PCTI Basketball Training: BAMBI

·  On average, how often do you play?

There's a 10:30 AM game M,W,F that I play in one to three times a week. I also played in a league in the winter and will play in another one before too long. The league is not very good competition but helps with getting in a game flow, shooting free throws, etc. 95 percent of my hoops comes in the pickup game. 

·  How did you get involved in the game(s)? How does it get put together?

This is a game that exists at the gym I belong to, Lexington Athletic Club. It's famous in PCTI lore as the site of the shoot-around before PCTI II. If my memory serves me correctly, we were fresh off the infamous PCTI wine night and had opened up a full box of Stanford swag sent in by Skillz. Hilariously, we were mistaken as an actual basketball team. 

Anyway, I got linked in to the game before moving to Austin because it worked well with my work schedule, since TV people work at night. The game was still intact when I got back to town and I joined back in it. Although I'm a "regular" this is just your typical health club gym (shoutout to PCTI Denver), so anyone could join the game at any time. 

·  Whats the make up of the group? Age, skill, size, etc

Ability wise, the vast majority of people are in a good age range and athletically inclined enough to make the game competitive. We just added an ex-NFL defensive tackle who is a few years younger than me who helps with the general size and athleticism of the game and who I often get matched up against because of my height. 

In a perfect world, I'd like to play in a game where I was in the middle third of players as far as ability goes, in this game I'm always in the top third. The competition is good enough that I'm confident my skills will be sharpened adequately for PCTI. I do have major concerns about conditioning, as the pace/energy of the games is slower than normal, as is often the case at an open pick up game. 

·  What is your role in these games? How does that differ from your role in PCTI?

PCTI historically is always a departure of sorts from the way I typically play. Since I'm a "big man" in PCTI (you know, since I'm 2 inches taller than about half of the supposed guards) I know for my PCTI team's spacing and overall flow I have to be willing to be the screen setter ("little to big" screens in PCTI are illegal, if you haven't heard) and float between the high post and short corner to do what's best for my team. In pickup games (and really in any basketball I've ever played sans PCTI) I typically have a little more freedom to float between the post and the perimeter, depending on who is guarding me and where the rest of my team is comfortable. I used to struggle with this but now I just make sure I make a point to focus a little bit more on getting in a big man's mindset in my pickup games in the weeks leading in to PCTI. 

·  What is one thing you love about it? What is something you don't like?

Obviously private games are ideal but considering I have typically worked at night and on the weekends, I'm fortunate to have this game at all. What I like most is that the guys are all pretty decent people and it's regularly scheduled, so I can also itch the basketball scratch within my schedule and never go more than a week without playing. What I like least is that it's still an open pickup game where if you lose you may have to sit for a half hour so sometimes it feels like you spent a lot of time at the gym and didn't get much in return. 

Editor's Note: What a glorious gym that was. I think this is the reason PCTI is so great. You can have a good consistent game but at the end of the day, PCTI is another level (or 3) over a good pickup game. Also, I like how he threw out the new addition of an NFL DT, but didn't name drop. That is journalistic integrity!