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Tuesday, November 7, 2023

Basketball: Ball Reversal

Premise: "movement kills defenses." And movement appears in player and/or ball movement.

Ball reversal forces defensive movement and therefore ball reversal  way challenges defenses, creating open shots and long closeouts. 

Basics: options - skip, around, through


 Simple drills: develop a pass-and-cut mentality 


Skip passes. Advantages include emphasis on spacing, attacks sagging defense, and forces long closeouts. Limitations include lack of strength of young players and lack of shooting range. 


Through the post. "Help and doubling defense" exposes vulnerability to ball movement. The weak side perimeter player can't be covered easily. 


The post player has to "know" where the open players must be. 

Don Kelbick shows how post players can leverage ball movement.
 

Short roll options. Aggressive defensive opens the short roll, creating multiple options for the skilled roller. 


"One more" passing. Ball movement is part mindset and part skill set. Forcing defensive rotation stresses defenders.
 

Lagniappe. Work to develop a variety of separating actions. In general, especially for girls, I believe a quick first move is often a winning move.

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Lagniappe 2. There's a role for lower impact recovery. 

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Monday, November 6, 2023

Basketball: He Made Teammates and Teams Better

Exceptional players have one commonality. They make teammates and their teams better.

I can't recall which college basketball coach said, "I won't recruit a player who scores thirty points a game for a 10-10 team." The point was well taken. Make a difference. Impact winning.


He won championships in high school, college, the NBA, and internationally. He was named to the ACC 50th Anniversary men's basketball team. He was twice named an Academic All-American. 

Over thirteen years in the NBA, he averaged 8.6 ppg and 4.2 rpg, yet earned respect as a "glue guy" and fierce defender, competitor, and NBA Teammate of the Year. 

His foundation has distributed over $3 million in awards. Putting team first has worked out well for Shane Battier. 

  • Put the team first. 
  • Play unselfish basketball. 
  • Do the dirty work. 
  • Play both ends of the court. 
  • Be a great teammate.
Do you care about your numbers or your team? 

Lagniappe. Iverson backscreen. 
 Lagniappe 2. “What do you think when you look in the mirror? Greatness.” Are we better off seeing self or selflessness? 










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Sunday, November 5, 2023

Basketball: Mentoring

Thoughts on mentoring: 

"Mentoring is the only shortcut to excellence." 

Find a mentor and become one. 

Steve Kerr's three core values include: mindset, mentors, and culture. 

"Make friends with the dead." Great mentors don't have to be accessible in real time. Consider coaches like Dean Smith, Pete Newell, John Wooden, John McLendon, and Pat Summitt.  

Share thoughts from a few mentors:

Coach Sonny Lane (New England BB Hall of Fame): 
  • Sacrifice. Teams win through sacrifice. 
  • Turnovers. "The ball is gold." 
Dr. Bill Baker (Cardiology)
  • Consider 'base rates'. Coronary disease is rare in young people under 30. "You fellas fish those waters pretty hard." 
  • Things add up. "I don't see many people with bad lung disease in my clinic and you won't see many with bad heart disease in yours." 
Dr. Thomas Walsh 
  • "You're following a lit fuse." (If he thought we weren't on track...)
  • "DATU" ..."doesn't apply to us." (Certain training functions...e.g. mercury spill training)
Important tasks of mentors
  • Be a sounding board not a rubber stamp.
  • Encourage mentees to "think again."
  • Be a good listener. 
  • Ask good questions.
  • Invert. What if you did the opposite? 
Lagniappe. Good ideas are often simple. 

Lagniappe 2. 

 

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Saturday, November 4, 2023

Basketball: Post 3700. Transformative Technology and the Value of Joy

Reflect on transformative technology. That implies domain changers. Think of fire, the wheel, shipbuilding, metal forging, the printing press, the horse, the Internet, AI, and so forth. 

Just because a technology is transformative doesn't mean easy adoption. Resistance to printing religious texts was widespread in sixteenth century Islam. The primary arguments reflect religious conservatism and the primacy of calligraphy and its surrounding industry. That was not the case for Islamic adoption of other advances in medicine, mathematics, and more. 

What transformed basketball?

The jump shot. The origins of the jump shot date to the 1940s and Kenny Sailors. Perimeter scoring took one great leap for mankind. 

