{The Blogs I Never Posted} That Time When Jeff Was A Coach

****

We were half way through the basketball season and our record was 0 and 4.

We’d made 8 points total - unless you excluded those 2 that were taken away because of a foul, and those other 2 that were scored by the opposing team.

So yea, it was going well.

Actually, considering all things, it really was a good season.

Our team was the last team put together and most had never dribbled a ball all the way up the court, much less played an entire game.

We were playing teams that had played together for years. They were running plays and stealing balls while our team was learning the difference between basketball and tackle football and other small details...like which goal to throw the ball into.

We were pleasantly surprised with how well Hayden had kept his head in the game vs. his baseball days.

He was fast and seemed to think it was more of a track meet than a basketball game. If he would have ever figured out how to take a ball down the court with him, he would have been in pretty good shape since he was the first one down the court 9 times out of 10.

Hayden played very close attention to the game when he was on the court. If someone shot the ball, he wouldn’t take his eyes off the ball.

(Not for rebound purposes, but so that he would know when he should start sprinting to the other end of the court.)

Also, if one of his team members happened to catch it, he knew to mimic what the rest of his team is doing…which was to chirp “Pass! Pass! Pass!” like a bunch of baby birdies.

That was about the extent of our “plays” in 7U Basketball.

If you happened to catch the ball (read: get hit in the head with it), you had three options:

1) Shoot it! (regardless of your proximity to the goal)

2) Pass it to one of your chirping teammates! (or a teammate on the opposite team if they seem nice enough)

3) Take a knee and down the ball! (this usually ends in a wrestling match)

***Update: Hayden's basketball career was short lived. It was just one season when he was 7, much to Jeff's dismay...but watch out Johnny Football - he's moved on to bigger and better things!