What are Sport Systems?
System – a set of things working together as parts of a mechanism or an interconnecting network.
Sports systems can be seen as an abstract term for the ‘sets of things’ that athletes have to manage in their sports careers.
How an athletes navigates these systems determines their success.
Most of the systems are intertwined and overlapping. They include but aren’t limited to coaching, offensive, defensive, media, endorsements, health/diet/training, contracts, teammates, draft, team politics/egos. A very select few players get to choose which team they play for especially when it comes to who drafts them. As we’ve looked at previously from a team success perspective a players success can be greatly affected by which team selects them.
Coach of the Golden State Warriors Stever Kerr notes that “there’s maybe 10 or 15 players in the league who determine the circumstances on a team. The other 450 are … people who excel based on their circumstances.”
Would Kawhi have won two championships so early in his career if he hadn’t been drafted by the San Antonio Spurs? Would Anthony Bennett be considered a bust if he hadn’t been selected number 1 overall? Or if he hadn’t gone to the Cleveland Cavaliers? The draft and subsequent team a player ends up on our just two systems they navigate in their careers.
Any changes in the systems can drastically affect a players career.
But at the end of the day it’s how well the player imposes their will on these systems that ultimately determines their success.
