Speaker 1: You tell young people, hey, work hard and put all
Speaker 1: your energy into this and all this stuff. I get
Speaker 1: all that, but to me, that's baked in the bottom
Speaker 1: line in this is this is supposed to be fun.
Speaker 1: Everybody gotten into this for fun. When you go to
Speaker 1: a game, that shouldn't be an agonizing experience, like you
Speaker 1: want your kid to do well because your kid wants
Speaker 1: to do well, not because you know it reflects somehow
Speaker 1: on you.
Speaker 2: This is the Reform Sports Project, a podcast about restoring
Speaker 2: healthy balance and perspective in all areas of sports through
Speaker 2: education and advocacy. Hi, this is Nick Bonacor from the
Speaker 2: Reform Sports Podcast. My guest today is Jay billis ESPN
Speaker 2: basketball analyst, former professional basketball player and coach at Duke University,
Speaker 2: and practicing commercial litigation attorney in North Carolina. While in
Speaker 2: law school, Jay served as an assistant coach at Duke
Speaker 2: under Mike Rzewski, helping guide the team to back to
Speaker 2: back national championships in nineteen ninety one and nineteen ninety two.
Speaker 2: In nineteen ninety five, Billis joined and has since become
Speaker 2: one of the most popular college basketball analysts, a New
Speaker 2: York Times bestselling author, and sought after keynote speaker, Jay
Speaker 2: and I discussed why competitiveness is not an excuse for
Speaker 2: bad behavior, helping your kids find the right college environment,
Speaker 2: and why developing meaningful relationships make sports at any level worthwhile.
Speaker 2: I got another awesome guest. This dude is an absolute stud.
Speaker 2: We're coming up to his time a year college hoops.
Speaker 2: Really really excited and of course being born and raised
Speaker 2: in Connecticut, being a diehard Yukonusky fan my whole life.
Speaker 2: It's an extra special year going to the men's season,
Speaker 2: in particular coming off a national title. But the man,
Speaker 2: the myth of legend. I'm pumped to have him, Jay
Speaker 2: Billis Jay, thanks so much for hopping on man.
Speaker 1: Be great to be with you. Thanks for having me, Yeah,
Speaker 1: for sure.
Speaker 2: And first of all, I want to give a shout
Speaker 2: out to Allen Stein Junior for hooking us up. Allen's
Speaker 2: come on the show. He's a great dude, does amazing
Speaker 2: work and I appreciate him. How did you and Allen connect?
Speaker 1: Over the years? We met working Nike Skills Academies. So
Speaker 1: Alan and I work together for I don't know how
Speaker 1: many years now, maybe twenty, and and you know he
Speaker 1: started with us as a you know, exercise physiologist and
Speaker 1: working with players, and I knew he was at Damatha uh.
Speaker 1: And then you know, he and I started a basketball
Speaker 1: camp together. It's got my name on it, but it's
Speaker 1: a collaborative effort, and so we've worked together forever. I
Speaker 1: love Alan. I think he's the best dude.
Speaker 2: I love it, And I'm glad that you that you
Speaker 2: went there with the camp because j billis camps and
Speaker 2: obviously I had no idea that you and Alan were,
Speaker 2: you know, partners in the deal. But you know, one
Speaker 2: thing I noticed about your camp, at least on your website.
Speaker 2: I love for you to dig in there. There's a
Speaker 2: specific part, you know, dedicated to parental education. Why is
Speaker 2: the parental education such an important piece, so much so
Speaker 2: that you actually have like open clinics and seminars at
Speaker 2: your skills camp.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's multi multi part. You parents that they usually
Speaker 1: go through this only and they have a lot of questions.
Speaker 1: It's a difficult process, or at least can seem difficult
Speaker 1: because you don't know exactly what's coming at you when
Speaker 1: your son or daughter becomes a recruited athlete, a recruitible athlete,
Speaker 1: or if you want them to be recruited. It seems
Speaker 1: like it's a daunting thing, and you know, you need
Speaker 1: some information or at least feel like you do. And
Speaker 1: we started the parental programming at our basketball camp very
Speaker 1: early on. But you know, selfishly, there were a couple
Speaker 1: of reasons for it. One, you know, we wanted to
Speaker 1: have good programming and answer questions and be able to
Speaker 1: give parents what they needed because we had a lot
Speaker 1: of people associated with our camp that knew the process
Speaker 1: and they were getting all these questions anyway, so why
Speaker 1: not put it together for the parents in a digestible
Speaker 1: way that they could really use and then they could
Speaker 1: all ask questions and that might prompt further discussion having
Speaker 1: everyone together. And honestly and frankly, one of the reasons
Speaker 1: we did it was, you know, I didn't go to
Speaker 1: a lot of camps when I was a kid, but
Speaker 1: I did go to a couple when I was in
Speaker 1: high school, and they were these you know, recruiting camps
Speaker 1: like five Star. Went to thing called sports World Superstar
Speaker 1: Camp on the West Coast where there were you know,
Speaker 1: it was nothing but college basketball coaches and all that stuff,
Speaker 1: and you know, parents dropped you off. And my parents
Speaker 1: didn't stay and watch, and now the parents, not all
Speaker 1: of them, but the parents stay and watch, and so
Speaker 1: our facilities we have to have places where they can
Speaker 1: stay and watch. And the truth is, one of the
Speaker 1: reasons we started that was to get the parents away
Speaker 1: from the players a little bit and so they could
Speaker 1: have some time to just play without being watched every
Speaker 1: five seconds. And that's not a negative on parents, because
Speaker 1: I think they're invested and you know, they enjoy watching
Speaker 1: their kids play. To me, that's a positive. But it's
Speaker 1: not a positive all the time. I mean, there are
Speaker 1: times when it's good for the players to just be
Speaker 1: on their own. They don't have to look over their shoulder,
Speaker 1: things like that. We have rules at the camp where
Speaker 1: no cheering and you know, no comments to official stuff
Speaker 1: like that. The parents are all great about it because
Speaker 1: it's not a basketball game. It's a camp, so it's
Speaker 1: a little bit different.
