Brad Stevens joins Abby Chin to talk about role players when building a team.
How important are role players to a team's success?
"I think everybody has a role to fill, whether you're the superstar that takes all the shots and gets all the statistics and everything else. Or, you're the person that doesn't play. Or, you're just the person that's just called upon to defend and rebound," Stevens said.
How does each player carve out their role on the team?
"If a person goes and shoots 40 out of 100 shooting jumpshots by himself in the gym, he's not a shooter. If he goes and makes 70 or more, then that's his range. Those things define themselves. And then when you get in the game, if you get swallowed up with the ball, then you've got to just be a ball mover. If you're a guy that can get by anybody, then you're more of a penetrator," Stevens said. "What you do well, shows itself true. What you don't do well, shows itself true. And the key is with 90 percent of basketball players is just managing what they don't do well, because all of these guys are here for a reason and there are things that they do exceptionally well. Some of them -- a small few -- do everything well, and that's why they're at the level they're at."
How do you deal with a bottleneck?
"If you do something really well and our team needs it, then you're going to fill that void that we have," Stevens said. "We might have four guys that do something fairly well but we only need two of them to play. That something where you have to mix and match your team and figure out how to piece those people together, so that you're team can play as well as it can."
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To hear the entire conversation, check out the video above.
