(NAME)
ENGL 102-051
Professor
Feb 25, 2025
My Favorite Sport
Basketball is one of the most popular sports worldwide. It has changed millions of lives,
including my own. It’s a great activity to improve your mental and physical health, learn
valuable skills, enhance your character, make new friends, and become more creative no matter
your athleticism, height, or any other deciding factor.
Exercise has already been proven to yield many physical and mental benefits to its
participants; basketball is a more enjoyable way of doing just that. You’re constantly moving
around the court, creating opportunities to score, playing defense, running, etc. You are also
using all three types of endurance; short, medium, and long distance are all involved in any given
game. According to the Physiology of Basketball review article from Pub Med Central, the game
is packed with short and intense bouts of activity combined with moderate-intensity movement
and walking and the energy systems that support all 3 types of endurance. It also discusses the
benefits of improving cardiovascular health, supporting the nervous system, and speeding up
their metabolism. It forces you to give more effort to perform well because of the competitive
aspect, which improves your mental health at the same time. Basketball is often more of a mental
game than it is physical; you’re forced to focus fully on the game, putting you into a flow state.
This acts as a stress reliever, as for a certain amount of time, you are getting exercise and letting
out your mental frustrations. According to Rehab 4 addiction, basketball is a powerful way to
build stronger mental health. It reduces stress within the exercise of the game while also
improving your sleeping habits by making you more tired by the time you go to sleep. Basketball
also improves mood by releasing hormones like dopamine and endorphins, which are meant to
alleviate stress, anxiety, and depression. It also builds confidence and improves endorphins and
self-esteem through skill development and competition.
Basketball is also an excellent opportunity to learn valuable life skills and improve your
character. Life skills include discipline, resilience, hand-eye coordination, teamwork,
communication, and strategy. In Dunkest, it also talks about the mental cognition benefits of
playing basketball as well, such as motor skills, decision-making, and sharpening mental focus
and coordination. It also helps you connect with other people, as sports encourage you to talk
with your teammates and opposing players, fostering a space for improving teamwork and
communication skills. As for character development, it teaches you to be a team player and to
accept losses and setbacks as opportunities to grow and improve. They actually have research
that shows how students who participate in sports like basketball display improved conflict
resolution, communication, and improved social skills. Rehab 4 Addiction continues to discuss
how basketball can give its participants a sense of belonging in their lives as they’ll
automatically meet a lot of people who share a similar interest.
Even if you never end up taking sports seriously, basketball can be an entertaining hobby
and a creative outlet. There are plenty of people who have basketball as just a hobby or a fun
activity they do with friends or family when they're bored. It encourages you to talk to other
people and gives you many chances to connect with strangers over a shared activity and make
new friends. Having something to do together is one of the best ways to connect with new people
and make more quality friendships. When the team wins, everyone is happy and celebrating;
when the team takes a loss, the team has a new goal to win the next game.
Therefore, basketball is an enjoyable, useful, and interesting sport because of its Physical
and mental health benefits. It is even more valuable because of the valuable life skills and social
and character-building opportunities. All of this without having to be an athletic person or have
previous experience in sports.
WORKS CITED:
L, Tim. “How Basketball Assists Mental Health.” Rehab 4 Addiction, 17
May 2019, www.rehab4addiction.co.uk/guides/how-basketball-assists-
mental-health.
Team Dunkest. “The Role of Basketball in Shaping a Student’s Life:
Beyond Physical Fitness.” Dunkest.com, Dunkest, 17 Jan. 2024,
www.dunkest.com/en/nba/news/163398/the-role-of-basketball-in-
shaping-a-students-life-beyond-physical-fitness.
Gottlieb, Roni, et al. “Physiology of Basketball -Field Tests. Review
Article.” Journal of Human Kinetics, vol. 77, no. 1, 2021, pp. 159–167,
www.johk.pl/files/10078-77-2021-v77-2021-15.pdf,
https://doi.org/10.2478/hukin-2021-0018.
