The Secret Sauce to Connecting in the NBA

Getting a job in the NBA

What if I told you that it doesn’t matter if you reach out to 10, 100, or even 1,000 people?  What matters is how you reach out.  You’ll have a better chance at reaching 1 out of 10 with 10 intentional notes than 1,000 copy and paste notes.

For anyone trying to connect with NBA personnel… personal is the key. 

NBA personnel get reached out to daily via e-mail, text, LinkedIn, etc.  So how can you stand out?  How can you make a real connection?

One way to certainly not make a connection is to copy and paste the message you sent to the Thunder to the Celtics to the Heat etc.  When I was with the Trail Blazers, I used to get so many messages where a team name had a slightly different font or size which would be an easy giveaway to a copy and paste message which would then be deleted. 

If you are going to reach out to someone, be intentional about it.  Look them up.  Read their books.  Listen to them on podcasts.  And then… ask follow up ?’s

My LinkedIn inbox is full of messages that have been sent to me that ask, ‘What do I need to do to get an NBA job?’

These messages rarely get responded to.  We have an entire Substack and on-line courses dedicated to answering these questions.  If that is your follow-up question, you obviously haven’t done your homework, again, delete. 

But if you start out with, I read your Substack and I had a follow-up question regarding… I heard you on a podcast and I was wondering about…

There are so many ways to personalize a message and increase your chances of a response. 

Look for those commonalities and build your connection from there!

Still want to join our GITG101 NBA Training Camp Course? Sign up at getinthegame101.com or e-mail me at john@getinthegame101.com. We still have 3 classes on Oct 8, 15, and 22 and you can catch the video from an incredible week 1 with a former GITG101 student turned G-League Scout, former NBA Head and Assistant Coach, and current NBA Director of Basketball Operations.