This page will deal with a unique type of Basketball Shooting Workout Plan. Although not a plan in the traditional sense it is nonetheless a plan to deal with shooting the Basketball.
Please read carefully as I feel there are so many great ideas that a player can utilize when working on their shot.
Coaches too will gain great insights on how to correct major problems realting to basketball shooting without drastically changing a shooters entire mechanics
Shooting (by Cavit Altunay)
You can’t win if you miss shots.
Shooting and footwork is the most neglected technique in teaching basketball. Even techniques of1950-1980 period are much better than the 21st century techniques.
Good, nice , are the correct adjectives, talking about beaux-arts.
Shooting is pure mathematics. Wouldn’t it be better to use technical expressions?
Let’s go for the scientific definition of shooting.
Shooting has three essential parts.
1 – Locate the correct direction
All movement must be on the “same geometric plane”. (Your right foot must look to the rim, the ball over your right knee, middle finger, forearm, arm, shoulder, set point, and centre of the basket).
If you follow these principles, all your shots will go to the center of the rim 100%. This is a mathematical reality. Anybody can do it. As you see, it is easy to do, nothing you are born with. Best of all it is easy to learn.
2 – Locate the distance
Then comes the difficult looking part..
But, thank God, we have two eyes. We can form a triangle to calculate the correct distance. The same way hawks do. Calculating the distance while shooting is innate, conditioned reflexes . We don’t have to learn something.
3 – Establishing the ideal arch.
This is the most difficult part of the shooting. Don’t worry; I am the expert of it.
This part is really difficult. We need some scientific help. Some knowledge of “Ballistic” principles will help us to establish the correct parabola .
For Ballistic principles and information please go to Google to research Basketball Coaches.
If our parabola is flat, the ball will see the basket as an ellipse with a small diameter less than 9.3′ and we miss the shot. This is a mathematical reality .
According to ballistic rules, 45 degrees is the best arch for the maximum reach. According my experiences, an arch between 55-60 degrees is the best to shoot more than 70%. Yes…70%!!
KEY AND IMPORTANT POINTS TO REMEMBER
- Obey the “Geometric Plane” concept.
- Your weight must be on your right foot
- Never bend forward
- Take the ball over your right knee .
- Take the ball to the set point. Your left thumb just before on your nose .
- Your right hand, over your right eyebrow and below the ball.
- Push the ball up 90 degrees until your elbow comes at the same level of your eyes.
- Then use your forearm up and forward with 60 degree angle.
- At the release point (almost over your head) use your wrist to push the ball up and if the summit or the arch is higher than the basket the shot will go in using the parabola’s downward arm using Free fall.
All sports shots are using extreme forces, but not basketball. Basketball shots must be shot within the “Plane” and atrajectory using a parabola between the release point of the ball and the basket .
A correct shot will not bounce out of the colored area or Key. It is too slow (This is one of the important advantages to organizing offensive rebounding).
Without knowledge, to reach high tech is impossible.
Now, you understand why within 20 training sessions you will shoot better than 50%. If you stay 2 weeks, back to back, at our Camp, instead of one, you will realize more than 60% shooting. This is my Guarantee.
With the shooting off the dribble technique and +60% shooting, a scholarship looks like guarantee. But, for off the dribble technique and
+60% you will need 40 training sessions.
You may begin to choose your College.
Don’t risk your future in Basketball. Reserve your place for two groups, especially for High School Seniors.
Contact Mr.Todd Kozinka immediately.
We can only accept 60 players, for each terms.
You will all have scholarships.
For technical questions about Basketball Shooting, don’t hesitate e-mail coach Cavit Altunay.
Shooting a basketball is not nearly as hard as many coaches would have you believe. Read the following article to know what I mean.
Please Click below for a Podcast with Coach Tom Nordland entitled “The Truth about Basketball Shooting”
Before moving on to Tom’s article let me just say that personally my basketball shooting ability has improved dramatically following these principles.
The ideas and concepts are so simple and easy to follow that I just wished I had Swish and Swish 2 available to me when I was in High School and University.
If you are serious about improving your basketball shooting then I urge you to read to the end of this page and then click on the link to Tom Nordland’s Swish website.