Speaker 2: So where do you think when you say it's great,
Speaker 2: you know in many ways, but at times it can
Speaker 2: you know, have an adverse effect. When do you think
Speaker 2: over involvement or you know, helicopter parent type thing, When
Speaker 2: does that become something where it's a negative or can
Speaker 2: you give any specific instances where you're like, dude, this
Speaker 2: is a little bit overboard.
Speaker 1: I think it's kind of a know it when you
Speaker 1: see a thing. And look, every child is different and
Speaker 1: every parental relationship is different, so there's no set rules
Speaker 1: to this. But I think with anything else in parent
Speaker 1: child relationships, where if your kid is worried about you
Speaker 1: when they're playing, I mean, this is supposed to be fun.
Speaker 1: If they make a mistake and all of a sudden
Speaker 1: they're looking up in the stands to see your reaction,
Speaker 1: it's great that they know that you're there. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's a nice thing. And I can only speak for me.
Speaker 1: When I was a player, one of the things I
Speaker 1: appreciated about my dad especially was that I didn't get
Speaker 1: a lot of feedback from my dad on my play.
Speaker 1: My parents cared about did I behave myself and I
Speaker 1: did I conduct myself appropriately? Stuff like that. You know,
Speaker 1: that was the parental stuff that they were into. How
Speaker 1: I played was up to me, and feedback to me
Speaker 1: as a player was up to my coaches, and for
Speaker 1: the most part they stayed out of that. I mean
Speaker 1: they would say good game, and hey, you really played
Speaker 1: well and all that stuff. But my dad really wanted
Speaker 1: to hear about, Hey, what was said in the locker
Speaker 1: room or what was said in the huddle. He liked
Speaker 1: stories like that, but he pretty much stayed out of that.
Speaker 1: And he was my dad, not my coach. And for me,
Speaker 1: when my son was playing au basketball or high school
Speaker 1: ball growing up or you know, I didn't tell him
Speaker 1: what to do. That wasn't my place. If he came
Speaker 1: to me and had had a question, I'd answer it,
Speaker 1: but that was his thing, not my thing. And you know,
Speaker 1: I was there to support him, not coach him or
Speaker 1: you know, be constant feedback. I didn't want there to
Speaker 1: be any pressure there because if he didn't want to
Speaker 1: play anymore, if he wanted to, you know, play baseball
Speaker 1: or soccer or something like that, fine, I was. I
Speaker 1: was there to support him, not have him do what
Speaker 1: I felt he should do. And so it's it's sort
Speaker 1: of walking that line of knowing your kid and and
Speaker 1: what's right for him. It's okay to emphasize things, and
Speaker 1: but you know I was I probably had the same
Speaker 1: experience as most others. You know, you think you know
Speaker 1: a little bit about basketball or something, and my son
Speaker 1: would come to my camp and that was the only
Speaker 1: time I felt like, well, I get to tell him
Speaker 1: what I think is because I would do that with
Speaker 1: any player at my camp. But it was always better
Speaker 1: when somebody else told it to him. If I said something,
Speaker 1: it didn't resonate as much as when somebody else said it.
Speaker 1: And I remember when he went to college. You know,
Speaker 1: I had told him in high school he had said something,
Speaker 1: and I said, well, you know it wouldn't wouldn't hurt
Speaker 1: you get a little stronger, you know, be a little
Speaker 1: bit more physical out there, and you don't need to
Speaker 1: go into the weight room. I mean, you do a
Speaker 1: hundred push ups in the morning, a hundred night, do
Speaker 1: some of these things to get a little bit stronger,
Speaker 1: because you know, strength on the court is a good thing.
