I hate losing

I hate to lose more than I love to win.
Jimmy Connors

Our basketball team just lost a close game to a team that beat us earlier the season on a buzzer-beater. It really brings out that nagging feeling that Connors noted, something I've felt in sports, poker, and any other competitive endeavor.

If that is really true though, why would I play? Or better yet, why wouldn't I just play against 12 year old girls so there's never a risk of losing? Well in poker I'd actually gladly do the equivalent that a lot of the time and happily rake in the cash. That's pretty much what I did for 3 years of college, and the last 3 months of 2004 on PartyPoker (more on this in another post, this one is about competing). But with sports I guess I just love playing against good competition too. I love the feeling of improving my game, and I love when my vision of a play becomes a reality.

You hear cliches like "play as a team," or you read about the effects a great coach can have on a team, or you talk about how "team chemistry" is so important. In team sports you have several people all working together towards a common goal, the most effective way to reach that goal and win the game is to have everyone playing with one mind.

Any NBA team would easily crush even the best college basketball team, because the players are bigger, stronger, faster, and smarter. But if there was some alternate reality where 5 bodies could share one mind, I think the smaller, weaker, slower athletes could easily beat even the best NBA team. If everyone on a team knew exactly what everyone else on the team is going to do and has the exact same vision, they have an insurmountable advantage over a team of vastly superiour athletes. I don't know exactly where the line is - the high school JV girls team isn't going to beat the Lakers no matter how many minds are involved - but the point is that 5 bodies work so much more effeciently controled by 1 mind instead of 5.

Obviously in this world we can't share a mind between several bodies, but you try to get as close to it as possible. The point guard flashes 3 fingers to run a baseline screen play; the coach switches to a zone defense during a timeout; defenders call out a switch to cover a pick-and-roll; I make eye contact with you and then I make a backdoor cut for a layup. Communication.

Teams run plays so they know exactly what everyone is supposed to do. You practice them over and over and understand all the options. You scout out the competition and prepare a game plan to defend against their strengths and exploit their weaknesses. Everyone knows the plan. Everyone knows their role. Everyone is on the same page, and the best TEAM wins the game, at least thats what us purists believe.

The most frustrating thing about this basketball league I'm in with my boys is that we just go out once a week and run and thats it. I don't mind if people miss shots or fall over, but I hate it when we don't play smart. And I don't by any means intend to exclude myself - tonight I scolded us for taking bad shots, and promptly went right out and took a contested 3.

I try to get us to throw together a quick gameplan before we start, but we struggle to stick to all but the most basic strategies. If I map out a quick play during a timeout, everyone forgets about it by the time we walk back out on the court. I bark out orders on the court and from the bench because communicating is our only hope of playing with one mind. I don't know if my ideas are better than anyone else's, but everyone acting on one decent idea is better than 5 people acting on 5 different great ideas, and nobody else is speaking up.

By no means should this be interpretted as my busting on anyone on the squad. We all just signed up to come out and run, and I'm grateful that they listen cause I talk way too much. Everyone has a great attitude and is open to everyone else's suggestions. Every once in a while we even manage to execute on a plan. It is damn hard to have 6 people show up 10 minutes before a game after a long day of work and play well together. I love basketball and I love playing with these guys.

Teams that succeed in leagues like this are usually teams that have been playing together a long time and thus know each other very well, or teams with one or two excellent players with a ton of experience who are leaders for the team. These teams play with one mind better than the others.

An idea I'd really like to try is to find somebody who would coach us. It sounds funny for a league like this, but it would really help us so much to find an older guy who knows ball to watch from the sidelines and run the game. We can't really spend hours scouting opposition, cooking up schemes and practicing them. But we could have a respected leader who we all respect and follow.

Now I'm going to go watch the Maryland-Duke game. I think one reason among many that I'm not as into Maryland ball as I used to be is because I hate when we lose more than I love when we win. But I do love basketball.