The more that you study basketball shooting and basketball in general then I say the more enjoyment you will get out of the game and the better player and or coach you will become.
Please let us know how we are doing.Thanks and have a great day!
Fixing What’s Wrong with Basketball Shooting
by Tom Nordland Shooting Coach
You don’t have to watch too many high school, college or pro games to realize that basketball shooting percentages are steadily plummeting from year to year.
Missing easy jump shots is so common that it’s not considered out of the ordinary anymore. Teams often shoot only 30 to 40 percent from the field for a game and that includes layups and dunks! Seventy-percent shooting from the free-throw line is now considered quite good.
The problems with basketball shooting stem from seven basic issues, as described in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle in 1996 called “Why can’t Johnny make a jump shot?”
It was written by Bill Reynolds, Providence (R.I.) Journal-Bulletin. After understanding those issues, players need to learn better basketball shooting technique and coaches need to realize there are four critical mistakes they are making when it comes to coaching the skill.
7 Basic Reasons for Poor Basketball Shooting
Here are seven reasons why today’s shooters can’t drain a jump shot like their counterparts of a couple of decades ago.
1. It’s Not Cool
Swooping dunks are what guys want to achieve. They want to look like Dr. J or Michael Jordan. The highlight films on TV are mostly about slamming the ball down over an opponent, not about deft passing and a smooth outside jumper.
2. Wrong Players Shooting the Ball
It used to be that only the better shooters shot the long outside shots, the perimeter shots. Now, because of the 3 point shot, everyone wants to put them up and be a hero.
3. Power Game
The game has become a lot more physical. Athleticism at all levels is revered at the expense of skills. Speed, quickness and jumping ability are favored more than good fundamentals or a great basketball shooting touch.
4. The Rise of AAU Programs
Kids used to learn basketball on the playgrounds, playing for hours, including lots of time to practice shooting. Now with AAU programs and endless structured tournaments, a lot more emphasis is on playing games rather than practice.
5. Poor Technique
Europeans learn to shoot the right way, perhaps from some text book. They’re encouraged to practice basketball shooting and learn good form. Americans often learn it by watching TV and picking up bad habits. Going for the 3 point shot too early and too often can wreck a shooting style.
6. Poor Facilities
Another old line is that kids from inner cities don’t shoot particularly well because they grow up on playgrounds, places where there are bent rims without nets, places not conducive to breeding shooters. To learn a reliable shot takes repetition and hours of practice. These days there are too many kids and too few courts.
7. Better Defenses
This is certainly one of the major reasons. The in-your-face physical pressure initiated by Georgetown in the early 80’s probably started this. Defense is a statement, and it’s tougher than ever to get an open jump shot.
Changing Technique Not Time Consuming
Most people will look at those seven basic basketball shooting problems and think that none of them can be solved overnight. While overnight may be a stretch, shooting well is not that difficult and can be learned in a fraction of the time many players and coaches might believe.
The truth about most physical actions, in my opinion, is that we greatly over complicate them. The basketball shot has evolved for most players into a throwing motion coming mostly from the upper body. Arms, wrists, hands and fingers are employed to power and guide the shot, thus creating a flat arch (30 degrees above horizontal at best) and a ball flight controlled by small muscles.
Watch your players shoot. Most shots get only 1-2 feet above the basket at the highest point. The shots are coming in “hot” and flat, around 20-30 degrees above horizontal. How often do you see one that rises higher than the top of the backboard? If you do, it’s probably coming from the best shooter on the court. Shooting high does two major things:
(1) Creates a larger landing area for the ball
(2) Softens the shot, as gravity has more time to slow it down as it rises.
From my research, a shot coming into the basket at a medium high angle of about 45 degrees above horizontal has an effective landing area about 60% larger than for a shot coming in at 30 degrees. A 60-degree angle shot (the angle considered most effective by coaches) has a landing area more than twice as large as a 30-degree angle shot.
Getting Players To Shoot Higher
Most players can’t shoot very high with the muscle action they use. Arm, wrist, hand and finger actions are horizontal motions. They create a flat arch. To get higher arch, the players must use more body and leg action.
