The Basketball Podcast: EP260 with Stefan Weissenboeck on Player Development

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Stefan Weissenboeck Quotes:

“First, the work . . If we want to change, if we want to improve, there has to be work . . The trust is . . how is our connection to the player? The third [aspect of development] is the patience. It’s not going to come quickly. Sometimes it comes quickly, and then it goes away again, the improvement or the goal or whatever we’ve been working on.”

“We started bringing in guys before practice working for 15 minutes, 20 minutes. Until then, I knew only my individual practice had to be 45 to 60 minutes, full energy, an extra session. To bring in everybody just a little bit earlier, but maybe two times a week, sometimes three times a week. Now, he doesn’t have to come extra, it doesn’t kill him from the load. And still two or three times 20 minutes is a full hour.”

“If you’ve gotten over yourself, if you’ve reached the point in your profession where it’s not important to you, because you know that you know what you’re talking about . . when you’re not scared of making a player angry or when you’re not scared of making a mistake…that’s when you can be effective.”

“If you see a player work with a coach, I think the goal should not be that after the practice to say, ‘Wow, this coach is great.’ You should say, ‘That player is great. He did great stuff.’ That should be the goal.”

“I listened to a podcast of a mental performance coach and I think he’s in baseball. I don’t know what podcast it was and he said play or use your emotions, but don’t play emotionally.”

“I also cooperate with randomized trials from . . a mental performance coach. It’s good to have somebody, in addition, who can help with that, who can maybe even start working with a player if there’s the time, the capacity, and the potential to do that.”

“If you make it or not, I don’t even comment it. The term of a good miss comes from Brian Roberts. And he would say, oh, that’s a good miss. And we started to like it, and I use it more and more, the good misses, because sometimes we do everything right on a shot, and the ball still doesn’t go in.”

“If it’s an NBA player who wants me to come over and work with him. The first step is identifying the job. What situation is he in? And how can I help him? What does he need now? And that needs preparation. I have to watch film. I need to talk to him, to his agent, to his family, maybe even to his former coaches and get as much information as I can so I can customize the workout for him, be able to choose the right words, and be able to choose the right exercises.”

Stefan Weissenboeck Breakdown:

1:00 – Three Things Intersect
5:30 – Trust
10:00 – Player Development
13:30 – Comfort and Confidence
17:30 – Finding Solutions
21:00 – Parts of Practice
23:40 – 24:21 – Immersion Videos AD Jan 2023
25:00 – Individual Differences
27:30 – Importance of Feet
34:30 – Emotional Regulation
37:00 – Mistakes
40:00 – Feedback on Misses
44:30 – How to be Better Coaches
46:00 – Conclusion

Stefan Weissenboeck Links from the Podcast:

Stefan Weissenboeck

Chris Fleming

Andrea Trinchieri

Daniele Baiesi

Kenny Atkinson

Sean Marks

Caris LeVert

Holger Geschwindner

Dirk Nowitzki

P.J. Tucker

Patrick Miller