The Herd with Colin Cowherd - All Ball - State of Youth Hoops Development in 2020, Coaching Philosophy, Fundamentals with NBA Skills Trainer Shea Frazee

Episode Date: February 13, 2020

This week, Gottlieb talks with NBA skills trainer Shea Frazee on the current state of youth hoops in 2020, his philosophy in player development, fundamental changes he would make in the development process. Make sure you download, rate and subscribe here to get the latest All Ball Podcasts! Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise,

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Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the Fourth. And on my podcast, The Clivert Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker, this linebacker walks up to me. He goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her.

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That's 1-800flowers.com slash tune-in. Hey, what up? You can check out the Doug Gottlieb show Weekdays 3-6 Eastern, 12-3 Pacific, on Fox Sports Radio or the I-Heart Radio app. Hope you're having a great day. Thank you so much for downloading this podcast. Look, we tackle all kinds of basketball topics,

and I will share with you my thoughts on upcoming weekend's games and some of the things with the Houston Rockets that I love, the Lakers, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But this particular all ball is about youth basketball, something that I grew up playing, and that's expanded where everybody's on an AU team, there's tournaments every weekend, and everybody's got a program. And when I did the Kobe podcast, I may not have been, that's not forthcoming.

I was pretty forthcoming. But I kind of glossed over how I came to start back up my program and kind of my father's image, if you will, in Orange County. We're only really in year two. And I did it for a couple reasons. One, I did it for legacy's sake. And two, I did it because I just like coaching ball and I like teaching kids a certain way.

the gentleman who was running a program, still running his own program, who was coaching in Newport Beach, and guy named Schaefer Z. And Shay, he'll tell you his story. He's a former college basketball player and he's a great workout guy. Great. And what we found is we have kind of not opposing philosophies, but I start at one place and try and end at another place.

He starts at one place and tries to end at kind of a similar place. but they're at opposite ends of the spectrum. It's really interesting. Anyway, here's about a 30-minute discussion on Shea, workouts, youth basketball, and some of the challenges in 2020. And there's also a little discussion there about holdbacks. Now, I am a holdback. I stayed back in eighth grade.

It really helped me in my development. I don't believe that every kid should be held back, even though seemingly every kid should be held back. I've talked about holding back my own son, not necessarily with my wife, because I don't think she's all that hip to it just yet, but it's going to depend upon, I think, his level of seriousness in the sport,

and it's not just seriousness in the sport, but you also have to be honest with yourself and with your kid if they have a shot. You know, you got to look at your kid, and he's like, well, I want to play Division I basketball. Like, okay, well, you're going to be 5'8, and you're just not good enough. like let's let's be the best basketball player we can and maybe we go and become a coach if you really

love the sport. The same thing can be true. Maybe you're a, I talked about Josh Elliott's a long time friend of mine used to work together at ESPN and he would talk about Michael Phelps. And he said the most amazing part about Michael Phelps is 6566 white guy and somehow he found swimming, which was not just perfect for his body type because he doesn't really have long arms, he has big hands, but he has this long torso. So he found the perfect sport for his body type and his personality, and it just worked. It became arguably the greatest swimmer of all time. So I think that's the other challenge. Many of you have kids that want to play basketball, but maybe they're not that good. Stay as a hard year. It's a hard thing. You're going to separate your son or daughter from their

classmates, from any of their friends, maybe for a year, maybe for the rest of their scholastic time. but it can also open up a ton of doors for them in the future. It did for me. More on that to come. Here's my interview with Shea. Be sure to catch the live edition of the Doug Gottlieb show weekdays at 3 p.m. Eastern, noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio in the IHeart Radio app. All right, let's bring in Shay Frazy, who we discussed a little bit in kind of the Kobe pod. And, Shay, you grew up playing what, in the Seattle area, right?

Actually, I grew up in Alaska, Doug. I lived in Alaska until I was like 17. Where in Alaska? Fairbanks. In fact, I don't know if we discussed this. My dad used to have Team Alaska, right? 100%. Your dad recruited me to come down to Southern California and play on one of his

ranch west teams when I was like junior, going into senior year of high school. Did you do it? I didn't. I wish I would have actually. I didn't know the land. landscape, you know, like being in Alaska, you know, you're kind of, you're not really privy to the, you know, the kind of the grassroots mecca that Southern California is. And I'd already committed to the double pump camp.

You know, the camp they used to run, we could sign up as an individual and go. And so I had like a conflicting deal. And, you know, in hindsight, I wish I would have gone with your dad because that seemed to be a better way to get the job done and get some looks. college. But, you know, it is what it is. Your dad was a really cool guy. He came up there every year.

I know he recruited. Did you know that Ray kid that was like the seven-footer that played on Wassa? I know he was like one of the kids that was well-known to come down to Southern California with your dad. Yeah, there's also a kid who played at Santa Barbara. I'm trying to think, shoot. He played at UC Santa Barbara. Man, all these names are familiar to me because I help coach him. kind of some of those teams when they came down to the lower 48.

But he would go up there and he would, he would, he was Ray Schaefer, right? Ray Schaefer, that's exactly it. He had a little brother who wasn't quite as big or as talented, but yeah, Ray Schaefer, that is it. Yeah, and he went, he played, let's see here. Oregon. Yeah, he went to Oregon. Yeah, yeah. That's accurate.

Okay, so you end up playing where, but then you played in Seattle and college, correct? Yeah, so I ended up going to, my whole family moved down to Seattle to help out my grandparents, my senior year of high school. So I played one year at Redmond High School, graduated in 2005, played two years at Bellevue College for Jeremy Eggers. and then I transferred to Cal State East Bay in the, it's like in Hayward, it was Cal State Hayward, formerly Cal State Hayward, about 10 minutes south of Oakland and finished up there in 2009. Then what?

