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The Good and the Bad of AAU
Starting on Sunday, I am going to be heading over to the Pump Brothers AAU basketball tournament here in LA . I will cover some of the games for Basketball.org and offer some of my viewpoints from the tournament. I am excited to watch the games, check out the talent and see old friends.
I want to take this opportunity to reminiscence and talk about my experiences with AAU and AAU in general. Arguably, my AAU experience is one of the highlights of my life. What better way to spend a month, as a 17 year-old, than travelling from tournament to tournament and playing games against some of the best competition in the country, while bonding with teammates who instantly became friends. However, due to the AAU “system” plenty of kids out there don’t get to have the same experience as I once had.
I was fortunate enough to play for a great coach in Nelson Washington of the Bay Area Ballers. Nelson truly didn’t care about the AAU “hoopla” and cared only for the progression of his players. He worked to get you recruited and pressed his teams to play together to win. His belief was that the more you play as a team, the farther you go in a tournament and the more exposure you get. Our teams bought into this philosophy.
Unfortunately, there are plenty of AAU coaches who don’t give a damn about Nelson’s philosophy. Yes, they do want to win, but they don’t care about their players, getting them recruited or even improving their games. These coaches just want the exposure on themselves. They take money from shoe companies (something Nelson turned down), stack their teams with players all throughout the country and don’t even coach . I believe this is flat out wrong in an “amateur” competition and not good for basketball in general. These AAU coaches and sneaker companies are kissing the ass of a 17 year old making these kids think they are above the rest. Why wouldn’t they?
I don’t think this type of system can be stopped, but I would like to see it changed. I do think that basketball in this country is severely lacking in fundamentals and do believe it has to do in part to the current youth basketball system. As we saw with the 2004 Olympics and other international competition, we have taken strides backwards in respect to the international game. We need to make changes now. Colangelo and USA Basketball are making the appropriate changes at the top of the game, but there needs to be changes at the bottom.
Hopefully, Basketball.org is that change and we intend for it to be. We are working diligently to get to our launch in order to give youth coaches and players an online basketball resource for they can be the best that they can be. Don’t mean to sound like an Army slogan but you get my point. These tools will help create more fundamental basketball players and teams, thus enhancing the entertainment of the game.
Image Source: * AAU
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July 27th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
Very well said, Jaime.
March 2nd, 2009 at 9:47 am
As a basketball official and a former player, I really feel the AAU system is one with great potential but it needs structure. I definitely agree with your assessment of the association, some of the coaches are terrible. My son is now old enough to play and I struggle with find a team where he will get the discipline, instruction and other life skills that I feel a lot of the coaches really lack themselves. The parents are even worst than the coaches.
March 19th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
As a coach on the high school level in SC I have first hand experience with AAU and it is mostly bad. Most coaches compete for kids with lies and false promises. The top team in the state is propped up by Nike and is just as you described, no coaching and just 3-5 D1 players running up and down the court. Many of the teams are filled with kids who are academically ineligible for their high school teams and will never go to college. I’ve seen kids expelled from school playing just so a coach can win games. These kids rarely pay while the players they replace do. There are a few quality AAU programs out there but most I have had dealings with do more harm than good. As Saeed said, there is so much potential with this organization but they must have more structure.