Scouting for players: What's their comfort zone?

Last night Paul, my long-time partner, and I had dinner at our local Irish pub. The last of the NIT championship game was on the big screen followed by the NCAA 3-point championship.

Now, the 3-point championship doesn't mean that much. Mainly it's a way for players whose teams didn't make the Final Four to get a little more publicity for their schools and get a little more personal attention from pro scouts and coaches. Still, it's an interesting diversion to watch because it's not easy to consistently sink long baskets from the 3-point perimeter when you're just horsing around. Make it a championship and you have something that simulates the pressure of making the game-winning shot in the final seconds of the game. Do it four or five times in a row while dashing around the court and it can be pretty impressive.

To succeed, you have to get into a mental zone that puts you on automatic pilot, instinctively executing the right stance, the right wrist move, the right head turn to the basket that will send the ball -- swoosh -- through and not -- bonk -- off the rim. One guy caught our attention in the first round as the person who seemed the most relaxed into that shot-making groove. As the elimination rounds proceeded, I also noticed that he was demonstrating some really good sportmanship moves on the sidelines.

He genuinely seemed to be rooting for his competitors, shaking hands, patting backs, doing guy-hugs; talking and engaging with the other players in a "big-happy-family" kind of way. I pointed this out to Paul and said that if I were a scout I might be looking at him as a good team player.

Paul and I talked about this for quite a while. Traits and tip-offs that we had seen or read about or heard from others that were good clues you may or may not want to work with a person.

Our guy ended up winning the shoot-out fairly easily 22-17 and the women's champion won her title by the same dominant margin, 19-14. Then of course, it was the battle of the sexes, Men's champion vs. Women's champion. Here's where it got interesting.

It was close, but our guy won 17-15. And when the woman's last shot bounced off the rim, the camera caught him doing the most exaggerated head-shaking, shoulder-waggling, hip-shimmying, "dance-on-the-grave-of-my-enemy" celebration you could imagine. It was so insulting....What happened to Mr. Good Sportsman, I wondered?

Paul hit on it right away. "The risks were too high. He could have been beaten by a girl."

Competing against other men, our guy was in his comfort zone; all the learned patterns about cameraderie and sportmanship were flowing in the zone. There was not much to lose if he lost to another one of the guys. But when the stakes shifted, the zone broke down and the behavior shifted with it.

It's an interesting thing to keep in mind when you're scouting talent for your team.