Speaker 1: And after his freshman year at Wake Forest, he played
Speaker 1: at wake Forest, he came back and he says, you know, Dad,
Speaker 1: I really need to get stronger. And I was like, well,
Speaker 1: I wonder where I heard that before. But it doesn't
Speaker 1: you know, coming from a parent, it doesn't always resonate,
Speaker 1: and so sometimes other voices are actually better.
Speaker 2: I could speak to that, you know, when I was
Speaker 2: when I was an athlete in high school before college,
Speaker 2: my Dad couldn't tell me anything. I knew way more
Speaker 2: than him, And of course, in hindsight, you're like would
Speaker 2: an idiot, and it's it's tough. You're you're Jay Bilish,
Speaker 2: have all this experience, but you're still Dad. And that's
Speaker 2: a very common theme. I want to ask, like with
Speaker 2: regard to the education piece or maybe the content that
Speaker 2: you helped share with the parents, like have you had
Speaker 2: to really, you know, adjust here, particularly in the last
Speaker 2: few years as the portal and NIL has become such
Speaker 2: a now it's mainstream or whatever, but it's really been
Speaker 2: it seems like a crash course learning experience. Seems like
Speaker 2: the NCAA, everyone's still adjusting, you know, a lot of
Speaker 2: most people have no idea how to navigate it. So
Speaker 2: is that something that you incorporate in the parental education
Speaker 2: do you think you need to? And also, if you
Speaker 2: can expand a little bit, like how do you feel
Speaker 2: like in a pro and conway, the portal and NIL
Speaker 2: are impacting college sports, particularly you know, men's women's basketball.
Speaker 1: Well, the short answer to your question is, yes, we
Speaker 1: do incorporate all of those things. You know, my input
Speaker 1: in it is in helping your child pick the right
Speaker 1: school is really the environment you're putting your child into.
Speaker 1: And I think sometimes you can get a little wrapped
Speaker 1: up and you know, who wants your kid the most?
Speaker 1: Will your kid play there? What position? How much playing time? Early?
Speaker 1: Things like that, Those things don't really matter as much.
Speaker 1: What really matters is the right environment. And that's not
Speaker 1: just the locker room. It's not just the team. It
Speaker 1: goes to the entire school. And you know, I remember
Speaker 1: telling my son when he was looking is you know,
Speaker 1: one of the things you need to think about is
Speaker 1: what would your happiness look like if you stop playing basketball?
Speaker 1: What if you get hurt or what if you decide,
Speaker 1: you know, in an odd way, what if you decide
Speaker 1: you don't want to play anymore? Is that the right place?
Speaker 1: Is that the place you'd want to be, because it's
Speaker 1: about more than basketball or whatever sport your child is playing.
Speaker 1: And I think you do need to look at the
Speaker 1: locker room environment. What's the track record of players who
Speaker 1: have been there? Do they come back? Because you know,
Speaker 1: you are putting your kid into an environment where other
Speaker 1: people are going to impact your kid. But you remember,
Speaker 1: I try to emphasize this too. You know, even though
Speaker 1: you tell young people hey, work hard and put all
Speaker 1: your energy into this and all this stuff. I get
Speaker 1: all that, but to me, that's baked in the bottom
Speaker 1: line in this is this is supposed to be fun.
Speaker 1: Everybody got into this for fun. You know. I play
Speaker 1: a lot of golf, and I practice and I work
Speaker 1: at it, but I do it because it's fun and
Speaker 1: I want to get better at it so I can
Speaker 1: enjoy it more. It's not that I'm you know, I'm
Speaker 1: putting my entire identity into this kind of thing. And
Speaker 1: to me, the parents need to keep that in mind.
Speaker 1: When you go to a game, it's fun for you
Speaker 1: to watch your kid. It's supposed to be fun. It
Speaker 1: shouldn't be an agonizing experience, like you want your kid
Speaker 1: to do well because your kid wants to do well,
Speaker 1: not because you know it reflects somehow on you. And
Speaker 1: I think my parents were that way. They enjoyed going
Speaker 1: to the games and watching and being there and being
Speaker 1: a part of it. Their investment, you know, going back
Speaker 1: to the conducting yourself piece and the behavior piece, Like
Speaker 1: my parents got to tell me what to do at home,
Speaker 1: like they were boss at home, but when I was out,
Speaker 1: somebody else was in charge, and they were pretty respectful
Speaker 1: of that, and that was that was a line they
Speaker 1: walked that I really appreciated. I think I appreciated at
Speaker 1: the time, but definitely after and when I became a parent,
Speaker 1: I really appreciated it because that was my thing. It
Speaker 1: wasn't their thing, and they were supporting me in something
Speaker 1: I wanted to do and enjoyed doing. And it wasn't
Speaker 1: for them to be telling me what to do or
Speaker 1: how to you know, how to rebound or why didn't
Speaker 1: I go after that ball? You know, that's not their thing.
