Jeremy Lin is good for a lot of reasons including natural explosiveness, coordination, and spatial ability, but in terms of skills he is good at the stuff they teach kids in camp. He has fundamental skills and abilities that, surprisingly, a lot of NBA players don't:
-court vision: he sees teammates, understands spacing, understands where he is relative to them on the court, understands how to draw and move the defense using the dribble and the pass
-jab step: with the jab step he keeps defenders off balance and can get off 3 pointers and/or get into the lane
-passing: he is a great passer, and all of a sudden the whole Knicks team is passing well
This is the stuff they teach you in basketball camp, the stuff they say to practice that 1 guy in 100 (including a guy named Jordan) actually follows through on and that is absent in many NBA players.
Incidentally, this is why the US national team lost so many games to foreign teams in the past few decades including the Olympics. Teams like Argentina, Spain, Italy stick to the basics. All they do is pick and roll, all they play is team basketball.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Whole Paycheck?
Maybe you've heard the joke "Whole Paycheck" referring to Whole Foods. It can be expensive. However, the truth is that in many ways Whole Foods is cheaper than a regular grocery store like Safeway.
In the Undercover Economist Tim Harford explains that Whole Foods costs more only when you buy higher-end and/or more unusual items that you simply would not find at Safeway. So it's not that Safeway is cheaper, it's that it sells mostly high-volume, mass-produced, and/or lower-quality stuff.
Harford points out that a bottle of mineral water costs less at Whole Foods than at Safeway. It's because at Whole Foods mineral water is part of "the basics" whereas at Safeway most customers would find mineral water a luxury.
Take the goat milk that I buy every week (sometimes every day). It costs $3.79 a quart. That's over $15 a gallon, which is a ton. But it's not that expensive because it's at Whole Foods, it's expensive because it's unusual. You can't find goat milk at Safeway at all.
Or take the salad bar. Safeway sells bare bones salad, none of it organic. Whole Foods salad bar sells much more variety including organic and it is better prepared. So the price per pound may be higher but you get something more.
It works the other way, too, however. Whole foods sometimes does not offer just plain old cheap stuff. They don't sell cheap paper towels, they are all recycled and specially made, etc. So if you don't really care about how eco-friendly your paper towels are and just want Bounty, you are going to pay more by going to Whole Foods.
So the bottom line is
-Whole foods is cheaper, not more expensive, than Safeway on identical items
-It is up to you to spend your money or not on individual higher-end or unusual items that Whole Foods carries that you cannot find elsewhere.
In the Undercover Economist Tim Harford explains that Whole Foods costs more only when you buy higher-end and/or more unusual items that you simply would not find at Safeway. So it's not that Safeway is cheaper, it's that it sells mostly high-volume, mass-produced, and/or lower-quality stuff.
Harford points out that a bottle of mineral water costs less at Whole Foods than at Safeway. It's because at Whole Foods mineral water is part of "the basics" whereas at Safeway most customers would find mineral water a luxury.
Take the goat milk that I buy every week (sometimes every day). It costs $3.79 a quart. That's over $15 a gallon, which is a ton. But it's not that expensive because it's at Whole Foods, it's expensive because it's unusual. You can't find goat milk at Safeway at all.
Or take the salad bar. Safeway sells bare bones salad, none of it organic. Whole Foods salad bar sells much more variety including organic and it is better prepared. So the price per pound may be higher but you get something more.
It works the other way, too, however. Whole foods sometimes does not offer just plain old cheap stuff. They don't sell cheap paper towels, they are all recycled and specially made, etc. So if you don't really care about how eco-friendly your paper towels are and just want Bounty, you are going to pay more by going to Whole Foods.
So the bottom line is
-Whole foods is cheaper, not more expensive, than Safeway on identical items
-It is up to you to spend your money or not on individual higher-end or unusual items that Whole Foods carries that you cannot find elsewhere.
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