My gauge might be off

Sundays--ordinarily a day of church in this house--have been dominated by basketball since the second Sunday in January. There are two more games after today before the season is over. I didn't know at the time that I registered him for the sport that our ward was switching to afternoon session, although I might have figured it out if I'd thought about it. I guess I didn't think that the University Ward would *want* the 9:00 am time slot, but fair's fair and there it is. So we've been going to part of the three hours on any Sunday where the game is 3:00 pm or later and throwing in the towel on the Sundays where the game is at 2:00 pm. Most of the games are 3:00 pm or later. Today's was at 2:00 pm.

Now, I think I mentioned back in early January that basketball is another new sport for Max. He wound up on a team that has a LOT of experience. Most, though not all, of the other players have been in the game since they were 5. For the first two games he was blissfully ignorant and pretty involved in the game, albeit not with any precision. But around game 3, he began to hold back. The more he understood the game, the more he held back in the game, afraid to make any mistakes. By the last game I attended, game 5, it was clear to me that extreme measures were called for. Chris was playing with him, but after watching Max in practice--and even before the games during warm-ups, it was clear to me that the problem was all in his head. Even before the game today during warm-ups, Max was making baskets. Nice, clean baskets. But how to get him over that lump of fear that had him playing the game as well as he could while simultaneously keeping the greatest amount of distance between him and the ball?

Well. He's the son of two self-employed parents. We're not greedy. No. But we're highly motivated when paid well. So after watching him in practice on Friday I came up with the bright idea of offering NHL-style incentives. (I don't know if the NBA offers scoring bonuses, but the NHL does.) Mine were a little more reachable. Since it had been, to my knowledge, three games since Max had touched the ball even once in play, I offered one dollar each time he touched the ball --without fouling anyone.

I offered $2 if he knocked the ball, without fouling, out of the hands of another player. Finesse wasn't important. It could go skittering across the court and into the hands of another player on the other team. I just wanted him to achieve what he set out to do. Getting the ball away from that guy was the purpose of the swooshes he made vaguely at the ball without ever touching it. I wanted commitment.

I offered $5 if he got a rebound. It counted at either end of the court. In the second game he'd played someone else had gotten the rebound and passed it to him. Max had dribbled it down towards his basket and passed it off to someone else. If he got the rebound at the other end--after a basket was made, the other kids would automatically start running to the other end of the court. That would leave him to dribble the ball down. Besides, he'd never caught a rebound--it stood to reason that after a few times catching the rebound at the other team's basket--he'd go to the next level at some point and get the rebound at his own basket--and shoot it.

I offered $10 if he took a shot. It didn't have to go in. It just had to hit the backboard or the rim--it couldn't go sailing into outer space. I wanted him to aim before he threw.

It could have gone horribly. The other team scored first and this mega-talented team that Max is in faltered. They've always made the first few baskets. They've never won by less than 12 pts. But Max didn't notice. He was out to touch the ball. In the first five minutes he played he touched the ball twice--and knocked it out of the hands of the player trying to score (legally) once. Both coaches jumped a little in their seats and screamed his name happily. Max grew an inch. He looked at me with a "did you get that?" look and then jumped back into the game.

Between the genuine run for their money (ha! get it?) that the other team was giving our Blue team, and Max's complete commitment to the game, I could barely breathe. He never missed an opportunity to try for the rebound. He wanted that ball. He ran after it. I tried to knit when Max was on the bench, but there was so much going on! I'm pretty sure those few rows are a bit snugger than the ones before them.

By halftime our team was starting to recover confidence and they'd moved ahead by a few points. Max had five touches of the ball and one "get" (getting it out of the hands of the other guy). More importantly, he knew he could play the game. He understood, finally, that he didn't need to shoot a basket to make a difference in the score of the game. He never took his eyes off the ball. He wanted it.

And then, in the fourth quarter--he got it. He got the rebound and the other kids broke away and he dribbled it, a bit unsteadily, but gaining in confidence, towards the other end. He had the ball too far out in front of him and another kid came in and took the ball away, but that kid hadn't gone more than a few feet when one of the other kids on our team stole the ball back, passed it, passed again--until there was a score for the Blue team.

Max had been positioning himself correctly for the rebound through most of the game, but some light went on and he got the rebound two more times. The second time he passed the ball to someone else who took it down and made a basket. The third time Max dribbled it down himself and keeping the ball in closer, went most of the way before being swarmed by yellows and having to pass it off.

It was a wonderful, wonderful, game. The coaches were falling over themselves happy to see their reluctant player in the game. They coached--Max wasn't deaf with fear--and he responded.
Maybe I wasn't supposed to bribe him. Maybe I was supposed to let him have his own breakthrough. But it still looked like his breakthrough from where I was sitting. That looked like my kid grinning. He told me with a swagger that they'd won again for the umpteenth time. (I corrected this unsportsman-like behavior--and a teammate said, "well, specifically 6th time.") In the past he's always enjoyed the fact that they won--but there was little sense of ownership of the win. "Our team won," he'd say. This time it was, "We won."

As he gets older I'll have to warn him that it's always good to know when money is a big motivator. That the Advisary is good at using that against you to convince you to do something you shouldn't. But sometimes in order to be motivated by pride, by a sense of satisfaction, by the feeling of a job well done--you have to have a moment of pride, a moment of satisfaction, and the belief that you CAN do the job well.

"If I actually get the ball in the basket, do I get more than $10?"
"Yeah, you get $10 and the knowledge that you scored two points for your team in an actual game."
"Yeah . . . That'll feel amazing."

That's what I'm bettin' on.