Speaker 2: It's interesting, though, because it seems as though and it
Speaker 2: always I guess you can always say it has been
Speaker 2: for the select few, where in some instances it's a
Speaker 2: business decision. I mean, particularly now where you know, you
Speaker 2: have kids signing you know, hundreds of thousand or a
Speaker 2: million dollars in some very rare instances and il deals,
Speaker 2: and I feel like the numbers and such get thrown
Speaker 2: around so much of it. People feel as though it's mainstream.
Speaker 2: It's like, well, you know, we got to prepare not
Speaker 2: only for potentially this university experience or this collegiate experience,
Speaker 2: but a way to market yourself and brand. And I
Speaker 2: think that that's all great, But how do you separate,
Speaker 2: you know, the business from the fund, Like I guess,
Speaker 2: how do you compartmentalize that? Particularly if you're a parent
Speaker 2: who doesn't happen maybe you didn't play in college, maybe
Speaker 2: this whole athletic thing is a whole new experience for you.
Speaker 2: And I feel like for some parents that may have
Speaker 2: played collegiate sports or even professional you know, they know
Speaker 2: how to kind of navigate that and juggle you know,
Speaker 2: the fun piece and the workpiece and all of these things.
Speaker 2: But how do you separate the business which is now?
Speaker 2: I mean, I mean I've talked to enough coaches they
Speaker 2: say it's a business. I mean, it is a business.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with that, But I think we tend
Speaker 1: to overcomplicate this a little bit because when you get
Speaker 1: right down to it, everything is a business decision. When
Speaker 1: you decide to go on vacation, it's a business decision.
Speaker 1: What can we afford, what's the best destination for us,
Speaker 1: where should we stay, what's the best value? Things like that,
Speaker 1: do we drive or do we fly? You know, all
Speaker 1: these things if you look at it that way, their
Speaker 1: business decisions. And for any student, let alone an athlete,
Speaker 1: for any student. It's a business decision, and it comes
Speaker 1: down to how much scholarship money, if any can I get?
Speaker 1: What is this going to cost? How far from home?
Speaker 1: Will my parents be able to come see me? Things
Speaker 1: like that, Can I get home? You know? Do I
Speaker 1: want to stay closer to home go further away? Does
Speaker 1: this place have the area of study? You know? How
Speaker 1: are they ranked in that? You know? What are my
Speaker 1: job prospects afterwards? If I go to this place for
Speaker 1: an initial job. The truth is most of these things
Speaker 1: don't matter as much as we tend to believe. I think,
Speaker 1: for I know that my kids. I have two kids,
Speaker 1: and their senior year in high school. You know, junior
Speaker 1: and senior year was not as pleasant as mine was.
Speaker 1: You know, when I was coming out of high school
Speaker 1: in the early nineteen eighties, you know, the discussion among
Speaker 1: my peers was are you going to college? It wasn't
Speaker 1: where are you going? And now it seems like there's
Speaker 1: so much status attached to where you go. And I
Speaker 1: actually did this with my son. I don't know whether
Speaker 1: it resonated with them or not, but I showed them
Speaker 1: a list of CEOs of American companies and where they
Speaker 1: went to college, and I said, show me the pattern.
Speaker 1: You know, there's no pattern to this, and it's it's
Speaker 1: not that it's not important where you go to school.
Speaker 1: It is important, but it's not outcome determinative. You can
Speaker 1: go anywhere and do extraordinarily well. You know, it's just
Speaker 1: what's the right place for you. And your question earlier
Speaker 1: about nil and the portal. Look, if somebody's making you
Speaker 1: an offer out of high school, an NIL offer something
Speaker 1: like that, that's fine, you can feel that offer. But
Speaker 1: you know, if it's just about money, you take the
Speaker 1: highest offer. If it's if it's about fit and where
Speaker 1: you go to school and where you're going to be happy,
Speaker 1: then maybe you're willing to take less money in order
Speaker 1: to go to the place you want to go. So
Speaker 1: it's a little bit of sliding scale, and that to me,
Speaker 1: the portal is of zero consequence when you're making your decision.
Speaker 1: You're not making your decision based upon Okay, you know,
Speaker 1: where will I go after this? You know that that
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense. The portal is of zero consequence.
Speaker 1: When you're deciding where to go, You go somewhere with
Speaker 1: the intention of staying, and if circumstances change, that's fine.
Speaker 1: But the way I tell people is is, you know,
Speaker 1: when you're coming out of high school and you're deciding
Speaker 1: where to go to college, you know that's your decision.
Speaker 1: Once you make that decision, you should be all in
Speaker 1: and all in for at least that first year. At
Speaker 1: the end of the year, then you can make a determination.
Speaker 1: Am I happy with this? Do I want to stay?
Speaker 1: Should I consider leave it? At the end of the year,
Speaker 1: that's fine, And then once you make that decison, then
Speaker 1: you need to be all in a gain, you know.
Speaker 1: I think those are important distinctions.
Speaker 2: When we come back, Jay and I discuss mental health
Speaker 2: awareness and the value of learning to stay present before
Speaker 2: we head to break, I have a question for you.
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Speaker 2: Team Snap customers with mid to large size organizations. Welcome back.
Speaker 2: Where we left off, Jay and I were about to
Speaker 2: talk about the lessons he learned from Coach k and
Speaker 2: what next play means to him. You mentioned the culture.
Speaker 2: You know, when you're making the choice of where to
Speaker 2: go to school, it's what type of environment is my
Speaker 2: child or am I going to be in? And I
Speaker 2: think a lot of that has to do with I'm
Speaker 2: my oldest son just went to University of North Carolina
Speaker 2: at Pembroke Division two school, really good, you know, top
Speaker 2: twenty wrestling program, and it was the perfect fit for him.
Speaker 2: I mean, he had a relationship that he built with
Speaker 2: the coach for years, even when he was in youth.
Speaker 2: He'd go there for youth camp and of course went
Speaker 2: recruiting time came. You know, the coach got on him
Speaker 2: really quick and they had that rapport and we love
Speaker 2: the coach and just you could tell the effort, just
Speaker 2: a great human being, and I checked all the boxes
Speaker 2: for him. When I went to college. I went to
Speaker 2: North Carolina wesley And College, a small Division three school
Speaker 2: at the time, was a you know, a national powerhouse,
Speaker 2: you know, competing for national championships. And at the time
Speaker 2: the coach was Mike Fox, who you know, went on
Speaker 2: to coach the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill for
Speaker 2: twenty two years as a retired you know, retired a
Speaker 2: few years ago as a Hall of famers, kind of
Speaker 2: one of the best coaches and highly regarded and ever
Speaker 2: in college baseball. I had no idea at the time
Speaker 2: when I was being recruited by him that that he
Speaker 2: was this, you know, going to be a legend. But
Speaker 2: I was fortunate to play for this guy, and I
Speaker 2: have a relationship to him to this day. I'm forever
Speaker 2: thankful for it. You got to play for Mike Krzyzewski,
Speaker 2: coach k you know, a legend, right, a legend among legends.
Speaker 2: Mount Rushmore type figures in coaching. So parents like often
Speaker 2: say or adults say, well, don't go to the coach.
Speaker 2: Don't let that be a major factor because coaches leave
Speaker 2: programs all the time. I, for one, think that that's
Speaker 2: a critical component of the environment, right the coach who's there.
Speaker 2: But with that said, with coaches at times, you know,
Speaker 2: going to other programs, how important is it for you
Speaker 2: or do you think parents should consider that coach because
Speaker 2: I think the coach relationship piece of it all is
Speaker 2: one of the most key components to success.
Speaker 1: Well, I tend to agree with you. I mean, when
Speaker 1: I was coming out of high school, I made my
Speaker 1: decision based solely upon the coach. And that may not
Speaker 1: have been the right thing, it was just the right
Speaker 1: thing for me. And when I committed to Duke, I
Speaker 1: you know, coach k didn't have the kind of success
Speaker 1: that he had later on, and and he was actually
Speaker 1: on a little bit of shaky ground at the time,
Speaker 1: remember that, and so but but I wanted to play
Speaker 1: for him. That made the difference for me. But Duke
Speaker 1: was a place I knew I could be happy with
Speaker 1: or without basketball. It was just basketball was the most
Speaker 1: important thing to me at the time. It doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that everything else wasn't important. That was just the most
Speaker 1: important thing. And so I think for anybody, you know,
Speaker 1: who you play for is important, but it's different for everybody.
Speaker 1: You know, every every person may and family may place
Speaker 1: a different UH have different priorities. So you know, if
Speaker 1: you do go you know, say I went to Duke
Speaker 1: because of coach K and after two years he decided
Speaker 1: to go coach somewhere else, or he got fired or
Speaker 1: whatever decided to leave, then I'd have to make a decision.
Speaker 1: But I can't. I didn't feel like making my decision
Speaker 1: at the time should be based on speculating out what
Speaker 1: could happen. I wanted to be on on what I wanted.
Speaker 1: I could always pivot if something did happen, but I
Speaker 1: wanted to make the best decision for me at the time.
Speaker 1: And so I do think it's important. And it's not
Speaker 1: that you don't look at stability or say, hey, you
Speaker 1: know this one coach that's recruited me, I like him
Speaker 1: the best, but he's only got a year left on
Speaker 1: his contract and they haven't renewed him and all that.
Speaker 1: You know, those are those are important considerations, but uh,
Speaker 1: there's no set rule for it, and that that's the
Speaker 1: that's the challenge is you have to you have to
Speaker 1: take all these variables into account and make your best decision.
Speaker 1: And you know I did that it happens all the time.