Then I actually met a buddy, a friend of mine, Charlie Torres. He was playing at East Bay, or he was going to play at East Bay, and then he ended up leaving, like, right before the season, started to play professionally in Mexico. we stayed in touch my two, three years that I was there finishing up school, and he invited me to come down to Southern California and start helping him with some skill development stuff in 2011. He had been working with Derek Williams, Arizona,

and ended up being the number two picking the draft. La Marrata High School? Just for people, it was funny. I was just talking to Bobby Hurley. He went to see he has a kid who signed a Pacific high school, and they play, he said, they played La Mirada? I was like La Morado. I was like Derek Williams, dude, you got to know these guys.

Anyway, go ahead. You know, yeah, the Suburban League. So me and Charlie were assistant coaches at La Marrata High School, running kind of player development out of the gym after hours. And that was kind of how I got my start in Southern California basketball. But then you started working out a lot of pros, didn't you? Yeah. Last night, a blown call changed the game.

This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, Nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise. Breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves.

Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slic Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games.

And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking. Trip Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it. And we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses.

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growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, Learn the Hardway. Open your free iHeartRadio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the 4th. And on my podcast, The Clivert Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff, like being an internet famous referee.

We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker walks up to me, he goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Quarterback on office blue 42. Hey, rec, my mama want you to wave at her. What? Hey, Ms. Parker. Listen to the Clifford show on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

What's up, fam, Ms. Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast Point Game is about Defendant. the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows without Luca and Austin Reeves,

I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense. And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too.

Steve Nass would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He running up the court, licking his fingers while he got the ball. Like, after you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah, you figure it out real quick. Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So Charlie had a pretty good following going. Actually, one of the first places we went to when I moved down here was Modder Day.

And we were working out, Kate and Reinhardt, Elijah Brown, like Landry Field, the Ware Brothers. And there was his freshman kid. I thought he was part of the football team. He was like 6, 5, 200 pounds. And he kept peeking his head. This is like the summertime. He's like peeking his head out from behind the curtain watching us work. And then Coach McKnight comes up to me and Charlie one day and is like, hey, you know, this kid Stanley, he plays the five on our team.

He wants to jump in your workouts when he's done with attention. And we were like, yeah, all right, you know, throw him in there. So we start talking to Stan. I thought he was like a senior on the football team who played tight in and like was the big rebounder, bruiser five. We, you know, he ended up being Stanley Johnson and he was coming off his freshman year. And like, that was a pretty cool experience. If you love to be remembered as the person who gives the best birthday gifts, I'm here to tell you that 1-800flowers.com is your ultimate birthday gifting destination.

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Why do you think he hasn't had a better run as a Doug. I think a lot of it has to do, and we can get into this deeper later, a lot of it has to do with the psychology coming out of being an elite high school player and moving into being like a professional when you're playing with men with seasoned veterans and kind of like in a hierarchy, I guess, where you're at the bottom of the hierarchy. or even if you come in with a lot of talent, a lot of hype, and I don't know the inner workings, and I could be wrong, you still have to, what would you say? You still have to work your way and kind of earn your stripes into the hierarchy. Sure.

And I think that can be tough. And if you don't hit the right situation or if you're not extremely strong mentally, and Stan had some, like, you know, she's Stan's mom, that was a tough one for him, I know. she passed right as he was going into his rookie season. And so I think like, you know, there's probably five to ten things we could bring together to, you know, to kind of figure out why things haven't gone better for him.

But, I mean, he's still in the NBA. He's doing his thing in Toronto. You've got to work his way into the rotation. But, you know, just being there is a big deal. No, I understand. It is funny how we lose perspective. Like he's in the NBA, right? he was I think the seventh pick of the draft or whatever.

He's on to his second or third contract. So if we take the perspective of he was a top 10 pick and McDonald's All-American and he's not a rotation player in the NBA, he would be seen as a disappointment when you consider the fact that what he's made and that he's made it, and there's only 450 guys in the NBA and he's lasted this long. He's actually overachieved based upon anybody's reasonable level of expectation. So some of it's about expectations more than anything. And I think, look, there's a bunch of stuff, right? Like, he never shot the ball all that well.

And the league has really become about shooting more than you. Like, you have to be able to, you have to be so spectacularly talented to play if you're not a great shooter. And he wasn't a great shooter. I do think there was always questions about not his toughness. You know, a tough kid, but the amount of work. And I think that comes from shooting, right, is was he really a worker? then you factor in that he didn't stay at Arizona long to really kind of develop his game.

Then his mom dies, and he's a really thoughtful person. Like he's not like a basketball savage that that doesn't affect him. It does. And then he was in a place like Detroit, which is totally foreign. They lost a lot. He'd never lost before. Like all of these things kind of culminate, and he hasn't been able to break through. And he only, the most success he saw in Detroit was when they finally moved him to the four,

which is kind of interesting because especially talking to you. you because, you know, like, when he was in high school, he was a point guard, right? Like, he'd bring the ball. When they needed a bucket, they had Spencer Friedman, but he would bring it up, and he would be the point guard when they needed a bucket. And you go from that, everybody wants to play down a position thinking that's what you have to do, the higher the level you play. But now as basketball has kind of evolved or maybe devolved, now at six foot five, you can play the four. No, I think you're right on, like, a lot of those counts, Doug. like, you name five to ten things that really factored in to Stan's ability to be successful

as he'd like to be in the NBA. And, yeah, his senior year at Modder Day, he did play point guard, and he handled the ball, brought it up the court. They didn't have Spencer yet. He came in the next year. Not that, yep. But they had a solid team around him, guys that could shoot and space it for him to get downhill. His freshman year, he played the five, and he kind of worked his way backwards toward

the one by his senior year. but speaking about like the style of basketball that's going on right now and I think four was successful for him in Detroit because he you know he's playing in the middle of the court and you're playing off closeouts for the most part either playing on the side off the close out or in the middle off of a closeout and guys are recovering to you guys are rotating to you and you're not doing as much coming off the wing

or standing around in the corner just having to wait for the ball to catch and shoot which I think you know I'm I'd be speaking for Stan right now, but I don't think that was his favorite thing to do. And that's the thing that, like, these young wings coming into the NBA, I was just talking about it with a buddy last night, who's probably going to do some pre-draft stuff for BDA this coming summer. BDA is Bill Duffy, by the way, for people who are listening. Yeah.

