Year 3 – NBA Training Camp

October 4, 2015 | by Matthew Dellavedova

 

You blink for a second and it’s already time for training camp of my 3rd NBA season. Time flies when you’re having fun! Training camp has started well. It definitely helps having a lot of the same guys from last years team, it feels like we are a step ahead of where we were this time last year. We obviously have big goals as a team and are looking forward to the challenges that this season will bring.

I have learned many things and improved my game in my first two years in the NBA and I’m as hungry as ever to improve every day and see how much I can improve. The most important thing you can do is to better yourself, comparing the player you are today to the player you were a week, a month, a year ago.

My “off season” involved playing for the Australian Boomers which is a great honour. We have a great bunch of blokes that have played together for a number of years now. We had our preparations in Europe, playing some quality teams that prepared us well to beat New Zealand to book our spot in the 2016 Rio Olympics. This is something the boys are really looking forward to and are focused on. We all feel that now is the time to do something special. Going to the London Olympics was one of the best experiences I have had and I can’t wait for Rio.

I have had some more time to read and watch some TED talks after a busy summer traveling and playing games. Someone who I always learn a lot from (and get some great reminders from) is Carol Dweck. She is a professor at Stanford and specializes in the area of motivation, something I am very interested in. This talk by her is “The power of believing you can improve”. She has some really great stuff, like having a “growth mindset” and using the word ‘yet’ when you haven’t learned or mastered a skill, or figured out how to do something.. yet! Enjoy this talk here http://go.ted.com/bAyw.

I will try to be more active this year on my websites blog, if you have something you want to know or hear more about – let me know!