Matt Alwine
February 13, 2013
English
30 Days of the Association
“Just play. Have fun. Enjoy the game.” This quote is from the best basketball player in the world, Michael Jordan. I kept this quote in my mind while I did my 30 day challenge. It took me many days to think of what to do for my 30 day challenge, I changed my mind many different times. When I finally thought of something that I was actually excited about, I stuck with it and decided to do it. For the 30 days I am going to play basketball every day, so I can try and improve my basketball skills. I am not only going to work on just shooting; I am also going to work on my athletic ability, jumping, passing, leadership, foul shots, and shooting. For the 30 days I will be trying many activities to improve the areas I have just listed. My research question will be: In 30 days can I improve my athletic ability, jumping, passing, leadership, foul shots, and over all shooting? I will try to improve my skills over the next 30 days by doing many things that I have done my research on and found drills and practices. While I try and improve my overall basketball skills I will also improve my overall health but I will not record it because that is not my main goal.
Playing basketball for 30 days will not be hard for me because I use to play basketball every day when I was in high school however when I came to Ball State I have maybe played three times all year. I have played basketball for most of my life and I want to get back into the routine. For many people going to the gym and hitting the bag for a while is the way they go and blow off steam, but for me basketball is a way to clear my head and relax. I choose to play basketball for 30 days because I love basketball and it will relax me from all of the stress that college puts on my shoulders, and also I want to have fun while doing an English project. I am going to keep track of my progress through a blog where I will write a blog post every so often. In my blog posts that I will be explaining my progress and what I did every day.
I am writing this paper for those people who think they are the best at basketball, but in reality they can improve. I am going to show them that they can improve their game, even if it’s a small improvement. The only thing that I will need for this experiment is a basketball. Since Conner Metzger is doing basketball we will go to the gym and play basketball together. However, he is working on improving his shots and I am not, but I can still plays basketball when he does even though we are not doing the same topic. I researched many different ways to improve my basketball skills and found more research into the drill side of improving. I am more focused on individual aspects that aspects are needed when playing basketball. For any of my readers that read this research I would like them to be able to improve their basketball skills as well as having fun and getting in shape.
Lit review I did my research on what it takes to become a better basketball and I found many sources that will fit perfect in my paper. Once I found these sources I categorized them into four topics. I separated them into a shooting category, an overall improvement, a drill category, and a miscellaneous category. In the shooting category I found a few sources that will help improve my shooting. The overall improvement category contains sources that don’t have to deal with shooting but still are about improving my basketball skills. The next category is a miscellaneous category, and the miscellaneous category is a mixture of sources that deal with improving basketball skills without involving actually playing basketball. The final category I chose to separate my sources into is all about drills to help improve my basketball skills. In the shooting section I have an article that was written to help Tricks of the Trade for Basketball (Improving2004). There is no author of this text however the steps were created by Peter Greider and he is a M.ED and use you do work with the NBA team Orlando Magic. He is very knowledgeable in the subject of basketball and that will help me in my 30 day challenge. This research is not as in-depth as the other research I found. It doesn’t go in to detain on every little thing and it doesn’t have proof but I still want to try it because it seems like it couldn’t hurt my free throw percentage. This article will fit into my research when I talk about the improvements in my free throw shooting. The next source I found that has to do with shooting is called 7 tips to Improve Your Shooting Mechanics (Haefner2012). The author is Jeff Haefner and he has his own basketball site that has many options to choose from about improving your skills. This site is most likely meant to be seen by anyone who wants to improve their skills. Since I am trying to improve my skills I wall use this source in my paper. This source is going to give me advice on how to improve my shooting mechanics. Haefner will help me prove my point if the 7 help or not.
From the research that I have done, I have come to the conclusion that if I continue following the tip in the research I will improve my shooting percentage and over all shooting ability. If I do the drills and practice every day, I am going to improve my form and my fitness level. The downside to trying to improve my shooting is that my arms may become sore and injured. The next category that I separated my research into is the overall improvement category. In the overall improvement category I choose to put sources that would help improve all aspects of my basketball game, but that wasn’t about improving my shooting. The first article was written by Ignacio Roman. There is not much information about him but after doing research into Roman I found many studies that are all along the same topic of sports. The article that I used is intended to be read by sports players’ ages 17-18 years old who want to learn ways to improve their basketball skills. The source is useful because it tells me how I can improve my skills. I can use this source in my findings after playing basketball for 30 days to report if his finding helped me improve my game or not. The source brings up the relationship between exercise intensity and performance (Roman09).
