How To Beat A Bully

Round 3 of the NCAA tournament resumes
tonight, and I'm chompin' at the bit. That's
the Gator chomp by the way even through
Florida doesn't play till tomorrow night.

I felt like Florida was standing up to a bully
in their 2nd round game against Purdue.
Nothing wrong with that style of play. The
Boilermakers did a super job of almost
pulling it off. Hats off to a valiant opponent.

It took Florida 2/3rds of the game, but
they eventually showed enough toughness
to catch up to and pass the engineers from
West Lafayette with Al Horford in the post
and their secret weapon.

Free throw shooting.

Even though the Gators season free throw
percentage isn't all that great this year
(Low 70's I think) they knocked in around
85% for the Purdue game, and Purdue was
fouling a lot.

I'm not sure what Florida did to be that
much better. Probably just made the
decision to concentrate and make free
throws a priority because they knew
they'd need them.

Winners find a way.

Shoot For The Stars,

Coach Dean - The Dean of Shooting Hoops

P.S. One thing that will help your free
throw shooting is to cultivate a ritual
and do it the same way every single
time.

Remember how Kyle Macy of Kentucky
used to always touch his socks. Other
people dribble a certain way, the same
number of times, spin the ball, etc.
Whatever helps you focus and get into
your confidence groove.

If you don't have a ritual yet come up
with one that works for you, and start
knocking down more and more free
throws.

P.S.S. Free throws are also critical to
you becoming a double digit scorer.
Coach Patrick Chylinski explains it all
in his powerful ebook 'How To Average
20 Points A Game' available now at:

http://www.deandelker.com/20ppg.html

Note: This blog entry is protected by
copyright, but you have permission to
copy and use it in its entirety as long
as the links are intact and the contact
information is included.

Copyright 2006,2007 Delker Enterprises, Inc.

Coach Dean Delker
8413 SW 4th Place
Gainesville, FL 32607
352-494-6572

dean@deandelker.com
www.deandelker.com

When Does Your Practice Stop

When do you stop practicing?

When you die?

I bet by now you're getting conditioned to
think this is a trick question. It's not.

There is a time when more practice gives
you fewer results. In economics it's called
the law of diminishing returns. It's that
place where more and more work yields
less and less productivity.

As an example from the NCAA tournament
look at John Calipari's Memphis Tigers.
This season they shot 61% from the free
throw line. Not so great. And I don't have
to tell you that can be a big Achilles heal in
a one-and-done tournament.

All you need is a big physical team that
forces a deliberate half-court game and is
deep enough to foul you often, and you
can be in trouble.

Undoubtedly Coach C. has worked on free
throw shooting till everybody was blue in
the face, but it didn't seem to make a
difference.

Fortunately though he took the crazy
advice of a sports psychologist and had
his team stop practicing free throws,
period. Instead he had every one of them
go home and visualize making ten straight
or more every night with feeling.

Do you want to guess what they shot their
last game? It didn't always look pretty,
but 82%.

Coincidence. I think not. They just needed
to believe and visualization helped. I'm not
saying to quit practicing free throws, but
you might need to if you're frustrated, and
I'd at least try adding in the visualizations
if I were you.

Shoot For The Stars,

P.S. This whole idea was floated to me by
my friend Coach Tim Kauppinen in his
daily email newsletter.

Tim specializes in training athletes to run
their fastest and be their quickest. He also
teaches the average joe and ex-athletes
how to stay fit without slaving away for
hours. Isn't science great.

Every coach in the world is looking for
speed these days so I recommend you
get on his email list to be the best you
can be. You can get started 24/7 at:

http://www.makesyoufast.com/

Note: This email is protected by copyright
with all rights reserved, but you do have
permission to copy and use it in its
entirety as long as the links are intact and
the contact information is included.

Copyright 2006,2007 Delker Enterprises, Inc.

Coach Dean Delker
8413 SW 4th Place
Gainesville, FL 32607
352-494-6572

dean@deandelker.com
www.deandelker.com

What Can Focus Do For You

I don't hear a lot of people talking about the virtues
of concentration and focus. It's something I think
most people associate with things that require
extreme concentration like tightrope walking.

The truth is for any kind of athlete though focus
can be invaluable. It will allow you to:

-> Defeat teams with greater athleticism

-> Perform with more consistently by not drifting
mentally in and out

-> Perform when it matters most, like free throws
in crunch time.

