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THE SHOOTING NEWSLETTER - NOVEMBER 2005
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By Tom Nordland, Shooting Coach
Volume 7, Issue Number 11, NOVEMBER 2005
Editor: Tom Nordland
E-mail Tom
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ATTENTION: You are receiving this newsletter because you subscribed to it. If you'd like to remove yourself from this mailing list, please see the instructions at the end of this newsletter. Our subscriber list is NOT made available to other companies or individuals. We value every subscriber and respect your privacy.

PLEASE excuse the advertisement paragraph you'll see at the top of this Newsletter. Because I have a "free" service with the Mail List company (Topica), they insert that ad to help them pay for the service. Sorry for the little commercialism.

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IN THIS ISSUE
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1. Welcome from the Coach
2. Purpose of this Newsletter
3. What About "Dipping"?
4. The Idea of "Homework"
5. Coaching a Deaf Player
6. Organizations Helping Transform Youth Sports
7. Swish 2 Available This Week for U.S./Canada
8. KIDS' KORNER
9. Please Bookmark this Website
10. Shooting Clinics / Private Coaching
11. How to Subscribe / Unsubscribe
12. Contact Information

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1. Welcome from the Coach
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Welcome to my free Monthly Basketball Shooting Newsletter. Each month I write about the skill of shooting in the game today and how it can be more effectively learned and coached. If you like what I'm saying, please tell others about it and suggest they subscribe, too. Remember: Great Shooting CAN be taught!

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2. Purpose of this Newsletter
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This newsletter is a vehicle for communicating what I know about shooting and for a conversation on how shooting can be improved. With your help, I intend to shift the game and help players and coaches everywhere rediscover the Lost Art of Shooting. Thank you for reading this and subscribing to it and sharing it with your friends.
-- Tom Nordland

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3. What About "Dipping"?
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IS "DIPPING" NECESSARY OR HELPFUL?

Dipping is the name we've given to the act of bringing the ball down and then back up to "set" the ball before shooting, assuming the ball is starting at a high position. (When we shoot a free throw or set shot, the ball starts from a low position, so dipping isn't required.) The purpose of the action is to allow time and motion to align and connect the ball with the target. I feel it's something all great shooters do to increase accuracy. And it's what we all do naturally. In Swish 2, you will see a six year old boy dipping the ball before shooting without being told to.

But now I'm hearing of some coaches who say, because of the tighter defenses and more athletic shot-blocking of today, that you can't afford the time to "dip" the ball.

My answer to that is "Good luck!" If you dip the ball, you will have the ball in line with the target for a longer time than if you just catch it in the Set Point and shoot from there. No dipping is a nice "theory" of how to shoot more quickly to avoid having a shot blocked, but in reality, shooting percentages will drop if done that way, and what's the value of the instruction if shots don't go in? Getting the ball off quickly isn't the main goal; making shots is the main goal. Read what I say and demonstrate in Swish 2 about this:

"ON LINE AS LONG AS POSSIBLE
"As the ball is SET (brought up to the Set Point), be aware of the hand position relative to the eye and basket the whole time. For superior accuracy, you want it on-line for as long as possible. Free throws and set shots tend to be more accurate because they can have a longer in-line setting. This can be explained by a law of Physics ­ Newton's First Law of Motion ­ which, in part, says: 'An object in motion tends to stay in motion and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force!' Another way to say it is that it's easier to KEEP something in motion than to GET it in motion. If a basketball is moving and on line with the target before the Release, it makes it easier for the Release motion to be accurate."

This idea is an important one in understanding how to improve accuracy in shooting a basketball.

DIFFERENT WORDINGS FROM THE INTERNET
Just for some fun, view these different readings of Newton's First Law I got off the Internet:

o "Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it."

o "An object in motion will stay in motion and an object at rest will stay at rest unless acted on by an unbalanced force."

o "A body will continue in a state of rest or uniform motion in a straight line unless acted upon by a resultant force."

o "A body continues in a state of rest or uniform motion in a straight line unless, it is acted upon by external forces."

o "Every object continues in its state of rest, or of motion in a straight line at constant speed, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces exerted on it." (Hewitt, Paul G., Conceptual Physics, Second Edition, p. 28)

o "Things tend to keep on doing what they're already doing." (Hewitt, p. 29)

A silly one:
o "Whatever an object is doing, that's what it wants to do." (Professor J. S. Miller)

o "If you leave an object at rest, it will "stay put" forever unless something pushes or pulls on it. If you start an object moving, it will keep moving at the same speed in the same direction forever unless something pushes or pulls on it."

