Masters of Offensive Spacing: The San Antonio Spurs Spread Pick and Roll

The most well oiled, fine tuned offense in the NBA Playoffs (and for the entire season for that matter) has been the San Antonio Spurs. They have the personnel, experience and understanding of basic offensive concepts to create some beautiful offense. The staple play of their offense and the one that did the most damage in Game 1 against the Utah Jazz was the Spread Pick and Roll. The Spread Pick and Roll is a set where a high ball screen or high angled ball screen occurs while having 3 shooters spaced outside the 3PT line. The Spurs usually go to the Spread Pick and Roll exclusively when Matt Bonner, Stephen Jackson, Danny Green/Manu Ginobli are in the game, because they are all deadly shooters. Add that to the fact that Tony Parker is using the ball screen to get into the paint at will, while guys like Tim Duncan, Dejuan Blair and Tiago Splitter are rolling to the rim for dunks, and no wonder they have the best record in the West.

How The Knicks and Carmelo Can Create Easier Scoring Opportunities Against The Heat

In Part 1 of The Locker Room’s look at the Heat’s defensive strategy against Carmelo Anthony, we saw how fronting the postup was effective in taking away an easy scoring opportunites for Melo. In this post we will look at two ways that the Knicks can take Melo off the ball and use some planned movement to get him easier catches in better scoring positions.

Stopping A Great Player: The Heat’s Defensive Strategy Against Carmelo Anthony

Throughout the NBA playoffs, we here at The Locker Room will be looking at the most interesting topics and moments that arise during all these highly contested games. In Game 1 of the series between the Miami Heat and the New York Knicks, the Heat showcased how to effectively stop or slow down a great player. That great player was Carmelo Anthony, who shot 3 for 15 from the field and had 4 turnovers in the blow-out loss.

The Heat clearly made it a point of emphasis to take Melo out of the game early on. To stop Melo, the Heat used a combination of great defensive size and athleticism, taking away any catches in an operating area, double teaming, and forcing contested mid-range jumpshots. The defensive size, athleticism and intelligence came in the form of LeBron James and Shane Battier. They both battled Carmelo every possession, taking away any easy catches and making Melo play further and further out on the perimeter. Both have great length to contest any ISO jump shots that Carmelo decided to settle for. Lastly, both are quick enough to contain Melo if he decides to go off the dribble.

NBA Playoffs Preview: What To Watch For In Each Series

The most exciting time of the year is finally here, The NBA Playoffs. There are some favorites to win but as we all know any thing can happen, just look no further than last year’s champions, the Dallas Mavericks. In this post, we will give something to watch for that will help you further enjoy what will be eight great first round playoff series.

What To Watch For: San Antonio Spurs vs. Utah Jazz

• Do the Spurs’ role players continue to do their jobs (play defense and hit corner 3′s) or do they disappear under the playoff pressure?
• The Jazz are young but talented and have the most menacing crowd in all of the NBA behind them. Can they steal one on the road to better utilize their Salt Lake City home court advantage?
• The battle of the 15 to 18 foot jumper from the 4 men (Duncan, Milsap, Jefferson).
• Devin Harris vs Tony Parker. Who is going to be more effective off the pick and roll and in creating a faster pace?

OneBasketball Co-Founder Mickey Abbatiello Featured In Great Article

OneBasketball Co-Founder, Mickey Abbatiello, is featured in a new article in the Town Report, a newspaper from the Bronxville, Eastchester, and Tuckahoe areas of New York. Please visit their online site  to read about how he was instrumental in helping create the OneBasketball App and brand.

Improve Your Speed By Squatting

In an article in Men’s Health this week called “Squat for Speed”, a new study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research suggests that performing the squat in the weight room can drastically improve your sprint speed. In the sport of basketball especially, a player will rarely ever reach top end speed like a 100-meter sprinter would on a track. So, top priority for basketball players becomes the ability to accelerate, decelerate, and change direction between distances of 2 and 20 yards. The ability to produce the force needed to accelerate in those small spaces comes from improving total body strength in the weight room. The squat is a great and fundamental movement that is essential for creating maximum strength that transfers to on-court performance. Bottom line is, if you aren’t doing a variation of the squat in the weight room then you aren’t really working out to improve your performance on the court. And if you are not working out to improve your performance on the court then what are you working out for?

