Basketball: Principles Outlive Tactics, Decision-Making Theory and Practice

"Technique beats tactics." - Gregg Popovich

The unknown can kill you. In Empire of the Summer Moon, S.C. Gwynne shares the story of Comanche dominance of the Great Plains for over a hundred years. Inconvenient truths about pre-civilized cruelty darken their story. Their rise and fall reflects technology advancements, for the Comanches, horsemanship, and for encroaching settlers, the Samuel Colt .44. 

The speed and execution of THE horse tribe allowed 25,000 Comanches to control massive tracts of the developing West. Technical excellence (horsemanship and territorial ken) and tactics (guerrilla raids) allowed them to hold off encroachment from the south (Spaniards) and east (French, English). They knew their strengths and leveraged them. Disease (smallpox, cholera) and "Manifest Destiny" doomed their reign. 




We need first principles, too...fundamentals and game understanding to "advance our narrative." We envision a desired 'end state' but we need everyone involved to keep turning the pages. 

We operate best within our circle of competence and regularly access that of our team. Expecting them to execute beyond their competence usually fails and frustrates. If they don't shoot well, creating long-distance shooting chances will end badly. 

In The Decision Checklist, Sam Kyle discusses mental models, recommends a decision journal, and shares decision processes like the PrOACT model. He shows that although many organizations have extensive analysis and process, they fail to make good decisions. 

We can apply the model to practice. How should we allocate limited resources (practice time) to solve key problems like overcoming pressure defense or defeating zone defenses. 

Problem: too many poor quality possessions leading to turnovers or low shot quality.

Objectives: reduce turnovers, increase quality shots, improve points per possession

Alternatives: different press breaking strategies, change practice time and drills, change personnel, change roles within breaking the press (e.g. invert, bringing more skilled bigs up against quicker, smaller opponents)

Consequences: how will changes affect the organization and the people making those changes? 

Tradeoffs: will restructuring practice and/or roles sacrifice too much time from other need areas (shooting, team defense)? 

The authors expand their discussion to include UNCERTAINTY, RISK, and LINKED DECISION-MAKING. Often this considers the 'basketball IQ', flexibility, and mindset of our teams. This requires 'second level thinking', also known as AND THEN WHAT? 

My favorite drills for press breaking are 5 on 7 no dribble (advantage-disadvantage with constraints) and 'ultimate' 5 on 5 no dribble where every time the ball touches the floor it's a turnover. Both force player and ball movement, and involve offense, defense, decision-making, and conditioning. 

Gauntlet is another useful drill, where 2 players (here 1 and 3) advance the ball (constraint is one dribble per touch), through four levels of defense. The rotation is the offense goes to the back and each level of defense rotates up. 

Making better decisions is a skill and learning better decision-making includes using better tools and measuring the results. 

Lagniappe: 

T-Post & Flare/Slip - Player2 slips the flare screen for Player4. Player5 makes the read and pass from the T-Post position #ModernBigTips pic.twitter.com/8Xn0n5AbZB

— Radius Athletics (@RadiusAthletics) June 20, 2018

Radius Athletics shares 3-on-3 flare screen slip...via FastModelSports