How to Overcome Challenges Implementing the CLA

This is the Transforming Basketball Podcast hosted by Alex Sarama. This is the podcast helping coaches and practitioners change the way we think about basketball performance. Our goal is to provide the ultimate resource for making sense of applying contemporary skill acquisition ideas within basketball.

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Welcome back. A little bit of a different episode today. We wanted to take some of the messages we've been seeing the most since we started Transforming Basketball and general things which have different social media platforms, and we wanted to use our platform on the podcast to answer them and put some common kind of challenges to the CLA to rest and actually properly articulate how we would answer those questions from our perspective.

So, Adam, first one I'm going to fire over to you, and that is, I want to see results, not science. What basis besides a book, podcast, and fancy words are being used to challenge the status quo? What NBA players have trained with the CLA to confirm that this contemporary approach works?

The 2 things that come into mind for me are, well, they have trained under the CLA. It just may have not been intentional, first of all. So you don't really necessarily know that. And the other thing I'm thinking about is just because it worked for somebody at the highest level doesn't— does that mean that was effective?

Are we questioning what we're doing? I think we should always be asking, is there a better way? And for me, like, how did you achieve those results? Those are like This kind of comes back to the same discussion for me around like something that we had a discussion on initially when we first met was like, yeah, points possession is a useful statistic, but it doesn't tell me how it emerged.

And if you're going to base your entire offense around that, that's a pretty scary proposition because then if it's like, well, let's do threes and layups.

I'm just adding analytics and reductionism in analytics or something like analytics through a CLA lens to our podcast bag to record. Sorry, I'm cutting you off.

You're perfectly fine. That's the key word, reducing. And again, I'm sure there are approaches and stuff like that. Like, again, I'm not going to say like, to me, it's just, it's a very simplistic way of looking at a complex world that we live in.

It's not as simple as like, oh, A led to B. He did this, therefore that's how it goes. Without even asking like, well, what elements of it? I can think of a discussion I had with Linus. I keep bringing him up just because I talked to him yesterday about like, he thought, for instance, that all the work he was putting in the gym, work, quote unquote, being a heavy actually emphasis on the work aspect of it, like shooting in the gym by himself for hours on end.

Like that's how he got to where he was. And then I just started asking him about his childhood and when he first started playing basketball and first fell in love with it. Turns out that Linus had a park that was less than a block away from his house and he'd go and the older kids were super cool to him and he would play against them all the time, all day long.

And that's when he first fell in love with the sport and there we go.

Fantastic. All right. You covered that one really well. What have I got? What's next?

Okay. So I don't know, like this kind of confused me because I don't necessarily, um, I guess it is a question. The science is sitting on a surface level understanding of basketball. Big leaps are made to tie skill acquisition to science.

Yeah. This was a little bit of a confusing one for me because skill acquisition is science because it's an evidence-based field. So, you know, there aren't big leaps being made to tie it to basketball because we've had researchers in universities all over the world who have been studying this and pioneers within the ecological space who obviously we've mentioned on many of the podcasts.

And these ideas, especially when we look at what an ecological dynamics approach is, you know, I think it was what, the early 2000s, the first kind of papers were actually released on this. You know, it's not something that suddenly has happened and it's not something that's come from me and you, Adam, where we just decided to do, to record this podcast today and try and change the status quo in the basketball world.

No. It's people who have been dedicating their lives to understanding how athletes become more skillful and actually looking at, you know, really challenging traditional approaches to skill acquisition and obviously challenging the status quo in that field. So we can't separate skill acquisition from science.

It is science. And obviously it's there for us as coaches not to be scared of it, but to actually embrace it. And I think it's, that's the key thing. At the end of the day, skill acquisition can help us design better practice environments backed by empirical evidence.

So that's kind of what I would use to challenge that question, if it's even a question. I think what we're seeing here is a coach who is assuming that there are very kind of specific techniques which players need to know. And I think what they are suggesting is that these very specific techniques will not emerge within a CLA environment.