Fast break basketball. Because "great offense is multiple actions," the fast break revolutionized basketball. John McLendon, the Boston Celtics, and the Laker "Showtime" break all changed the game. 

Film study. Video is 'the truth machine'. Showing players their technique, edges, and limitations allows for refinement and growth. The latest iteration is cellphone video that allows access anywhere, anytime. Film also allowed for officiating standardization as once the game was officiated differently on both coasts. 

The three point shot. An ABA innovation, the three-point shot proved transformative conceptually and analytically. The 'standard' for higher level basketball became layups, free throws, and three point shots because those are the highest points-per-possession actions. 

Analytics. From Dean Oliver's Basketball on Paper and the Four Factors, a new generation of analytics gurus emerges. 

Foreign affairs. Once foreign players were considered too 'soft' for the NBA. Time changes everything as some of the biggest stars in the Association are Nikola Jokic, Giannis Antetokuonmpo, Luka Doncic, Joel Embiid, and others. In essence, the foreign players' size, skill, and athleticism reached or exceeded their domestic counterparts. That doesn't include the historical impact of Hakeem Olajuwon, Drazen Petrovic, Manu Ginobili and others. 


Where will the next transformation arise? It's probably underway with the evolution of the big man with Doncic, Chet Holmgren, and Victor Wembanyama. 

What would be a coaching evolution? Will it go beyond the rise of the elite trainers? Will there be an AI revolution real-time? Someday, will a computer coach? 

Lagniappe. Separate with a brush screen. 

Lagniappe 2. How do we translate our values into our program? 

 

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Friday, November 3, 2023

What Is the Problem Statement?

Coaching and diagnostics overlap.

"What is the problem statement?" - Rosalind Brewer, Fortune 500 CEO 

Consider defense.

  • Symptom - allowing too many easy shots
  • Sign - too many mismatches, 2 on 1s, easy shots. Is there ball pressure and containment, ball penetration, too many second shots?
  • Test - review film 'the truth machine'
  • Treatment - "do it better, do it harder, change personnel, '$&%* it ain't working' (change tactics)
For my last team the 'root cause' defense issue was inability to contain the ball. That led to needing too much help and rotation, which wasn't great. 

Ultimately, we had to change from 'individual assignment' (man) defense to a hybrid defense, asking the guards to stop open threes and our interior defense to challenge the inside scorers (we had two shot blockers). 

I didn't do that until late in the season, because I believe developing players outweighs winning. 

Dave Smart emphasizes being good at critical areas:
  • Half court defense
  • Half court offense
  • Defending transition
  • Defending and executing the pick-and-roll
For youth coaches, players need to:
  • Learn fundamentals
  • Reduce turnovers
  • Learn shooting, shot selection
  • Handle pressure, especially against teams whose primary focus is winning
For high school coaches, watch and ask:
  • What's the philosophy?
  • What’s the culture, the ecosystem of training and performance?
  • What's the intent of these or those actions?
  • How do you get more scores and stops?
  • How does the team play close and late? (Special situations, delay offense and defense, pressure free throws for a few)
  • How do teams stop beating themselves (Four Factors failures)?
As teams stand at the cusp of new seasons, think about how to change or sustain behaviors whose footprints are losses or success.

Lagniappe. There's always another Horns action. 

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Thursday, November 2, 2023

Basketball Boomerangs and More

"Movement kills defenses." 

Navy SEAL team leader Jocko Willink told a story about a teams guy who said, "I can remember just three things. What are they?"

Maybe you hated science because they didn't teach applications. Boomerang physics utilize the Bernoulli principle (also used to allow airplanes to fly, pitchers to throw curveballs, and volleyballers to use topspin). 

Chris Oliver explains shaping space to create advantage with switches and training that with small-sided games. 

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Geno Auriemma's UCONN Huskies ran a "boomerang" BOB when Breanna Stewart was the inbounder. 


UCONN moved the defense with a cutter and then entered to the high post who ran an unorthodox give-and-go to Stewie. 

Years ago, our 7th grade girls improvised this SLOB "boomerang" off a zipper entry. 


Imagine the possibilities. 

Lagniappe. Slip the wing ball screen. 