Be sure to check out the Men’s Health article as well as the links below for more information on techniques and variations of the squat.

http://news.menshealth.com/squat-for-speed/2012/04/10/

http://www.dieselcrew.com/how-to-squat

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVNMMJnotnQ&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PLF4C56E96DA9F3443

Thanks for reading.

How Great Shooters Can Dominate A Game: The Ray Allen Story

Ray Allen’s stat line from his game against the Miami Heat on April 10th, 2012 will always say he scored 9 points, dished out 3 assists, and grabbed 1 rebound. A “solid” game some would say. But, if you watch the game and watch Allen and the Celtics, you will see the blueprint on how to dominate a game as a great shooter.

Ray Allen is the all-time leader in NBA history for 3PT Field Goals made. He has one of the quickest releases and purest jumpshots the sport of basketball has ever seen. The Miami Heat as well as every other team in the NBA know of this resume and constantly put him at the top of their scouting reports. So how does Ray Allen continue to produce and be a very valuable player for the Celtics? And more importantly how can all those players out there who are classified as “just a shooter” expand their games and be more effective on the court without having handles like Jamaal Crawford?

What Can Basketball Players/Coaches Learn From Jon Gruden’s QB Camp Show?

This weekend and throughout the lead up to the NFL Draft, ESPN has been showing a show called Jon Gruden’s Quarterback Camp. For those who have never seen the show (YouTube clips attached below), Former NFL Head Coach and current broadcaster Jon Gruden basically interviews, critiques, works out, and tests upcoming NFL Draft QB prospects in person. If you are a regular follower of The Locker Room, you will know that we are very fond of finding tidbits that transfer from sports like football to basketball. And after watching Jon Gruden’s QB Camp, we are left wondering a few things.First off, why isn’t there a show like this leading up to the NBA Draft with a person like Jeff Van Gundy, just passing years of basketball wisdom onto upcoming rookies? Secondly, what can we all learn from watching Gruden and the QB prospects that can help develop basketball players and coaches?

Basketball Drills of The Week – Dynamic 2on1/3on2 Drills

To develop decision making skills in players, they must be put in variable and random situations where they can get numerous repetitions against live defense without the pressure of performance that comes with playing games that count. Much of basketball is all about transition and creating advantageous situations for the offense. While the focus is often on full court 2on1/3on2 situations, these situations occur in the half court as well, in smaller spaces in all different, odd angles. This video shows clips where 2on1/3on2 occur in the half court as well as after a defensive scramble or broken play.

The plain old full court 3on2/2on1 team drill that almost every coach/player has done at some point, fails to maximize the skills needed to find quick, decisive solutions in live transition gameplay. Players become too programmed because the drill creates a pre-determined almost too perfect version of an advantage situation that almost never occurs in a game. The following drills look to develop Dynamic 2on1/3on2 situations where players can get numerous decision making reps as well as work on movement off penetration, reading the defense, passing, shooting and finishing at the basket. And as an aside, the focus may be on the offense in these drills but they also are great drills for developing help and recover, stunting, contesting and communication in the half court and transition defense.  These drills offer any coach great flexibility to control and work on what they want to emphasize.

The Importance Of Tracking Your Progress

The first thing any player should do before embarking on their offseason basketball skill development is to identify the goals/objectives that they would like to achieve. A player’s goal needs to be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and have a time frame.  Too many times players say they want to “improve” or “get in better shape.” These are not goals simply because they are too general. Improve at what? Get in shape how? Great players and expert performers have a specific focus everytime they step into the gym. Below are some examples of some specific goals that a common high school player might/should have: