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Introduction
Are you a dedicated athlete who trains rigorously but finds yourself stuck in a performance rut? Do you feel like you have untapped potential waiting to be realized? This article is for you. Often, athletes struggle not because they lack effort, but because they haven't trained the right skills. They haven’t trained the right skills because they haven’t properly assessed themselves. The key to breaking through performance barriers and excellerate improvement lies in proper player assessment.
These are the 5 steps to create your very own player assessment:
Step 1: Learn what a player assessment is
Step 2: Know the performance dimensions
Step 3: Learn when to train strengths and weaknesses
Step 4: Asking yourself proper assessment questions
Step 5: Using our basketball player assessments
What is a Player Assessment
Step 1
Player assessments involve deriving descriptive insights by observing performance behaviour and analyzing statistical data.¹ It's about interpreting the numbers to understand your current skill level and charting a course for future improvement. While anyone can conduct an assessment, those with a deeper knowledge of the sport can offer the most accurate evaluations.
Statistics (like FG%, steal per game, etc.) provide a foundation for the assessment of tangible skills meaning skill that are measureable. Other skills, like effort, confidence, and focus, aren't as quantifiable on a box score sheet. This is why they are called intangible skills or skills that are harder to measure. To assess them, you can directly rate these skills from a scale of 1-10. For example, "from 1-10, how focused are you in general in competition?"
Another way to assess intangible skills is by simply reflecting on specific game scenarios. For instance, if you turn the ball over off your leg with no one guarding you multiple times a game, that might be a sign of low focus.
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The Four Performance Dimensions
Step 2
Athletes can evaluate themselves across four main areas (I call these areas performance dimensions) to enhance their game:
Mental: confidence, determination, resilience, and positive attitude.
Technical: Sport-specific skills like shooting and dribbling in basketball, or tackling in football.
Tactical: Strategies, decision-making, and understanding of game dynamics. These are skills like watching game-film, learning the scouting report and memorizing team plays.
Physical: Attributes displaying athleticism such as speed, strength, agility, and endurance.
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Player Assessment Questions
Step 3
To create your player assessment, ask yourself targeted questions for each performance dimension to identify areas for improvement and tailor your training regimen accordingly.
A question you can ask yourself is: how good am I at {insert skill here} compared to my peers (basketball players your age)? For example:
Technically, "How good am I at {shooting/rebounds/dribbling} compared to my peers?"
Physically, "How {fast/strong/quick/agile} am I compared to my peers?"
Mentally, "How {confident/motivated/composed/calm/resilient/mentally tough} am I compared to my peers?"
Tactically, "How much/well do I {execute/memorize plays/remember the scouting report/do I watch game film} compared to my peers?"
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Strengths vs. Weaknesses
Step 4
An assessment reveals both your strengths and weaknesses, providing opportunities for growth. While focusing on weaknesses may seem daunting, persistent efforts yield significantly more benefits than improving strengths. Working on strengths, on the other hand, will be less work however it will yield you less performance gains.
Generally, you should allocate more time towards strengths and minor weaknesses during the season and address major weaknesses in the offseason.
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Conclusion
An accurate assessment of an athlete's skill can take the guesswork out of training. Assessments provide a roadmap for growth, allowing athletes to focus their efforts where they will yield the greatest impact when skill training.
Try Our Free Basketball Assessments
Step 5
Ready to improve your game? Take our 5 question quiz to get a personalized assessment of both your physical talent and mental performance in the game of basketball. Also, you will get recommendations for free resources to better your play!
If you want an even more in-depth assessment of 3 of the 4 performance dimensions, try our free mental training course. In this free course, you will:
obtain a list of 75 skills to self-assess your game
get a workbook with 4 mental performance exercises
get 2 course videos learning the number one skill in basketball
find the number one problem preventing you from playing your best
This course will help you realize how easy it is to normalize your best performance right now! Embark on your journey to become the best right now!
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