awesome to welcome basketball coach motivational speaker filmmaker and Industry expert Tim Martin to the basketball podcast Tim Martin's Journey from humble beginnings to becoming one of the most respected skills trainers in the basketball Community is nothing short of remarkable his journey took a pival turn when he began training young athletes his work ethic Second To None caught the attention of rising NBA start Tyrese Maxi Maxi who has trained with Tim since his freshman year at South Garland High School describes their relationship as oriented Tim Martin's impact extends beyond the court he has developed comprehensive training transformation programs for basketball players at all levels his virtual Training Academy established in 2007 has helped produce 21 NBA draft selections and assisted clients in earning over 550 million in NBA salary Tim has worked with NBA WNBA NCA and Euro League champions leaving an indelible mark on the basketball World Tim is not only a basketball trainer but also a motivational speaker filmmaker and Industry expert as the Director of basketball relations for the Dwayne Wade sneaker company Tim has cultivated relationships with Premier names and sports entertainment and fashion Tim welcome to the basketball podcast thank you so much for having me man Chris it's always good catching up with you it's long overdue longtime follower Big Time fan here and I'm so excited to have you on and Coach we got to start we got to start with the journey because you have one of the most unique stories and every day I see you on social or I see you or we talk I'm just so happy for your success homelessness to world renown trainer n it's still surreal with me I I just get carried into work when you got your head down and you locked in on doing what you trying to do I don't really celebrate probably like I should to be honest especially at this stage in my life this is going to my 16th 16th year doing this and so definitely a lot of trials and tribulations a lot of Blood Sweat and Tears to say the least my past made me who I am today and I think that's just part of my testimony is obviously everything that I've had to endure and overcome it actually made me better to to help others so that's the gift in in all of this is I'm able to speak from experience on on a lot of different factors as you said it's probably shaped a lot of your approach and I know a big part of your approach is a really holistic approach to Player Development to person development all these different things so talk to us a little bit about that holistic approach yeah man I'm a hippie at at the end of the day like to the core of me myself I'm very frees spirited and I've been blessed by my mom with that in terms of my upbringing she did a great job of just you know teaching me about people my grandfather was a a people person and so with me moving so many different places throughout my childhood I I had an ability to be able to tap into other cultures and experience a lot and see a lot that's the other thing you can't unsee things and you can't unhear things as you grow I was very blessed in that regard and so fact my infactuation with sociology and a astrology and psychology even with physiology when we talk a lot about body language and stuff these are just all these different mechanisms and and tools that I used organically into my Approach of my teaching and so for me I think as coaches a lot of us could get redundant in terms of our our speech when we're teaching and I think Bruce Lee said it the best for me my job is to find 10,000 ways to say the same thing so you have to get creative in in your approach and be authentic too a lot of these players whether they're middle school high school kids or even in the NBA you're dealing with a lot of smart players and so for me it's just trying to not reinvent the will but just try to make it my own version and and so the holistic way is the way to go for me it's wonderful to hear you talk about that and that a great example of that would be Tyrese Maxi someone you've worked with for for so long and again he could get tired of hearing the same thing from you if you don't phrase it in different ways so maybe talk a little bit about how special that relationship ship has been in your journey but even more so to see that he's still Rising so clearly the way you're saying things has been helping yeah no I'm so I'm man proud as an understatement Tyrese is literally I know everybody uses the the term little bro but now that's family right there like in and out he comes from a great family but I think for us we've always had that Synergy I think we just had a natural uh connection that sometimes I don't even have to say anything I could just look at Ty and just be like man you know what you need to do and over time I think just repping certain things out we worked on this floater for six months um in high school and I think over the over a period of time when he started having these small wins in practice and in games he would understand oh this stuff really works his buying was very early and I think just to see where he's at the coolest thing for me personally is just all the conversations we had years ago talking about hey because I'm big on specific when you're talking about your goals I I need details and so saying I'm going to be the most improved player he was saying that I'm going be an NBA Allstar and for everything that comes to fruition it was already expected from both of us but at the end of the day you still got to celebrate those victories when they happen and the challenge working with a player like that is obviously how do you keep pushing him to improve while maintaining confidence and that seems to be one of the challenges for trainers in general and coaches in general is I've got to push them to get better but I've got to maintain their confidence at the same time right now and this is just a theory of mine but when with this newer generation I'm the last of the micans right where it was the old my way or the highway kind of thing in our generation but with this newer generation they