The next source I found that is about improving my overall basketball games is called the effect of a balance and proprioception training program on amateur basketball players' passing skills. This article will fit in my paper good because I am a good passer and I know what it takes to be a good passer and I agree with this research. However, I did not know everything about passing so I will be able to work on my passing skills with this research. This document will help improve my overall basketball game, but that not it. I am expecting to also improve my balance after following some of the tips that are brought up in this article (JournalofPhysicalEducation&Sport12). After reading some research that I found online about overall improvement, I have decided that I should see it easier to balance and jump. At the end of my 30 day challenge I should have stronger legs. The downside that arose in these sources includes things such as; soreness in legs, fatigue, stiff limbs and tiredness. At the end of the 30 day I will compare what is expected to happen and what actually occurred. The following category that I separated my research into is drills. This category is a few drills that I found after researching. These drills will help improve my basketball game. The first article I found was written by a company that offers many different drills to improve your basketball skills. The staff is involved in training and research into basketball tips. The source will be used in my paper to show that I will try a few of the drills I found on this site. This site is not like the others sites I found because the staff of this company is dedicated to help people improve their skills. Unlike the other sources, this source has no research or experiments. There are no formulas or numbers; it is more connected with the reader (Basketball4all12). The next source I found and put in the drills category is called One-Person basketball drills. This article is written by James Patterson and he is an author who specializes in writing about health topics. This piece of work was intended to have an audience who are dedicated basketball players who have time to play basketball and are willing to do drills to improve their game. I will try some of the drills that he has talked about and I will write about how they improved me basketball game. I have other sources that have to deal with doing drills and this one will be just like the other sources I found (Patterson2010). In the drills category I will try some of the drills that were mentioned in the sources and I will see if the help me improve. The last but not least category is the miscellaneous category. The miscellaneous category is comprised of research that will help improve my life. The first article I found that was placed in the miscellaneous category is titled how to motivate yourself into an exercise routine you’ll actually stick to. The source was written by Alan Henry and he is a reporter for the website Life Hacker. Alan intended this article to be read by people who are trying to get into doing something every day, like myself. This article will help me start my paper because I plan on talking about the difficulties that I face while playing basketball for 30 days. This article will fit well alongside the other sources I will use because it goes along with my objective and helps me talk about the mindset it took me to play basketball for 30 days (Henry2012). The next source in the miscellaneous category was written by an article wrote by Jessica Padykula. The article is about why you should workout with a friend opposed to working out by yourself. I found that Jessica has many topics that she writes about. Most of her work is about how to do something or why to do something. This article is going to fit well into my paper because I am going to play basketball with a fellow peer who is also playing basketball. Playing with another guy will motivate me to be better than him. I don’t have a piece of work that talks about exercising with a friend so this is the first source that is on this topic and will still fit into my paper (Padykula2012). The main improvement that I am looking to get out of the article in the miscellaneous category is just improving my health and life. The articles in the miscellaneous category are all intended to improve my life in different ways.
Method
In the past 30 days of playing basketball I worked on improving my athletic ability, jumping, passing, leadership, foul shots, and shooting. Every day I worked on different aspects and I did different drills. To work on my athletic ability I ran on the treadmill and partook in pick-up games. By running on the treadmill I have improved my speed and cardio. I ran on the treadmill every day for about 45 minutes at a fast-jog/ slow run. I noticed that after the first few days of running my legs were very weak, but I didn't want to slow down so I kept running. This has improved my speed on the court and I can now run longer and stay involved in the plays instead of standing outside and watching. Also to improve my athletic ability, I practiced breathing patterns to save energy. Another way I improved my athletic ability was by airing the correct shoes that were made for basketball.
While I improved my athletic ability I have in return improved my jumping. After running on the treadmill for 45 minutes my legs have become stronger and I can now jump higher than I could before. Running on the treadmill isn’t the only thing I did to improve my jumping, I also did this drill where I jumped on and off of these box type things with weights on my back. At the beginning I didn’t notice any improvement but as I did this drill many times over the 30 days I have noticed my legs have become stronger and I can control my jump better. The biggest thing I have noticed from doing this drill is I have improved my jumping height and also I have improved the time it takes to recover from one jump to another. This has helped my basketball skills in more than one way. Improving my jumping has made my inside rebound game, shot blocking and also improved my offence side because I can go to the goal harder and stronger. I leaned this drill from a source called Impact of Different Training Methods to Maximum Vertical Jump Height in Junior Basketball Players.
To improve my passing skills I got a basketball and went to the rec center to practice a drill that I used when I played basketball in high school. I actually did two different drills, the first one is where I threw the ball at a target on the wall and moved in a circle around the target. The second drill is a passing drill with a partner. I throw the ball to him and he throws it back, while passing the ball to each other we run up and down the court many times and eventually we speed up our passing.