And we were just talking about kids coming in and having to, instead of looking at Paul George and Kauai Leonard and who they are now, looking at Paul George and Kauai Leonard, as who they came in the league and how they developed into who they are now and taking the steps one by one and being, like you said, a big-time shotmaker who can defend

and then working your way from that role into, you know, whatever you're going to be at the topic. And, you know, if you end up being Robert Covington, like he might be the most coveted player in the NBA right now. He's 17s every week we're trying to trade for Robert Covington

and there's nothing wrong with that. That's a great point. Okay, so what I wanted to have you on for, You and I had had discussions in the past about basketball at the developmental level. And when you and I first met, I saw your workouts, and I had the people I talked to, you know, like I knew Landry Fields really well. And Landry's like, dude, Shea is awesome. He is just great workout guy, like really understands the nuances of how to get a shot

and how to use your body. And so I watched you with younger kids, and you and I talk about. We were talking about passing and pivoting and some of the kind of the fundamental stuff. And it's interesting because there's a bunch of layers to it. One, you know, summer used to be, used to be about developed. Like summer is where young kids used to develop. Used to go to basketball camps. He used to develop.

Now almost every basketball camp is just a moneymaker and very few focus on fundamentals. And then now when we do basketball during the quote basketball season, which really lasts all the rest of the year. Even that is more about, a lot of it is about more, you know, finishing moves, finishing shots, different types of footwork, whereas I feel like, and you tell me because you've been actually doing this longer more recently, like I coached my dad's AU programs going back to when we talked about, you know, Team Alaska.

This is like in the early 2000s. And then there was like a 10-year span where I was, and that was even that was high school kids. With young kids, what do you think the biggest challenge is in terms of developing them fundamentally? Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in.

I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves, their locker room stories, their reaction, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games,

from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

And for more, follow Timbo Slices Life 12 and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my, new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of Mental Health Awareness Month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark.

Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it. And we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth,

or are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Kear Gaines, is we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, learn the hard way.

Open your free, our heart radio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now. What's up, guys? This is Clever Taylor the 4th. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff, like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game.

This linebacker walks up to me, he goes, Hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Come on out. Quarterback on office blue 42. Hey, Brett, my mama want you to wave at her. What? Where's she at?

Hey, Ms. Parker. Listen to the Cliverts show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast Point Game is about defining the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game.

His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nasree. He has to guard Julius Randall.

And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense. And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nash would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He run up the court, licking his fingers, why he got the ball like,

after you go through a training camp with that Isaiah, you figure it out real quick. Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's a big question because there's a, how would you put it? There's a big span of youth.

There's a big span of youth levels. So you have eight-year-olds who are extremely coordinated and can do almost all the passion, catching, pivoting. They have an idea of how to break the pressure as a team. They can dribble through a press if they need to, and they can shoot threes. I think in a lot of ways, kids are more skilled to develop than ever. And then you have the rec level.

And, you know, that's what we were dealing with down in Newport. Right. Me and you were kind of coaching together and doing some skill stuff together. And Newport was, it was like right between rec and kids getting into the new club-level basketball. club level basketball, I'm sure, when you were a kid was like the best of the best kids. Yes. And now club level basketball has become just one step above direct basketball. And anybody who gets serious at all, they start to play club basketball.

So I think at the level that we were working at, I might have been doing things who were advanced for a solid portion of the kids. my philosophy on on that level that we were working with at that time was okay so there's a there's a one shining moment that kid get when they do something new for the first time and that moment is like how would you put it it's a that moment is exacerbated when they do it in a game or in competition and so a lot of times when I'm trying to develop somebody's passion for basketball, which is kind of like how I've worked, and maybe not everybody has that, you're looking for those one shining moments and really the dopamine hit that makes them feel really, really good about what they just did.

And so an example I can give you from our time down there is Max Rogers. You remember Max? Sure. So, you know, by the way, I just saw him play yesterday. Did you? How's Max doing? He's doing well. He has the move you taught him. You taught him it's like a pass fake to the left and like a sweep to the right.

And I'm telling you like for a year, that was his, and it worked like every time. And I, and my thing was I was always like, hey, Max, you know, you have, there's this thing on your left arm. It's a left hand. How about we use that every once in a while? And now he's going both ways. Yeah, he doesn't play for me, but he's doing really, really well. If you love to be remembered as the person who gives the best birthday gifts, I'm here to tell you that 1-800flowers.com is your ultimate birthday gifting destination.

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Brought to you by the U.S. Department of Health at Humanities. and Services Administration for Children and Families and the Act Council. Look through your children's eyes to see the true magic of a forest. It's a storybook world for them. You look and see a tree. They see the wrinkled face of a wizard with arms outstretched to the sky. They see treasure and pebbles. They see a windy path that could lead to adventure.

And they see you. Their fearless guide through this fascinating world. Find a forest near you and start exploring at Discover the Forest brought to you by the United States Forest Service and the ad council nice so yeah max and that was exactly the example I was going to give was max has an unstoppable move going right and he can make a reverse lay up off of a little you know sidestep or euro step whatever you want to call it and to me that's the fuel that keeps max going in basketball and because he knows that he'll be willing to take some hits in terms of learning

what you would call the more mundane skills of pivoting and passing and jump-stopping and the basic things that everybody has to learn and are definitely the most fundamental things but nobody really likes to drill out in that way. I don't know, what do you think? I think that's a great, you're basically, you're working backwards. I love that, right?

