The Basketball Podcast: EP441 with Steve Scalzi on Coaching Methodology and Constraints

Steve Scalzi Quotes:

“I feel like that is when your kinetic chain is at its best. . . when you’re taking flow warmups where you touch the floor, where you’re taking mid-range shots, where we’re just sort of practicing the flow of what this looks like . . and then building that out to catch and shoot 3s. To me, they’re all the same. I think off the dribble, you can also access and find the same flow.”

“I’m not changing your shot. I’m not changing anything other than accessing when you feel best about your shot. Everyone can relate to that concept that I described to you. It’s like you’re flowing down the wing, all of a sudden the ball flows to you, the shot goes up.”

“Comfort, consistency, repeatability. Those things matter in any job, in any profession, even when you know that isn’t exactly the realest rep . . as long as there’s a little bit of a system to it or a physical experience to it that’s re-creatable.”

“Part of it is the spacing of your offense. Where do you belong? Where will you be? And then are you in the right spot? And then from there you have a know-when-to-go moment . .  you can create that in drills, and then you can create that environmentally . . these are the spots or the environments where that’s your moment. So, when they see that and they get excited by it and they know what to do with it, they can critique themselves at times, too.”

“When we are running, we are sprinting, there’s chaos, there’s multiple defenders, we have all the bodies out there . . that’s the absolute best true rep for like an in-game finish . . there is a version of asking players [to play] 50% defense, be out there, give him something to read. This is not about you versus him. And I think when you describe it as such, they get low-key competitive.”

“Whether that’s driving from the corner, you’re trying to obviously straight line it along the baseline. You’re trying to get, you know, you’re trying to get middle from those high quads. Just the concept of like when I go straight, can I drive into the defender and therefore he’s the first to give ground?

“[A drive line] is as straight as possible . . when I go straight, can I drive into the defender and therefore he’s the first to give ground?”

“I don’t mind scripting finishes at the start. I don’t mind saying we’re trying to create an angle so that you feel comfortable using a bump Euro and naming the move, scripting the move. And then say, ‘Use any of the three finishes’ with [the defense] leaning on you at various angles. They adapt quickly if you haven’t given them 5 to 7 finishes, if you give them just 2 or 3.  The creativity that they come with after that at our level is really impressive.”

“Spacing in the dunker spot becomes relevant when the floor is moving. When you’ve driven, you’ve driven and you’ve kicked, you can pause briefly on the baseline. Because when you do and you watch the floor set, trust me, your defender does too. And then the shell is very distorted, and it doesn’t look like anything they drill.”

“When you come to the Detroit Pistons and they ask you to create an academy setting and coach all these coaches and things, it just was all those experiences stacking upon each other that allowed us the chance to try to do something special here.”

Steve Scalzi Breakdown:

Steve Scalzi Selected Links from the Podcast:

Steve Scalzi
Ebuka Okorie
Ugonna Onyenso
J.B. Bickerstaff
Trajan Langdon
Brendan Suhr
Kevin Eastman
Kevin Durant
Steve Nash
Adam Harrington
Steve Kerr
Will Gent
Dennis Schroder
Darko Rajakovic
Russell Westbrook
Victor Oladipo
Billy Donovan
Mark Daigneault
Ish Wainwright
Jalen Brunson
Chris Paul
Cade Cunningham
LeBron James
Luka Doncic
Nikola Jokic