2 + 1 vs 3 (Shorthanded versus Pressure)

Purpose: defeat pressure

Constraints: "3" cannot enter until ball crosses midcourt; 4 only enters ball.

Complexity: initial 2 versus 3 pressure (could play 3 +1 versus 4 or number of your choice)
options: 1) no dribbling, 2) limit number of dribbles, 3) defense to offense after stop or score

Feedback: importance of moving without the ball and passing early to open player

Note: I frequently like to constrain dribbling, forcing emphasis on cutting. 

Quick Hitter...Stagger Empty

"Good artists borrow; great artists steal." - Picasso 

Via Wes Kosel via TheBoxand1.BlogSpot.com 

Nice staggered screen combined with clear out action

The Book Shelf: What Have You Been Reading Lately?

Intellectual curiosity and reading belong to successful coaching and leadership. About forty percent of Americans NEVER read a book. What a loss! Reading a book a week or even a month can open new dimensions and hidden worlds. Reading is the primary predictor of career success.

Here are some of my recent choices and current selections:

Recently finished:

1) Invisible Influence by Jonah Berger
2) Raylan by Elmore Leonard (okay, okay a rare non-fiction book)
3) Leadership Lessons of Gregg Popovich by Leadership Case Studies (ghost written)

In progress:

1) 21st Century Basketball Practice  by Brian McCormick
2) The Inner Game of Tennis by W. T. Gallwey

Recently reviewed (notes)

The Success Equation by Michael Mauboussin

Fast Five: Broken Wing

We've all faced the "broken wing" situation, a player with a fracture, dislocation, or combination which keeps her from full participation. I have a player in that situation now. But can we train this to advantage. 

Here are some possible "broken wing" solutions that still mimic game actions. 

1) Dribblers can improve their spin dribble by enforcing the move by keeping the ball in one hand and relatively tight to the body. Dribblers can also practice hesitation and in-and-out (fake crossover) moves. 

2) Proper warmup shooting. Form shooting. 


I have players that struggle to keep the elbow in. Form shooting can correct this. Players need to understand that 'form precedes function. 

3) Floaters. Smaller players need tools to deal with 'the monsters'. Floaters emphasize quickness and elevation...with a one-handed finish. 




4) Layups. Even one-winged, players can practice underhand, reverse, and high arcing layups. 




5) Passing. Players can work on one-handed 'push' passes as well as baseball passes. You can also work on one-handed post entry passes. 


Remember Coach Wooden's sage advice, "never let what you can't do interfere with what you can do." 

Quality Control

What makes up great practice? We can imagine great intensity, tempo, focus, and positive attitude with poor execution and little progress. 

In The 21st Century Basketball Practice, Brian McCormick offers three questions (my annotation in parentheses):

1. Are my practices designed to develop the global player? (Create positionless play)
2. Do I practice the perceptions and actions together or isolate the actions? (Each player is king; decide and execute)
3. Can my players adapt their technique to changing demands? (Popovich's competition, fundamentals and adaptability)

Within this context, how can we ensure quality control of content and operations? Atul Gawande, a Boston surgeon, hired a senior consultant to watch him operate. A plastic surgeon recently told me about plastic surgery techniques designed to reduce operating time, a major cost input for patients. 

Having a coaching advisor or mentor would be analogous. We want practice to improve our team's CFA (competitiveness, fundamentals, adaptability). Of course, for some that means surrendering some ego, acknowledging that others might also have experience, judgment, and knowledge. Some people can't make that leap. 

Attention to detail begins with preparation. The preparation can include new reading (like McCormick's books) as well as step-by-step practice schedule format. "Pound the rock" in Popovich-speak. 

Players need clarity. It matters only what players understand, not what I teach. Coach George Raveling would say, "what is not learned has not been taught."

Communication includes feedback. Ask players to to explain what I just said as simply as they can. "See one, do one, teach one." 

Practice stimulates competition and allows players to see their own progress and their achievement relative to their peers. Their notebooks allow them to record gains and needs.  

