Offense - The triple threat position

The game of basketball by its nature is a fast sport. As the sport has progressed, the game has sped up quite a bit at all levels. That being said, it is important that players are in a position to manuever without any wasted motion. When a player has the ball and has not given up their dribble, best practice states that the player should be in "triple threat" position. This position should allow the player to do one of three things: shoot, pass or dribble.

To get into triple threat position, you should hold the ball with both hands and keep the ball close to your chest. If you hold the ball to far away from your body, it makes it easier for the defender to poke it out. By holding the ball in this fashion, you will notice that your elbows are bent and pointing to the side. You also want to have your feet at least shoulder width apart to maintain a good center of gravity so you are on balance for whatever move you are about to make. In order to be a scoring threat, you must be facing the basket. If you are not facing the basket, then the defender knows you will either pass or dribble.

When you are in this position, you can easily do one of the three offensive moves stated. You can begin your shot from this position. One can also initiate their dribble towards the basket or some other point on the floor from this position. You can also perform a chest pass or even an over the head pass from this position with good balance and power.

One thing that is an important and is not mentioned much by coaches is that you as an offensive player want to try and keep the defender guessing as to what you are going to do. If they can consistently anticipate your next move, it makes it that much easier for them to react to any type of move you make. If you are on offense and holding the ball in the triple threat position, the defender has to play you honestly for any one of those three moves you can make from this position.

Dribbling - The basics of dribbling

The one thing I would discourage players from watching are the "And 1" mix tape videos. It is amazing what some of those guys can do with the basketball, especially dribbling. In a real game, 95% of what those guys do is illegal. If you are a player and your dream is to join that team, then this blog is definitely not for you. What I'd like to talk about in this article is the basics of dribbling.

Dribbling is a lot like shooting, there are mechanics involved and once you master the mechanics, dribbling becomes almost second nature. The proper way to dribble the ball starts with top of your dribble. You almost want to hold the ball like you are about to shoot it, but your palms are facing down. You also want to grip the ball like you are going to shoot, in other words, the center part of the palm should not be touching the ball. As you push the ball down towards the ground, its almost as if you are shooting the ball straight down. You want to make sure you rotate your wrist like you do when you shoot, except with dribbling, you do not want to hold the follow-thru like you do on your shot. Once the ball releases from you hand and rolls off your finger tips you want to prepare your hand for catching the ball back on the way up. You want to make sure your fingers are spread so that the ball has a bigger target to hit on the way back up. As you practice dribbling, you will start to get a feel for how the ball will travel back up based on the way the ball left your fingers. When you obtain the ball again on the way back, again, make sure you grip the ball without the center of your palm touching the ball and bend your elbows a bit to absorb the contact of the ball reaching your hand. At this point, you are ready to dribble the ball again. The more you dribble the basketball, the more you will get a feel for how the ball reacts when you dribble the ball.

Begining basketball players should just stand with their feet shoulder width apart and knees slightly bent. Dribble the ball with your right hand for 100 dribbles. Try your best to keep your head up and eyes looking straight ahead. This might be difficult at first, but make this your goal if you cannot achieve this. After 100 dribbles with the right hand, do the same thing with the left hand. If you or your players are struggling with this drill, then have them continue until they can do it with relative ease. After this, gradually introduce walking with the dribble. Again, try to keep the head up and eyes looking forward. Once you or your players master this, then graduate to running. As you move faster with the ball, the dribbler must start bouncing the ball ahead of them so they can run at the ball otherwise the ball will be left behind.

There are goggles available on the market that cover the lower portion of your eyes, so you cannot see the ball when you are dribbling. Here is a link to a version of this product: Dribble Specs (EA)

Hope this describes the basics of dribbling to you. If players cannot master these simple aspects and dribble without watching the ball, then they will have a harder time in the games because they will have to focus on dribbling and not where their teammates are on the court.

Shooting - The touch

There are a lot of factors to keep in mind when shooting. One of these factors is the touch. Often times you will hear announcers during a basketball game talk about the "shooter's touch" or "he has a nice touch". What do they mean by this? Well with a proper shooting touch, the ball will manuever through the air with a particular rotation and you will notice that the ball will not bang off the hoop or backboard. So how do you achieve this touch? The answer is to have a basic understanding on how to hold and release the ball in addition to practice practice practice.