By far the easiest part of improving my basketball game was improving my leadership. To improve my leadership I watched many different basketball games. This was so easy because I like to watch basketball games and watched games before this project. I didn't have to do anything different than I did before. Also by improving the other aspects of my basketball game I improved my leadership at the same time because basketball is a team sport and you have to do what's best for the team.
Foul shots are one of my biggest strengths, and I was a good foul shooter before I started this 30 day challenge. The only thing that I did to improve my foul shots was by improving my pre-shot ritual. I learned this from Improving Your Free Throw Percentage Using a Pre-Shot Ritual how to improve shooting free throws and I created my own foul shot ritual (Tricks2004). The next part that I was trying to improve was my shooting. Before this 30 day challenge I was not a good shooter. I have never been able to shoot and I followed tips that were given by my high school coach and 7 tips to Improve Your Shooting Mechanics (Haefner2012). I went to the gym and just practiced my shot for hours and hours. I took my time to get a shot method that worked for me.
Results
During the first week of playing basketball I wanted to find the starting base for all of my stats and I have made a table to show my base line. Running (Minutes) | 74 Minutes | Jumping (Minutes of drill) | 35 Minutes | Number of games played | 4 Games | Number of games watched | 6 Games | Free-throw (percentage) | 60% |

For the first week of playing basketball for 30 days I tried to find the perfect balance between school work and playing basketball. During week one I focused the most of my time school work but I still managed to go to the rec center and play basketball every day for as long as I wanted. In week two I wanted to try and go to the gym for a longer amount of time because I noticed that I had enough free time after finishing school work to play basketball. Like week one I went to the gym every day to play basketball and work on improving my basketball game.
At the Rec center, Conner Metzger and I put up a few shots before playing a few games. After playing basketball I went to the pool to swim a few laps. I swam because it helped improve my Cardio and strengthen my legs. Swimming wore me out and made me tired. Also during my second week of playing basketball for 30 days, I did many of the same drills as I did in the first week. I ran on the treadmill, watched basketball games, and did jumping and dribbling drills. I shot 20 free-throws and made 75% of them. I ran on the treadmill about an hour and a half throughout the week. I noticed an improvement since the first week. I can now breathe easier and last longer. I also watched four games on TV and I noticed many things that helped me improve my leadership and basketball IQ. I played four basketball games through the week and I really have noticed an improvement in my ball handling and Cardio. By the second week I felt like this 30 day challenge has helped improve my basketball skills so far.
During week three of my 30 day challenge I didn't play as much basketball as I did in the other weeks. I played the same amount of games than usual but they didn't last as long as they normally did. I played five games and watched five games. I made 72% of my free throws. I put up 25 shots. I was really surprised that my percentage is going up very little. I didn't plan on seeing that much improvement over the 30 days. Instead of running on the treadmill I walked on it for two hours throughout the week. I walked instead of ran because I cleared my head and focused about midterms. I did my normal drills that I have done the past two weeks, just not as much because I studied of school work for midterms. In the Final week of the 30 day challenge I figured that since I didn't play much in week three, I would go extra hard. I played eight games, swam, watched 8 games, ran over 3 hours, and made 75% of my free-throws. I feel like I have improved over the last 30 days.
From the start I did not have a set out in stone research plan to follow. Through the month I just played basketball when I had free time. I played basketball for all 30 days and I feel like I improved many aspects of my basketball game. I feel like the 30 days was a complete success. I achieved improvement in my basketball game and also my life. I was to measuring the improvement in my life but I defiantly know I improved my life. During the third week of playing basketball I can say that I did not try as hard as I could have. I can’t blame it on midterms because when I look back at what I did in my free time I realize I could have spent it playing basketball or improving any other aspect of my basketball game.
Discussion
From the beginning I asked myself one question that I was trying to achieve and that question was, In 30 days can I improve my athletic ability, jumping, passing, leadership, foul shots, and over all shooting? So now that I am at the end of the 30 days I think I can answer that question. My answer to the question would be, YES!!! I was looking to improve in most of my basketball game, and I feel like I have improved in every category. From the beginning I wasn’t expecting a huge improvement in my free throw shooting but over the 30 days I have noticed that I improved my free throw shooting. In my research I was told that I would be sore and tired and over the course of the 30 days I can now call that true. I was sore and tired every night that I went to bed earlier than normal and I slept better that I use to before the 30 day challenge. I have learned over the last month that I was not in shape, at all. The last 30 days have improved my heath that I will now be more concerned about my health and body. The challenge also showed me that I am not as in shape as I thought I was. It also showed me that my bad knee will hold me back when I do too much. My knee started hurting some days but I just muttered through it and kept pushing. However, that was not the smartest idea I have ever had.