Conditioning can proceed within practice segments. Transition offense and defense are obvious, but controlled scrimmages (offense-defense-offense) out of free throws, BOBs, and SLOBs initiate transition sequences. Shooting drills can incorporate conditioning as well. 

Incorporating decision-making into drills creates challenges. 

This simple 'overplay' drill teaches cutting and passing reads. Every closeout drill demands real time decision-making. Small-sided play (2-on-2, 3-on-3) demands decision/action play. 

Drills should translate to play(is our drill book relevant?). Only you can decide what applies to your system and how to teach. 

Applying and defeating pressure (Pressure work) is fundamental to the game. We sometimes don't have enough players at practice in the offseason to scrimmage beyond 3 on 3. But 'don't let what you can't do interfere with what you can'. We can set up late game inbounding drills on 1 on 2 offense. 

Situational play success or failure (e.g. close and late) needs repetition. I know my players do not have a full court and half-court 'winner' play in mind. 




   

       

Their ignorance is my responsibility. 

I'm not saying my practices are better than yours. I mean that my practices can improve and I suspect that some of yours can, too. We control quality. 

Time

Basketball is a game of (fill in the blank). We might substitute 'life' for basketball. One of my favorite expressions is 'basketball is a game of passing and cutting'. But it's also a game of time and space. Let's examine 'time'. 

"There is always something that we can improve." But improvement demands not only a commitment to 'do the work', it requires time. 

Eric Greitens concludes his book Resiliencewith a chapter on 'Sabbath'...the rest. He quotes Rabbi Abraham Herschel, Six days a week we wrestle with the world, wringing profit from the earth; on the Sabbath we especially care for the seed of eternity planted in the soul. Greitens adds, Time is beyond your control. Yet you have to live meaningfully in time as well as in space.

Time factors into many areas of basketball. We have 'practice time'. We have time for off-season personal development. As a high school or college player, we have finite eligibility. We have game time. We have timeouts during games. The passage of time is immutable; we cannot control time...but we can control tempo. 

How do we manage our time? Do we choose to spend our time or invest it? 

Darren Hardy in The Compound Effect discusses the value of tracking, To help you become aware of your choices, I want you to track every action that relates to the area of your life you want to improve. In the investing community, journaling is highly recommended as a way to track your thought process and decisions. This demands using time to help organize time. 

A few thoughts on time:
1) Run practice at a high tempo. We can always get more done when we commit to do so. 
2) Don't squander timeouts. I like to save at least 3 (of 5) for the last four minutes of a game with a variety of purposes. 
3) Start on time and end on time. Our players deserve that. It's tough to put the responsibility on kids (transportation needs, multiple activities)
4) Don't talk them to death. They need the reps. 
5) "Tomorrow is granted to no one." 

Fast Five: Leadership Lessons of Gregg Popovich

Gregg Popovich has led the Spurs for twenty seasons. Maybe most remarkable are seventeen consecutive fifty plus win seasons. 

I just finished "Leadership Lessons of Gregg Popovich" and share a few points about Popovich, an Air Force Academy graduate with a degree in Soviet Studies...not the usual path to NBA greatness.

This little book is constructed from information in the public domain and is designed to explore business concepts relating to the Spurs success, a very worthy read for $2.99. 

1. The Spurs' culture incorporates a core of CFA - competitiveness, fundamental excellence, and adaptability. For example, Pop isn't a big fan of the three-point shot but has used it with extraordinary success during his five championship run. He understood early the value of "3 and D" players. 

2. The Spurs have integrated resource management better than other teams, specifically blending many foreign players into their system. He rejected that foreign players were too soft, too aloof, and unwilling to learn English. He has even learned some of their languages to improve communication. 

3. The Spurs believe that "debate and new ideas must always be allowed." They have enjoyed a unique culture and Pop believes players should have a worldview and that the 'world is wider than the basketball court'. 




4. "Technique is more important than tactics." Great fundamentals lead to adaptability. Adaptability allows players to "figure it out." 

