I wish I did this more often throughout the season, but here are some notes from today's media session. Every once in a while I lie to Pick Toole's brain just on his philosophy of things. Earlier in the season I asked him about the art of setting ball screens. Sometimes we talk about defensive awareness and things like that. Today I asked him about rebounding.
Just out of curiosity, I asked him on what his philosophy of rebounding is. How much of it is effort? How much of it is fundamentals and positioning? His answer was lengthy, so I'll break it up a little bit.
"I think about 99.9 percent of it is a mindset. Guys that want to go rebound, rebound. You watch film of us, you watch film of our opponents, and you just see. You see guys that pursue the ball. The problem is it's a work intensive, low reward job. You've got to maybe go to the glass ten times just to get three rebounds. Your return on investment isn't very high, but you've got to be committed to it. If you only go five times you're not getting three of them, but if you go 15 you might get five of them. So, that percentage of times you go to the glass versus the amount of times you actually get one, you've got to be okay with that.
"You watch some of the best rebounders in the world, the reason they're one of the best rebounders in the world is because they go for so much more than anybody else. You watch some of the guys on our team, where we'll have a big at 15, 17 feet and they're not going to make an effort to get to the rim. Well, you know you might not get it, but if you don't go you're never going to get it and we try and explain that to guys. The biggest part of it is just trying to get to the rim and not getting boxed out, having that motor that you're going to continue to go in there to make a play for your team, try and get an extra possession, try and get an extra bucket, it's all mindset.
"There are some great rebounders in this league that aren't great athletes, there are some rebounders in this league that aren't the biggest guys in the league, there's some great rebounders that are guards in this league. Lucky obviously isn't our biggest, quickest, highest jumping guy but for some reason he's our best rebounder for four years. It's the mindset he has when the shot goes up. I think he has some instincts to it but I think a lot of it is just a willingness to go and go and go and go and go and keep going to the backboard," he said.
I think a lot of guys share a similar sentiment. rebounding is so much more about the effort and wanting the ball than anything else. Unfortunately, Robert Morris is a horrendous rebounding team. Their defensive rebounding percentage of 35.1 percent is 324th in the country. Clearly, there are some guys who can[/I] rebound the basketball. Can that effort be put together consistently? It has yet to be proven. Wagner will be a tough test. For what it's worth, I asked Rodney Pryor the same question and this is what he said:
"I would say 80/20, 80 being effort, 20 being the mechanics. You always have to find a body, make sure you get a bump on them and then after that it's just who really wants the ball the most," he said
I also got a good laugh today out of an Aaron Tate story. Toole talked about Tate's first recruiting visit and Aaron's quiet personality:
"It was funny, when he came on our visit I kept saying to our assistants what, 'do you think he thinks' because he doesn't say anything. Everything was yes sir and no sir, thank you, and so afterwards when he called me and said he was coming I made a joke to his mom, I said 'once we got him to calm down and stop being so rowdy on our visit...' and she started laughing. I think that's just the way he's always been. Even when he comes to the office you kind of have to ask him 20 questions to get any information out of him," he said.
Obviously, Aaron has become the sort of glue-guy for this team. The coaches love his work ethic and his teammates respect the hell out of him and his game.
This post was edited on 2/25 6:25 PM by Chris Cappella
Just out of curiosity, I asked him on what his philosophy of rebounding is. How much of it is effort? How much of it is fundamentals and positioning? His answer was lengthy, so I'll break it up a little bit.
"I think about 99.9 percent of it is a mindset. Guys that want to go rebound, rebound. You watch film of us, you watch film of our opponents, and you just see. You see guys that pursue the ball. The problem is it's a work intensive, low reward job. You've got to maybe go to the glass ten times just to get three rebounds. Your return on investment isn't very high, but you've got to be committed to it. If you only go five times you're not getting three of them, but if you go 15 you might get five of them. So, that percentage of times you go to the glass versus the amount of times you actually get one, you've got to be okay with that.
"You watch some of the best rebounders in the world, the reason they're one of the best rebounders in the world is because they go for so much more than anybody else. You watch some of the guys on our team, where we'll have a big at 15, 17 feet and they're not going to make an effort to get to the rim. Well, you know you might not get it, but if you don't go you're never going to get it and we try and explain that to guys. The biggest part of it is just trying to get to the rim and not getting boxed out, having that motor that you're going to continue to go in there to make a play for your team, try and get an extra possession, try and get an extra bucket, it's all mindset.
"There are some great rebounders in this league that aren't great athletes, there are some rebounders in this league that aren't the biggest guys in the league, there's some great rebounders that are guards in this league. Lucky obviously isn't our biggest, quickest, highest jumping guy but for some reason he's our best rebounder for four years. It's the mindset he has when the shot goes up. I think he has some instincts to it but I think a lot of it is just a willingness to go and go and go and go and go and keep going to the backboard," he said.
I think a lot of guys share a similar sentiment. rebounding is so much more about the effort and wanting the ball than anything else. Unfortunately, Robert Morris is a horrendous rebounding team. Their defensive rebounding percentage of 35.1 percent is 324th in the country. Clearly, there are some guys who can[/I] rebound the basketball. Can that effort be put together consistently? It has yet to be proven. Wagner will be a tough test. For what it's worth, I asked Rodney Pryor the same question and this is what he said:
"I would say 80/20, 80 being effort, 20 being the mechanics. You always have to find a body, make sure you get a bump on them and then after that it's just who really wants the ball the most," he said
I also got a good laugh today out of an Aaron Tate story. Toole talked about Tate's first recruiting visit and Aaron's quiet personality:
"It was funny, when he came on our visit I kept saying to our assistants what, 'do you think he thinks' because he doesn't say anything. Everything was yes sir and no sir, thank you, and so afterwards when he called me and said he was coming I made a joke to his mom, I said 'once we got him to calm down and stop being so rowdy on our visit...' and she started laughing. I think that's just the way he's always been. Even when he comes to the office you kind of have to ask him 20 questions to get any information out of him," he said.
Obviously, Aaron has become the sort of glue-guy for this team. The coaches love his work ethic and his teammates respect the hell out of him and his game.
This post was edited on 2/25 6:25 PM by Chris Cappella
