Sending the Right Message

"It takes a village to raise a child." - African Proverb 

There's a story about a man who goes to pick up the newspaper on his front steps, and finds a snail. He picks up the snail and tosses it across his front yard. Three years later, he goes out to pick up the paper, sees the snail and picks it up. The snail shouts, "what was that about?" Sometimes we have to ask that question.

The beauty of team sports comes when a group of individuals comes together, each sacrificing a part of themselves for the benefit of the group. Phil Jackson says, "basketball is sharing," and sharing isn't easy. Sure, we know about Robert Fulghum and All I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, but most of us find sharing figuratively or literally tough.  

Jay Bilas wrote a remarkable book, Toughness, where he outlines values needed to succeed in basketball and in life. One of his thirty-plus values is "it's not your shot, it's our shot." I attended a basketball gathering years ago (the whos and wheres are irrelevant), and overheard a parent tell their child, "you're just as good as anybody else, you should be taking more shots and getting your points." I doubt anyone else heard this, but that was a tough message to deliver to a child, the antithesis to "we're all in this together."  

The other day, I asked our youngsters at practice, "who is the most important player on the team?" Crickets. Finally, one player piped up, "EVERYONE!" Exactly. That's what a team is about, and that's the message we need to deliver.