My favorite:
o "Things keep doin' what they're doin' 'til you mess with 'em." D. C. Schaller

CERTAINLY YOU CAN SHOOT THAT WAY...
Sure, there may be times when you have to shoot quickly (time clock running out), and you catch the ball high and someone's in your face. In those cases, then, yes, shoot directly from where you catch it. But the odds of it going in are reduced by the lesser degree of alignment and connection to target. It would be better not to shoot if that's the case and you have the time. Pass off to someone else.

TRY IT BOTH WAYS -- YOU BE THE JUDGE!
As with all of my coaching, let your own experience be the teacher. Try it both ways and see which is more accurate for you. I'm sure you'll feel a greater sense of alignment with the target when you can dip the ball.

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4. The Idea of "Homework"
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A coach asked recently what she could do while waiting for delivery of the Swish DVD. I referred her to an article I wrote a few years ago that could be considered valuable "homework." The document is on my "Articles/Reviews" page and is titled, "Coaching Shooting with Teams and Groups" (http://www.swish22.com/GroupCoach.html). This teaching also applies to a player or parent waiting for Swish to arrive.

The main goal of the article is to increase players' awareness of how they shoot now, a critical first step to learning something new, and then the article offers some coaching ideas to give the players that will improve their shooting.

FIRST HOW DO YOU SHOOT NOW?
First it shows you how to set up exercises with a demonstrator to clarify the distinctions of shooting in seven areas, and then how to structure the team or group in going off in pairs to explore the various distinctions themselves. It's important to "know" how you shoot now so you won't fall back into old habits without knowing it. When players know what they do, both the old and the new and any/all variations and extremes, then they can truly coach themselves, which is the goal, be it for yourself or a group of players. It's in the "practice" time, off line from the more competitive team stuff and games, where players truly develop.

SECONDLY, SOME GENTLE SUGGESTIONS FOR A NEW WAY TO SHOOT
Secondly, the article gives you suggestions in the various areas to give that will start them on a powerful process to play with and learn a more effective way to shoot. This is done "generically," without mention of the Swish Method. If you know the Method, then you can tie this instruction to it, but it isn't necessary at this point. The Swish Method is just a structured way to give a name to all of the explorations and discoveries (things that work) that will develop out of this article's exercises.

SOME WORDS ABOUT THE MENTAL "STUFF"
The final section is some mention of the "mental" aspects of shooting. As I say there, from my experience the mental will follow the physical. By that I mean if you "know" how to shoot and can do it, your confidence will naturally rise. You don't have to psyche yourself into a state of confidence. It's when you don't know how to shoot -- and failure is a frequent bedfellow -- that you could benefit some from psychological tricks, like "positive thinking" or "self talk." But realize that kind of programmed, conditional, and even false or faked confidence will eventually fail if technique isn't there and if results don't follow. Learn a great stroke and learn to trust it under pressure and you won't need a sports psychologist.

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5. Coaching a Deaf Player
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Recently I had the pleasure of coaching a deaf person. To prepare for the lesson, I wrote down all the basic ideas I wanted to convey on sheets of paper with large type (18-24 point, at least). I then was able to hold up a page with the ideas I could not speak. Throughout the lesson both he and I wrote our comments and questions on a pad of paper, and I incorporated most of them in my latest version of the document.

The lesson went well because of the preparation I had made. If you want a copy of that document, just email me (Tom@swish22.com) and I'll send it to you. Reading the document, I feel a deaf person could then watch the Swish or Swish 2 videos and "get" a lot out of them, especially Swish 2 because I used many more Bullets and Subtitles in it. Once they can read and know the simple principles involved, a deaf person can figure out what's happening with the many subtitles shown.