Better shooters use their legs and entire bodies to shoot. They don’t just jump to get elevated or to initiate the shot — they are shooting FROM this energy. This gives them more arch automatically.
The more your players shoot from this power (I call it “UpForce”) the higher, quicker and more stabilized the shot will be. Also, note that the more the shot comes from the lower body, the more the upper body can relax, quiet down and become constant and predictable. Basketball shooting starts to become effortless.
Challenging Conventional Coaching Wisdom
While a good deal of blame can be placed on the player for what is wrong with basketball shooting these days, coaches, too, must bear part of the burden. Four areas in particular are where coaches often struggle to guide their players. Instructing players to square up, have their elbow under the ball, shoot at the top of their jump, and flip their wrist need to be re-evaluated and better explained to shooters at all levels.
1) Squaring Up.
Squaring up should only be referred to if you’re telling your player to face the basket while stopping any lateral and rotational movement as he or she begins the shot. The problem is that most students misunderstand the idea of squaring up and take the command literally, forcing themselves to have their feet, hips and shoulders exactly perpendicular to a line from the middle of the chest to the basket. Players don’t need to be perfectly square to the basket to shoot a one-handed shot. Instead of using the term “squaring up,” coaches should tell their players to “face up.”
For a one-handed shot, it’s more natural to open the body and rotate to the left for right handers, right for left-handers. This also makes the forearm of the shooting arm more vertical without tension, and allows the shooting arm to extend more easily toward the basket. The guide hand just moves aside and hangs back.
Have your players try shooting both squared up and open and see which feels more natural. Offer your players both options and observe which they adopt naturally. If you watch good shooters, most of them rotate at least a little naturally and many of the great shooters rotate up to 45 degrees.
Common Misunderstandings With Squaring Up:
Players mistakenly believe that squaring up somehow gets them in better connection and alignment with the basket or helps with the shot motion. With this position, the elbow is out to the side, like in a salute, and the forearm is about 45 degrees below vertical with the palm facing the basket. To get the basketball shooting hand in line with the eye, your player has to force the arm and hand into alignment. This creates tension in the setup, and, if the player tries to keep her or his body in that relationship, the tension is maintained in the Release.
New Approach:
Let the body turn naturally and see what works best. Compare squaring up with turning 10, 20, 30, 40 degrees or more. Your players should have the target, ball, hand, eyes, body and legs generally in alignment, and if he or she opens the stance, this seems to happen more easily. Test it out. See which stance gives your players the feeling of being more under and behind the ball. Which one creates less tension? There’s no one right answer here. Each person needs to find what works for her or him.
2) Elbow Under The Ball:
Somewhere in the lexicon of basketball shooting coaching has come the idea that the elbow must be directly under the ball at the set point before the release. However, if you examine it carefully, you will see that we’re not built that way. The hand, wrist and arm are not built to be in a straight line when you bring the hand in line with your shooting eye. If you shoot over the shoulder, then this lining up idea is true. But shooting off the shoulder is out of alignment with the shooting eye and presents problems with accuracy.
Common Misunderstandings With Having The Elbow Under The Ball:
The misunderstanding is that having the ball, hand and elbow in line will produce accuracy. For a one-handed shot, as we saw above, an open stance is more natural and requires less tension. With an open stance, bring your shooting hand in line with your shooting eye and have the center of the hand solidly in line with a target. Can you see that the elbow is out to the side a bit, maybe 4-6 inches, depending on how long your arm is? Now bring the elbow directly under the ball and see what that does to the hand. Doesn’t it tilt the hand off the target?
New Approach:
What really matters is the hand position, since that is where the ball is. We do not hit the ball with the elbow. If we did, then where the elbow sets and where it points and how it moves would be critical. Rather, it’s the hand (and ball) we’re moving toward the target in the Release, and it’s important to have the hand solidly in line with where you’re going. The forearm is close to vertical, but not exactly.
3) Shooting At The Top Of The Jump.
While coaches stress this tactic to elevate and shoot over an opponent, the shot is likely to be a failure because the player has used up all the energy on the jump and nothing left in the legs for the shot. The leg power is there to stabilize the shot, but there’s none of it left if you shoot at the top. Some elite athletes are able to shoot quite well this way, but it’s a very difficult shot. (Note: There is an exception. For close-in, turnaround-type jumpers of the taller players, elevating before shooting can be effective since the target is close and the margin for error is large. However, even then they should not wait until the exact top of the jump, as the shot becomes unstable.)