have so much access to information and so for me to keep him just curious I love asking questions so I don't really go into the gym with any of my players lecturing I I try to keep the engagement going by having conversations and I think that allows the player one to to at least let their mind wonder and use their imagination and have a say because if I could Empower you to feel like you're a part of this development and and you like this move as opposed to this move now it it actually becomes more interesting in the subject matter and how we progress through things it's more not so much Innovative but it's more attractive and that's I think that's what keeps the players engaged over time because if it's just me saying we're going to do XYZ anybody's going to tune you out after a few weeks what's remarkable to me in watching your journey for all these years is clearly we know it there's been other trainers that have locked in with a future pro at some point in their Journey but what's remarkable about you is how not only have you kept Tyrese improving but you've expanded into different business ideas different types of players like really again there's no pigeon ho holding Tim Martin at all and has that always been a part of your mindset this expansive mind yeah I I view myself and I don't want to be self Proclaim but I I look at the Jay-Z's of the world on how Jay-Z I looked at his track record and his business model where you used hip-hop to come in to to get your foot in the door and then as you progress at your craft and you get better you have these certain business Endeavors that you could build around to where it's a clothing line like my clothing line with a beautiful struggle so we selling merchandise I'm building out my app I'm I'm Consulting with leaning and Dwayne Wade's shoe company and so doing all these different Ventures on the side that's just coming through relationships we both know if it wasn't for that ball we're probably not going to really be able to be introduced accordingly when and the universe just has a special way of of connecting you with the right people and the more you put into this business the more you get out and so that was always my philosophy I just didn't want to have a 9 to-5 and create my own schedule so that was the set point for me and then my exit strategy is just being around the game I love spending more time with with my loved ones and traveling the world and God has definitely blessed me to do I I'd love to hear your advice you mentioned self-promotion which is one of the tricky parts for both of us we run an online brand and to a certain extent we want to sell ourselves without selling ourselves so can you give any advice to those in coaching or those in the training World about how to promote yourself without coming across as self-promotional yeah I ain't going to lie like I that's always my I don't even want to say a weakness but something that's make me uncomfortable because I'm I love promoting everybody else but then in that you cut yourself out of a lot of different opportunities if you don't self-promote and so I think uh for me it's to allow it to come out organically if you see if you're talking about shoes for example I'm definitely going to go ahead and throw the tibbit of Leaning I feel like we have the number one brand out there we got Dwayne Wade Jimmy Butler D'Angelo Russell all these different players but yeah I I think it's just you you have to find the right time to do it and then also coming at it from a a space of being proud like the message um for example with the beautiful struggle I think everybody could relate with that because it's it's a journey for us all it's something that you've clearly um had an experience on your come up you're just not ever developing it up on the up and up but you have to deal with the downfalls and it's a roller coaster and so I think whatever brands that you represent or whatever your brand is to try to curate a conversation to where it's relatable to the consumer or a certain target audience that you could find ways to connect with and another way is obviously just to storytelling telling your own personal testimony will always get people engaged and interested in what you have to offer absolutely great advice and and particularly your origin story you talk about a superhero or you talk about the power of myth Joseph Campbell the origin story is something that is so powerful and I love that about your journey that that origin story always comes back to just again the power of doing things the right way and you've done that it's beautiful you mentioned Angel Reese for example so maybe let's go there in terms of not her specifically but just that type of role now for you transitioning from college to Pro which I know you spent a lot of time with different players in that world can you talk about some of the challenges and maybe some of the things that you do to help them overcome some of those future possible challenges yeah so I think the rock said this one time and it hit me directly in terms of you have to have an anchor right and so I think for Angel I I gotta get with her this week she's about to play the Dallas Wings a couple times this week and so one of the things that I'm stressing to her currently is what's your approach looking like what's your I don't even care about basketball but what's your daily routine like because when you have star status you have to do interviews you have to do appearances you have thousands of people calling you asking for something and so I think for her it's okay we have to have an anchor something that you could have some alone time whether it's your morning routine before shoot around or before practice something that you could always have that's consistent to where mentally you're able to diagnose any problems like for me my anchor is going for a morning walk right so before I get into the gym I got to have a self-checking time where I'm drinking my coffee I'm just trying to engage my emotional state trying to see where I'm at the things that I need to accomplish Etc but for Angel I