5. "Pound the rock." If it takes 101 hits to split a rock, you can't skip fifty along the way. As Brad Stevens would say, "the magic is in the work." Control what you can and have gratitude for your unique opportunities. 




"...extra passing...ball movement...lead the NBA in threes...play hard every night"

Xs and Os, Finding a Middle Ground

"All great offenses are alike; each bad offense is bad in its own way." 

The Boston Celtics dynasty ran six plays with options. Execution, not volume of plays, is the key to success. Great offense gets great separation with easier (and more) shots by reducing mistakes. 

Great offense comes in many different shapes but invariably converges at the intersection of spacing, cutting, passing, and screening. Watching the NBA Summer League, we are treated to the destruction of great offense, the continued rise of long-range shooting, and questionable team play. NBA wannabe blacksmiths keep clanging threes off the Vegas iron. 

How would we teach 'great' offense? I believe that it starts 'piecemeal' in the 'part-whole' concept. As an example, consider 'horns'. 

A couple of years ago we ran this set five times and scored seven points...with sixth graders (who can't shoot)...with three baskets and one free throws. It's the height of simplicity with a possible give-and-go off entry, off-ball screens, and if nothing opens, the 5 can go one-on-one. The 2 and 3 have to go through and up if nothing opens to create some semblance of floor balance. 

But usually offense isn't five on five, it's one on one, two on two, three on three. 1, 5, and 2 have to work together to create something ball side and 4 and 2 work to create something on help side. Teach the screeners that their role (rolling!) makes them the second cutter, so that all five players are involved...not just on the court. 

But our 'drawings' only come alive when players set up their cuts, cut hard, wait for and read screens, and of course, finish. Yes, shooting is critical as well as penetrating to pass. But there's more to the game than just dribble-drive. 

Time to get off the soap box and watch some more uniquely, mostly bad offense. 

There Is No Easy Button

On the drive to work today, I heard Rob Ninkovich tell a story on the radio about Rob Gronkowski putting an 'Easy' button in the end zone and then picking it up and jumping around crazily after scoring a touchdown. He then handed to Bill Belichick...not a great idea.

As recently discussed, Michael Mauboussin (The Success Equation) shared the continuum of skill and luck. In basketball, the meek do not inherit the earth as skill (with attendant deliberate practice) correlates strongly with results.

Success in sports, business, and professions demands attention to detail in strategy, system (organization), people, and process. If you want the best results failure in any area compromises your results.

Strategy. How do you want to play? If you want to play fast are you preparing players and team for the conditioning and execution of the transition game? Is practice oriented to achieve that? Does each player understand her role, the commitment, and the organizational goals?

System. Do you have a unified organization, from administration through whatever 'varsity', junior varsity, freshman, feeder programs? If not, can it be fixed? Do you have your 'community' support at every level or are you facing a Sisyphean and thankless task?

People. Are the 'right' people installed at every level of the organization? For example, in the Celtics front office, there is ownership (Grousbeck et al.), management (Ainge), and coaching (Stevens) stability. That allows consistency of approach as they work to identify and acquire a roster that can compete for a championship. The paradigm of success is the Spurs, with long-term stability with Peter Holt (owner), R.C. Buford (GM), and Gregg Popovich (coach), and the Big Three of Duncan, Parker, and Ginobili together for almost fifteen years.

Process. Do you have a coherent and consistent process of planning, preparation, study, practice, evaluation, feedback, and refinement? Creating a thoroughly integrated program sets the bar high. That means attention to each individual within the organization, reminiscent of Bill Walsh's "Standards of Excellence." The person answering the phone has to have the same pride in their role as the management and players. You may remember the visit to NASA when the President asked a custodian about his job and he replied, "I help land a man on the moon."

Developing that organization certainly doesn't have an Easy button. Finding people who declare their passion and commitment is easy. Very few choose to work the process.  

Basketball and Belichick

How do we mimic elite organizations that have maintained a sustained competitive advantage? Mike Reiss discusses "The Patriot Way." It doesn't always work. 

10. No shying away from tough decisions. The Patriots have cut ties with a number of elite players through the years. Sometimes a player has to go. 