SWISH COMES WITH THE TEXT
Swish, the original video, comes with a ~30 page "Workbook," which is the text of the video, word-for-word, so that video can easily be used by a deaf person. The longer, more detailed Swish 2, does not include the text, but the bullets and subtitles are so frequent and clear, little will be lost. And as I often say, once you "understand" the simple principles of the Swish Method, you can make your OWN discoveries of how to shoot and how to coach it, just as I did. It's not complicated. In fact it's just about the simplest thing possible.

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6. Organizations Helping Transform Youth Sports
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I've written here before about a wonderful movement focused on changing how youth sports are played, managed and coached. The Positive Coaching Alliance, based out of Stanford University, is a terrific organization working to train coaches, parents and players in a more "positive" way of involving kids in sports. Their motto is "Transforming Youth Sports So Sports Can Transform Youth!" They are a nationwide organization offering information, materials, suggestions for coaches and parents, training courses, etc. I became a Charter Member a couple years ago. Their Board of Directors includes Phil Jackson, Larry Brown and Doc Rivers. Phil is an active spokesman for the organization. As I wrote a couple years ago, Larry Brown agreed to be on the Board because, as he said it, his 8 year old son had an experience with a coach that he (Larry) doesn't want any other kid to ever have, if he can help it.

MAINE ORGANIZATION: SPORTS DONE RIGHT
In the Parade Magazine in our newspaper for August 2005 was an article about a group from Maine doing the same work, called "Sports Done Right." It seems the whole state of Maine is in action to make a difference. In the article entitled "Who's Killing Kids' Sports?" the Parade writer David Oliver Relin asks the question why are kids dropping out of sports "...in record numbers," and offers some solutions. Here's a URL directly to David's article.

Here's a quick story from that Parade article, at the end:

"An example of that good sense [the "good sense" that Maine is famous for and which is suggested be applied to youth sports] recently occurred at a 'Sports Done Right' pilot site. 'An influential parent, a guy who volunteers to coach sixth-grade basketball, wanted the kids divided into an A and a B team, so he could coach just the elite kids,' says Stephen Rogers, the principal of Lyman Moore Middle School. 'I said we weren't going to separate the kids and discourage half of them. We were going to encourage all of our interested kids to play.'

"'But we won't win the championship,' the parent complained.

"'I don't really care,' Rogers said. 'We're not talking about the Celtics. We're talking about sixth-graders.'"

Here is the website for Sports Done Right
For the Positive Coaching Alliance

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7. Swish 2 Available This Week for U.S. and Canada;
Taking Orders for International "PAL" Format!
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Swish 2 is being replicated right now and our first thousand should be received by December 9th if the production plan is met. Our order pages are being modified to offer it both separately and in a couple of package deals. Please check our Website for the announcement of it. If you want to call us, you can place an early order (888/794-7422). Shipment should be early enough to be there for the Holidays in the U.S. and Canada.

SWISH 2 TAKES SHOOTING TO A NEW LEVEL
Swish 2 will take the Swish Method to a new level, building on what Swish has started. It's two hours long vs. 56 minutes for Swish. You could think of Swish as the "Basics" of the technique and Swish 2, the "Practical Application." If you own Swish 1, you will get a discount on Swish 2. If you buy both, you'll get 50% off on the second one.

"NTSC" FORMAT AVAILABLE FIRST, THEN THE "PAL" FORMAT
We are getting the first thousand in NTSC format only (that's the format for the U.S. and Canada). As soon as we get the first batch, we'll check it out to make sure everything is exactly as we want it. Then we'll place an order for a thousand PAL DVD's for international sales. They will be available by the end of December. You can order the PAL DVD's for Swish 2 as soon as the website allows it, but we won't be able to ship it until that first batch comes in. If you want us to let you know when PAL is available to ship, let us know and we'll add you to a special database. Thanks for your patience.

HOLIDAY GIFT CERTIFICATE!
If your order is for a Holiday gift, we can create and send you a Gift Certificate in PDF form you can print out that will describe the "exciting shooting video gift" that will soon be there.

GREAT DETAIL, WONDERFUL EXAMPLES
Swish 2 goes to great detail in explaining how both to learn and coach this simple, powerful approach to shooting. There are great examples throughout the video, from the opening scenes of player after player making swishes to the final section of the Appendix offering some creative shooting exercises and a suggestion to learn to shoot with your opposite hand for the lessons it teaches.

