his end of the court that his teammate was being manhandled by two Lakers and rushed in to break up the fight. As he approached Washington from behind, with his hands down, Washington turned suddenly and threw a single punch at Tomjanovich. The combination of Washington's strength, the speed at which Tomjanovich was approaching Washington's fist, and the exact location of the punch left Tomjanovich on the floor in a huge pool of blood.
Tomjanovich, who doctors say was lucky to survive the kind of punch that dislodged his skull, did not play again that season. Washington was suspended without pay for sixty days and his career was never really the same again. NBA rules governing player fights grew out of what happened that night because it made league officials aware of the great danger of letting men the size of professional basketball players take swings at each other. The league tightened up to such an extent that even players on the periphery of a fight were subject to fines and suspensions, especially those coming off the bench to involve themselves.
Just as importantly, the lives of Kermit Washington and Rudy Tomjanovich would never be the same. No matter what either player ever achieved on or off the court, each would always be remembered first for "the punch." Each of the men played for several more seasons, and Tomjanovich even coached the Houston Rockets to two NBA championships in the nineties, but both of them are still haunted by what happened during ten seconds of one of the thousands of basketball games they played during their lives.
John Feinstein was able to get both men, their families, and many of the players and coaches who were on the floor that night to share their memories. Rudy Tomjanovich, try as he might, cannot get over the feeling that everyone he meets thinks of him as the player "who got nailed." Kermit Washington has spent his life trying to convince people that he is not a thug who almost killed someone with a sucker punch in a fit of anger.
Feinstein gives equal time to both men, exploring their childhoods, their days as amateur basketball stars, and their professional careers. He does not take sides or make excuses for what happened that night. Instead, he lets both men tell their versions of what happened and how that has affected their lives ever since. Strangely enough, it is Kermit Washington who seems to be having the hardest time dealing with the whole thing. Washington seems to have become somewhat paranoid about what he did and still blames the hit his reputation took that night for everything bad that has happened to him since then. As pointed out by John Lucas, an ex-player who made plenty mistakes of his own, Washington needs to finally just say, "I'm sorry. I screwed up." He will never find the closure that Tomjanovich seems to have found until he stops saying, "I'm sorry, but..."
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September 12, 2008 at 4:43 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Customer Review: Wheelchair Warrior
Wheelchair Warrior is an eye-openeing portrayal of Melvin's fight through life, whether it be during his time as a youth involved in a gang or his rise to the top of wheelchair basketball. The book is inspirational for everyone who reads it because the adversity Melvin faces can be related to anyones everyday life. I enjoyed the book from cover to cover.
Customer Review: This book is amazing and a must buy!
This is a book that from start to finish can not be put down. It is beautifully written and from a real perspective. Melvin does not hold back about his life in a gang and the transition he made in his life after he was paralyzed. He also does not take all the credit for where he is today, but gives it to the people that are apart of his life. This book shows how important mentors are in all of our lives and how important it is to give back to the next person coming up. It is an inspirational book for all adults, disabled or able-bodied.
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September 11, 2008 at 1:43 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
This basketball rule book is a simple and easy to read guide to the most common basketball rules and violations. It has large 11 point type and many illustrations. Now in its sixth year Basketball Rules and Violations may be the most accurate of its kind.
Customer Review: A worthwhile read, but could use a lot of improvement.
I question the validity of the 5 star review above. The comment about the clipart is bothersome because the clipart is actually quite annoying and takes away from what has the potential of being a good book. The clipart is drastically over used and obviously used to fill otherwise blank pages. It is very childish cartoon clipart and often has nothing to do with the topic. The author stretches to use corny humor to tie in the terrible clip art. In one section he is even reduced to using bowling clipart and vainly tries to make a humorous basketball tie in. It fails miserably.
Today I tried to read the book before a game I was coaching. The clipart is so childish I wondered if people would think I was reading a Dr. Suess level childrens book. I am not kidding about that.
As stated above the book is poorly bound, but I didn't thank that was an issue. The book is obviously printed on a copier and bound by a cheap plastic hole punch binder. Again, this is really not an issue with me.
The book is chock full of misprints and typos. A good proof read is really needed and would fix all of these.
The book could use a good index also.
Still, the book is a worthwhile read. It does clear up a lot of misunderstood rules and little known rules.
The bottom line is this. I will recommend this book, even though it is not professionally edited, full of errors the the clipart is VERY annoying and childish. This book has given me respect with the referees and really helped me in my coaching.
If a book is a quick read and will help you with coaching of youth basketball teams it is worth reading. This book is both of these things.
I only hope the author will loose the cartoon, childish clipart, fix the numerous typos and add a good index. I'm not saying loose all the clipart, just the obviously rediculous clipart. So if you are a youth coach, buy the book and ignore the absurd overuse of clipart and typos.
[...]
Customer Review: Good info, binding needs improvement.
I bought this book/manual to help learn basketball rules better for when I play casual self-ref'd pickup games.
I read through the book and I enjoy the summary format of information which allowed me to quickly skim through the key info.
One suggestion I would have is to improve the binding cover and page thickness to ensure better durability. I haven't used my book that much but it is starting to wear.
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September 11, 2008 at 1:48 am · Filed under Uncategorized
The single common attribute shared among the legends of Indiana high school basketball is dominance. From Fuzzy Vandivier winning three titles in a row, to Glenn Robinson's Gary Roosevelt Panthers winning the 1991 state title in a dream match against Alan Henderson's Indianapolis Brebeuf, these superstars exhibited total dominance when it mattered most. Indiana High School Basketball's 20 Most Dominant Players relives the passionate memories, thrilling victories, and the sheer dominance of these Hoosier hardcourt idols. With these twenty players combining to win 14 coveted Mr. Basketball awards and 28 state championships, Hall of Fame sportswriter Dave Krider truly profiles the best of the best.
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