Assistant Coach Dave Joerger

could have taken a hard earned trip off the grid. Instead, he's spending his time giving back in multiple communities across the country. Ahead of one of Yeager's favorite summer events, a basketball camp on the Standing Rock Reservation in northern South Dakota and southern North Dakota, the now thirty years Sixers assistant coach sat down for some time on the seventy Sixers Insiders podcast to discuss life, what's ahead, and everything that he's doing to make the world a better place.

I'm so so happy now to be joined by coach Dave Yeager. It is wonderful to see you. It's wonderful to see you healthy. How are you, Where are you? What is happening in the life of an assistant coach? Right now. It's great to talk to you as well. Things are really good for the Sixers and for me as well as far as personally things that have going on with recovering from cancer treatment, and it is a process, and you know, you never feel like you're fully healed

or done with it. That it's always going to be a part of your story and part of what you're going to go through physically and mentally going forward, and your family has to live with it as well. But we feel very positive about it because of getting to it early and identifying what the what the problem was early and then going to treatment immediately, and so we feel really very positive about what's going going forward to

be and live a full life. Well I'm not the only one that feels this way, but it's just awesome to see you. How it's sort of like back to yourself. For like a little extra context. I remember last season

really well. We started a long road trip and you sort of gave the announcement that we're gonna be taking time away from the team, and nobody knew about it, and I remember as time went along there were questions about whether or not you'd return during this season, and I think that doc especially, it was certainly hoping that

you would get back, but not expecting you too. And I remember how meaningful it was to have you back for the end of the season, for the playoffs, and how I think, especially among men like people don't express a lot of emotion, but that was a moment when people really did and everyone was so happy to have you back. So what was it like to be able to get back? And now how much do you look

forward to going into a more regular season? Yeah, that was really there was neat Any impact I had on them was times a thousand of the impact they had on me, you know. And being around the guys, being around the coaches that are both the players and the coaching staff are way more than a working professional relationship. We're all friends, and you know, you're pulling for each other, and your families know each other, and your your families

are trying to help each other all the time. And we're around each other more than we are with our sometimes with our with our own families, and so it's its own family. And so that was very invigorating for me and just a real shot in the arm um.

And then certainly the competition and being able to be part of another successful season, and now as you flow into the upcoming season and the excitement that we have going into that, and I know we'll talk about that, but uh, it's just it's there's just such a good vibe. We have a great group of players as people, and the same with the coaches as people that you want

to be around them. And so now with the success we've head and the success we feel like we can have going forward, it's just really it's a very positive vibe because everybody's all pulling in the in the same direction. And the offseason is a weird time because we don't really get to check in with you guys all that much. But in the limited check ins that we have had with the coaching staff, with executive leadership, there's a lot of excitement about what's gone down in the last few

weeks adding to the roster. Looking ahead, you mentioned building on what was already a pretty successful experience with the existing unit. What excites you about the changes that have been made and the opportunity that's ahead now a little let's say, like a little over a month in the distance. Yeah,

it's pretty it's pretty crazy. You know, we thinks go fast you know, and I think before you even get to the changes, I think you get to the fact that James Harden and Joel Embiide and then the other guys did not have a lot of time together. Our core has has two years together, Tyrese, Tobias and Joel and Tobias have been together for X number of years.

We get that, But to add a guy who has the ball as much as James does, especially with Joel, that's only going to get better as more time is spent together, right, And so I think that's going to be really a positive for us to be able to have a training camp and to go into a full

regular season together. And that's that's a process and a journey that they'll continue because they're great players, continue to get better at And then when you add the fact that our development of our younger players, they're going to continue to get older. Shake Milton Matisse, title, et cetera, et cetera. And I don't want to miss anybody. I mean, in Tyrese, we kind of sometimes just glean glean over Tyrese because he's so he's so prominent. But he's had

a great summer. We know this, and so there's that development and that improvement from within UM and now you then add the other players that Melton, D'Anthony Melton and uh and PJ. Tucker with with Daniel House. So what it does is it gives us a lot of flexibility. Those guys can all play multiple positions. They can play with the basketball, they can play without the basketball, and they can all defend their own position very well as

well as other positions. So it's just a it's a really And then they're good dudes too, Let's not let's let's not let that go. They're they're good people. We're adding to the mix. So it gives us a lot of depth. And some would say the other side of it is you have more margin for error. You have Injuries are part of the process of an NBA season, and so to have that continuity where you kind of don't miss a beat something when somebody has to be out for X number of games or a period of time.