SECTION ON LEARNING AND COACHING
My favorite chapter is called, "A Conversation FOR Learning and Coaching." In it I describe how we are all geniuses, with extraordinary learning and performance just waiting to express itself. Coaches (or you coaching yourself) have the job of unlocking potential, not adding anything. I mention how I've learned that awareness is the key to learning, not the words of a coach or parent. A coach's job is to enhance awareness, and when that is done, learning will happen automatically. Judgment ("good" and "bad") tends to cloud the issue by putting a moral value on performance, inviting the player's ego to get involved, wanting to "look good" and avoid failure. When the student can just see and feel what happened with no or minimal judgment and evaluation, then the body can do its amazing learning thing and shooting becomes easier and easier.

IF YOU LIKED SWISH...
I like to say to people who ask about the value of Swish 2, that...
If you liked Swish, you will LOVE Swish 2!
If you loved Swish, you will go "gaga" over Swish 2. (Is that a word?)

It's that powerful and complete. It offers the wisdom and insights about shooting I've gained in the past 8 1/2 years since Swish first came out. Though it took a long time to take shape, with lots of false starts and detours, I'm very happy with the finished production. The ~28 editing sessions paid off in the end.

I hope you will get Swish 2 (and Swish 1, if you don't already have it). You will NOT be disappointed.

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8. KIDS KORNER
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I RESPECT AND HONOR YOU

Just let me say how much I respect and honor you as young players participating in the game of basketball, even though I don't get to meet most of you in person. I try to write something unique each month for kids of all ages. I thought this time to just write about how much I respect your effort and your spirit.

Basketball is an arena of life that hundreds of millions of people worldwide participate in. It's one of many sports possibilities, and it's estimated by groups that focus on such things that 43 million Americans love the game (either as a player, former player, coach, parent, etc.). Worldwide, last I heard, the number is estimated to be over 250 million. It and soccer are the top two "team" games in the world, if I remember right.

SPORTS TEACH US WHO WE ARE
Sports can be wonderful teaching and learning arenas. We learn about ourselves by playing games. It's a way to learn how we learn, to test our strength, quickness, our will, our coordination, etc. Games can simulate life situations without being life threatening. Some sports are more dangerous than others, like boxing and auto racing. Basketball, performed on a court and usually indoors, is a safe environment to encounter ourselves. We can learn to experience and enjoy our natural abilities, how to face our doubts and fears, learn to work with others (the team aspects), to challenge ourselves to work hard, and learn to accept both defeat and success.

Some players naturally excel more than others. We all have different skills and talents and are at different levels of development. What matters is the "effort" you put into the game, no so much your inherent strengths and talents. Some kids will naturally and relatively easily achieve success. For others it's hard work and a lot of failure. But what matters is the learning that happens. The natural hero who gets all the praise and accolades may not have to work very hard, so winds up thinking he or she will succeed in everything and may fail later in other aspects of life. The shorter, slower, less coordinated boy or girl who works hard and learns how to achieve through effort, strength of will, commitment, joy, etc., may very likely (probably) wind up winning in other ways throughout life.

BASKETBALL WAS EASY FOR ME; OTHER THINGS LESS SO
Basketball came fairly easy to me and I became a so-called "hero" because of it. But I didn't develop myself in other ways. I wish I had. For example, I was not a good speaker. My voice became very weak and breathy and I had trouble communicating orally. The more I thought about it, the worse it got. I couldn't express myself well. I was a hero at 17, and though I didn't verbalize it, I thought I had it made. How wrong I was. When I went to college and made the team but was not successful in playing (I lost my shooting touch and confidence and was lacking in the other skills) and wound up a bench jockey, it was devastating to my ego and took me many years to work out of it.

Looking back I wish I had taken courses in areas like speaking, debate, and theater, to name a few, courses that would have helped me develop in areas other than sports. Debate teaches you to organize your thoughts, learning how to speak both for and against a point of view. That helps you a lot in life. I think of theater because it teaches, I imagine, how to "be" other people, including yourself. You learn to act and express yourself. I didn't take those kinds of classes because I was afraid to, but if I had faced the fear and overcome it, my inadequacies in speaking and expressing myself would have been much different. Sports worked out great for me and I'm grateful for it, but there are other things in life, too.