think as a rookie getting accustomed to the time differences and and you may be on the east coast in New York and then you have to play in LA the next so I think the day-to-day regimen is a lot different because now you have so much free time how are you going to fill that those holes of your time with productive things that you could do to enhance as a player as opposed in college your whole schedule's already laid out you have to go to school you have Team practice and then you're only playing like maybe what two games a week so just getting adjusted to more of the off court stuff I think is the the primary thing that we talk about um because the basketball is that's the easiest stuff to to take care of but the routine prior to the game I think is essential for any player making that next step I love that I love you connecting it to something that helps ground you as a person and brings you back to your Center or your balance whatever that may be and then player like Nick Claxton who obviously has had success in the NBA and now again is continuing to try and Rise what are some things prior to moving into an offseason with a player like that are you doing yeah so for Nick it's a simple question is what do you want you get the 200 million 150 million okay cool what's next how are you like how one outside of the money what's your purpose now at this stage in your career because when you was coming out of the University of Georgia you just wanted to make it to the NBA and then when you made it to the NBA you had overcome certain injuries and then you was playing from the second or third backup center to where now you wanted to become a starting center so now you're one of 30 guys in the world that's starting for a potential not just playoff team but there's Championship admirations with the new coaching staff coming in um so it's okay we have to elevate our goals we have to elevate the way we think the way we approach tactics all of that and it's more so putting it on him to get him a Clear Vision I don't like vague approaches if I was to ask you what makes you happy most people say oh spending time with friends no I said what makes you so just refining some things in terms of his vision and to be specific as possible I think that really gives us a blueprint and a map for us to go from here to there and be able to execute our strategies but yeah Nick's been great he's definitely on the right path and just like Maxi and REE and all these other players I'm extremely proud of him and his progress over the years is complacency one of the biggest challenges in general it's human nature to say I've made it I'm done it I'm secure for the rest of my life and as you said now getting to that point of saying specifically okay but what is your goal what do you want to do now yeah now I think basketball I I can see a lot of that not just with my players I think that's just human nature for anybody once you give me a 100 million at 25 years old I don't know where I'm at you know what I mean so it's easy to fall in under that trap but for me I'm obsessed with developing as a human being and so I it's very seldom that with the wiim wimas and all these other players we it's very seld we talk about basketball because for me I'm trying to challenge them in in other ways to maybe become a better speaker in their interviews what are you doing from a charity standpoint what are you interested now is it real estate or what books are you reading because I've never met anybody that's mastered life period there's always something that we could get better at and if you have mastered a craft at something else then let's find a new Venture for you to tap into and then learn something new whether it's playing the guitar the piano I don't know let's go let's create a new hobby and and get engaged in that just try to spice things up so it's a wide variety of things that I'm always interested and throwing out there that's such a great point there about connecting them to the fact that obviously they had such a curiosity and such a desire to improve as a basketball player so applying that to other aspects of your life keeps you engaged in your life more than just basketball at that point I I love that that's really well said and uh talk to us quickly about Wy just give us the origin story how did you get connected with weni yeah so his agent uh bu eni I I was working with a lot of his players prior from Rudy Gober to a lot of the French athletes that he has some of them didn't even make it into the league but some of the overseas guys and he's actually based out of Dallas as well so we just crossed paths and he would always tell me about a kid he had in France he was going to be the next big thing and you for me I hear that all the time especially from parents or or other college coaches hey I got this player he's really good but when I saw him what stood out wasn't even the the physical proudness of him it was his way of articulating his ideas in his conversation I knew very early that this is probably one of the uh smartest people I'll ever meet because the way he thinks is beyond being entric he's one of a kind and so I think the label the alien the nickname the alien is very fitting because he's not of this planet I can't even explain it but he's one of one for sure and it makes sense that in this sense as well based on what you just said and from watching him there's no blueprint for him so it's got to be something that kind of again all these experiences that have help shaped you and helped you shape other players come into this whole perfect kind of synergy right now isn't it because it's there's no blueprint what do you do with this guy how do you help him get better when we don't know what he's capable of yeah that's the cool thing is I feel like all these players that I've worked with and were like my guinea pigs in the lab if you will I've been able to experiment so much over these 16 years and I'm taking everything that I've learned and accumulated from some of these greats the Trey Youngs the Tyrese Maxis Nick claxon's I'm just putting it all into Victor