9. Reaction to adversity/clutch situations helps define greatness. How do we respond to challenges like illness or injury? What is our level of preparedness for close and late situations, with or without timeouts? 

8. Public relations 101. How skilled are we and our players at communication?  Do we credit role players publicly. 

7. Fun is allowed and encouraged at times. Can and do we vary our communication substance and style? We have to PLAY basketball. 

6. Leadership takes on different forms. We can be 'on task' (all business) at times and relationship-focused ('player's coach) at others. We can be quiet or demonstrative; but we players need to know that we're on their side. 

5. It’s all about the details. No organization flourishes without knowledge of its people, market, its product, and its competition. But it begins with people. 

4. Always choose comfort on the sideline. This isn't really relevant to most of us but we need to be comfortable in our own skin. The "hoodie" becomes metaphorical for comfort with ourselves. 

3. Hardcore preparation and adjusting on the fly. I've always believed in detailed practice schedules and information sheets for players. But I've seen detailed game plans where players either forgot or never learned assignments and failed to execute when the situations arrived. 

2. Power of the team. No coach teaches the power of the individual over the welfare of the team. But the paradox is that maximizing player skill maximizes the potential of a team, as long as players willingly subjugate themselves to the team. 

1. Do Your Job. Success demands teamwork, but also requires winning the individual battles inherent to sport. Slogans only matter when they translate into action. 

Fast Five: The Hekawi (What the Heck Are We Doing?)

An old post from HoopThoughts reminded me of the F Troop tribe, the Hekawi. Are you a splitter (more categories) or a lumper (fewer)? We must know who we are and where we are going. 

1. Priority. What's our 'why'? Why do we play? We're here to share a growth experience and a growth mindset, but about more than basketball, about teamwork and excellence. 

2. Emphasis. "Basketball is a game of mistakes." We can't "go back" to fundamentals. We have to live there. How do we score and how do we get stops? How do we eliminate or minimize mistakes (turnovers, bad shots?) 

3. Self-analysis. What works for us (do more) and what doesn't (do less)? Strategic planning needs objective underpinnings. 

4. Practice versus process. On the continuum of skill and luck, basketball is weighted toward skill. According to Michael Mauboussin, the correlation between skill and records is about 90 percent over an NBA season. Where skill dominates, deliberate practice reigns. In domains that are more luck dependent, including investing, process has a larger role than practice. 

5. Simplify. Results emerge from "performance-focused, feedback-rich organizations." How do we intend to wear down or wear out our opposition? We need to develop and teach a realistic plan at the highest tempo, and subtract the extraneous.

Found in Translation

                                             

Finding readily available information can add to your players' physical and mental make up. I'll share a few examples from today's Boston Sunday Globe. 

Nick Cafardo discusses the transformation of Oakland left-handed pitcher Rich Hill from journeyman to ace. 

Hill says, "I've finally reached the point in my career where I've learned to focus completely on the mound, where you don't let in outside distractions...I focus on each pitch." Translation: play in the moment, this possession, the Mike Krzyzewski "next play."

"Brian (Bannister) studied the elite of the elite - Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke - emphasized that, take what you think are your best pitches and use them correctly." Translation: courtesy of Michael Mauboussin, 'do more of what's working and less of what isn't." 

Mauboussin has written, “When everyone in business, sports, and investing copies the best practices of others, luck plays a greater role in how well they do.” 

Adam Himmelsbach discusses the Boston Celtics' acquiring center Al Horford. 

"Coach Brad Stevens told the four-time All-Star, "the type of player you are is what we want." Translation: you have to know what you want and identify how to develop (or find) players that fit your culture, philosophy, and identity.

"He (Horford) is a big man who can space the floor with his outside shooting, and is capable of switching onto smaller guards on defense...he can do multiple things. He's not just a pick-and-pop guy. He can pick-and-roll, he can finish at the basket, and stretch his shooting ability out to the 3-point line." Translation: offensive and defensive versatility have increasing value in today's game. In contrast to Hill's doing more of one thing, basketball requires you to perform more skills well. Because the Celtics were among the five worst three-point shooting teams in the NBA, they need to make changes to improve spacing and solve scoring problems that plagued them in the playoffs. 

