Execution, not cleverness

    "I think we must spend a great deal of practice time committed to execution of the fundamentals, the cuts, the screens, the passes, and the shot. I do not believe you are going to win games on cleverness. Concentrate on the execution, not the cleverness."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett)

No extra points

One thing that ESPN teaches young players that they ought to unlearn as fast as possible is that in basketball there are no points for style. They all count the same, whether awkward or flashy.

Team first

    "Players who are committed to the team first will find a way to helpwhen things are going bad; they will do whatever it takes. Kids that are more into themselves will not do that. They will take care of themselves and get more individual when things are tough."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Irene Dunne trivia

Just for the record, she is one of my favorites of old time actresses, for several reasons.

She wanted to become an opera singer, but was rejected by the Met because she was inexperienced and had a "slight" voice. She studied music at the Indianapolis Conservatory of Music and the Chicago Musical College.

She was known as "The First Lady of Hollywood."

The night before he died, her father told her, "Happiness is never an accident. It is the prize we get when we choose wisely from life's great stores."

At "Dedication Day" at Disneyland in 1955, she was asked by Walt Disney to christen the Mark Twain River Boat, which she did with a bottle filled with water from various rivers across the country.

She was an avid golfer who twice made a hole in one.

She was married to dentist Dr. Francis Griffin from 1927 to 1965. Maintaining the relationship took a lot of work on both their parts, but it evidently worked well. An interview in Photoplay magazine had this line: "I can guarantee no juicy bits of intimate gossip. Unless, perhaps she lies awake nights heartsick about the kitchen sink in her new home. She's afraid it's too near to the door."

Consistency

    Only by watching [Dick Bennett] over time does one realize the consistency of his emphasis on specific details of his philosophy. During his 1995 coaches clinic he said, almost in passing, "Your players will do what you emphasize, not what you teach them." His comment, which ironically was stated rather quickly and without emphasis, was likely glossed over by many of those in attendance because of the simplicity of the idea. Nonetheless, that simple code is the primary driving force behind his personal coaching style for practices.

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

I have said for many years that people remember what you do much more than what you say.

Luise Ranier trivia

She was the first actor to win multiple Academy Awards, and the first to win them back to back.

She was the longest-lived Oscar winner, 13 days shy of her 105th birthday.

In 1938 she traveled to Europe, where she worked with children displaced by the Spanish Civil War.

She spent her last few years living in a flat that previously had been occupied by Vivien Leigh.

She was the youngest person to receive a second Oscar (at age 28).

She said, "I always considered myself the world's worst actress."

Stuck in between

    "My way to beat the best is to find players who believe in what we are doing, who buy into it whole-heartedly. That is what Green Bay taught me that no other place could. Those kids were so tough mentally, so skilled, and so smart, they parleyed their lack of athleticism into a strength. . . . " Bennett sat forward on his chair and pounded his fist on the desk again. "That is where I am hung up now. I don't have that here, yet. I'm stuck in between. I don't have Kentucky's athletes and I don't have Green Bay's smartness and intensity, so here I am, in between, trying to make the best of this."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Complicated, but distinguished

(When you survive two husbands who die from battlefield wounds, and have as many blueblooded connections as she had, you have a distinguished place in society.)

Patricia Katharine Countess of Dundee, who died 3 December, 2012, at Birkhill by Cupar, Fife, was aged 102. Lady Dundee was a great-aunt of Sarah Duchess of York.

She was born Patricia Katharine Montagu Douglas Scott, 9 Oct, 1910, a scion of the Dukes of Buccleuch and Queensberry, the second daughter of Lord Herbert Montagu Douglas Scott (1872-1944), by his wife the former Marie Josephine Edwards (d 1965). Her elder sister Marian Louisa married (1) Col Andrew Ferguson, and was the grandmother of Sarah Duchess of York.

She married (1) 8 Jul 1931, Lt-Col Walter Douglas Faulkner, MC, who was killed in action in May, 1940; married (2) 9 Sept 1940, Lt-Col David Scrymgeour-Wedderburn, DSO, Scots Guards, scion of the Earls of Dundee. He died of wounds in 1944. She married (3) 30 Oct 1946, her brother-in-law, Henry James Scrymgeour-Wedderburn (later Scrymgeour of Dundee), de jure, later de facto 11th Earl of Dundee, PC (1902-1983).

She had issue from her three marriages, a son David James Faulkner, b 1932 (dec.), from her first union, 2 daughters from the second marriage, Janet Mary (now Mrs Fox-Pitt), b 1941, and Elizabeth, Baroness Teynham b. 1943, wife of the 20th Baron Teynham (and mother of 10); and 1 son from the third marriage, Alexander Henry Scrymgeour of Dundee, 12th Earl of Dundee, who was b 5 Jun 1949.