and I don't know you ever seen that that cartoon big hero six the Disney movie I have not oh well so essentially the whole method of the the movie is like this you got this small dude he creates this big robot and he puts the artificial intelligence in the robot and everything and now the robot would move just like he would and so that's the fun part about working with wimy is is I get to like just try different things with him whether it's the the one foot three-point shot or the fadeaways or whatever cuz he is a Crea player so there's definitely no limits for him but for me as a trainer I I have fun with it just because we get to experiment a little bit more than what you would with any other player now what are the challenges of experimenting too much because again other people coaches trainers might be thinking here that if I try too many different things then they're not doing what they're actually good at yeah so I've always to be honest I've always had a rule of three that's my theory and so if you working in the offseason typically every player whether you're in middle school high school college or in NBA you have about 90 days so it's like a probation period you get 90 days and each month we're focusing on just one thing because if we're gonna add and expand his game the one thing that we can't do because we're going to erase his muscle memory by default is by working on everything so if we had just like before we would work on his midst reads right just how he's catching the ball right with his footwork then how he's fading away on his shot or is he standing up straight so we would work on all these different mechanical elements in the mid post for like just a whole month so every time we come into the gym we already had a a focus point we had a theme and we would just try to rep out every scenario out of the mid post once we get comfortable with that we layer it out to the three-point line maybe we focusing on his dribble drives or just his setup moves in isolation and just work on that for a month and so that's been the theory not just with him but with all my players is the rule of three focus on three things all summer and then by training camp you'll definitely be able to self-correct your your mistakes I love that idea and uh it it it helps you keep stay focused on the things that can be improved and then obviously demonstrate the Improvement because the other part of this for you I know you mentioned that relative to the floaters of Tyrese Maxi one of the challenges for coaches trainers is to say what we worked on is actually helping you and that's a really important cell for you to the player isn't it and talk to us a little bit about that process because that's a big part of all coaching yeah no so my theory is this is that if we're going to work on something in a one on0 situation that's going to take us at least two weeks two to three weeks because it's what 21 days to form half right so if I'm working with a player I need them to lock in on the technicality of a floater for two to three weeks and I'm using Maxi as an example now in those weeks once we figure out how we need to pick up the ball how we need toh finish with our touch and all that is precise then we're going to go into one-on-one scenarios I'm a big fan bones over cones that's my my motto right because this is still a reactionary Sport and I think a lot of coaches and trainers tend to forget that because in this era players just don't play enough pickup and I know you talk about that all the time yeah I need them to have some form of critical thinking and mentally be able to self-correct themselves if you have so many voices coming at you telling you what to do I don't think you could really ever develop because you're always waiting on somebody to correct you and so having the one-on 0 segment and then building up to one-on-one and then two on two and then really just three on three I really don't even tap into the five on five an offseason because to me the game is played in threes and I need guys getting as much touches as possible in these scenarios where in the first game we may just get all floaters the second game we may just do nothing but pick and roll so these side mini games is another huge component to all these players development is allowing them to just freestyle a little bit take us deeper into that then when you're talking about playing three on three or two on two in particular who are they playing against who are they playing with what is that mindset because I know that's sometimes the challenge for these situations and I know you can help shape that for coaches who are trying to understand it yeah so the first part is I I want them to do the moves against my coaches so I have a staff and the reason why is because we're older we can't move like NBA guys but in theory the first part of the reason to that is because I want the players to have confidence doing what whatever we're working on against weaker opponents so to speak so if they feel like they could get their move off a couple times and see the ball go through the net or whatever the scenario is if they have these small wins for a day or two and then by day three or day four okay now we got to do it against other Pros or more elite athletic players and then we could just tailor that and and discuss what we need to improve on from there but I don't never just let them work on a move and then play one-on one against other Pros because there's a buildup and I feel like confidence is something that's either overlooked or under taught and we all know if you have confidence I've had a lot of players virtually zero skill but through the roof confidence and they're effective on the court because and that that's my biggest thing is just teaching confidence as opposed um to other methods that's a big time uh play for me so I I love that mindset of that and then bones over cones obviously we were in agreement there so to a certain extent it starts off a little bit guided in terms of playing against your coaches and then at what point do you evolve it into a little bit more Freer