EP 11Player development
Crafting a Coaching Philosophy: How Theory Shapes Coaching Strategies
Alex Sarama and Adam discuss the importance of theory in the coaching profession and the basketball industry.
11 min
0:0011:37
Alex Sarama and Adam discuss the importance of theory in the coaching profession and the basketball industry.
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In this episode, Alex Sarama and Adam discuss the importance of theory in the coaching profession and the basketball industry. They emphasize that everyone has a theory, so it is crucial we gain awareness of it and then ask if we have evidence to support it. They also address the misconception that embracing theory makes coaching too scientific, explaining that theory actually simplifies and enhances the coaching process. Alex and Adam stress the significance of investing time in understanding the theory of skill acquisition, as it changes coaches' perspectives and impacts all aspects of coaching.
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هذا النص يتبع التسجيل الصوتي الأصلي باللغة الإنجليزية.
This is the Transforming Basketball Podcast, and I'm your host, Alex Sarama. This is the podcast where we help coaches and practitioners change the way we think about basketball performance. Our goal is to create the ultimate resource to help make sense of how contemporary skill acquisition ideas can be applied within the basketball world.
Throughout the podcast, we'll unpack how an ecological dynamics framework alters our perspective If you're ready to join us in our quest to transform the basketball world, then this is the podcast for you. Welcome back to the podcast. So Adam and I, in this episode, we're gonna quickly touch on why we think theory is important to the coaching profession and industry as a whole.
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I've looked at all the other great people within the ecological kind of landscape sharing these ideas, and I'm a little bit intrigued. But ultimately, you know, I keep hearing that the theory is important. But why is the theory important? Why do we need to have a theoretical framework informing how we coach?
The theoretical framework to me is— I wouldn't say fundamental, I would say it's foundational. It is something that grounds you. It's something that actually underpins everything that you do as a coach. And as far as ecological dynamics, I do my best to actually have that serve as the foundation for what I do in my everyday life.
Amazing start. And, and I think it's— if you don't have a theory, you know, it's— well, let me rephrase that, because everyone has a theory, correct? The difference is if your theory is actually supported by evidence-based ideas or it's not. Because if you believe that doing something like a drill is better than using a CLA activity, well, you have a theory, right?
The key difference therefore is if that theory is embedded in contemporary skill acquisition ideas. So, you know, I think a lot of coaches rebel when they hear us talk about theory, but we can't get away from the fact that we all have one, whether you like it or not, we all have one.
So I think something I'm hearing a lot is that we are too radical at Transforming Basketball, Adam. And, you know, it's that we are trying to make coaching too scientific.
Yeah.
And how I would argue that is that it's actually the opposite. I would say that people using a traditional approach are radical because there's no evidence base to support why they're going about that. And I would not consider myself a radical because everything I do is informed by the theory, right?
It's very different. And additionally, I don't think that we are making basketball too sciencey. I would actually say that basketball and basketball coaching has simply just been incredibly oversimplified due to how the game has always been, forms of life, and what our coaching industry has become.
So that's why, because of, you know, reductionist ideas and this oversimplification, that is why, you know, now we're coming in with these ideas and it's rocking the boat a little bit.
Well, yeah. And like, to me, if you actually talk with the researchers and whatnot, they're not trying to make sports science too sciency either. Like, they understand their limitations with like being able to control certain aspects in the labs and certain things they can study at this point.
And they're hoping to expand like what they can and cannot study, but there's also budgetary issues. They're simple. And even like aspects of science can't necessarily calculate certain things. And they, they completely understand that. And that's why they want to— they speak in much more terms that transfer across all of sport.
And frankly, I think that's actually very applicable anyways. But to me, like, again, just to get back to like why theory is important, it actually provides you so much freedom. To me, I remember just talking with one of our fellow coaches. Like I talked with Jonas early on and he was asking me, I gave some activities and stuff I would help around a player development session.
And he was like very intrigued with like some of the ideas and whatnot. He's like, how did you come up with that? It takes inspiration from somewhere. I'm like, Yeah, I took inspiration from the game and I just thought like, I just simply sampled from the game and I'm just like, how could I do this in a way that's like a condensed version, but then also add like a little tweak here, tweak there that could invite different behaviors.
So like, I don't need to, I always joke with you. I like follow 2 people in the basketball world as far as what material they put out, you and another person. That's it. Like, I don't know, like people ask who should trainers and you guys send stuff, like our coaching staff will send stuff in, like used to send stuff and like, oh, making fun of this coach or that coach, I'm like, who the hell cares, man?
I, I don't pay attention to this stuff. I don't follow these people. It doesn't come across my timeline. And when it does, I just simply just like, oh, that's interesting. That's how they're approaching things.
And like we said at the time, it's just, it's taking ability away from our, you know, focus on actually what's more important. And that's thinking about the players. And if we're wasting time, you know, like looking at videos and, you know, looking at all this stuff, it's just, well, we don't have that time anyway.