Lagniappe 2. Stack BOB  





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Wednesday, November 1, 2023

We Stand on the Shoulders of Giants

Repost on Coach Robert Knight… 

Lagniappe. Knight screen reads. 

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Tuesday, October 31, 2023

Basketball: A Game of SepARATion - Pick 3

Pet peeve - spelling. There's ARAT in separate. And basketball is a "game of separation."

Let's examine the Celtics - Wizards game looking for three paradigms of separation either:

  • Off screening
  • Off the dribble
  • Off cutting


Here the Wizards use a combination with a ball screen to get advantage and an acrobatic finish with dribble separation. 



The Celtics use a handoff, "draw 2" against drop coverage, and a simple roll gets a layup. 


Jayson Tatum gets an easy basket with a simple basket cut and the Wizards appearing lost on defense. 

Simple but well-executed basketball often gets layups. 

Lagniappe. More 'simple' basketball. 
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Monday, October 30, 2023

Practicing Mudita - "Your Happiness Is My Happiness"

Learn skills that aren't on everyone's radar. 

Muditā (Pāli and Sanskrit: मुदिता) is a dharmic concept of joy, particularly an especially sympathetic or vicarious joy—the pleasure that comes from delighting in other people's well-being. 

It's an important concept; I didn't know there was a word for it. Your classmate gets accepted to their school choice or a neighbor gets a big promotion. "Fantastic. Way to go, Jimmy!" 

It's the antonym of the German word schadenfreude, to delight in another person's misery. "Well, the Yankees didn't make the playoffs, either."

There's another expression about envy, "drinking poison and expecting another person to die." 

When can we find mudita in basketball? 

  • A colleague or teammate has unexpected success
  • A team overachieves
  • A hard-working player gets a chance and succeeds
  • An outside authority bestows an honor or award to someone we know
  • An underdog triumphs

Feeling happiness for others' happiness is a skill. 

Lagniappe (something extra). A lot of solid books on this list (I've read seven of them). 

Lagniappe 2. Become more explosive. 
 
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Sunday, October 29, 2023

Basketball: Fast Five - Points to Share Plus Three Useful Bonuses

The new coach gives you two minutes to share five points to help the team to more success this season. Think about the proverbial Warren Buffett top 25 possibilities and choose your top five.

5. Outwork the other team. Teams succeed when they have ability and the will to play "harder for longer." Hard work is a skill. 

4. Win this possession. Games are the sum of winning individual offensive and defensive possessions. Focus. Play present. 

3. No easy shots. "Hard 2s." That means denying dribble and pass penetration. Contest shots without fouling. Free throws 1.4 points/possession, layups on average 1.2 ppp, threes about 1.05 (presume 35% conversion).

2. Take care of the basketball. A turnover is a zero percentage shot. What's worse is that live ball turnovers are converted to high points per possession chances by opponents. Good teams don't give games away or the ball away. 

1. Take quality shots. Better shots are the quickest pathway to improvement. Quality shots often comes off assists, off unselfish play. 

Of course, most of the time, the new coach isn't asking for recommendations. 

Lagniappe. Want separation? Change direction and change pace, especially stopping.  

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 Lagniappe 2. Combat tight/overplay defense with back cuts and screens. 

Lagniappe 3. Coaching resources, Coach Doug Novak

 

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Saturday, October 28, 2023

Basketball: Imagine the Power, Crowdsourcing


Imagine the power. Crowdsource our best ideas. Great coaches like Don Meyer never feared sharing. Sharing was their brand.

What if every coach (or player) reading this committed to sharing - sharing with teammates, sharing with colleagues, sharing with strangers? 

Part of the equation is openness to receive ideas. I knew a doctor who when confronted with a particularly challenging patient said, "I'd like to believe that I am smarter than ALL the many doctors and specialists that have evaluated you. But that's unlikely. There is something about you or your condition that makes it especially difficult to diagnose and treat." 

Here are a few ideas, shared or stolen, that might improve our coaching. 

1. The Success Equation   ACHIEVEMENT = PERFORMANCE x TIME

One great performance matters. Carlos Santana didn't make his bones solely through his Woodstock performance. The "Body of Work" matters. We're obsessed with the next new thing. Some have extolled Victor Wembanyama over LeBron James. PERFORMANCE over TIME. Maybe Wemby will be the greatest player in history. The Success Equation still applies. 

