Technique, Practice, and Craft

Last week, Sports Illustrated published an article about Georgetown’s basketball program and its coach, John Thompson III. Georgetown has a long tradition of producing skilled big men, starting with Thompson’s father in the 1970s and 1980s. And while Thompson has continued that tradition, he’s gained a reputation for something different:

Much has been made about the Princeton-style offense that Georgetown runs under Thompson, about how difficult it is to defend and prepare for. But what is unique about Georgetown’s system has little to do with anything that is written in a playbook. Everything the Hoyas do offensively is based on reading the defense and reacting to those reads. Most systems involve a player being told something along the lines of: cut here, run off of that screen there, set a pick for him and roll to the basket, lather, rinse, repeat.

Georgetown’s theory is different.

Thompson doesn’t tell his team what to do on any given play. He doesn’t give them specific instructions, rather he teaches them, from the day they set foot on campus, how to make that decision for themselves based off of what they see on the floor in front of them. In his words, “the ability to just be a basketball player is something that we stress. Don’t be a position.”

And that is the most difficult point to get across.

“A lot of freshmen want to be told specifically what to do,” he said. “The difficult part becomes understanding that they have to make the read, because they’re so used to being told where to run in the play next.

“It’s new for most players to have to make reads and have to make decisions based on how they’re being played and how the defense is set. But once you grasp that way of thinking, I think it is very simple.”

I’ve loved basketball my whole life, but I’ve never played it competitively. So I’m intrigued by what this actually means in practice. I totally agree with it in theory. However, before you can learn how to make your own decisions, sometimes you have to learn things by rote.

I recently heard chef extraordinaire Jacques Pepin on the radio talking about cooking, and he gave a wonderful definition of technique:

For me, technique is very important. Technique is really a repetition, repetition, endless repetition of a certain movement, whether you use a knife or whatever, so it becomes so engrained, so part of yourself that you can afford to forget it, because it’s there forever.

You learn a certain movement, a certain reaction over and over and over again until, as Pepin said, “you can afford to forget it, because it’s there forever.” That, to me, is the essence of craft, whether it’s sports, cooking, or my own craft of collaboration. Learning certain things by rote ultimately gives you the freedom to express yourself.

After a recent playoff game, Boston Celtics coach Doc Rivers had this to say about his point guard, Rajon Rondo:

“He’s got to be in attack,” Rivers said. “I thought the second quarter he was attacking and attacking. I thought he was reading a lot instead of playing on instincts. I think sometimes his IQ hurts him at times. He’s trying to read the defense, but you can’t read and play with speed at the same time.

“We go through it a lot — at least Rondo and I — about, ‘Rondo, just trust your instincts. Your speed has to be part of it. Your instincts will take over. You’ll make the right decision.'”

Doing any craft well is all about trusting your instincts. You get those instincts by doing your thinking in practice rather than in the moment.

Sports and Collaboration

My friend, Andrew, recently gave me the book, Scorecasting. Just started reading it (thank you, Kindle), and I came across this excerpt:

Exploring the hidden side of sports reveals the following:

  • That which is recognizable or apparent is often given too much credit, whereas the real answer often lies concealed.
  • Incentives are powerful motivators and predictors of how athletes, coaches, owners, and fans behave — sometimes with undesirable consequences.
  • Human biases and behavior play a pivotal role in almost every aspect of life, and sports are no exception.
  • The role of luck is underappreciated and often misunderstood.

As with most things having to do with sports, these principles also apply to anything related to collaboration. If only we had as much data about our work lives as we do about our favorite sports teams.

Off to watch the Lakers….

Tiger Woods: Model Learner

Tiger Woods
Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

I know nothing about Tiger Woods as a person. Well, that’s not entirely true. I actually know much more than I want to know.

But that’s not what this is about. This is about learning. And when it comes to his craft, Tiger Woods is the model learner.

He became a professional golfer in 1996 at the ripe old age of 20. He was probably the most hyped golfer ever, yet he somehow managed to exceed expectations. He won The Masters in 1997, breaking the previous course record and becoming the youngest winner ever. He won three more PGA Tour events that year and became the fastest to ascend to the number one ranking.

Then he began a remarkable pattern that he would repeat two more times in his career, and that he seems to be repeating again. He decided he needed to improve. And in order to improve, he realized that he would have to struggle.

Beginning in 1997, Tiger began to struggle. He won “only” one Tour event in 1998, and critics wondered whether the hype had caught up to him. Tiger’s explanation was that he was working on some swing changes with his coach.

Golf is a game of mechanics. You have to train your entire body to move consistently in perfect harmony. The only way to do that is through endless repetitions. Even the slightest hitch in your mechanics will result in failure. As a result, the golfer’s mindset is, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” and there are good reasons for that.

Then there’s the challenge of fixed mindset. Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck showed that people who believe that intelligence is innate (fixed mindset) tend to be demotivated by success, since future failure might cast doubts on their natural abilities. Fixed mindset is a barrier to learning, and it’s amplified by the level of success.

Tiger Woods had many good reasons not to change anything, but he chose to ignore them. After his first “slump,” he went on to win three consecutive majors, breaking countless records along the way.

In 2003, he began to slump again. Once again, he explained that he had switched coaches and was working on changing his swing. And once again, he went on to dominate the Tour.

Tiger has obviously been undergoing a lot of physical and personal adversity recently, and clearly, his game has suffered. Today, ESPN reported that Tiger’s been working with a new coach. In describing his mindset with his new coach, Tiger said:

I needed to understand the whole concept before I committed to what I was doing. It’s nice when you get rewarded with results, and the shots that I’m hitting now, it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to do that. That’s always a good sign.

I’ve committed to the concepts, and more than anything, I understand what he’s trying to reach. So that’s the biggest thing.”

Needing to understand the whole concept?! What golf concepts could Tiger possibly not understand?! It feels impossible to fathom that the best golfer that the universe has ever seen has anything to learn about the game of golf, but that’s obviously not true.

Tiger is obviously a remarkable golfer, but he is an even more remarkable learner. We could all learn from his example.

Appreciative Inquiry in Baseball

During last Saturday’s playoff game between the Cubs and Marlins, Tim McCarver raised an interesting point about baseball players. He noted that when a player was hitting well, he would usually just shrug his shoulders about it and not try to analyze it for fear of jinxing things. However, when a player was in a slump, he could give entire dissertations on everything he was doing wrong — elbow too high, stance too open, swinging under the ball, etc.    (9D)

What does this say about baseball players? What does it say about human nature? Would ballplayers be better off if they focused their energies on why they were successful, and shrugged off their slumps?    (9E)