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean that you can't make a mistake or
Speaker 1: circums chances can't change. But you know, if you can play,
Speaker 1: you're going to have options. So it's not going to
Speaker 1: be that big of a deal. The problem is, or
Speaker 1: the challenges I shouldn't say problem, but you know, there
Speaker 1: are a lot of parents out there that, you know,
Speaker 1: they have a player that really wants it and wants
Speaker 1: to be recruited and wants to play at the highest level,
Speaker 1: and they're not getting the attention that they maybe feel
Speaker 1: that they should be, or they're not getting recruited, and
Speaker 1: they think, well, you know, I need to get my
Speaker 1: son or daughter seen. And you know, I get these
Speaker 1: questions all the time. And I had one parent, this
Speaker 1: one sticks out, came up and said, you know, I
Speaker 1: need to get my son seen. He hasn't been seen.
Speaker 1: And I asked him where do you live and he says, well,
Speaker 1: we live in Fairfax, Virginia. And I was like, you've
Speaker 1: been seen. Your son's been seen at one he's been
Speaker 1: seen here, but he's been seen. You know, if you
Speaker 1: were in some the outer reaches of North Dakota, I
Speaker 1: could understand. But just because your player hasn't blossomed yet
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that he or she's not going to. But
Speaker 1: you have to take the circumstances as they are. Perhaps
Speaker 1: division two or division three is where you start, and
Speaker 1: there are some players that my son was one of,
Speaker 1: really good high school player, fringe division one player, very
Speaker 1: good Division two player. So his decision was, do I
Speaker 1: go division two, where I can play right away and
Speaker 1: I'm going to play a lot, or do I go
Speaker 1: Division one where I may sit the bench my whole career.
Speaker 1: And he decided he wanted to go division one. He
Speaker 1: had a wonderful experience. But I told him, I can't
Speaker 1: I can't tell you the right answer. You're the one
Speaker 1: that's going to have to live with this. And if
Speaker 1: being on the floor all the time is important to you,
Speaker 1: if that's the most important thing, then you should go
Speaker 1: division two. If you want the full experience and the
Speaker 1: high level stuff and all that, then go division one
Speaker 1: and work your butt off and see what happens. But
Speaker 1: you have to prepare yourself for if this doesn't work
Speaker 1: out the way you want, are you're still going to
Speaker 1: be happy, And he was really happy.
Speaker 2: I think that's such a you talked about making the
Speaker 2: decision in the present, you know, and taking it. You
Speaker 2: can't speculate, you know. You can prepare for the future
Speaker 2: the best that you can. But we all get thrown curveballs,
Speaker 2: you know, every single day. I'm a father of six.
Speaker 2: I mean, God, I'm getting thrown knuckle curves and sliders
Speaker 2: and damn everything I can imagine every single day, sometimes
Speaker 2: minute by minute. So having a pivot as a parent
Speaker 2: is as you know, is just comes with the territory.
Speaker 2: And you've interviewed countless amounts of high level college athletes
Speaker 2: and professional athletes that have been around some of the
Speaker 2: best and competed against some of the best and been
Speaker 2: one of the best yourselves. How important is staying present?
Speaker 2: How important is being in the moment? Being locked in?
Speaker 2: And how do you get locked in for these big moments,
Speaker 2: whether it's a big game, a Final four, March madness,
Speaker 2: whatever it is, how do you as a competitor and
Speaker 2: is this something they should be working on, like staying
Speaker 2: present and do you think that helps performance?
Speaker 1: Absolutely? To me, it's just sort of priorities in concentration,
Speaker 1: and you concentrate on what you're doing at the time.
Speaker 1: You know, I remember when I was a high school player,
Speaker 1: you know, and you're a kid. You expect this kind
Speaker 1: of thing when you're older, that you would have gone
Speaker 1: through this. But I had a game one time and
Speaker 1: I did not have one of my better games. And afterwards,
Speaker 1: my dad said, was something bothering you? And I said, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I got all this stuff going on, and
Speaker 1: I had some tests coming up or all that, and
Speaker 1: I was distracted. And that was advice my dad would
Speaker 1: give me. He would say, it's okay for you to
Speaker 1: throw yourself in one hundred percent to your game because
Speaker 1: there's nothing you can do about that test while you're playing.
Speaker 1: Worrying about the test while you're playing did you absolutely
Speaker 1: no good. You're no better student by worrying about it,
Speaker 1: he said. But when the game's over, it doesn't do
Speaker 1: you any good to think about the game. After it's over,
Speaker 1: move on to the next thing, and then study for
Speaker 1: your test and get ready and all that stuff. You know.
Speaker 1: His thing was, you know, you prepare when it's time
Speaker 1: to prepare, and you perform when it's time to perform.
Speaker 1: And even even getting upset after game. If I if
Speaker 1: we'd lose a game, and I'd be all fired up,
Speaker 1: about losing. He said, what good is that doing you?