First of all, you have to make sure that you are holding the ball properly at the start of your shot. The key is to grip the ball with your fingers spread and the ball must not rest on the palm of your hand. Again, I will say this again, because it is very important... the ball must not rest on the palm of your hand. If you were holding the ball like a waiter holds a serving platter and pointed your fingers away from you, you should see a small gap in between the palm and the ball. The ball should be resting on your fingers and the pads of your hand at the bottom of your fingers. Now still holding the ball like a platter, have the fingers pointing towards you as if you were ready to shoot the ball. When shooting, you should use your wrist to help roll the ball off by rotating your wrist forward. The ball will naturally roll off your fingertips and you should use your fingers to help guide the ball towards the basket. If you watch the rotation of the ball after performing this movement, the ball should be rotating back towards you, the rotation should occur on an axis that is parallel to the floor. If the ball rotates in a side to side motion versus a front to back motion, then you are rotating your hand when rotating your wrist forward, so concentrate on having the palm of your hand facing the floor at the end of the shot, if the palm is facing any other way, then you will not get the right rotation. The best analogy is to create a goose neck. Imagine that your hand is the head of a goose with your fingers being the beak and your arm being the goose's neck. After shooting the basketball, you hand and arm should form the goose neck and you should maintain that position until the ball reaches the target.

The best drill to achieve touch that I teach players is quite simple. Stand close to the basket and hold the basketball like the waiter holding the serving platter. Make sure your shooting elbow is at a 45 degree handle. With one hand, and one motion straighten out the elbow and rotate the wrist forward and have the ball rotate off your fingertips towards the basket. Do this a number of times trying to swish the basketball (in other words make the basket without hitting the rim and touch nothing but net). As you continue shooting, adjust your shot and feel how the ball should come off your fingertips in order to swish it. Remember to maintain the goose neck when doing this drill. The goose neck assures you that you are following through the shot and not stopping in the middle of your shot. Lack of follow through will force you to compensate your shot since its not being executed the same way everytime. If you are a coach and you are watching your players do this drill, continue to remind them to maintain the goose neck until the ball goes through the basket. Once you make 10 swishes in a row (harder to do than one would think), take a step back and continue shooting in this manner and make another 10 swish shots in a row. Keep stepping back until you have to use a 2nd hand to guide the ball and your legs in order to shoot. Then start shooting normally and you will feel that the touch you achieve from the closer shots in your normal shots. This is the kind of drill players should do prior to a game or practice on their own to get their touch. I still perform this drill prior to playing in city league games.

Shooting - Start with balance

When shooting the basketball, whether its a free throw, jump shot or set shot, the 1st thing that all players must establish is balance. Proper shooting techniques state that at the end of a shot, the player's body should remain relatively in the same place from where it started. This is made easier when your body is balanced prior to the shot.

Balance is achieved by having your feet shoulder width apart and having your knees slightly bent. The best way to demonstrate proper balance is by standing straight up with both feet together and having someone genly push you. This gentle push with will cause the person to lean and have to re-establish themselves so they don't fall. In other words, the person loses their balance and has to adjust in order to regain that balance. Now try the same exercise, but with feet shoulder width apart and knees slightly bent. It is much harder to lose your balance this way. Another thing to keep in mind during your shot is to keep your body upright and try not to lean in any direction. Leaning forces the body to naturally compensate in order to be on balance, that being said, you will have to adjust your shot based on this natural movement. The key is to minimize the amount of compensation you have to perform on your shot due to your body naturally trying to balance itself. All this said, when practicing your shot, focus on starting out on balance.

When I'm watching a basketball game, I can almost always predict whether a shot will make it in the basket or not based on the player's stance prior to the shot. If the player is leaning or running into their shot, a large majority of the time, the shot won't go in. There are few players in the world that can consistently make off balance shots, but most of those players are professionals that have perfected the basic on balance shot. If you are a coach, make it a point to tell players when they are off balance prior to their shot and instruct them that it is a bad shot.

Welcome

I am a former college basketball player and current youth basketball coach. If you watch basketball in this day and age and you are a student of the game, you will see that very few players utilize basic basketball skills. For instance, how many times in a professional basketball game do you see a guard bring the ball up on a fast break and jump stop at the foul line? I don't know how many times I yell "jump stop" at the television when players charge into the defense. I guess that is the coach in me... my wife always asks me who I'm yelling at.

So I have decided to build this blog dedicated to sharing the skills that I was taught as a player as well as pointing out scenarios in games on television that highlight common mistakes made by not executing basic basketball skills. My hope is that players and coaches alike are able to read the entries and either learn something new or reinforce something already learned. This blog won't work if there is no feedback either. If you are a player and a particular article has helped you with your game, let me know. It's always great to get assurance for your efforts. If you are a coach and you see a tip or drill that you havent learned before and it helps your team, please provide your feedback as well. If there is an article that you feel is incorrect or can be described in another way please feel free to comment as well.