Why basketball?

    "Why did you choose to coach basketball over football or baseball?

    "I thought basketball was the one sport played where the whole could almost always be greater than the sum of the individual parts." Leaning back in his chair, he relaxed and his speech became freer, the tension visibly passing out of his body. "I wasn't sure about that in baseball where you had to have pitching. I wasn't sure about that in football because aspects like size and speed are so important.

    "In basketball, Id seen five small guys come together and play big and I'd seen five slow guys outplay quick guys just by being smart. Overall, I had seen a lot more variables that could be used to offset disadvantages in basketball. I just gravitated toward basketball because I felt like I might be able to make more of a difference."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Rita Johnson trivia

Rita was one of those actresses whose face old movie watchers know, but perhaps not her name. She was one of those actresses whose mouth would smile, but whose eyes frequently did not.

In her youth she worked in her mother's lunchroom and sold hot dogs on the Boston-Worcester Turnpike.

She attended the New England Conservatory of Music.

Her career progressed from radio to Broadway to films. By 1936 she was appearing in ten radio shows a week, including the lead in Joyce Jordan, M. D.

Because of an injury from a falling hair dryer, she had to have brain surgery, which caused her career to come to a near stop. It took her a year to recover, and she died at the age of 52 from a brain hemorrhage.

She was a good enough swimmer to once consider entering the Olympics.

Dealing with pride

    "There are two incorrect ways that my pride manifests itself when I'm affected by it, particularly after a loss or criticism. Sometimes I react passionately and lash out, in which case I almost always develop an incredible guilt over that action. Other times, I will just take everything inside and blame myself, and really suffer for that period of time following the rebuke or loss. At my best, I'm able to look at the situation and say I did my best, it wasn't good enough, so I have to learn from it and move on. That way, the third, is the way I have worked to develop over the years."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Coaches and recruiters

Great coaches have less pressure to recruit great players because they develop their own. We have quite a few Super Salesmen masquerading as great coaches these days.

Vulnerability

    "I've always said there is a great blessing in vulnerability, especially if that vulnerability is understood. I'm vulnerable because of my pride, and I know that. So I have to be vigilant almost all of my waking hours, because I know that if I let myself go, I would be more prideful than anybody. That is what I mean by the blessing of vulnerability, and pride is my vulnerability. For example, it is like the athlete who can't shoot the ball. He better know that. There is nothing worse than a kid who can't shoot the ball but thinks he can! And so, self-knowledge in this case, as with my pride, is invaluable. My pride wells up inside of me and I have to bite my tongue and walk away more times than I would care to admit."

(from A Season With Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Peter Ortiz trivia

You might remember Ortiz as Captain St. Jacques in the movie Rio Grande, who had the patch on one eye and the very proper manners.

He spoke ten languages, five of them fluently.

Served in the French Foreign Legion, the U. S. Marine Corps, and the O. S. S.

Captured by the Germans in World War II, but escaped.

He was awarded 24 medals by three different countries.

The films 13 Rue Madeleine and Operation Secret were based upon his exploits.

He rose to the rank of colonel in the Marines.

Parachuting into France, he became a Maquis leader in 1944. He frequented a Lyons nightclub to gain information from the German officers who also frequented the popular club. One night, a German officer damned President Roosevelt, then the USA, and finally the Marine Corps. Ortiz then excused himself, went to his apartment and changed into his Marine Corp uniform. Returning to the club, he ordered a round then removed his raincoat and stood there resplendent in full greens and decorations yelling, "A toast to President Roosevelt!" Pointing his pistol at one German officer then another, they emptied their glasses as he ordered another round to toast the USA then Marine Corps! The Germans again drained their glasses as he backed out leaving his astonished hosts and disappeared into the night.

Character must be at a premium

"I believe in the synergy of the group, believe that the sum of the parts is greater than the individual talents of the members. Therefore, I have always tried to recruit players with great character, players who are selfless and committed to the team first. But great talent is an easy seduction. It is awful easy to look at a kid with that kind of talent and think that it really doesn't matter that he won't go to class, that he will lie, that he is lazy or selfish. That doesn't matter because I can teach him integrity. Yet, in reality, I know I can't. Not in the short amount of time I have to spend with him. Therefore, I want to hold character in the highest regard."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Volleyballers as basketballers

Much of the skills of basketball involving the aiming and manipulation of the ball in a manner that is not required in volleyball. Thus, the skills developed in volleyball would not necessarily translate to basketball, since many of them are not needed in that sport, and vice versa. For example, catching the ball is not a factor in volleyball, but is essential in basketball.