And I think that's just only And also the fact that especially PJ has been around the block, he's got veteranness to him, he's got experience to him, and he's vocal, and I think that's really going to help our locker rooms going to help our team continue to grow through

the journey of the season. We've heard Doc talk about, we heard players talk about post game after the final loss in the playoffs this season is toughness, And so you talk about PJ is someone that has all the experience that a player can have in this league in terms of winning, but also in terms of years. James of course has both of those as well, but the

toughness factor. As a coach, when you see the additions that have been made, how excited are you to watch the identity sort of start to evolve based on the addition of people like PJ and the desire to get tougher that we heard everybody express after the loss. Yeah. Sometimes you know, as a coach, you don't really want to hear that sometimes, I think from players, But I think what they're expressing is I want to be part of me wants to be like this, but I need

somebody to go first, you know. I mean, like I got it in there, but I you know, And I think that's what PJ. Tucker's going to really like. You're going to see guys now like come a little bit out of their shell with their personality not outside of themselves, but to that part of it can come out a little bit more as somebody is kind of out there

in front. I wouldn't say that we are not tough as our group, but I think that now we have a catalyst for that and a leader in that area, and I think you'll see guys be their toughness is going to come out a little bit more than it has in the past. Well, I'm really excited about it. I'm excited for you to hopefully have a more conventional, traditional eighty two games season to see how it all

comes together. The reason though, that we got together for this conversation is to talk about some other things that are happening off the court. This is something I love doing with our players. Some of my favorite conversations to have our sort of how are we using our platforms outside of basketball to use your influence in a positive way and make the world a better place. So I know that you're going to be doing a camp this upcoming week. I know that you're doing other things in

the community as well, but let's start there. Why is it so important to invest in the different communities that you've been in and maybe can you actually rewind and tell us about your roots with this area of the country, why it's important to you to continue giving back there. Yeah, So you know, there's four things or probably more that we try to do in the offseason. One is totally relaxed right from the long season, and then another one would be we try to work with our younger players

and develop them as much as possible. And then another one would be, Okay, now I'm trying to think of new ideas, and that usually kicks in about August because you've been chilling, you've been enjoying your family who misses you throughout the course of the season. So as a coach, you're trying to pick other people's brains, the college guys

wherever they're picking your brain. You're trying to figure out different things that you can add to your group and bring to the party this year that will help us get to another level. And so we're doing that, and then forth being having an ability now that the summer leagues are over, everybody's kind of available and the opportunity to do some camps or to do clinics and to give back. And I think the mindset is always how can I help? And you see that with Tyres and

you see that with some of the other guys. It's not a self promoting deal. It's it's how can we help more people have experiences that they might not otherwise have by providing resources for them to be able to do some of these things. And so I'm a part of a basketball camp and on the Standing Rock Reservation in southern North Dakota right in the middle and it's northern South Dakota, southern North Dakota in Fort Gates, North Dakota.

And it's important to me because I think I think as a league we do a lot a lot of good things as a league and individual parts of that, and I think we try to help some of the more underserved places in our country. And one of those that sometimes I think gets overlooked a little bit is are the reservations. And some of the poorest counties that we have economically in our country are on the reservation.

And the issues that some of these kids deal with, the suicide rates, the alcoholism rates, and those kinds of things that they grow up with, where I'm able to maybe have a have a chance to uh to have an impact or to show them something or they they hear something like, oh, that's cool, I get I get a taste of that. I get a vision of what it looks like. If it's not about getting out, but

it's it's it's rising too in their future. Maybe I want to be part of this that or the other experience that maybe I never even got to chance to see in my mind. For us to do those kinds of things as some of the players do with their camps, and that's what we're trying to do and what I'm trying to serve at this camp. That's so cool, so exciting, and very helpful to people like me that don't have

background in that area to just learn more. So thank you for sharing that, and thank you for everything that you're doing with them. I know you're also involved in the NJTL. If you want to tell us a little bit more about that. I don't know that people always understand it's a it's a it's a privilege for me rather to force you guys to brag about yourselves a little bit, because not everybody knows that this is such a big part of your life, of the players lives,

of the other coaches lives. So if you would indulge me and us and let us know a little bit about that organization as well. I think people would love to hear about it. I think, you know, if you champion certain things where you are, and how you can help with maybe your experiences and how that can maybe help somebody else. And so I bumped into this opportunity in while I was the head coach in Memphis junior

