³ÉÈËÂÛ̳

Colin Jackson: In the NBA (National Basketball Association) there are a lot of really good players, but what makes a great player?

Ron Adams: First of all you need the right genetics. Some people are naturally better athletes than the next person. We don't have many superstars, we have a few. To be a superstar you need a combination of the will to be successful and the will to work, because no one is successful without that. Along with that you need a mental edge. You need to be in tune more than the next person.

I'm a tennis player so I follow it a lot. It's amazing how even the tennis competition is with both men and women. There are many, many good players. What separates them is their mental strength. Obviously basketball is a bit different. If you're seven feet tall then that's going to give you a bit of an edge.

CJ: What do you look for in a player?

RA: Consistency is the key thing that any coach or general manager looks for. In the NBA we have a few superstars, a lot of good players, a lot of average players and some below average players. Even the average players in this league, who have maxed out in terms of their mental and physical ability, are consistent. Every night when they come to the floor I know what I can expect from them, which you need when you play at a very high level.

The idea in sport is to max out. You need to develop a tremendous work ethic so that you're fit as a fiddle and your mind is clear. You need to have studied your sport so that you have a deep understanding of it.

One of the things we try to do with our younger players is help them understand that this is their job. You have to know it inside out. You have to know the rules and read the situations. Anyone can become a great player by my definition of the term. It wouldn't be everyone's definition, but great to me is someone who has taken whatever God's given them, as far as ability goes, and reached their potential - they've maxed out.

CJ: How good is Luol Deng?

RA: Luol's a very good player with star quality. In our team he's a star because we don't have all stars. Luol is a physically and mentally gifted player because he has great drive and a fantastic work ethic. In off-season he does pilates, yoga, works with his strength coach and improves the areas that need improving. He's a very young player but he can go as far as he wants to. He's got drive, a work ethic, vision and he has good intelligence on the basketball court.

CJ: How do you keep your players grounded and focused on the job in hand?

RA: Motivation is extremely important. The secret to motivation is selecting motivated people. As a coach the hardest thing you can do is take a non-motivated person and motivate them. I try to draft people who are motivated. You want to select someone who, once they're paid, remains motivated.

One of the problems with high level sports, when there is a lot of money involved, is selecting people who love the game. People should be motivated by their love of the game, and by an awareness of what is expected of them once they're given a big pay cheque. That's an issue in our league. Sometimes people are paid and they think they've hit the lottery. That's something you try to stop through your player selections.

CJ: How do you work out a strategy for a big game?

RA: I'm one of three assistant coaches. We're each responsible for ten games. We prepare our scan report and a game plan, which is approved by the head coach and handed to the players in a simpler form. The players also receive a detailed analysis of each person they are playing against, whether the person drives left or right most of the time, what their shooting and defensive skills are and so on.

Veteran players develop a feel for everyone they play against through experience, but younger players don't have that. On a typical game day we'll do a little bit of shooting and go through our opponent's offensive plays. We'll discuss and work on defensive plays that are different from what we normally do.

The first players come onto the court for their individual warm-ups at about 5pm for a 7.30pm game. After that we go to the locker room and watch an edited tape of the team we're playing - their plays and so on. We do a lot of preparation on the day of the game. Those times are valuable because we play a lot of games in a short period of time and you don't get to do or say some of the things you'd like to.

CJ: I didn't realise how important statistics are in basketball, how do players adapt to that aspect of their preparation?

RA: A lot of college players think the NBA is just about running up and down the court and having fun. It's a very sophisticated game compared to the college league. If you're running a couple of nice plays they work for two weeks, and then your opponents will shut them down by playing them differently. There are a lot of nuances to the game which makes it interesting.

CJ: How much do statistics help you with your job?

RA: Statistics can be helpful but they can also be a bit misleading. You may have a player without outstanding statistics who is your most stable player and the glue to your starting five or your top eight players. You can't just look at statistics. The scorers score and the passers can pass but that doesn't tell the whole story. You can be the scorer on a bad team but that doesn't mean you can score against good teams at a higher level.

CJ: Do the players look at match statistics and go 'Come on guys I had more rebounds than you, what's going on?'

RA: I'm sure that happens a lot. In some cases players try to justify certain things through statistics. I think they're important to a point but they can't explain team chemistry. It's that side of things that has always made basketball a very intriguing game for me.

CJ: What's more important - talent or attitude?

RA: That's a tricky one. There have been very talented teams in our league with a collective bad attitude and they've won. I would say that the trick is getting the talented person with the good attitude and the good mentality.

Attitude will get you so far, but then talent has to kick in and carry you through. Likewise talent will get you so far and then the attitude has to kick in to get you to championship calibre. If you look at the teams that have won the NBA Championship recently - like San Antonio, they have a very good combination of athleticism, skill and attitude. You need people who want to win and to play as part of a team.