And I think they're thinking that maybe for some players it might happen, But for all players it won't. And I think the easiest starting point is that we don't want all players using highly similar techniques because, as we were talking about before on the podcast, every player solves problems in different ways.

And I think at the end of the day, we gotta remember that, yes, there is actually no limit to the solutions that could be found. There's many different ways that problems can be solved. And of course, you know, there may be things which are preventing players from moving in different ways.

we've spoken about before— action capabilities, attunement to affordances. Absolutely. But critically, the key difference is we don't believe in trying to get them to move in one very kind of scripted, coach-prescribed way. What would you say to that, Adam?

Hey coach, I wanted to take a quick break from this episode to let you know that our website is available to you right now. If you just go to transformingbball.com. The goal of our site is to present basketball coaches and practitioners with the ultimate resource for applying evidence-based ideas.

It contains a number of free resources such as blogs, practice activity ideas, as well as some of our paid products including clinics, workshops, and courses. The website contains everything you need to take your coaching to the next level. Find the website in our show notes or head to transformingbball.com.

I would say like, if you're really honed in on this is quote unquote fundamental to the game, I would say then what are you worried about? If you put them in the game, eventually that'll happen then. And I think, and this speaks invariants and attractors and fluctuators within movement, is if you provide enough variation and give them enough different experiences, those attractor states and those invariant features of the game that you are seeing, like certain behaviors you do see in shooting and stuff like that, are always a part of it.

Yeah.

it.

You see it because it's embedded within the environment and the task. It's unavoidable. It distinguishes between shooting versus a layup. These are different actions because again, it's different demands. And the more you experience them, they're going to sort out itself. The body's going to sort out, all right, this is what I do in this, under these conditions.

Absolutely. I think the key thing here is it's like, we're so creative with how we both manipulate constraints that it's amazing to see all the movement solutions that do emerge. That's where you have to know why you're manipulating constraints and critically how to do it in a way which can afford different movement solutions.

So next question, we've kind of covered that one. How can a player perform a skill without being first taught it explicitly? How can a youth player that cannot dribble a ball suddenly play one-on-one or a more complex small-sided game? Get those fundamentals down, develop creativity later.

Sadly, like the first thing I think of is just simply like, how did you learn to walk and how did you learn to crawl? You just interacted with your environment and you were trying to stand up. That's what you were initially trying to do.

You were trying to traverse the environment and actually get from point A to point B. So you just tried and explored different things over and over again. Now, when it comes to the sport itself, basketball, it's simply exploring within the rules of the game.

Like you can just describe and tell the player like, oh no, you're not allowed to do it that way. You don't have to tell them how to do it. You can just give them the rules. Essentially, the coach early on could be there just to simply provide them the rules of the game.

They can almost serve as if they're a referee early on when, when they're simply exploring and say, nope, nope, that's— you're not allowed to do that. That's all right. And then just change variables that allow them to discover certain movements within the game.

Like, you're playing against the rule book. There's no inherent rules like you have to do it certain ways.

And just practically, for something like that, play dribble tag. Kid who can't dribble is going to do that. You know, you just got to think about being creative as a coach. And, you know, I don't want to be too mean or nasty here.

You know, that's definitely not my intention. But for me, when coaches say those things, I just think it's more of an indictment on their inability to create an effective learning environment. There's always a solution to how we can manipulate constraints, even for beginners.

Okay, so maybe last question here, Adam. What have you got for me?

There are multiple learning styles. I wouldn't want players to organically learn a jump shot when the jump shot took 30 years to appear. Youth players aren't going to reinvent the game quickly. The CLA should be used for some things, but without ignoring best practices that evolved over time.

Okay. So I guess let's start by covering the myth of learning styles. And this would be a very short and easy one for me. There is no theoretical framework for suggesting that learning styles exist. In fact, it's opposite and it's actually Quite widely known now that there's no such thing as a learning style.