The answers to our daily needs are often in plain sight. Fleming discovered penicillin by observing bacterial inhibition in a laboratory 'accident'. Sildenafil (Viagra) was a failed high blood pressure medication. J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter series) had a dozen publishers reject her novel. Persist and succeed. 

Resilience

This article about Resilience comes courtesy Brook Kohlheim's weekly basketball email newsletter. Brook is relocating on her basketball journey, climbing the arduous coaching ladder on the women's circuit. She shares valuable information and has become a 'go to' resource. 

The concept of resilience has grown exponentially recently. Terrific books are available including Resilience by Eric Greitens, Performing Under Pressure by Weisinger and Pawliw-Fry, and Stronger: Develop the Resilience You Need by Everly et al. 

Here are some excerpts from the Harvard Business Review article. In our daily lives, we often need shortcuts to incorporate more concepts in less time. 

The very lack of a recovery period is dramatically holding back our collective ability to be resilient and successful...And lack of recovery — whether by disrupting sleep with thoughts of work or having continuous cognitive arousal by watching our phones — is costing our companies $62 billion a year in lost productivity.

A resilient child is a well-rested one. When an exhausted student goes to school, he risks hurting everyone on the road with his impaired driving; he doesn’t have the cognitive resources to do well on his English test; he has lower self-control with his friends; and at home, he is moody with his parents. Overwork and exhaustion are the opposite of resilience.

The key to resilience is trying really hard, then stopping, recovering, and then trying again.

If you’re trying to build resilience at work, you need adequate internal and external recovery periods.

...you can take a cognitive break every 90 minutes to recharge your batteries.

I know that as a physician, time management is challenging. For example, yesterday I saw five patients in the hospital, nineteen in the office, and made innumerable phone calls to patients and families, other physicians, and insurance companies. I spent my 'lunch' refilling prescriptions and doing paperwork. According to this article by Achor and Gielan, there was no way I could perform at an optimal level. "All work and no play" makes for an inefficient life. 

"Portland" SLOB Series

Here are some possible actions off what I call the "Portland" series. It opens up a variety of options that could also be run as part of a half-court offense "2 Man Game". Adjust the assignments to fit your personnel skills. Running different options from the same set requires a higher defensive IQ. 

Classic action to set up late 3. 

Same set different intent. 

Same set designed to create action on the weak side. 

Other options include 5 screening away 

Leaving Ordinary

Exceptional play and coaching share certain qualities. Borrow from other disciplines to develop new ideas. For example, vacuum cleaners borrowed from other technologies to fashion exceptional science. Watching the British Baking Show tonight, I heard the judges echo themes we regularly share. 

They commented about the need to distinguish between ordinary and extraordinary performance. They noted how one contestant seemed unwilling to leave her comfort zone and fell behind other competitors. Creativity mattered. A losing contestant still shaped a marvelous 'biscuit box' shaped like a fire engine. But the "Star Baker" combined fundamentals such as baking texture consistency with superior but not overwhelming flavors. 

Bill Russell reminds us that "imagination leads to innovation leading to differentiation." Exceptional performance reflects special actions and effort. Last night we chastised some of our players for lackluster defense. Some responded with temporarily amped up concentration and effort that were readily apparent. I quietly counseled one that full effort can't be random. Defensive intensity must be existential. 

After the game I shared my beliefs that basketball isn't played by halves or quarters but by possession. The best players commit to succeeding each possession, getting or preventing quality shots. That demands extraordinary commitment and leads to confidence earned by proven success. 

Players' and coaches' inputs determine their collective destiny. You will never become a complete player by allowing yourself defensive complacency while saving energy for offense. We know it when we see it. 

I lose respect for players who are quicker offensively than defensively, who go to the o-boards yet don't block out defensively, and who hunt shots instead of open teammates. As a player what do you stand for and as a coach what will you stand for?