It's like, look, let me show you the cool stuff And then let's kind of, whereas I was always, and this is where I even running into this with my own son, Hayes, where he's like, Dad, we do this passing and pivoting every day. And I was like, yeah, because you can't do the fun shit unless you do this, whereas your philosophy, which is a very interesting one, is working backwards. It's give them the one thing that keeps them coming to the gym. And while you're there, you sprinkle in the other stuff that makes it, makes it hard to teach. but, right, that's a really interesting way of learning. I think there's a bunch of levels to it. Some of it is, you know, it's like I personally want to give, like, my own son, different experiences.

Playing for me, not playing for me, playing with teams that play high-level tournaments where they press and they pressure. And it's a little bit more frenetic. It's maybe uglier, but it does test kind of their toughness. and it speeds them up because what happens is I feel like when they play that wreck level or against the lower level, the speed is so much slower that they're able to get away with things that you can't really get away with when you play real basketball. So it's a very hard thing. I also find that when you get them and they're in sixth or seventh grade,

and I even had this a little bit in fifth grade, is you're plugging holes in their fundamentals, right? No one taught them how to help. No one taught them how to screen. no one taught them how to read a screen, even if it's off a ball screen, right? They may know against a cone to come off and shoot, but what happens when that guy hedges out hard? They don't know yet.

And some of it you can only get when they play games, and you can only get when they get embarrassed in those games because they got to learn to break a press. So I think it's really hard. This is really kind of the embodiment of my conversation with Kobe, which is how do you teach kids? because, yes, the way in which we were taught was more fundamentals, but the game has evolved some.

So I almost never teach post-play. I just don't. I do teach finishing shots. I teach them to... What I've done is just when they're practicing shots around the basket, they do it off both feet with both hands, all different sorts of angles. And it's just about volume of makes around the basket with either hand. But how you teach them, like I think you do it.

an incredible job of teaching guys the different footwork it takes to get those shots off now, whereas that wasn't the way that I was taught, and it's something that I'm even learning on the fly. Yeah, well, I think you make a really good point about the style of basketball being different and how

when you play at the higher club levels, you're essentially playing, like both teams are pressing. That's the, you know, in med school, that's like, you know, bio one-on-one where this is where we're going to vet the kids.

And some kids are going to be able to deal with the pressure, and some kids are going to have to figure it out. And, I mean, so there's this thing called mate hoops. And it's a Nike-sponsored event, and it's 7th and 8 great players, and it's like all the EYBL teams have their younger teams, and some teams get in. But it's all the best kids for the most part in the country.

Every team presses all game long until both teams, both teams can break the press and score on it every time, and that's the only time the pressing stops. So with that being said, the premium is on making shots, because if you make shots, you get teams out of the press, being able to handle the ball and be comfortable with the ball

with two people on you, and being able to be calm, or even if you have to pick up your dribble, being able to be calm, pivot, make tough passes, and then finishing down his, or making a decision on the move downhill fast. And I think offensively, if you can do those things and you're comfortable with those things at a fast pace,

you can play against pressure and you'll be all right, kind of no matter where you go and you're basketball. Yeah. And then you work in, you know, the what used to be the most important fundamentals of, you know, making a catch on the wing with somebody denying you, reading a down screen, reading a ball screen

those things don't even come into play really at the higher levels of youth basketball until you can break the press and be comfortable playing at a really high pace That's a great point I do this drill And so my dad used to do something he called escape drill Which was Last night a blown call changed a game This morning the internet lost its mind Highlights are trending opinions are flying

And nobody's telling you exactly what happened That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise. Breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athletes themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real.

From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaders to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports slice brings you closer to the action. with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to SportsSlic on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Sliced Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok.

Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit,

suit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing and we're still chasing it and we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve

Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth or are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me. Kier Gains is we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new

podcast, Learn the Hardway. Open your free iHeartRadio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the 4th. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff, like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game.

This linebacker, this linebacker walks up to me, he goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Time out. Quarterback on office blue with 42. Hey, Brett. My mama want you to weigh better. What? Where's he at?

Hey, Miss Parker. Listen to the Cliverts show on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, fam? This Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast Point Game is about defining the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without. Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what.

He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows. Without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid.

He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis is our offense. And when IT's friends stopped by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nass would get that thing. That man, hell get to fly. He running up the court, licking his fingers why he got the ball.

Like, after you go through a training camp with that, IZAD, you figure it out real quick. Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay. Which was you would have three defenders, two guys. and you throw you the ball and you had to break the, break the two guys, but break it on the dribble.

He was big on, he was big on, you break it on the dribble. Don't break it on the dribble because you have to learn to break it on the dribble. And then the second, the third defender comes at you. That's when you find your teammate and your teammate has to also find the opening. So what I do is instead is I do, I put them in half of the court, and I give one guy the ball, put two defenders on there. And I say you've got 30 seconds. The defense can double team. You do whatever you want.

And you have to, all you have to do is dribble the ball and not lose it for 30 seconds. And almost none of them are able to do it because they still, but you watch, they get better and better. I agree with you. And you know what? Here's what's funny. I did Arizona State USC on the weekend. And USC dominated the first half, up 13 the first half in the second half. They didn't finish on a couple two-on-ones.

but Arizona State basically got back into the game and won the game. They did not make a field goal for the last 11 minutes until the very final shot. They won the game because they basically pressed, run and jump press, the entire second half on makes, and USC just kind of shit the bed and couldn't consistently break through the pressure. They turned the ball over 24 times. And I was like, this is what it's like to coach AAU basketball, right? Where either you break the press and you make them pay and you have to score against the press, or they're going to keep pressing, they're going to crank it up, and this is what happens.