Speaker 1: He said, you should have been this fired up when
Speaker 1: you're playing. He said, being upset after the game didn't
Speaker 1: do you, and he good's over and uh and that,
Speaker 1: and he was really big on you know, how you
Speaker 1: behaved after the game. You know, I think sometimes competitiveness
Speaker 1: gets used as an excuse for bad behavior. So you
Speaker 1: lose a game and you know you're supposed to shake
Speaker 1: hands afterwards and be respectful of your opponent, and somebody
Speaker 1: you know, acts inappropriately and says, well, you know we lost.
Speaker 1: I'm a competitor. Well the competition's over. You know, the
Speaker 1: game was over, so the competition's over. So your competitiveness
Speaker 1: doesn't mean anything. After the game. It's time to you know,
Speaker 1: be sportsmanlike and accept the results and act appropriately. And
Speaker 1: he didn't accept, you know, competitiveness as an excuse behavior.
Speaker 2: That's a great point. I almost feel like the best
Speaker 2: competitors know how to turn that switch on and off.
Speaker 2: And that's a maturity thing I know I went through
Speaker 2: as a as a baseball player. It's like, I don't
Speaker 2: have to demonstrate to you how upset I am. You
Speaker 2: know what I mean, and make it seem like I
Speaker 2: care more than I do. I never haven't really thought
Speaker 2: about that in a long time. And I guess from
Speaker 2: a mental health piece, this is something I've seen you
Speaker 2: on your on your ex or Twitter feed. I know
Speaker 2: it's called X Now you talk a lot about you know,
Speaker 2: the mental health or you know, we hear that a lot.
Speaker 2: You know, the NCAA talking about the importance of mental
Speaker 2: healthier coaches and such talk about it. You know, here's
Speaker 2: some of the most renowned athletes, Michael Phelps, Simone Biles
Speaker 2: and many others, Kevin Love talking about the importance of
Speaker 2: mental health and compartmentalizing that. And it's a part of
Speaker 2: them working on themselves. How do you, as a as
Speaker 2: a parent, or or as you know someone who's around
Speaker 2: these athletes, how do you see mental health? And I
Speaker 2: guess coaches putting themselves or putting things in place to
Speaker 2: help student athletes work on their mental health. And and
Speaker 2: and I guess because coming vulnerable enough to talk about
Speaker 2: things that maybe twenty five years ago you could potentially
Speaker 2: be ostracized for coming out and being vulnerable and showing weakness,
Speaker 2: I guess weakness is strength, right, being able to be
Speaker 2: vulnerable and show those things. What are ways in which
Speaker 2: you're seeing the culture shift to emphasize the positivity and
Speaker 2: the strength in being aware of your mental health.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a really important question. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: issues for young people of depression, anxiety, things in that
Speaker 1: realm are more prevalent than they've ever been, and I
Speaker 1: think it's much tougher. I believe anyway, it's much tougher
Speaker 1: to be a young person now than it was when
Speaker 1: when I was a young person. They have more coming
Speaker 1: at them than we did, and more to deal with
Speaker 1: with social media, all these things that can be good things,
Speaker 1: but they can also be tremendous negatives if they're not
Speaker 1: handled the right way. And I look at Maybe this
Speaker 1: is overly simplistic, but I kind of look at mental
Speaker 1: health of the same way I do with with overall health,
Speaker 1: even physical health. That you know, if you're not feeling well,
Speaker 1: if you've got some sort of illness, cold, whatever, and
Speaker 1: you run down and tired and you don't feel right,
Speaker 1: stomach hurts, headache, well, people aren't hesitant to say I
Speaker 1: don't feel well. I need I need something here, I
Speaker 1: need I need help. You know, I think the stigma
Speaker 1: of issues of mental health are largely they've gone away,
Speaker 1: but they haven't gone away completely. And I think for
Speaker 1: young people, especially when they're dealing with with anything like that,
Speaker 1: to be open about it and to seek help is
Speaker 1: not a weakness, it's a strength. And I think for parents,
Speaker 1: you know, nobody knows their kid better than a parent,
Speaker 1: and I think being vigilant and making sure you're staying
Speaker 1: on top of you know, is everything okay, because sometimes
Speaker 1: you can assume that everything's okay, that your kid's got
Speaker 1: it completely together, and then you're you're somehow surprised when
Speaker 1: you find out it's not. Their clues and signs and
Speaker 1: things where you can you can step in and help,
Speaker 1: and uh, I think that's a big part of parenting,
Speaker 1: even when they go to college. You know, we had
Speaker 1: that experience. I know a lot of parents have, and
Speaker 1: you know, stand on top of it as best you
Speaker 1: can is important. And reading, you know, reading the te le's,
Speaker 1: reading the signs that maybe only you can see, that's
Speaker 1: that's vital.