tennis and my kids. We were going to put him in this program and and the it's like three hours a day for five days of the week. And the guy said, you know, that's going to be fifty bucks. And I was like, pardon me. He goes, if that's too much, you know we have we can bring it down through our donations. I was like, no, no, it's not enough. How are you able to do that and

serve these kids? And and it was it was in the know in some inner city spots in Memphis, around the community, and and that's how I got to learn about it. And so how can I help bring focus to that and also funds so that we can get more kids in there who don't need, don't can't pay, or don't need to pay because we helped support that. And so uh, at the NJTL is National Junior Tennis in Learning UH and it was started by Arthur ashe uh just a tremendous spokesperson and wonderful human being and

we helped a lot of kids. And so now you know, as time has happened and my life has changed personally with through the cancer. And then we also have the COVID. I'm really looking forward to doing something with the NJTL in Philadelphia, and they've got a good program and people have gone on from there to do to do really good things as I've understood, and it's just the world is changing now that we're fully back open and we can get involved in some of those things. So I

think that's really positive. And then you have the what has happened to me lately and my experience with cancer and the idea that okay, how can I help and if I can use a platform to get it out that early detection makes a difference. It absolutely makes a difference. I'm not sure it's not a big deal. No, go get it checked out. Go and so and with the sixers have just been so supportive and that's just terrific.

We're going to be able to do five or six Jefferson is going to put out five or six different opportunities throughout the community with a mobile service where they can they can screen people and work on early detection for people that might not otherwise make that trip or push themselves to go have something checked out and man like that. That's like that makes a difference. And I'm just really really proud of our organization because they're like,

they're just ahead of the curve. They're they're fantastic in their support of how can we help with the resources we have, which is a lot. Uh and it's it's it's very humbling, very cool, and that of course is a product of the fact that the team made that donation in your honor following your return to the team. So really cool to a so you come back, but be so you get something really positive, positive out of

an experience that was pretty negative. It's really inspiring. It's really cool, and I'm really glad that you and the team are going to be able to share that For sharing about that experience as well, I can imagine that

it's been just like a totally surreal year. We all had to deal with COVID, but then you had to deal with so much more right when we were coming out of it, it was yeah, it was it was It was interesting and it was difficult, and uh, you know, I had a lot a lot of support from not just basketball people, but a lot of basketball people throughout the country and certainly friends and family and then also

you know our sixer's family as well. But uh, yeah, it's not something you think is ever going to happen to you. And I think that's why people don't go get tested and get get the detection devices and tests applied to them, because like, a, that's that stuff that

happens to other people. And I was certainly was one of those people, like that's never gonna happen, and it's it just I remember when I got the text and we were in Toronto and like we've found something, and you know what, and then you talk to your doctor, like you immediately call your doctor and then to sit there in that hotel room and you've been on the road plenty, you know how long those hours are from when shoot around is over to when you go to

the arena. That like, I think I could be a doctor with all the hours if I if I had we'd done some studying and research from the hours of twelve till four thirty in the afternoon on the road in the game. But it was the longest three or four hours ever. And so when then we got to the arena, the trainer, I grabbed him and we went in and Doc and I put our heads together and I said, here's what I know so far. We'll see what happens coming down the pipe. But I can't believe

this is happening to me. And you go through it and you get through it and come out the other side. Well, I know that it ended up being like a source of a lot of inspiration to people within the organization people outside of the organization. I'm sure it's not easy

to talk about it and share it. So thank you so much for sharing what you've shared and again applying the experience to now make some real actionable help and change for folks that are gonna be saved by the ability to test early and screen early, as was the case in your life. So thank you so much for sharing it, and thank you for continuing to push to make it easier for others. Absolutely good stuff, Coach Yager. Thank you so much for joining me today. Hey, I

can go on and on. You know we could just do this like two hours. You make it so easy, so I appreciate it very much. Thank you absolutely, Thanks as always for listening to the seventy Sixers Insiders Podcast. Thanks to Coach Yeager for his time during his time off. I'm Lauren Rosen. Check back into the seventy Sixers Insiders podcast feed for more updates As the off season comes to a close and the preseason approaches. Matt Murphy and I will have you covered every step of the way

for the twenty twenty two twenty three season. We are excited, we hope you are too, and we will talk to you next time.