Postby sloopjohnc » 31 May 2011, 21:49
I think to be really really good at sports you have to have the usual: good hand-eye coordination, balance, quickness and height or strength. All of them make you great, a combo makes you good.
What I've purposely left out is motivation. I think motivation can make a fair athlete good and a good athlete border on great.
I also think motivation can be converted into other things besides sports, like music or art, and a motivated or passionate person can achieve skill beyond their native talent. You can only go so far without true talent, but lots can be learned vs. natural talent.
I liked sports, and with a modicum of physical talent, have done pretty well at most sports I put my hand to. Obviously, most people gravitate towards success, so the sports I've practiced are the ones I was best at, probably.
Some sports, or aspects, are better for self-practice. Basketball, for example, or even baseball, and lord knows I've fielded enough bounced-back ground balls against garage doors to attest to that. Also, all my friends liked them and were good at them.
But back to the motivation thingy. The only sport my folks made my brother and I do without asking us was swimming when we were seven and eight. I remember those first swim practices I couldn't even make it the length of the pool. For some cock-a-mamie reason I liked it though and didn't want to quit.
I went from an eight year-old dog paddler at best to competing against the future gold medal winner in the 100 meter butterfly, Pablo Morales, in high school. I even had some feelers from Pac 10 schools in water polo, and had an Olympian tell me during a high school camp that if I kept up at it, he could see Olympics in my future. That was a nice compliment, but I burned out on both and decided studying had to take a priority over any sport. I also knew that I wasn't really as good as some people might have thought.
I've been lucky enough to play against future pros in football, baseball and basketball, and while I never thought I was that good, it was nice to know that I could hang on the same court or field with guys like that and not embarrass myself too badly. That was enough for me.
The thing with serious sports is there's a real small window of opportunity and age sets in pretty quickly if you're not willing to put in the time.
Again, it's like music. Those teenage years are the best for learning an instrument or playing lots of sports because you have tons of time to kill and can get good at them.
Don't fake the funk on a nasty dunk!