And 100% that is exactly what happens out there, and it'll be half court, it'll be full court. But they keep coming, and it's not until you can slow the ball down and control the game. It's until you score on the press and show them that you're going to score, like you're going to damage them for taking the risk of putting the backside, you know, in a four on three or a three on two or whatever it is. Yeah, that's a really good point. Yeah, and then it's hard because you have, you know, you have, if you have, especially like suburban kids, regardless of race, you have suburban kids, like, they're just not used to, you get some kids, they're just dogs, and they're going to, and, you know,

especially AU games, they can only call so many fouls. They're going to call foul every time, you know, and either you're going to compete and you're going to, you know, fight fire with fire or you're not. Do you have a way in which you, do you have a way in which you teach kids how to break pressure? I basically do what you do. I don't think there's reinventing the wheel out here.

So I run a non-traditional education option for kids like fourth to eighth grade. We want to specialize in basketball. So every single day we play one on two. You know how big full court will be cut into two smaller. This is what I do. Yes, we don't play one of a bit. I like that. Every single day we play one on two.

Because one, I think, like, we can dribble through cones and everything, but you're not going to get the variance of ball handling skills and the contact and, like, the necessity of using your shoulders and hips and footwork and splitting and all the different things that you get in a one-on-two situation. And like you said, you can see them. And I have them try and score because, like, you know, a one-on-two if you do it, a good job of it, it ends up being like pick and roll, someone chasing you from behind when you're playing against the big.

So I try and have them score, and one, it helps defensively because kids don't know how to make a box and keep a box, and when they get good at it, they can talk to each other like, you know, hey, get over on that side, or they get beaten. They're like, hey, take me on the other side, and the other one has to, you know, run all the way back to cut off and recreate the box. And then offensively, like I said, there's nothing like it. for your ball handling. There's no drill I can give a kid that's going to help them as much as one and two.

That's awesome. And we're live here outside the Perez family home just waiting for the... And there they go. Almost on time this morning. Mom is coming out the front door strong with a double-armed kid carry. Looks like dad has the bags. Daughter is bringing up the rear. Oh, but the diaper bag wasn't closed.

Dipers and toys are everywhere. Ooh, but Mom has just nailed the perfect. car seat buckle for the toddler. And now the eldest daughter, who looks to be about nine or ten, has secured herself in the booster seat. Dad zips the bag closed, and they're off. Ah, but looks like

mom doesn't realize her coffee cup is still on the roof of the car, and there it goes! Oh, that's a shame. That mug was a fan favorite. Don't sweat the small stuff. Just nail the big stuff. Like making sure your kids are buckled correctly in the right seat for their age and size. Learn more at

NhtSA.gov slash the right seat. N-H-T-S-A.gov. Slash the right seat. Brought to you by Mitzah and the Ad Council. What grows in the forest? Trees? Sure. Know what else grows in the forest? Our imagination, our sense of wonder.

And our family bonds grow, too. Because when we disconnect from this and connect with this, we reconnect with each other. The forest is closer than you think. Find a forest near you and start exploring. I discover the forest. Brought to you by the United States Forest Service and the Ad Council. Look through your children's eyes to see the true magic of a forest.

It's a storybook world for them. You look and see a tree. They see the wrinkled face of a wizard with arms outstretched to the sky. They see treasure and pebbles. They see a windy path that could lead to adventure. And they see you. Their fearless guide through this fascinating world. Find a forest near you and start a cross.

Exploring at Discovertheforest.org. Brought to you by the United States Forest Service and the Ad Council. If you could change one thing about youth basketball, what would it be? If I could change one thing about youth basketball, it would be, and this would, how would I put it? I would change the, I would change, this is going to sound silly, I would change the compartmentalization. of the levels. So right now, the elite high school players

only play against each other, and they're separated from the college players and the pro players. And I think like youth levels are certain, at the lowest youth levels, rec, club,

and the elite players, it is what it is, and it's going to be fine. And you have the vetting system of the speed, but I think that's vetting system, system is a good system. And I think players are more skilled and more developed than ever as far as they're shooting

and ball handling and decision-making on the fly. I would change, I would create a, what would you, if I could do anything like Carb Blanche, I would create kind of like the G-League, but I would create tiers to the G-League where it went all the way down, almost like a European pro system, to where you could have kids that were, I mean, 14 is a stretch, but we're talking like 15, definitely 16, 17, 18 years old, mixing in with older players all the way up to, you know, what we think of as college players, 22, 21, 22, and then even some of the lower level pros, 23, 24, or guys are in the G league, and I shouldn't say low-level pros, because the G-League is really good.

Yep. And I think that would take care of a lot of the psychological issues that plague, grassroots basketball at the amateur level. I don't think it's possible, but that would be like if I could snap my fingers and do anything, that's what I would do. Interesting. I would, I think if I could do,

I don't hate the idea of the vetting part of the pressure, right? Because this is, it's funny. I have daughters that ride horses. And my son, well, one, he plays football. He plays baseball. And it's, believe it or not, like for basketball, parents who are listening, it is all the same. It's like my daughter who rides. You know, there was a time in which she was tentative about bigger horses or horses that are a little bit

too fast that can take off on you. And I was like, look, it's okay. If you, if you're scared, and we use the term scared as a complete, as always a negative term. But there's no real other way to describe. You want to use a lighter term like hesitant, you know, whatever. If you're scared, you're hesitant. Scared is okay. Like, you're scared. You have fear. If you have fear, everybody has fear. Like, even the best riders are afraid, but it's how you process that fear. If that limits you from doing what you know how to do on a horse in a show,

well, then there's just nothing we can do. There's no coach who can magically do it. In baseball, if you're scared of the ball, right, if you're scared of the ball, at some point, there's nothing we can do. You know, I can get, I can take you to the greatest hitting instructor there is. I can take you to, you know, the greatest coaches, you know, get you the best bat, get you the best batting gloves, get you an elbow pad, whatever. You're scared of the ball, doesn't matter.

