Tuesday, June 22, 2021

Basketball: Apply Pressure with a Fistful of SLOBs and Principles to Remember

Apply pressure. Why let defenses relax instead of stressing them? Have an 'in case of emergency' supply of special situations plays. Especially with a shot clock, wasted time is wasted opportunity. 

SLOBs. Here are five worthy candidates. Keep others in reserve


Horns-like set with multiple options including either a pindown curl or a DHO off the pindown. 

2. Box Zipper Curl 


Zipper entry with sequential screen from 5. 

3. Winner (Yes, it's worked multiple times most surprisingly with 5 rebounding a miss.)


Entry to the corner helps mitigate pressure on the passer. Another option is setting 5 as the ballside screener. If they switch, you have a post mismatch

4. Zipper DHO Plus


Zipper entry is common off the SLOB. A handoff into a pick-and-roll creates multiple options on the weak side. 

5. GO 


One of multiple give-and-go options for the inbounder.

Lagniappe. Tom Peters. 
Lagniappe 2. Coach Hanlen ball containment defense 


Poor on-ball defense creates too many help, rotate, and recovery situations that lead to open shots. Watch through to the end. 

Lagniappe 3. Cost-Benefit Analysis

Disney CEO Bob Iger approached Steve Jobs about a Disney-Pixar merger. Jobs drew up a pros and cons list with a long list of cons. Iger was not sanguine. But Jobs said that the weight of the few pros exceeded the numerous cons. There's a saying on Wall Street that in the short term it's a voting machine, but in the long term it's a weighing machine (earnings). 

We do this daily, choosing Pietra or Paula. Kemba or flexibility? Relocate to Seattle? Is Ben Simmons broken or fixable? Recycled coaches or freshness? Surf or turf? 

Lagniappe 4. Zipper-return-screener roll. They figured it out themselves.