And it doesn't achieve anything. And, you know, that's one of the biggest things we're trying to do at Transforming. We're not, you know, you will see we are not critiquing anyone on this podcast. We are not doing it on social media. And there's no point to doing that.
And I've always believed that because if we're just getting in these feuds on social media, whatever, it's not helping people understand these ideas. If anything, it's going to push them away from it even more. So, you know, we've done episodes where we regroup, you know, ideas on what common kind of critiques we're getting.
But there's— it just, it does nothing when we highlight these people or whatever, because we don't want a fragmented basketball community. We need a united basketball community.
And just to really just hone back in and make sure like we stay somewhat on topic here as far as like the importance of like theory, I just— because I'm very passionate about this, Alex, because again, it really truly does, if you embrace it, it shapes your whole life when it comes for ecological dynamics.
And just to clarify, like my interpretation of the world is It's always an interaction. So the way I describe it, take whatever words and make them, turn them into nouns. Every, add an -ing to everything because it's always a process of doing. And you're always interacting with an environment.
Something always happens somewhere. Those are like the key things for me is just taking the context and realize you're always interacting with a context and it's going to shape who you are and how you're behaving and behaving being the key word. And as I just mentioned previously, that shapes how I see the game of basketball.
Therefore, I don't need, no offense, when it comes to like products and stuff, like we don't need an offense or something like that. I don't need to go and like search for drills or anything like that. Like, and I don't, I don't even need to hold on to drills of the past or like rely on them because again, I, whatever I put out there, it's actually like, it's really simple, but the adjustments and the manipulation of constraints, that's the actual coaching itself because I'm adapting.
Exactly.
Behaviors are happening in front of me because that's how I view it. I don't view it as. Oh, this activity will give me this result. No, it's what I'm observing, how the athlete is interacting with their environment and during that activity, and then we adjust from there.
I want to build on that, Adam, because that was fantastic. And I'll give you an example. During COVID I was obsessed with trying to like get— watch every clinic I could online, get as many kind of, uh, offenses as I could. But I, I would say I wasn't collecting drills.
But I was collecting small-sided games and I had just started understanding the CLA then, but not coherently, right? So what, that was 4 years ago. And now it's like, since then I'm so selective with what I watch, but it's also like what I watch, I kind of bring into my perspective on how I view life and how I approach basketball.
So I think many coaches are in this stage of just trying to collect random drills. And maybe they view the things we share at Transforming Basketball as standalone small-sided games, as opposed to existing as part of a greater methodology. Whereas investing time understanding the theory and skill acquisition coaches, it changes everything.
And I think sometimes coaches wonder why I've gone so deep, why you've gone so deep into this, Adam, and why we don't do things like watch X's and O's and, you know, things like that, do scout reports. Well, we still do those things, but we approach it through a different lens.
So we're not looking for a set play and we're not viewing it as one type of magical bullet, which is gonna solve our problems. Instead, we're looking at how players interact within the set. What are they attuning to? What are they not attuned to?
And maybe we're actually, I'd say, more interested in things that don't work because it shows us what the players need. And, you know, we start thinking, you know, we text each other, look at this, you know, think about this small-sided game, this constraint, what we, you know, what we were doing last year in Italy would be perfect for this situation.
And that is why. So when you have a theory, it changes everything. And it's difficult for me to explain unless you've lived it and you've gone through that process. But I can really say that just if you try and invest 10% of your time as a coach that you maybe invest on other tasks such as watching video scout reports, reading other material.
If you try and invest that in the theory of skill acquisition, it's going to change your perspective on all those other things. And I think that is why grounding your approach in a theoretical framework is so key. It impacts everything you do.
Yeah, it's in— I understand the difficulty behind it, Alex, because again, like, I'm an imperfect person too. I think big trouble is, again, sociocultural constraints, and a lot of it has to do with our view on like being productive, what is productive with our time, and like getting tangible results and stuff.
Honestly, like the most important thing I look forward to the most, and I don't do it enough, is not consuming things. Not necessarily like reading new material or something like that, which I do do, but the most important aspect of anything that I do is actually reflecting on it.
Yeah.
And think about how can it apply elsewhere? Because that's where all this stuff comes from. It becomes much deeper. And then once you actually think about it and then think about applying it to different contexts and stuff like that, all I can say is just, it's, it's very peaceful and freeing.
I, I said freeing earlier, and I think that's the most important aspect. You become much more adaptable yourself as a coach, and you feel like you actually have autonomy, much more autonomy this way than you do if you're constantly searching for the next thing.
That's, it's a very anxious way to live and perform your life if you're doing it that fashion.
Adam, that's a really nice note to end the podcast on. So we hope we covered, you know, just why the theory is important. Coaches, we want to hear from you. So if any of you have gone through this process since we started Transforming, where you've really immersed yourself in an ecological approach and you've really tried to get to grips with it, please let us know on social media.
And we want to know what changed for you so that, you know, we have more kind of ammunition for the next time we have to explain just, you know, why this stuff matters. So thanks again and see you on another episode shortly. Thanks for tuning into this episode of the Transforming Basketball Podcast.
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