An excellent way to drive the point of shot selection across to your team is by using a “shooting scale.” We first got the idea from Cal Bailey, a baseball coach at West Virginia State College who used a “hitting scale” for his team. If you hit a line drive you scored a 6. If you hit the ball fairly hard you scored a 5. A good hard grounder got you a 4 and so on. The theory was that it didn’t matter if you were getting hits as long as you were hitting the ball well. Continue to hit the ball well and the base hits will eventually come your way. Cal explained that he thought players focused too much on their batting averages. A player may go 0 for his last 8 and even though he is hitting the ball well sees his average decline and might start tinkering with his swing. Cal wouldn’t give his players their batting average but their scale average. Just another reason why he is one of the best baseball coaches in the nation. For basketball, we might play 5/5 or 4/4 and instead of keeping the traditional score, the staff will rank the type of shot using the following formula:4 = Lay-Up
3 = Open Jumper for Good Shooter
2 = Decent Shot
(Open for Average Shooter/Contested for Good Shooter)
1 = Bad Shot
0 = Turnover
By using this formula to keep score, especially if you run the losing team, you will find the players concentrating more on getting good shots. We also occasionally use this to chart shot selection after a game. It is important to do it both after a game where your shot selection is excellent as well as one when it is not up to your standard so they can see the contrasting score.