and live in terms of some of the reads and decisions because clearly when I think about some of the players you work with I look at them and go wow they're very creative they're creative finishers they're creative at finding Solutions and the tendency sometimes for us as coaches is that we do so much rote memorization that we take away the creativity and the freedom yeah now I'm an avid fan of Salvador Dolly and and basad and Andy Warhol and some of these painters my grandfather was a painter and so for me my job is to give them the tools the paint brushes and the colors I'mma give I'm I'mma set the canvas right and now I want them to have some kind of creativity and and paint their own picture if you will and so when we're going through uh these workouts my job is to not teach you so many moves but bring the geometry in the game because there's a lot of angles and and pace is another thing that we stress on and when I do set up the scenario I try to allow the player to be able to think freely under a condition I got one condition I I use seconds so before I used to do okayy you got three dribbles to create a shot but what I've learned over the course of time is the neurology aspect of it to where instead of three SEC three dribbles I'll say three or four seconds because technically it's about what one second per dribble right and in that when you're counting down you say four three two one the player now not only has the remember you got a clock you're working against but now you really have to be more efficient off the catch in whatever you're doing and so I think that's another uh element that we stress is I'm going give you some Freedom these are the guidelines and the parameters that you have to operate in these spots and we're going to just rep that out to where if you don't have success okay let's go back to having a conversation and it's just a watch and repeat trial and air kind of thing and eventually by the end of the summer most of the players master that that Synergy and that connects to me with what I know about you which is as well is the importance of the mental side for you is to be able to put some type of pressure on them so that they've learned how to handle that type of pressure so that's one example of that can you give us some other examples of how you can put pressure on them to be able to learn how to cope with the mental side yeah so another drill I like doing is C miss two in a row so I'll say hey we're gonna go Five Spot shooting right the goal is to try to make 10 in each spot total of 50 if you can't miss two in a row or if you miss one I need to see something change in your physiology right you can't just keep shooting the same way and expecting a different result so what I do is I try to end every workout with can't miss two in a row what that does is it it sets the bars to where maybe on Monday they only make 30 so they the first thing they want to do is ask me hey coach can I do it again my response is no I want you hungry coming into the gym on Tuesday and so now just off of that sometimes when you pull things from people and are they responding or they reacting I want to see what they're going to do when I pull something away in terms of an opportunity and so from that we building that philosophy but when I'm trying to create a stressful environment those are little subtleties that I'll do in some of my drills but like I said there's always a method behind my madness a lot of people may not understand it but for me I've had a lot of experience making a lot of mistakes in this game seeing what works what doesn't work and so over time like I said I got a few things in in my bag the beautiful thing in knowing you is you're not done with making those mistakes because you're continuing to strive to get better and to challenge your Paradigm of how you do things as well and love that as well so maybe talk to us a little bit about what has changed the most over the last 5 years in your approach that has made you even better as a as a coach trainer it's made me better I think patience man to be honest with my son getting older and I think that just comes with age you when you're able to have the ability to turn knowledge into wisdom you start understanding what this game of life is about and you don't take everything so so personal I still do to be honest with with certain things and I think naturally as a competitor you always want to be the best and have the best results come at you but traveling has definitely um humbled me just seeing how a lot of things work around this world whether it's in China Africa um Europe and so I think what's made me a better person is just having even more conversations with people like yourself or other people from walks of life and and seeing what they have to endure because especially as coaches and trainers and they call us this right but we're more entrepreneurs we're still businessmen at the end of the day and there's a lot of stress that comes with that on trying to figure out where your next dollar is coming and how do you change how do you separate from the marketplace how do you find your next dollar and so I think it's a collaborative aspect of all those things that has taught me and then also my I'm I'm very big on teaching myself some things to improve as as a person whether it's my speech my mannerisms my body language my posture certain things that I know I got to get better at but that's just a part of this whole experience absolutely and being an entrepreneur is not as easy as it seems from the outside much easier at this point in our lives than it was when we started yeah yeah this is before man I was doing this before YouTube before social media and conversely like on the opposite side is I'm trying to get away from from all that at certain points CU when you get out the gym you need some time to decompress and then you still have to be a dad you still have to be a husband you still have to do all these other things I think for me balance comes back to what I alluded to earlier in terms of that one or two things that you do consistently every day that