Okay, you can't play high-level baseball because that shit's coming in at 90 or it's coming in 85 and it might look like it's coming at your ear and curve in for a strike. Like, you're, everyone's got, no one likes to get hit by a baseball, but either you can process the fear and make it, make you understand what you, understand what you're supposed to do and do it, or you can't. In basketball, either you can break pressure and play through contact and play against physical competition or you can't. And if you can't, it's okay, but it's going to limit the level you play it.

So it's not that I don't like pressure and, and, and physicality defensively. I would say that I think we'd be smarter to limit the use of zone, right, and limit the full court pressure to whether it's the second half or the fourth quarter, just a way in which because, and look, some of this is selfish because I know, like, if I have a group of kids for a month or two months and we run offense, we're going to get any shot we want because I know how to teach it. I know how they can move and I can play to their skills. But I also think, though, that we're like, like, look, every team I play against, almost every team, they'll press and then they'll run like a one two two zone.

And even the zones aren't really sound in terms of how they, you know, when you get to playing real basketball, where you're covering people, you're covering your area and you're bumping your guy back, all that, they're just pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure in a zone. And it doesn't teach a kid how to guard somebody,

how to guard a ball screen or how to play off a ball screen, how to play off penetration, all of those things that we need because, truthfully, most high-level basketball is man-to-man concepts. we are skipping that and then backfilling once they get to high school or they get to college. That would be my adjustment is if they're a way at the high level, not to eliminate the pressure, but to make it where it can't be the whole game because, you know, it just kind of just becomes press to a shot, press to a shot with one two two zone,

you know, one pass into the high post, kick it out if they, you know, when you rebound, they just kind of trap the basketball. It's not great. and I do think it could be better. And we could, some of that skill stuff, let you point out you don't actually even need to teach because they don't, they can't use it in a game. It's a side note.

Yes. Doug's, uh, Dugs, uh, horns package for 10-year-old is an elite horns package. Like, you're, when they go, man, you really are getting whatever shot you want. And the kids don't even have to be that skilled yet. It's pretty funny. Um, I've stolen some of that stuff. Um, but no, to agree with you, the zone thing is my least face.

favorite because you don't even have to be good at pressuring to do the zone thing before 12 you and even sometimes at 12 you the kids can't throw and one of your biggest weapons against the zone where they're going to load up on the ball side is the skits and they can't throw them. Yeah. No, that's my that's my problem with my son Hayes is that he now knows that we're looking to skip. You know, the big thing I've I've changed and different from like my dad or whatever is, you know, now every day we work on getting the lane, jump stopping, looking opposite. But also, you know, and we're going to fake a pass, make a pass, but we want to throw that skip pass. But my son's just not strong enough.

He's just, he's a little 10-year-old, you know, and he's got to get stronger. You're totally right. And, you know, when teams are putting three guys on the ball, you throw it to a skip pass. I mean, it's not even, like you said, a real zone. Anyway, go ahead. I'm sorry. No, it's good. And when, you know, on teams that are going to play zone, if you can't skip, you

have to play checkers essentially and you have to have the cutters and people moving and someone catching it in the middle and kids like to catch it in the middle like they like to get hit in the back of the head because all of a sudden everybody's collapsed on them and a fake pass to make a pass is about three times harder they're just not very good at it and there's no really way to drill it outside of your basic monkey in the middle type drills that's not getting you a game situation in the way that you need it and so like zone is i agree with you zone is it's really the worst because it's a it

if there was and I'm not a big fan of regulating regulating play yeah I know it sucks to even think about but that would be the one thing that I definitely agree with you the pressing it's

I mean all the best presses that I see from elite youth basketball end up being man to man running jump style presses a lot of the good teams figure out how to beat zone presses because they figure out that you know that checker's style pass, pass, pass, or their guard is good enough to just, like, run straight through the gaps in the zone.

But, yeah, definitely the zone stuff, the half-court zone, I'm going to sit back and just make your 11-year-old shoot threes and pass it around the perimeter because no one's good enough to skip it. No one's experienced enough to play checkers. I have two more. Go ahead. No, go ahead. I have two more for you. Okay. As you said, you do pre-draft, you do out-of-season stuff with NBA players, with collegiate players as well.

What's the biggest challenge with those guys? What is because this is a completely different level now. What is the – and because, as you said, you've been doing it since 2011. Now we're nine, ten years into doing it. What is – maybe what's changed the most in this last decade of doing it? I think I'll take both things, the changes and the challenges. The biggest change is the premium on shot making. And shot making was a big deal in 2011, but it's not what it is now.

Like, you know, getting guys to get comfortable shooting threes, trying to get them comfortable shooting threes in games, especially when they're a transition type player, like a Stanley Johnson, another guy I've had recently who's been making that transition to being a higher volume three-point shooter Ben Moore who's like the best cutter

and offensive rebounder in the G League right now. From SMU? But he said, yep, from SMU. He's still trying to figure out how to consistently get his threes up and, you know, I think he's making progress.

But that's one of the biggest challenges or the biggest changes is the volume of the volume of three guys have to shoot to play the guard and the wing spot and even the big spot now. But the biggest challenge, I think, is consistent buy-in. And there's so many voices coming at these elite-level players that you walk in guilty until proven innocent in terms of your credibility and your ability to teach and whether or not what you're going to be having them do is worthwhile.

