During the summer months when pickup basketball dominated the playgrounds, I would play almost every night because the level of competition was top notch.  The collegiate players were all back from college and I being a high school player wanted to play against players who were better than me.  In doing so, I learned my weaknesses as a player.  In other words, if my crossover kept getting picked, I learned to adjust.  If I could not get my jumper off, I learned to adjust.  In a way, playing pickup basketball gave me a list of skills to work on the next day during my workout.  That’s how it was all summer, workout in the morning and pickup games at night.  This is a great method to use when training for basketball.  By doing so, players learn what skills work and do not work in real competitive games.  

If you ever get the chance, head over to Rucker Park or The Cage on West 4th Street in Manhattan and take a look at how good some of those players are.  They play day in and day out against great players.  As a result, they  learn how to adjust, they learn how to get better.  This is all a result of playing against great players on a daily basis.  It is a result of playing pick up basketball at the playgrounds and unfortunately it is something that does not happen enough nowadays.

In the next and final installment of The Effects of a Lack of Playground Basketball I will focus on how pickup basketball teaches players how to cope with the pressure of making big shots and big stops in order to get a win.

When I was in college and in high school I spent a significant amount of time playing pick-up basketball at different parks or gyms in my area.  I could not get enough basketball in and if the games at one park were no longer any good or if people just stopped playing there, I would find a new park or gym to play at.  It was like a religion where guys would come to the parks in droves to play each and every day and sometimes the wait would be about five games deep (anywhere between 30 and 40 players).  It does not appear that this happens any more as it seems that playground basketball has disappeared somewhat, at least in my area.  Maybe disappeared is too strong of a word, but it has definitely reduced.  I cannot remember the last time I drove by a park and saw that many people waiting for a game of basketball, and that is unfortunate.  It is inexplicable exactly why this has happened but there is no question that the reduced amount of playground basketball has hurt the level of play in recent years.  There are many aspects of playground basketball that are missed in today’s game not the least of which is making your free throws. 

When we played, to even get on the court, you had to make a free throw and if you missed, you did not play until the next game (at the earliest).  That is the pressure that comes along with playing basketball at the playground.  No one wanted to sit and watch so you worked on your free throws and made them in order to get in the game.  As a coach, I see many players miss free throws on a nightly basis particularly in pressure situations like a close game in the fourth quarter.  It is difficult to replicate this type of pressure in practices because what are you really losing in a practice if you miss?  However, at the playground, you are losing valuable time on the court and that can only hurt.  So ultimately, you learned to make your free throws under the guise that if you missed you sat out.  Nowadays, if there are not enough players to play at the park the pressure of making a free throw to get on the court does not even come in to play and perhaps that is why players time and again choke at the line under the pressure of the game. 

In part two of The Effects of a Lack of Playground Basketball I will take a look at how playground basketball helps players develop better basketball skills.