you know that no matter what how your day goes you could always revert back to that one thing that keeps you grounded and stay consistent in that that's a whole another story that's not easy to do with all the distractions going on in this world it's not easy I know and uh maybe if you could just take us through you don't have to use specific examples but uh you meet with say an NBA coaching staff or coach or something like that to prepare for an offseason with a specific player can you take us through what that process what that communication looks like back and forth take us on the inside of what that looks like yeah so the first thing I do is I just let it be know like this is a um a collaborative process so this is what I'm trying to focus on this is just what I know about the player and what I feel like he needs to get better at and what I see a issue is a lot of trainers will work with players and they're focusing on like a move right they're focusing too much on dribble moves or whatever the case step back threes and stuff and it's just know one you got to know your player right then you got to look at the scenario and what the role is for the team because my job is to get is the player as many minutes first off it's not about how many points they need to score or increasing shooting percentages I'm thinking can I get this player to be on the floor as much as possible I need every player to try to play 48 minutes in a game which is nobody's doing that but if you're on the floor that means you're going to have more opportunities to do more things so when I'm talking to these St I want to know what they're expecting what are their expectations for this player how are they going to utilize them in certain spots of the floor whether it's in transition in the half court set if it's in horns or whatever the formations are on the offensive set and just build a curriculum from from that and then just correlate the information that I feel has been working when we're working out so by the time they get to training camp um I think we're all on the same page because you you don't want to divide and conquer that that causes too many problems and just being a former coach I know how much hell it is when you have a a game plan and then you have all these external voices getting to your players telling them to do something separately it just doesn't help the whole dynamic of what you guys are trying to build and that's something that's changed quite a bit over the last five years is that NBA coaching staffs in particular in the offseason are much more involved and engaged with their players whether it's traveling out to Los Angeles to spend time with the player so when they do that are they collaboratively working with you or are those separate type of things yeah it's a little bit of both sometimes for me they they know I know what I'm doing so they just sit back and then take the guys out to dinner or whatever but for me I'm I'm still yearning for knowledge and and at the same time making sure that I'm on the same page with the staff I know what I'm doing but then at the same time what if it's completely different from what the coaches expect them to do so I think those conversations just have to be had because um they're in control of the players minutes and so for me I know I'm in control of the development side for even in season a lot of players retain me and and keep me on contract but it's again it's I'm really an extension of the staff or the organization that's how I look at it I love love that collaborative approach to it and yeah I was going to go there with that so in season take us through a little bit of your role in season with a player that you're still with contract with yeah so man that that's more of a mental side of things um because you really don't have a lot of time to get in the gym and if you do you damn sure don't want to like tweak an ankle or or have something something like an injury happen on your watch making sure that the plan that we had in the summer is being executed throughout the the season a lot of the times if a players going through a slump it has everything to do with offc court maybe it's with a girlfriend or family issues or something like that so it's my hat kind of changes from a developer to a counselor and just making sure that they're in a good frame of mind and having their mind where it needs to be to where they could perform at a high level and then does the coaching staff continue to communicate with you if let's say if a pro player is having some struggles or there's having some ups and downs is that a collaborative process with you at that point or is that sometimes again staff dependent independent it depends yeah it's very seldom I'll get a call from the staff sometimes they may just pick my brain or just let me know what they're um trying to do in terms of the adjustment aspect of it whether it's playing time or their role those coaches you have what typically anywhere 10 to 12 members on a team they're all trying to figure it out themselves and I think as a staff you don't want to bring in even more voices to just complicate things and so I think especially when you're building culture for an organization I think in season in those 82 games you're trying to isolate your team and your players as much as possible but if it gets really bad that's usually where I get the calls let's shift our Focus because one of the things I value about you is that you spent a lot of time in the Ed space and you continue to spend a lot of time in the Ed space because it really matters to you in terms of development of basketball for players at all levels so talk to us a little bit about youth basketball right now in terms of some of the things that you value the most and you feel that we can improve the most about youth basketball and the Improvement of youth players yeah my son's in seventh grade he's 13 so I work with his team and I think what we got to get do a better job of is just putting more emphasis in the developing side which means letting players understand how to play basketball you