-The Benefits of Pick-Up Basketball-
With Summer here, and kids having a lot of free time on their hands, we at Bend Hoops will be offering scheduled open gyms three times a week for various age groups (of course, if kids get a group of friends together, they can play nearly anytime they want!). Depending on the amount of people that show up, players can partake in 5v5, 4v4, or 3v3 games.
From this open gym offering, a very important question arises:
What are the benefits of pick-up basketball?
To answer that, insert a conversation I had with my pops as a kid:
Me- “Hey Dad, what did you do in your summer’s growing up?”
Dad- “I spent nearly every day at the Y, playing pick-up ball. “
Me- “Really?”
Dad- “Yep. I tell you what kid, you want to learn how to win and play real basketball? Play pick-up games where the losing team sits. If you take a loss and have to sit out for 20 or 30 minutes until you get to play again… you will learn real quick how to compete, and what it takes to win. You’ll learn to watch and see what the winning team is doing to stay on the court. How they pass, how they talk, how they rebound, how they move the ball on offense. You will be forced to learn this if you want to stay on the court… And nobody ever wants to be sitting on the pine, waiting.”
The overriding message?
Pick-up basketball has great benefits that will teach you as a player how to adjust to opponents and teammates tendencies, how to compete, and most importantly- how to win. Likewise, every player on the court is playing hard, because they don’t want to sit! If someone isn’t playing hard, the guys that are taking it seriously won’t want him or her on their team, an easy remedy for future runs…
Come down to Bend Hoops and see if you have what it takes to hold court
And again, don’t be this guy: