Pivot Work
September 21, 2011
Consider the pivot move in basketball. The player receives the ball, plants his or her foot and spins 90 to 180 degrees. Without moving the pivot foot, the player turns from facing one direction to facing a different direction. And with that new perspective, the player either passes the ball to a cutting teammate or dribble drives toward the goal.
If these are pivotal times in school sports – and I believe they are – we must, if we are to make the most of these times, remember the skills that many of us worked on when we played basketball and still often admire as effective when we watch basketball. The pivot.
- One foot firmly planted. A foot that can’t be moved. Our base. Our fixed orientation.
- Then the spin that changes our field of vision from one direction to another.
- Then a sharp pass to a teammate, one who’s gotten a step on an opponent.
- Or, if no teammate is open to receive our assist, a determined drive of our own toward the goal.
If these are pivotal times, and if we are to be the “pivotal generation,” this is the drill: Fixed to our core beliefs, look around for new ideas and cutting edge partners to assist, and take it to the goal ourselves if we must.
Dreamworks
January 25, 2012
William Butler Yeats wrote, “In dreams begin responsibility.” And while this may not at all be what the Irish author had in mind, here’s what this line has meant to me.
When you dream for something, you hope for it; and there is little hope of that dream coming true unless you take personal responsibility for it. Until you begin to work for it, there’s no hope for it.
Jesse Owens said: “We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline and effort.”
In other words, dreams take work. Be that Martin Luther King’s dream for peaceful relations between people and nations, or the comparatively modest dreams we have for schools and school sports. Dreams take work.