2. "Every day is player development day." Dave Smart said it; I keep stealing it. 
  • What are we doing to improve daily? 
  • What's our self-improvement plan? 
  • Do we have a mentor?
3. Adopt Dr. Fergus Connolly's framework of performance improvement - Technique, tactics, physicality, psychology.
  • Become more skilled. What is your overarching skill? 
  • Learn sport-specific strategy. That includes studying including video.
  • Develop athletic explosion. Get "bigger, faster, stronger." 
  • Psychology. Train resilience, mental toughness, positivity. 
Take a few moments to share your difference-making ideas.

Lagniappe. Horns breakdown. 

 



 

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Friday, October 27, 2023

Basketball: "Jeffersonian Dinner"

COVID disrupted our ability to share ideas and conversations. Some of that was 'biological' and some was sociological. We went in different directions. 

Having a "Jeffersonian Dinner" is designed to improve our discussions. There are a myriad of possibilities:

  • Improving shooting
  • Half-court offense
  • Creating a winning basketball program "what you do" 
  • Improving practice
  • Player development ideas
  • Better coaching 

Ground rules - no side discussions, everyone contributes

Number of participants - "Goldilocks number"

Introductions - brief background of speakers

Types of participants - diverse, not 'close friends', not people likely to dominate the conversation

Facilitator
  • Introduces participants and broad topic
  • Keep discussants on topic
  • Summary from each guest (takeaways)
Lagniappe. Earning playing time... 

Click on the post for the full list and more



 

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Thursday, October 26, 2023

Basketball: "Win in Space"

Young players often struggle with establishing and maintaining space. Let's discuss. Sometimes we don't prioritize it enough. 

"Spacing is offense and offense is spacing." - Chuck Daly

Spacing creates headaches for defenses. It makes help and double teams harder and opens driving and passing lanes. 

Great defense contains dribble penetration. Loading to the ball compromises offensive spacing, "shrinks space." 

One analogy is magnets. Same polarity repels teammates with offensive spacing. On defense, the ball attracts defenders. On the right, note the "Helpside I" such that ballside offense is playing three against five. 

Use the 'spacing line', also known as the three-point line. Part of that is "range building" on shooting and part is teaching players to finish with a maximum of two dribbles from the line. 

Great players win in space. They also "draw 2" or more and have the ability to pass to open teammates. This is a classic example that didn't work out for LeBron James and Danny Green.  

Teach players "do not cut to an occupied post." 

Other important spacing concepts include "opening gaps" and "clearing a side." For example, using 'horns' sets and clearing a corner through opens the side.  

Keeping the middle open is another spacing concept. How many times have you told defenders to 'see both'. The Celtics make the Knicks pay. 

Spacing also happens by staying outside the spacing line. 


Lagniappe. Perform better under pressure. An article summarizes Weisinger and Pawliw-Fry.  

Lagniappe 2. Move defenders and attack. 
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Wednesday, October 25, 2023

Basketball: Smoke and Mirrors

The coach described his team's success using an analogy, 'smoke and mirrors'. He meant that the record was an illusion as they had not played either quality ball or quality teams. 

When are we not 'smoke and mirrors'? 

  • Play "harder for longer." Excellent teams find ways to wear opponents out. In a postseason game in 1973 against a team that had won 18 straight, we made twenty-two passes to open the game...and then made an open shot. We won 57-37 shooting 23-42 from the field. 
  • Out-tough opponents. That doesn't mean fake toughness standing over guys or 'throat slashes'. Make tough plays - get on the floor, take charges, set and fight through hard screens. 
  • Be more resilient. Maintain composure. Respond to adversity. 
  • Win against quality teams on the road. 
  • Compete relentlessly. 
  • Make good decisions, especially shot selection, consistently.
  • Be professional in all areas - preparation, practice, self-care. 
Lagniappe. "Too many guys are looking inward." 

Lagniappe 2. Horns - Clear. Handback. Screen and roll. 


 

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"Think Better" - Cheat Sheet on Cognitive Biases

It's always worthwhile to think better. Cognitive biases hold us back. It's self-deception. I found this "cheat sheet." 


Think about the 'sunk cost' fallacy. The high draft choice, bonus baby, scholarship athlete gets extra opportunities even when they've proven they can't play. 

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