So it was something that really emerged, I guess, in the early 2000s or whatever. I remember doing it at school too, but there's no such thing as a learning style. So that's boom, done. Second one, let's look at the jump shot. So I think again, this is something we're seeing a lot.

And just in terms of reinventing the wheel, you know, it's like, well, within a jump shot, there's certain kind of attractive solutions that players are gonna be drawn to. And when we look at what a jump shot is, you know, the task to shoot the ball with a certain arc into a 10-foot basket means there might be some type of similar one-handed jump shot that we see being used in all players, right?

That is probably the most optimal way to shoot. You know, it allows players to get consistent outcomes in terms of being able to release the ball quickly over incoming defenders, being able to shoot with enough arc. But the key difference here is that the way that players do that to achieve those outcomes is going to be very different.

And that is because of the fact that not only is every player different, but the situation they're confronted by is always different. So looking at Bernstein's work, he showed us that repetition of a skill is impossible. But furthermore, if we want players to actually achieve similar outcomes, they need to move differently.

So this is why, within going back to this jump shot example, we can't just teach the same thing that we've seen done over and over because we might have been seeing a technique that was good for one player. But it doesn't mean it's gonna be good for another one.

And that is something we have to understand when we're covering this question. And I'll give another example. I don't think that we are giving the players enough credit for how they could surprise us because they may actually reinvent the wheel. And let me give an example of the Fosbury flop technique, which emerged in high jumping before, you know, Dick Fosbury coined the famous drop, which every other jump— sorry, which every high jumper now does, you know, going over the bar backwards with the head first.

Everyone was jumping in different styles. I think it was like traditional, you know, like facing the high jump. And he came along and he reinvented the whole way that high jumping was done. And what I'm saying is maybe there's something in basketball that we have not seen yet because we're confined by traditional thinking.

And I'm just trying to think of one practical example, Adam. It could be something like shooting off one foot. And I'm seeing a WNBA player, Marine Johannes. She does that incredibly well, far quicker, and she's extremely functional doing that. But, you know, it's not because of, you know, how we've traditionally taught shooting over the years.

Maybe players are actually being held back from doing things which are a little different to what we conceive them to be right now as coaches.

No, absolutely. Again, I think the word that made me smile was taught, not learn. Taught. So you're essentially saying, this is how I see it, therefore this is how it should be done. Many of the innovations that happen within our sport itself happen because of the player, had nothing to do with the coach.

was actually going against the coach. That's typically how these things happen. Bill Russell blocking the shot, jumping to block a shot.

Oh, great example. I put that in the book. Exactly. Being told not to jump to block. Great example.

I mean, just take even like how Steph Curry plays the game. Like, oh, jump. All the commentary around it was like jump shooting teams can't win championships. And think about how players from the past who could have been doing similar type things, be it a Mark Price or even like, yeah, like Reggie Miller coming off screens and stuff like that.

Like, I think again, it's a very simplified view. And instead of taking like, wow, these guys are very skillful at this, how could we actually design an offense that really takes advantage of this? Maybe an offense could be simply run like based off like tons of different floppy action that could really involve other players much more.

And it doesn't have to be done a certain way. You know, it's just opening up your bandwidth of what's actually possible for the game.

Fantastic. So Coaches, if you have other questions that you are maybe experiencing in your environment, if you're trying to get your colleagues adopting some of the ideas we share here at Transforming Basketball, let us know the questions that you are getting, and Adam and I will do a part 2 to this episode where we answer those questions.

So send them in, and, uh, whenever we next have the chance, we'll record and do another one like this. So hope that helps. See you on another episode shortly.

Thanks, George. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Transforming Basketball Podcast. If you'd like to learn more about the work that we do, head to transformingbball.com to access our free resources and spread these ideas throughout the basketball world. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform.

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