Because a lot of these guys, you know, there's people just like hammering at their doorstep to be the guy that rebounds the ball for them. And so creating rapport and getting them to buy into the ideas that you're bringing to them and getting them to buy into their individual development outside of the team, outside of what their agent wants for them, outside of what their crew or their family is talking about, and taking ownership of their game, that seems to be consistently the biggest challenge. Last thing, you said you run it, it's a non-traditional education program where got kids that want to be great at basketball for fourth through eighth grade. How does that work?

Yeah. I started like three years ago. Well, we did the pilot four years ago, and we had three kids, and we were kind of helping proxy their homeschool and their online public charter school education. And I was doing their basketball training every day. day. So the next year, we started a nonprofit, and we got a classroom, and we coordinated with a performance coach, and I got two ladies that were actually, one of them was working at the Boys and Girls Club. I kind of recruited her away from the Boys and Girls Club, because she's great with programming to help me run the program. And so now we have, like, two, we have an executive director and a learning coach who does daily activities with the kids. We have, like,

30 kids, they show up at 9 a.m. They stay until 4 p.m. They do their education every day. Like, you would have, kids would have PE. We do two hours of basketball skills training. And then twice a week, we do performance training. We have a wellness curriculum. We run twice a week for 45 minutes where they're learning about.

I guess you'd say like mindfulness, like financial literacy, things you don't really have in your core subjects in school. We do some yoga in the wellness. we have projects and like field trips we go on. We went to UCLA, Pacific Design Center, the Grammy Museum. Every year we go to Nike and we do kind of a project where kids read Shoe Dog, do a little project on Shoe Dog. We tour the Nike campus and then go watch Hoops on it. And then we proxy their education.

And we have a lot of different education entities we work with. A lot of them are public online. charter schools or correspondence programs where kids go a couple days to week to school and then come a couple days a week to us. And so we have 30 kids now. We're growing in a decent clip. We'll probably getting close to capacity because, I mean, it's like multi-grade, so we have all sorts of different grades in there. But it's been cool.

We have a lot of holdback kids. I know you did that, and I wanted to ask you about that. your experience of holding back and kind of the culture of holding back now and what you think about it all and this is awesome so we I don't know if we got the idea through Todd Mernovich

and of course Todd's dad Marv was a trainer and Todd was now an artist of course a former first round draft pick and starting quarterback with the Raiders his drug problems have been well documented but was a he was also a great basketball player he was one of the first holdbacks in Orange County.

Now, I was a holdback. My brother probably should have been. My brother was a March birthday, much like my son, and he was like my son, little and probably a late developer. So my brother graduated high school had just turned 18, and he had some low D1 offers, and he chose to walk on at UCLA. He didn't make the team,

and then he ended up playing as a walk on at Drake for a couple years, going back getting his degree from UCLA, and it's been a college basketball coach ever since. I knew I was going to be held back in eighth grade. It was a big fight, honestly, between my parents and between my dad and the district in the city of Orange. And but he just like, look, my dad grew late and he wasn't big, but he's like, I developed late. My kids are going to develop late. This is what I want to do and this is what we're going to do.

So that first year in eighth grade, I was kind of a fuck up because I knew I was going to stay back, right? I mean, I did school. I did all kinds of stupid stuff. I was like, dude, I'm taking this next year. And it was not a great year for me, even with my dad, because here he is, you know, fighting everybody to have me stay back. And yet, um, uh, and yet, uh, I wasn't really, I was, I knew I was staying back. So I didn't really, I didn't care, you know, I was just like, I'm going to do whatever.

I stayed back. I went to, so I, I grew up in the city of Orange. I went to three different middle schools in the city. of Orange. My first year was McPherson, which closed down and combined with Santiago, and then all those kids went to Elmendina High School. I went to Yorba Middle School, my third year of middle school, was seventh and eighth, so this is my second year of eighth grade. It was across town, so I didn't really know anybody. That middle school fed Orange High School. And so I went to three different middle schools in three years. And if you factor in my elementary school in sixth grade, LeVita,

and my high school, Tustin, which we actually went out of district to go to. Like, one, I was the ultimate school hopper, right? Five schools in five years. And I was like, I'd be a hypocrite if I said, you know, parents picking out schools for the kids is some sort of, is always a negative. I finished eighth grade the first year. I was five feet, five feet a half inch, 105 pounds. And when I, um, last night, a blown call changed the game. This morning, the internet lost its mind.

Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise. Breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real.

From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. SportsLice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to SportsSlice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Sliced Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host and your favorite therapist, Kier Games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience

in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking. Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing and we're still chasing it

and we don't know when we've done enough because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth, or are you a good person because you're afraid Because that's two different intentions, bro.

Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me, Kear Gaines, is we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, Learn the Hardway. Open your free iHeartRadio app. Search Learn the Hardway and listen now. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the Fourth.

And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game. This linebacker walks up to me, he goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Time out. Quarterback on office blue with 42.

Hey, rep, my mama wants you to wave at her. What? Where's she at? Hey, Miss Parker. Listen to the Cliverts show on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, fam, it's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast, Point Game is about defining the odds.

Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows. Without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup,

he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense. And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nass would get that thing. That man, hell get the fly.

He run up the court, licking his fingers while he got the ball. Like, you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah. You figure it out real quick. Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the Ophiard. Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

When I started high school, 15 months later at Tuscan High School, I was roughly 5, 9, 510, like 125, 130 pounds. So I obviously was a big year of growth. During that year, obviously I trained with my dad. I practiced with Pat Barrett's AAU team, which had Jason Hart and Shea Cotton. It was the best, I think there were seventh graders at the time. And then I played with a team out of Compton. I think it was called B-ball or Team L.A. or whatever.

