Alex Sarama

Alex Sarama is the founder of Transforming Basketball. He is widely regarded as an industry-leading voice within the field of contemporary skill acquisition and more specifically, the constraints-led approach. Sarama's bestselling Amazon book, Transforming Basketball, was released in April 2024. He has delivered clinics in over 40 countries around the world and worked as a coach developer for numerous organizations and international basketball federations. This includes work done in multiple sports outside of basketball.

Alex is currently Head Coach for the Portland Fire in the WNBA. He previously worked for the Cleveland Cavaliers as Assistant Coach / Director of Player Development, Paris Basketball in the EuroCup, the Rip City Remix (Portland Trail Blazers’ G League Affiliate), the London Lions and NBA Europe.

In May 2026, Alex earned WNBA Coach of the Month honors after guiding the Portland Fire to a 6–4 start in their inaugural season as an expansion team. He became the fourth coach in league history to receive the award in his first season, and just the second, following Becky Hammon, to do so in his first month.

Prior to these roles, Alex spent a formative three years working at College Basket Borgomanero in Italy, where he first started sharing ideas on how to apply an ecological approach in multiple departments. It is these ideas which now form the basis of the Transforming approach.

Alex has written three books on contemporary skill acquisition principles in basketball: Transforming Basketball (2024), A Constraints-Led Approach to Coaching Basketball (2026), and Transcending Basketball (2027 release). Furthermore, he has written guest chapters in the following books: Ecological Dynamics in Sport Coaching: An Essential Guide (2026), Talent Identification and Development in Basketball - Science and Practice (2027 release), and Sustainable Athleticism & Longevity (2027 release).

While no longer running Transforming on a daily basis, Alex’s ideas and vision underpin the principles being brought to life by the Transforming team, as well as inspiring the movement being explored by thousands of coaches around the world to change how basketball is coached.