Transcription
You know a basketball brain. When we study players, we're trying to get into their psychology. We look at how they move. We look at their facial expressions. We do research on what they believe. We look at interviews they've given. We see what teammates say about them. And today, we want to dissect two diametrically opposed styles that are both effective, but again, very different. We could call one the furious style, and the other one the joyous style. And two players really in these two styles of play perfectly. And one is Kobe Bryant, and the other is Steph Curry. And as you can guess, the furious style is Kobe Bryant. Let's check him out and see what we mean by the furious style.
Clock at six. Bryant for three. Puts it in. Kobe Bryant from downtown, and the Lakers regain the lead. Look at the on his face. So let's watch this in slow-mo one more time and just watch the fire in his eyes and the fury and the rage that he plays with. You know, it's really fun to study these two because sports were created for two reasons. One was to express that inner joy we have in our hearts, the fun of life, the camaraderie we feel around our friends when we compete, and even people we don't know, sort of bringing humanity together. The other side of sports was to channel the ferocity we have inside. Quite frankly, the kill instinct, the violence within us, the rage. And nobody embodies that channeling of rage more than Kobe Bryant. And nobody embodies that channeling of joy more than Steph Curry, as we'll see shortly.
Now, the truth is, you don't see many players play with this level of intensity night in and night out. Guys have flashes of it. Now, the downside to this sort of intensity is, and you've seen this in Kobe Bryant's career, is it can lead to overt trying. When you have that much energy flowing through you, it can lead to trying to do too much. And Kobe has acknowledged that he plays his best when he's right at that edge. You know, when he's right at that point where he could blow up and try to take over the game. But when he's really in his rhythm, he's right at that boiling point, but he doesn't boil over. So you take all of that inner fury and you direct it. And when you do, you start to dominate the game. You begin to send a message. And it's a very alpha male message. And everyone around you reacts to it because in this day and age, to be frank, men really don't have that anymore, or at least don't display it. So when you come on the court with that swagger, not like the young kids talk about swag, but real swagger, that confidence, that fury, it sets the tone and it puts you in the zone. But you have to control it.
Let's watch one more clip of Kobe and I'll show you what I mean by what it does to the players around you. About 30, 35 feet. Bryant again taking charge. Kobe all the way. Puts it up and scores. And the foul. Bryant going to work. He, he's starting to really feel like he has to assert himself now, tired legs or not. So what you see here when Kobe goes to the hole, gets fouled, there's a few things you want to notice. Look at everyone around him. They're demoralized by his energy because his energy is so focused and so great. Everyone else kind of looks like two-bit players. They're the background, he's the foreground. He's the one you're going to keep your eye on when you're watching this game. Even if you don't know anything about basketball, he's more tuned in than everybody else. He's completely, completely in the zone. And also, when you watch this, we talk a lot at basketball brain when we work with players about your body tempo. Now, just watch the speed with which Kobe moves. Now, Jordan had that bounce to him, but Kobe keeps his body tempo. The way he walks, the pace with which he walks is really a little bit faster than everybody else, but not out of control. It's that walk you have when you have confidence. It's, it's the energy of the game when you're in control. You know, if you've ever been, uh, doing anything where you feel very confident, notice how much faster you move, or when you're excited to do something, like your body is just, you're, you're clicking on all cylinders psychologically and physiologically. And you'll notice that everyone else on the floor is just kind of moving slowly, even his own teammates. So let's say your team's down, right? What you can do to be like Kobe Bryant is immediately start walking faster, talk faster, and make your face, uh, take the sort of orientation of an of an intense focus. Make your eyes have fire in them rather than dead eyes. Sometimes getting confidence in a game that's not going your way is as simple as saying, "All right, I'm changing my face. I'm getting locked in. I'm getting determined." So Kobe's playing with this enormous amount of fury that's channeled appropriately.
And now let's switch and find an equally effective way to play, but a much different style of play. And of course, we're talking about Steph Curry of the Golden State Warriors. Driving. No go. Last shot to win it. Steph on the sideline. It's seven at five at four. Curry to win. Good. Good. What T left? He did it. [Applause] Again. [Applause] So you can see it's kind of different styles, right? Especially as the highlights keep going, you see some more of Curry's celebration style. It's funny compared to Kobe, but it's not any less effective. Now, Curry is going to sort of build you up during the game. You know, if you're a teammate, you might like Curry better. You might be more fun to play with. Gets the crowd going in a different way. But that's not taking anything away from Kobe because a lot of your teammates, a lot of players need that alpha male to pull them forward and and get them into the game. Curry hits a game-winner, and he smiles. Kobe hits a game-winner, he scowls. Curry celebrates with a lot of jubilation. Kobe celebrates with a lot of fierceness. Curry's more like Steve Nash in a lot of ways.