-> Work smarter in practices and in the off season

-> Block out adversity and distractions

With the ability to focus on the moment an athlete
can get in a mental state which will let his or her
physical ability be maximized. What people call
"being in the zone".

The value of focus for a shooter is obvious, but the
ability to concentrate and get in the zone where
your mind doesn't interfere with what you've
been trained to do is a skill everybody needs so
keep practicing your sitting still routine. It's a
good start.

Get another good start putting your focus to best
use by spending time with Coach Stan Kellner on
his "How To Become A Prime-Time Shooting
Machine" DVD. Learn how to use your mind at it's
fullest in shooting a basketball today at:

http://www.deandelker.com/kellner_order.html

Shoot For The Stars,

Dean - The Dean of Shooting Hoops

P.S. Don't forget to have fun too. Did you know
you can exercise and compete with an inner and
outer smile, and it helps take your performanc to
a another level. Learn how to supercharge your
conditioning today at:

http://www.deandelker.com/matt_furey.html

Copyright 2006 Delker Enterprises, Inc.

Why I Used To Hate Goals

For much of my life I've never really gotten into
goals. At least not the way achievers talked about
them. I've had vague directions I wanted to go in,
but I was more of a "play it by ear" kind of guy.
Goal setting to me seemed to take the spontaneity
out of living. It made me feel like I was a robot, or
something.

Because of that, I experienced a lot of the coasting
and drifting like I was talking about yesterday.
And yes, I've experienced the pain that comes
from living like that too.

Going with the flow eventually drowns your ambition
and your pleasure. I was living a black-and-white life.

One reason I was so resistant was I only saw goals
objectively. They were something sterile and
intellectual to me. I didn't realize how much joy you
could experience in setting and hitting goals. I just
saw them as mile markers on a hard road. No
wonder I resisted.

Not any more though. I've done a 180 and realize we
are all built-in goal seekers. And if we don't pursure
what we want we'll end up getting what we don't
want, by default.

I'm reading "The New Psycho-Cybernetics" which
is modernized, updated version of the 30 million
selling self-help classic. Dan Kennedy the multi-
millionaire speaker, business consultant, and direct
marketing wizard has done the updating because
the original book helped him overcome stuttering,
and develop the habit of success. I'm seeing things
in a new light, and recommend it highly.

One of the reasons I thought I wasn't goal-oriented
is much of it went on automatically in the
background. When I watch a 12 month old learning
to walk, and I see it clearly, but when I walk now I'm
not conscious of the goal behavior going on inside. It
is though.

As human beings we have the privilege of being able
to set meaningful, satisfying emotional goals - and
then to hit them.

Rick Rosser emailed me last night and was pumped
up about a new personal best in consecutive free
throws. I would be too, and I love hearing about
Rick's success and any of your successes.

He shot 1558 straight freethrows recently , and
now he's even more confident he can work up into
Guinness world-record territory. And as a truck
driver who travels around he's also hit more than
100 consecutive freethrows in 136 different
YMCA's across the land. That's probably a world
record already. You should check on that Rick.

Rick is excited about life, and you will be too
when you start setting some juicy goals that light
your fire.

Remember if you're not moving toward intentional
purposes, goals or dreams you're going to get the
leftovers and the hand-me-downs in life. Then
you're going to whine and complain which will
make it worse, and you're just not going to be
very happy at all.

Shoot For The Stars One Exciting Goal At A Time,

Dean - The Dean of Shooting Hoops

P.S. Dan Kennedy was also very instrumental in
compiling and bringing Psycho-Cybernetics to the
masses in a step-by-step workbook format that
anybody can follow and grow from. The course
called "Zero Resistance Living" turned my life
around, and I've I'm just beginning to scratch
the surface of it's possibilities.

Find out how you can live large today at:

http://www.deandelker.com/zero_resistance.html

P.P.S Dr. Maltz was a friend of Salvador Dali who
was the antithesis of the "starving artist". Dali
understood how to live life to the hilt, how to
communicate that joy of living on canvas, and
how to get paid what he was worth.

Tania Gabrielle French carries that same torch in
the field of music today, and she can show you how
to use power-filled words and beautiful music to
rise to new personal heights.

Experience the positive power of music today at:

http://www.deandelker.com/secret_power.html