Speaker 2: I think there's there's two less things I want to
Speaker 2: ask you. I'd be remiss to not say, you know,
Speaker 2: you got to play for you know one of the
Speaker 2: one of as I mentioned. You know, Coach K just
Speaker 2: a legend. Is there a piece of advice that he
Speaker 2: gave you when you were playing for me? Even even afterwards,
Speaker 2: I'm sure you still have an amazing relationship with them
Speaker 2: that has served you throughout life, because I often talk
Speaker 2: about how important that coach relationship is, as I mentioned,
Speaker 2: and is there something you extracted from playing for that
Speaker 2: has served you in life?
Speaker 1: The things that I learned from Coach K and that
Speaker 1: I use daily sometimes without even realizing it, they're probably
Speaker 1: too numerous to mention. One of the things that he
Speaker 1: was really good at and remain so now because it
Speaker 1: has been a forty plus year relationship that we've had
Speaker 1: and it's evolved over the years. You know, he never
Speaker 1: really gave me advice that told me what to do
Speaker 1: in decisions that I made, but he was always really
Speaker 1: good to help me ask myself the right questions so
Speaker 1: that I made an informed, you know, the informed decision.
Speaker 1: And usually you make an informed decision, you're going to
Speaker 1: make the right decision, at least the right decision for you.
Speaker 1: But you know, something that he said all the time
Speaker 1: when I was playing was he would constantly say, next
Speaker 1: play that whatever, just happened in that play, it's over.
Speaker 1: Move on to the next play, positive or negative, whatever
Speaker 1: just happened. Quit living in the past. You need to
Speaker 1: move on. And that served me pretty well. I say, next,
Speaker 1: play myself a lot in daily life.
Speaker 2: And I'll follow up on that. What are things that
Speaker 2: you'd recommend parents do as their kids are, you know,
Speaker 2: not only going through the recruiting process, but their youth
Speaker 2: and amateur sport experience. What should they be looking to
Speaker 2: extract aside from the performance piece that'll serve them in life? Like,
Speaker 2: how do we as parents teach our kids to extract
Speaker 2: these values that we get from sport, from teamwork to
Speaker 2: help serve them.
Speaker 1: Well, I think there are a couple of things. One,
Speaker 1: the relationship piece of participation in anything is the most
Speaker 1: important thing that at the end of it. And it's
Speaker 1: easy to say when you're pumping up on sixty years old.
Speaker 1: You know, I was just at a Hall of Fame
Speaker 1: induction for coach k and Johnny Dawkins, one of my
Speaker 1: best friends and my teammate from college. And you know,
Speaker 1: we weren't sitting around talking about games. You know, was
Speaker 1: a relationship thing. We've been friends forever and that's what endures,
Speaker 1: and the thing that makes it worthwhile are the people.
Speaker 1: And so I think you want to be mindful of
Speaker 1: that if you're playing AAU basketball and which is largely
Speaker 1: what we're talking about here, the experience is what's the
Speaker 1: most valuable. You know, twenty years from now, thirty years
Speaker 1: from now, you're not gonna be talking about the second
Speaker 1: game you play it on a Saturday in Orlando, you know,
Speaker 1: but it's going to be the experiences you had in
Speaker 1: the relationships and empathy for your teammates and your coaches,
Speaker 1: and the getting to know the parents. That those are
Speaker 1: the things that endure and make it worthwhile. And then
Speaker 1: the last part, the last thing I'll say on this
Speaker 1: is is I think it's important for your kids to
Speaker 1: know that no matter what, they're gonna be fine. Whether
Speaker 1: they get recruited by the place they've dreamed of or not,
Speaker 1: they're gonna be fine. And you know, if you put
Speaker 1: all your emotional eggs in that basket, you know there's
Speaker 1: nothing but disappointment that follows that, because this stuff, whether
Speaker 1: you go exactly where you want it or go somewhere else, uh,
Speaker 1: your your dreams will still come true. You just might
Speaker 1: not have dreamed it, you know that way, but uh,
Speaker 1: you know it may exceed your wildest dreams even though
Speaker 1: you you don't wind up where you want it or
Speaker 1: what you thought you wanted. This is a pretty you know,
Speaker 1: for any kid, this is a this is a really
Speaker 1: fun ride if you allow it to be. If you
Speaker 1: let other people's expectations or things like that get in
Speaker 1: your way, that that's that's when when problems surface.
Speaker 2: J Billis, I can't thank you enough for coming on.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 2: I love following you love your content. You know, besides
Speaker 2: your your x feed, your Twitter feed. Where where can
Speaker 2: people find you if they want to? You know, just
Speaker 2: just follow everything that you're putting out there.
Speaker 1: I think I'm on Instagram, TikTok Uh, there's there's too
Speaker 1: much of me out there. But yeah, that J billis
Speaker 1: at all those things. You're the man.
Speaker 2: I can't thank you enough for coming on.
Speaker 1: Bro, appreciate you my pleasure, Dinick, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: That's es Basketball analyst Jbillis. Thanks for listening to the
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