Now, the downside of playing like Curry is the opposite of Kobe in that when you're mellow and play with joy, then there's a chance that you're going to under-try. And I think we saw that from Curry in the finals, and we've seen it before. He's so mellow, he's so Yin in the sense that he wants to stay in the rhythm of the game and really be patient, let the game come to him. That sometimes the game passes him by and he hasn't made an impact. Now, during the regular season, this doesn't happen too often, and he doesn't always do this. But when you're in the playoffs, sometimes it takes an exertion of your willpower to impose your will on the game. As commentators always say, Kobe Bryant starting to impose his will now. What you probably want to do is Kobe should play more like Steph, probably during the first three quarters, right? Melo, let the game come to him. But Curry probably should play like Kobe in the fourth quarter, especially when the game is close or they're down. He needs to exert his will, his his superior skill set. In game six against the Thunder, it was Klay Thompson who said, "I'm going to impose my will on this game."
Now, both Curry and Kobe, when they're in their zone, kind of, even though they're using different energies of joy and rage, play with a sort of great body tempo, right? Curry's might be a little bit slower, but it's still overall, they have more energy than the guys around them. Now, you have to watch Curry because sometimes he's so passive, it's he slows down too much. So it's rare when you see Curry lose his temper, like he did in the finals and threw his mouthpiece. And it's kind of weird to see Kobe come out and play lethargic. But they, this isn't written in stone, but these are their overall kind of demeanors and personalities when they play. That's what we're talking about, their their typical style, even though they may drift away from these styles occasionally. And you'll notice also, whether you play with joy or rage, Steph and Kobe don't talk trash at all, really, until after the play. That's when they talk to the crowd, after the deed is done. Very few players talk trash before they hit the shot, before they, you know, break somebody's ankles. They do it after. But the, when you're really in the zone, and the only reason I'm addressing this is because we get a lot of questions about it, to get in that type of zone, to be able to talk trash, there's a secret to it. And there's another podcast if you search for basketball brain trash talk, that'll teach you the secret of talking trash. And that is, I can give it to you very quickly. As the words come out of your mouth, there's sort of just vibrations to you. So your own words don't mean anything to you. So it's kind of like, like a virus that you send out, and you let it infect the other player without having to live up to your own trash talk. That's the secret to talking trash. So if I say, "You can't guard me," to me, that's just sound. The words don't even mean anything. I'm just sending that sound out. Now, he's going to take that as, "Oh yeah, he thinks I can't guard him." And now he's going to over-try. But in my mind, I'm staying in the rhythm of the game. Sorry for that little diversion, but let's watch Kobe one more time just to note the difference of the intensity between these two players, or the different types of intensity that they have.
So if I could leave you with any words of advice, it's this: Make sure you have both styles in your game. And that might change from night to night. Sometimes you're going to want to play with joy. Other times, you're going to want to play with fury. During the beginning of the game, I think it's very important to stay mellow, play at a level seven, 7.5 out of 10, if that makes sense to you. If you take the full basketball brain program, it will. You play at that kind of mellow, Steph Curry, Yin level. Let the game come to you. But in the fourth quarter, if it's a close game, you start to switch that Kobe mode. If your team's a little flat, you, you amp it up to like an 8.5 on the energy level, sometimes at a nine. You still stay in your rhythm, but but you start to exert your will upon the game. You start to change the dynamics of the game. You become the alpha male of the of the pack, and your teammates will follow you. They'll feed off that energy. They will, or they're going to get left behind. But the right players and the coach will start to notice who's in with you, who's going with you, and who's not. And he's going to make the proper substitutions. So basketball is an art. Some games you're going to want to play like Kobe. Some games you're going to want to play like Steph. There's no science to this. You have to have, you, you have to have an intuition and do what you feel is best. Usually, it's good to start the game with that mellow, even joyous sort of mentality. Be easy and light-hearted about the game. And as you establish your rhythm, at that point, you kind of switch to the Kobe mode, or toward the end of the game, depending on what your team needs. And it's as simple as changing your body language. Usually, by changing your body language, your facial expressions, and your body tempo, you can change your energy level. And when you change your energy level, the game changes. You can model Kobe's body language. You can model his face. By model, we mean copy, imitate. You can model Curry's body language, the way he moves, the way he breathes. And just by modeling their body language, and this is based on a lot of research as well, just by modeling their body language, you actually will start to think think as they do and feel as they, they do. So if you know you were to act really sad and pout a sad face, you did that long enough, you'd start feeling sad. If you were to just smile all day long, pretty certain you'd start feeling good. So they say, uh, a lot of, a lot of teachers tell you, emotion is created by motion. And that's true. So move with confidence, and you'll start to really experience the game at a whole new level. Michael Jordan, I, we had to say, was the master of being able to play both mellow and furious, with joy and fury. He would first three quarters play very low-key. In the fourth quarter, amp it up. He had mastered the game of basketball, and you can do the same. Jordan may be 6'6" with a 50-inch vertical and very quick and a huge wingspan, large hands. He may not have, you may not have all the physical attributes that he possesses. However, you can think and feel the same way he does. You can breathe the same, move the same, attack the game with the same mentality. And that's really special. It will help you get out of yourself every bit of potential you have. You can copy Kobe. You can copy Steph. And you should. It'll make you a much better player. That's it for basketball brains podcast today. Basketballbrain.com. Be a legend.