Common Misunderstandings With Shooting At The Top Of The Jump:
The idea here is that being higher in the air somehow helps with the shot and if the player isolates the shot to just the upper body, he or she employs fewer muscles. The height above the ground helps if there is someone in your face, but basketball shooting at the top is difficult, unstable. In addition, the higher the player is, the less likely he or she will think to aim upward to shoot. Also, at the top of the jump, all the upward energy of the legs has been expended and the only thing left to shoot with is the upper body.
In terms of shooting, the upper body muscles create mostly horizontal energy. When wanting the fewest possible variables — a repeatable motion — these finer muscles are less reliable.
New Approach:
Shoot on the way up for most shots. Your players will find their shots going higher with a quicker release and plenty of power. Use the release mainly to direct the ball exactly in line with the target. Shots will begin to seem almost effortless. For inside turnaround jumpers for the 4’s and 5’s, remind them to shoot near the top but not at the top, and they can raise their set points which allows for a quicker, more full-out release.
4) Wrist Flipping The Ball.
Once coaches convince their players that they have to release their shot at the top of the jump, they expand the mistake by teaching their players to flip their wrist to generate power.
This, once again, introduces unnecessary tension with the shot and engages small muscles. In addition, too many coaches are stressing the “reaching into the cookie jar” motion after the shot, which is creates tension and causes players to try too hard to have the perfect follow-through.
Common Misunderstandings About Wrist Power and Follow-Through:
Using the wrist and hand as a power source is an ill-advised concept that coaches are teaching their players. It will give you extra power, that’s true, but it’s horizontal power and it’s hard to control.
The wrist, hand and fingers are the smallest muscles in the chain from your feet through your body up to and through your arms. It doesn’t make sense to leave control of the flight of the ball, distance and direction, with the smallest muscles. The fine motor control they provide is subject to variation, especially under pressure.
New Approach:
Invite your players to use upper body energy in just a (constant) pushing action of the arm, aimed upward, rather than any kind of flipping or throwing motion. Players can relax the wrist, hand and finger muscles. They don’t have to do any powering, steering or guiding. They can just complete the connection with the ball and deliver it toward the basket as driven by the arm and body. By doing nothing more than that, they ensure greater accuracy and repeatability and basketball shooting becomes a breeze.
A little pressure from the finger pads ensures control of the ball, allowing it to roll off the fingers in a consistent way. When shooting this way, players get the feeling of doing nothing with these smaller muscles, and the feeling of basketball shooting becomes effortless when there’s strong power from the lower body.
My intention is that these ideas help your coaching, both for yourself and for others. Please email me with your questions and, especially, your success stories. I’ll post the more helpful ones on my website. Keep returning to my site to see the latest postings there. Read the Newsletters and the remarkable testimonials. Thanks.
Tom Nordland
Boulder Creek, California
1-888/SWISH-22
Email: Tom@swish22.com
Website
(c) Copyright 2002 Tom Nordland
(Please note that this article is a consolidation of two articles on “The Trouble With Basketball Shooting” that were originally written for the Basketball Highway website in 1997 and 1999. Mike Podoll from Lessiter Publications edited the two articles together).
Tom Nordland is a professional basketball shooting coach who lives in northern California. He is considered one of Minnesota’s all-time great high school shooters. In 1989 he had an “awakening” and re-discovered his shot from high school from many years earlier. In the last 13 years he’s been researching and perfecting his understandings and coaching of this critical skill and is now inspiring a Renaissance in basketball shooting. His 51 minute “Swish” basketball shooting video is highly acclaimed.
Visit his website to read of his history, his vision, his articles, and the remarkable endorsements and testimonials he is getting. He’s committed to training coaches all over the world in this method via his website and his travels. He publishes a free monthly Basketball Shooting Newsletter that is subscribed to by over 4,000 people worldwide. It is archived on his site as well.
— December 2002
Hoop Hype is Contagious-Don’t Forget Your Shot!
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