However, the pure vertical jumping skills of some of the top-level volleyball players are prodigious. Plus, the blocking of the ball is a major part of volleyball. That leads me to believe that it would be a relatively small step for a player to develop into a defensive stopper or to be an accomplished dunker. I do not know that I have seen it happen, but it seems like a natural step to me.

Coach Dick Bennet on recruiting

    "I do not want the players to get the wrong idea of who I am and how I coach. That is not my style." He shook his head slowly from side to side. "I just don't know how to do it without compromising my own personal standards. I can't sacrifice integrity for talent."

    "Whose integrity?" I inquired.

    Bennett seemed taken back by the question. He sat back in his chair and stared directly at me with furrowed brow. "Both, I suppose, mine and the recruit's I don't believe in recruiting as it is today, so if I buy into that style, I sacrifice my integrity."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Typical wartime honeymoon

We'd had our honeymoon - what there was of it, a mere shred of time sandwiched, like one of those thin slices of meat you got in wartime England, between two thick slices of crime - at Monterey.

(from The Applegreen Cat, by Frances Crane)

Weird about time

    "I always forget the most important things, don't I! Anyhow, it worries Lorna. She kept talking about Todd, how people didn't understand him, and about how he is a nut about time, always knows like a timekeeper when anybody round about him does anything. Isn't that queer, in a creative type of person, Pat?"

    "It's queer in anybody," Patrick said.

(from The Applegreen Cat, by Frances Crane)

Problems with languages

For the most part, at least, language is an art, not a science. Languages evolve more or less haphazardly; they are not deliberately developed. The "rules" of grammar may attempt to keep language specific and precise, but they are regularly broken for the sake of convenience and in order to make the language more beautiful. In some languages, the development has not been helpful, e.g., the Chinese language in which a single character is used for a word, thus making things agonizingly contrived.

As we individually study language, we ought to be trying to distill the best of what we find. Which writers are the clearest and most precise? Which have the most beautiful flow to their language? Which are most forceful?

"Behind the Armies and Fleets of Britain and France gather a group of shattered States and bludgeoned races: the Czechs, the Poles, the Norwegians, the Danes, the Dutch, the Belgians -- upon all of whom the long night of barbarism will descend, unbroken even by a star of hope, unless we conquer, as conquer we must, as conquer we shall."

Those English cooks

    He said, "It's almost teatime."

    "Teatime? We just had dinner!"

    Bobby grinned. "It's only been two hours since we left the dinner table, but all the same it's teatime, and Mrs. Murdock will be hard to handle if we're not on the dot. English cooks are tough babies. Didn't you know that Churchill's island escaped invasion because they ringed it all around with English cooks?"

(from The Applegreen Cat, by Frances Crane)

Tennis would have fixed it

    "I saw some time ago that Baron Gottfried von Cramm was taken prisoner in Africa - he was the most beautiful player I ever watched," Joyce said then. "If all the German children were required to play tennis, there would never be any wars."

    "Why so?" I asked.

    "Because tennis teaches fair play. There were no better losers at Wimbledon than the Germans. If Hitler had given them tennis, instead of war games - well, don't get me started on that!

(from The Applegreen Cat, by Frances Crane)

Wartime luxuries

"She stints our rations all week in order to have a real joint of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding on Sunday - when we have a one o'clock dinner, of course - and everybody in the place could be murdered before Cook would let that dinner be interfered with. And I've got to carve the roast and serve it properly or she wouldn't let it come into the dining room." (from The Applegreen Cat, by Frances Crane)

Those of us who never experienced wartime rationing would not appreciate just how precious little luxuries of life were to folks at that time.

Defensive stamina

"We must outlast the offense on every possession! Great defense takes consistent effort and a commitment to excellence, every second of every practice and every game. It is not good enough to just go through the motions, to give the impression that you are trying, that you care. You must take pride in your defense, in your effort, and be committed to outlasting your opponent." He implored, almost pleaded, "You have to believe that! Anything less gives our opponent the edge. Gentlemen, we must outlast the offense on every possession. That must be our foundation."

(from A Season with Coach Dick Bennett, by Eric Ferris)

Lady Cavendish

The Applegreen Cat is a murder mystery by Frances Crane. In it, she refers to a Lady Cavendish, who was Fred Astaire's sister. Her given name was Adele, and like her brother she had started as a dancer and vaudeville performer. In 1932, she married Lord Charles Arthur Francis Cavendish, who was the son of the 9th Duke of Devonshire. They had three children, who lived only a few hours.

Wrong catch

Louis L'Amour starts off one of his Sackett novels, "What I wanted was a fat bear; what I got was a skinny Indian." I can sympathize. I badly need to catch a skunk that is staying at our house. So far I have caught two possums.