And I played in an eighth grade league in like downtown L.A. And then I played in some Orange County League, you know. And that's what I did to stay back. And look, after my sophomore year, going into my junior year, I went to ABCD camp. And I was okay. I was being recruited by mostly mid-majors, the western Kentucky's of the world. but you fast forward to a year later. So if I had graduated at 18 like everyone else,

I would have been a low mid-major to maybe, you know, a Washington State type of player. Instead, I was recruited by everybody, you know, UCLA, Yukon, Florida. I chose Notre Dame or whatever. And I was on the Magic's All-American game as a replacement for Chauncee Billups. I was, you know, one of the top 50 players in the country.

And I graduated 19 years. old. Additionally, I thought it really helped me not just in terms of the level of scholarship, but my ability to play right away. And here's why. So I graduated high school at about 155. I was 160 when I arrived at Notre Dame. I was 175 for my first game at Notre Dame, you know, creatine, weightlifting, whatever. But part of it is like your body goes through a different process of maturing. First you grow and then you got to get those man muscles. had I, even if I was recruited at a high major level at 18, my body wouldn't have fully developed until my sophomore year. So I probably wouldn't have played for it.

Whereas now I started four years in college. Now, because I transferred and then sat out another year at Golden West, I finished college at 24. But, you know, so that might hurt you for the NBA or something because you're like, they feel like you're fully developed. but yeah like I'm up for the right kid especially a late bloomer I'm a proponent of most kids and my you know it's a it's a discussion we've had about my own son

and the hard part is your friends are going to go on and go to the same high school and you're probably not and that's that's the to me that's the only real negative to it is if you grew up in one area with one group of kids playing I still played the same AAU team with for my dad and I'm just you know by my senior year we had new guys but I grew up playing

playing with Miles Simon and J.R. Henderson and Chris Don Johnson. They all went and played in college, and then I had one more year of high school. Yep. I mean, it's the standard now, really. And it's, you know, I think you're right. A lot of the times it should be used for, you know, the right kind of kid who's developing late. I think now it's a tool that's used almost exclusively for confidence. I mean, like late development is a byproduct, but the confidence that it gives kids going into their freshman year, bigger, stronger, faster, having dominated eighth grade if they went

through it a second time, or even having played better in eighth grade, if they weren't a dominant player to begin with, people just really, they do well with that. And if you look at Devin Hasku, who actually reclassed back to his original class, same thing with Nico Mannion at Arizona, reclassed in eighth grade, and then re-reclassed from his junior year in his junior year back to his original class, people having a lot of success with it. And I think it's going to start to spread out, you know, move throughout the country. Even if it kind of started in this area, like you said, with Morinovich. And I knew about it from Mike Garrity, who did it kind of infinitely at Modern Day.

Yeah. He came in and started as a freshman. Yeah. But yeah, it's almost the standard now. Do you know what number Mike Garrity wore? What number did Mike wear? Forty four. Do you know why?

Was that you two, Doug? Were you 44? Yeah. Mike was like, he was like a little, he was like a little shit like four, I don't know, he was like maybe sixth grade or whatever, but he was tiny. And he used to come to our workouts. We used to work out Sundays at Woodbridge High School. And Mike would show up and his dad would drop him off.

And he would work out with the high school freshman, eighth graders, whatever. And he would stay and he would just try and hop in whenever he could. And yeah, now he's become, you know, then he obviously plays, played in college and now he's a workout with Cleveland in the NBA and is unbelievable what he does. So yeah, so it's

really interesting that the ties that bought. Hey look, how can somebody who is interested in your program get a hold of you or learn more about what you're doing? So for my training or my skill development stuff,

you can go to crazy skills.com It's F-R-A-Z-E-E-S-Skills.com. For the nontraditional education program, it's called ABA, above and beyond academy, that's at ABA Nation.com. And so, yeah, that's where you can reach me. Shea's great to catch out with you, dude. I'm glad we got to do this.

Let's talk more offline, and, you know, the best part is we both have a total passion for not just the sport, but the kids in the sport, and I really appreciate you joining us in the All Ball podcast. Hey, Doug, I appreciate you having me on, man. It's great to talk to you. Basketball lifers like you and me, there's nothing better than that. And yet, let's get Hayes out there to a workout sometimes soon. I haven't seen them in a while. Be sure to catch the live edition of the Doug Gottlieb show weekdays at 3 p.m. Eastern,

noon Pacific. All right, that's it for All Ball. I hope you enjoyed that one. A little bit different, right? Youth Hoops, we'll continue to do that. I have friends that call me and ask my opinion all the time. Any of you who listen to this podcast, I don't know if that helped you.

We want to talk more about YIPL and some of the other stuff coming up and camps. Actually, you know what? We'll do a podcast here. I'll come in the next couple weeks where we'll try and find the best youth basketball camps. Talk about my camp experiences. Some of the times I got in trouble as well. Anyway, thanks so much for listening and for downloading.

Always appreciate you being a part of All Ball. Progressive presents Forrest Metaphors. About bundling your home in auto. In sports, three goals is a hat trick. And when you bundle your home and auto with Progressive, you get a hat trick of great savings at round-the-clock protection. So you might be thinking, wait, that's two things.

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discount not available in all states or situations. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where SportsSlice comes in. I'm Timbo, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headline. And we're going straight to the source, the athletes themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slic Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok.

Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter.

Listen to humor me with Robert. smigel and friends on the iHeart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts what's up guys this is clivert taylor the fourth and on my podcast the clivert show i'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff like being an internet famous referee we're in the middle of a game this linebacker this linebacker walks up to me he goes hey ref my mom wants you to wave at her what time out look quarterback on office blue 42 a rep my mama want you to wave at her What? Hey, Miss Parker.

Listen to the Cliverts show on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. The story I've told myself can then shape my behavior, and that can lead me to sabotage the possibility of connection. This Mental Health Awareness Month, tune into the podcast deeply well with Debbie Brown. If you've been searching for a soft place to land while doing the work to become home. whole. This podcast is for you to hear more. Listen to deeply well with Debbie Brown from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.