THERE'S MORE TO BASKETBALL THAN BASKETBALL
My point is this: If basketball is an interest of yours, then go for it! Work as hard as you can to develop your skills (like shooting) and, hopefully, make the team. But learn to realize it's the "other" things you learn WHILE playing basketball that are most important, not the specific success or failure in the game itself. You're young. You're learning about yourself, learning how to learn, testing your skills. How you handle success and failure is a huge opening for your later life. Don't let success swell your head too much, because failure is lurking right around the corner. And don't let failure blast a hole in your confidence and self image too much. There is much to be learned. [Note: talk about this stuff with your parents, your friends, your coaches and teachers, your relatives. People LOVE to be asked about life and what's going on and to be able to help young people. Some won't have great advice, but some will. Keep looking, keep asking. Don't be shy. It's your LIFE we're talking about!!!]

FAILURE IS A NECESSARY FRIEND
We all fail at some things ... all the time. As I wrote a couple months ago, a great business leader I read about in an airline magazine tells his employees that, if they aren't failing, they aren't working hard enough. Failure is necessary! If you can learn to handle failure and success equally, then you are really alive and you will grow. Some kids will get all the accolades (it might even be you), and you can applaud and honor them, but please realize there is much more going on that what can be seen in the box scores. Character, spirit, knowledge of self, the deeper confidence in who you are, rather than what you've achieved -- things like that -- are much more valuable! Look for those things. Play your heart out, and then accept whatever happens. Ask for help from every angle you can. Keep striving to find answers, to grow, to learn. And then see if you can let go of attachment to results. Your long-term life will come from a place of greater inner strength and wisdom. Good luck. As I said at the beginning, I respect and honor you. Do the same for yourself and others.

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9. Please Bookmark this Website
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I invite you to bookmark my Website (http://www.swish22.com) so you can go there easily to catch my latest comments on shooting. You can read about my DVD/video there (including endorsements, testimonials, reviews and an overview of the video), my coaching, and the many articles on shooting I've written. You can see video clips and archived back issues of this Newsletter and, of course, subscribe, if you're not already getting this on a regular basis.

Please tell others about this newsletter, my site, and my DVD and video. Forward the newsletter to them and suggest they read it and the many archived issues. Send them the URL (http://www.swish22.com) and let them know there's a proven method for powerful shooting. This great game of ours deserves a Renaissance in shooting!

Direct links to my webpage:
· Website Home Page
· Endorsements
· Testimonials
· Articles, Reviews
· Coaches Page
· Newsletter
· Clinics and Camps
· Q&A's
· Video Clips
· Flash "Bonus" Clips
· Ordering the Swish videos

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10. Shooting Clinics / Private Coaching
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There is nothing planned at this time, since the season is in full swing.

To stay in tune with the latest news about all my Clinics, Camps and Coaches' Trainings, go to this page: Clinics & Camps and click on the respective area and clinic.

If you'd like to organize some shooting clinics or camps this winter or spring or for private sessions here in California, email Tom.

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11. How to Subscribe / Unsubscribe
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To SUBSCRIBE to this Newsletter, click on the link below.

***Important: Please note that when you "subscribe," Topica, the company that manages the free list for me, will send you a "confirmation" email and offer you two ways to "confirm." I SUGGEST YOU USE THE SECOND OPTION!

The first option is to click on a link to Topica where they will ask you open a free account with them. This is okay to do, as they have good free mailings lists, discussion groups, etc., but I think most of you just want to subscribe to the newsletter. You do that most easily by the second option, just REPLYING to the email. That's all you need to do, no need to key anything.

Click on this email -- it will start the subscription process: Subscribe. Remember to expect the Confirmation email.

To UNSUBSCRIBE from this Newsletter, just send a blank email to the following:
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12. Contact Information
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Tom Nordland, Shooting Coach
325 Crows Nest Drive
Boulder Creek, CA 95006
Website: http://www.swish22.com
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Tel: 888/SWISH-22 (888/794-7422)
or 831/338-4647 local in California
E-mail Tom
Creator of the video "Swish - A Guide to Great Basketball Shooting"
For a Renaissance in Shooting!

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(c) Copyright 2005 Tom Nordland
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