hear this all these narratives on online about players more skills than ever but when I go to Europe the players are just they're I'm not saying they're not as skilled but they just know how to play especially off the ball 90% of the game is played off the ball and what I love about European basketball is the emphasis on team and not even on the court whether it's in practices or whatever but I feel like they do a better job of the um building the camarad and the chemistry off the court having more dinners together um taking trips together as teams you we got 13 14 year olds that may spend the night at at somebody's house and play video games all night and I think we lose we lost that in our culture here in the States because when I was growing up that's all I really remember I don't remember winning games or or 13u tournaments and getting trophies I remember hanging out at the hotels with my friends and chopping it up and then we got to compete collectively on the court together so I think that's another issue I see because you have a lot of these kids playing on two to three different teams they get done with one game in a tournament and then they're shooting off to go play with another team and nobody's really sticking together just like the transfer portal you got all these kids moving from aou program to a program and it's just it's just chaos man to be honest and then that's another reason why as they get older they never deal with anything because everything's been allowed to just move on if if it's not going your way and so I think it's not a a basketball issue I think it's more of a morality and character issue that we got to do a better job here in the states I I can Echo that and again it's not always fault of the aou program or the coach we're not saying that but the system in place for example for one of my daughters she's essentially never played with the same roster any single weekend of the whole aou season so to think about forming team habits and team as you said team bonding or these type of memories that exist it's really a challenge isn't it and beyond that take us to Europe a little bit because I think it's easy to say oh Europe does it better and it's not necessarily that they do it better they do it differently where the focus is more within a one to twoe period that they're playing within a team within the same club and there's those this cohesive philosophy of development that revolves around practice to game and not just game to game yeah and I I think the biggest thing that I've seen when I go over there is everybody understands the big picture there's no need to try to get this scholarship in seventh or eighth grade nobody really cares about that is hey I need my son to be with a good coach that I feel like really loves my child and is going to teach them not just about basketball but about life lessons and in that over the course of time that's how these players develop because you see it in the league a lot of the players that don't have issues off the court are from Europe and it's because they usually have High character or they have certain characteristics that are taught from a young age through these programs and so again I'm not knocking the US for anything but when we have to look at ourselves in the mirror and look at things that we can do get better I think there's been a def a definitive shift from Europe in the states and so in Europe they just do a phenomenal job of teaching things from a traditional standpoint I agree and again there's a lot of good voices that are pushing some change forward and we're going to continue to do that and I know you will as well talk to me a little bit about just as a from a player perspective one is what is one of the most common things that players ask you in terms of advice whether it's a young player let's talk about young developing players say high school and college players everybody wants to get to the next level and so for me I've I've been famous for being said or telling a lot of players you got to make your bid that's the first thing if you can't even commit to making your bed every single day to me there's just no way in hell you're going to be able to get to the next level because if you can't commit to doing the little things you you're not going to be committed to going to the gym every day and and doing what's asked of you and so I think um that's one of the biggest things that I I tell players when asked what can I do to get to the next level then outside of that is just how studious are you really how curious are you about your own development because the dribble moves is not the way and I'm not knocking dribble moves everybody needs a handle and be able to create but do you know how to play without the bond in your hands because if you learn those Essences or instances of the game naturally somebody's gonna find a role for you but if you have to have the ball in your hands to be effective on the court you're you're already cutting your chances not even in half but essentially it's almost impossible to continue to to graduate to the next um level of basketball if you don't know how to play I can knock the dribble moves if they're only doing dribble moves and this is to parents mainly but also to coaches and and players to understand if you're only doing dribble moves and there's never an opportunity to apply those dribble moves yeah then again I I don't understand the point of that and that's we both seen it and it's it seems to be the default for all coaches trainers in the offseason is just dribble moves and how many dribble moves do you actually need to be effective yeah and the irony in that is at least for me that's when I had to figure out ways to articulate things to keep it in to keep the engagement because there's still times I'm in the gym with certain players and you got always two or three kids just looking up at the ceiling when you're talking right especially if you're doing off court stuff uh off ball stuff like coming off pin Downs or just technicalities of um a a back screen like working on screening and what have you but