“He works on a sliding scale, asking his clients to pay what they think is fair. Some players say they might pay $1,000 to $2,000 to keep him on retainer for a week, though Mr. Ravin says occasionally he gets paid in meals or shoes. Lance Young, Mr. Paul's agent at Octagon, now foots the bill for most of his young clients to train with Mr. Ravin before the draft. The agency pays Mr. Ravin roughly $5,000 per player. To make ends meet, Mr. Ravin operates a group of ethnic dating sites from his laptop -- including Ethiopian Personals and Eligible Greeks. His only bit of flash is a weakness for Louis Vuitton loafers and designer jeans. Meet Idan, the Hoops Whisperer How a Former Lawyer With No Basketball Experience Became the NBA's Hottest New TrainerArticle Comments (4) more in Sports Main »Email Printer Friendly Share: Yahoo Buzz facebook MySpace LinkedIn Digg del.icio.us NewsVine StumbleUpon Mixx Text Size By HANNAH KARP Idan Ravin, a soft-spoken, intensely private 38-year-old former lawyer from New York with no formal basketball playing or coaching experience has achieved an unlikely distinction. He's one of the NBA's most sought-after personal trainers. David M. Russell for The Wall Street Journal Idan Ravin Though he doesn't know who started it, Mr. Ravin's nickname in NBA circles is "The Hoops Whisperer." Denver Nuggets forward Carmelo Anthony flies Mr. Ravin to Denver several times a season to help him with his ballhandling. Star New Orleans Hornets point guard Chris Paul turns to him in the summers to sharpen his footwork and Washington Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas, who scored 15 points Saturday in his first game back from a knee injury, worked with Mr. Ravin throughout his rehabilitation. When Phoenix Suns guard Jason Richardson first met Mr. Ravin in Charlotte two years ago, he says, "I was, like, 'This dude has no idea about basketball.' He was a short guy, and when he asked if he could work me out I was like 'Yeah, whatever.'" The 45-minute session later that evening turned out to be "the hardest workout I've ever had in my life," he says. Now Mr. Richardson, who credits Mr. Ravin with dramatically improving his mid-range game, works out with him five days a week in the summers. Mr. Ravin's goal is to create so much chaos and stress on a player during workouts that the physical game becomes less cerebral and more automatic. He uses a combination of humbling psychological tactics and exhausting, unorthodox and sometimes spontaneous drills. He's been known to fire tennis balls at players while they're dribbling or make them stare straight ahead while dribbling two balls in each hand in uneven rhythms and walking from side to side. Getty Images Chris Paul In one particularly exhausting drill, Mr. Ravin throws 25 balls, one at a time, in different directions. The player's job is to catch them after only one bounce and then shoot. One day this summer, as Mr. Anthony's 15-month-old son Kiyan sat in a stroller nearby, Mr. Ravin put the one-time All-Star through a drill called the "full court lay-up," in which Mr. Anthony had to run from one baseline to the other while making only two dribbles. Mr. Ravin times every drill and never hesitates to let a player know how much faster another superstar client completed it. "He knows exactly how to get into [players'] heads -- especially mine," says Mr. Anthony. Raised as an orthodox Jew by an Israeli mother and a Russian father in Washington, the 6-foot Mr. Ravin played pickup games while studying finance and marketing at University of Maryland. After law school he started coaching boys basketball at the local YMCA in San Diego to take his mind off his dreary day job as an attorney. Soon, jealous kids from other teams began infiltrating his practices, and parents began calling to thank him. Three years later after moving back East, he began working out with a group of basketball players he'd known in college and putting them through some of the drills he'd devised for his 12-year-olds. Getty Images Carmelo Anthony His big break came in 1999 when then-college star Steve Francis, who grew up in Takoma Park, Md., and was preparing for the NBA draft, came to one of his workouts. Mr. Francis liked it so much he began to bring other friends headed to the pros, including Elton Brand -- who credits Mr. Ravin with helping him improve his ball-handling skills. "I wanted to know his basketball background and he told me he was a lawyer," recalls Mr. Brand. As word spread through the insular NBA, Mr. Ravin started getting referrals from agents, college coaches and other players. Most NBA players use more traditional trainers. Kevin Garnett swears by Joe Abunassar, who coached at the University of Wyoming for four years and offers his roster of All-Star clients nutritional education and body composition analysis at his two fitness centers in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. Kobe Bryant prefers the swanky new $15-million, 60,000-square-foot training center on Chicago's west side run by Tim Grover, who got his start working out Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Charles Barkley. Mr. Ravin, doesn't own a gym. He doesn't have employees and advertises his services on a modest Web site. He doesn't offer weights or strength exercises and focuses only on a client's weaknesses. He works on a sliding scale, asking his clients to pay what they think is fair. Some players say they might pay $1,000 to $2,000 to keep him on retainer for a week, though Mr. Ravin says occasionally he gets paid in meals or shoes. Lance Young, Mr. Paul's agent at Octagon, now foots the bill for most of his young clients to train with Mr. Ravin before the draft. The agency pays Mr. Ravin roughly $5,000 per player. To make ends meet, Mr. Ravin operates a group of ethnic dating sites from his laptop -- including Ethiopian Personals and Eligible Greeks. His only bit of flash is a weakness for Louis Vuitton loafers and designer jeans. After a tough loss to the Knicks Friday night, Mr. Paul emerged from the New Orleans locker room and lit up at the sight of Mr. Ravin, who was waiting in the tunnel. Mr. Ravin proudly noted that his protégé was wearing the same fashionable "Nudie" jeans he's been buying lately. "I learn from them and they learn from me," Mr. Ravin said. Write to Hannah Karp at hannah.karp@dowjones.com Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page D8 Copyright 2008 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com More In Sports Main Email Printer Friendly Order Reprints Share: Yahoo! Buzz facebook MySpace LinkedIn Digg del.icio.us NewsVine StumbleUpon Mixx ”