for me it's to one have the right energy as a teacher if I'm bringing good energy and I'm making it a fun competitive um environment it doesn't matter really what we work on the players are going to be in tune with with the subject matter and that's hard for a lot of coaches and trainers to do without teaching them the dribble moves because that's what keeps the players coming back that's honestly that's what sells but the essence of actually getting a player to go from here to there you we both know you got to work on a little bit of everything accordingly I'm not knocking trainers because again at the end of the day it's what you just said look we you're trying to make a living you're trying to do this as extra income whatever it is we're trying to find a way to bring them back because that helps us and hopefully it helps the player but definitely think there's better ways and you've articulated that throughout more so from the coach perspective or the trainer perspective what type of questions do they ask you most frequently that they seek out your advice on you said most coaches and trainers yeah most coaches are trainers when they're asking Tim Martin for advice what are some of the things that they're asking I think the biggest thing is like the business model aspect of how to just grow their business and that's something that I talk about in my members only Network and I'm going to plug it right away it's just at at Tim Martin iq.com but one of the things that we do is a couple months or a couple times out the each month we discuss on how to really scale your business everything from development to your curriculum to um marketing and things of that nature but that's really the the biggest thing because what I always shut down first first point is you don't need NBA players to do this at a high level I know a lot of players or a lot of trainers that are good friends of mine that maybe only have one or two NBA guys on their resume but they do a good job of being consistent with their promotions or their events and all these different things that's usually the biggest thing and then I would say going in shooting and just get into the paint and create for others so a lot of playmaking stuff love it and you mentioned the business side so let's Di a little bit deeper here as we wrap up but the business side is the biggest challenge isn't it because it doesn't necessarily correlate the number of followers to the actual business and that seems to be a disconnect a lot of the questions that I get asked from people is well wait I have 70,000 followers on Tik Tok but I'm not making the type of money I thought those don't always correlate do they no they don't and I think that's always been a challenge for not just for myself but for everybody in this business again being an entrepreneur there's no guarantees so if you're not following up on your calls and you're not engaging with your target audience in some form of fashion they're going to go on to the next person that's giving them that information and so how you package your information how you market and brand yourself for me it's always been through the authenticity I try to humanize everything that I do to be able to connect with my audience and everybody has their own methods and for me what's worked is really just the word of mouth that's always been my bread of mutter is letting my name speak for itself but when you do start trying to turn the corner it's not even so much about being creative it's more about the consistency behind it and that's I I got a lot of respect for you with all the content that you've been able to promote and share over the years I know that's been a staple in your business model and that's really the essence of what I do each and every day is just follow up reach out to people check on and just tap into your network and again with the members only Network that we have that's the whole genre or theme of what we do is getting coaches from around the world and and connecting them with other coaches to try to expand their name and their brand and to plug your membership Community I I do think that's the piece that will impact people the most is it it's not the basketball side it's the understanding the business side from building Network and knowledge and connecting that knowledge to your network those things are so important so obviously so happy you're doing that and having success in sharing that side of things yeah no I appreciate the platform and like I said everybody that was trying to find me just go to Tim Martin iq.com and that's something that we're going to be I'm doing a better job of just not just sharing information and and knowledge but just connecting people I think being a liaison in the game of basketball will always put everybody in the right position to to have success and when you Empower others the the universe will always find a way to to reward you in returns so I'm a firm believer in that Tim this has been awesome I'm so grateful to be able to have you share with us in Tim Martin iq.com place to go see coaches go check it out but the one reason to follow you is because look you're it's never boring there's always something coming with Tim and I love that man you have such a passion for this and I'm just so grateful that it it comes across so authentically and it's not just asking it's giving and I've received so much from you so it's long overdue to be able to have you on here and you I just feel like you approach it the right way no thank you so much man like I said we I'm gonna be sharing a lot more on my website at timart iq.com I got a Virtual Academy I got coming out with we got some more programs I'm about to launch also I got a world tour coming up so if anybody's interested contact us on the website and and we could book an event but man I I can't thank you enough for just sharing your platform of what you do for the game I think real recogniz is real and just our friendship over the years is is definitely grown and I look forward to seeing what you have coming up and sharing more knowledge to to the masses so thank you