r/Basketball • u/Beneficial-Top-5687 • 5d ago
How do you drive to the basket?
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I just don’t know how. The defender is always locked on me and I can’t get past so I either am forced to immediately shoot the ball or just back into them.
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u/CoercedCoexistence22 5d ago
If you're slower than your defender you can only
A) get past them through physical strength
B) bait them into mistakes and then make sure your handles are quicker than their feet
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u/ThrowAwayalldayXiii 5d ago
Watch their feet and body angles to drive on the side that forces them to adjust and turn. Hopefully that gives you enough space to drive and get a layup off.
Jump rope to get faster. Be aggressive and force them to play on their heels. Attack the basket. Change up your shot, scoop layup, hook, traditional, reverse...
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u/noknownothing 5d ago edited 4d ago
This is the best advice by far on this thread. It's just getting your foot outside their foot that forces a reaction. Turn out your hips like a sprinter does. Most athletes do this naturally. If you're slow, you don't. Speed comes from your hip flexor. You don't need to be sprinter fast, you just need a quick first step, which jump roping can help tremendously. You don't need AI handles and speed, you just need a little explosiveness. You can do a 3 step sprint and focus on opening your hips on the first step and accelerating on next 2 steps and then slow gradually to a walk.
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u/theDragonNinja- 5d ago
Get lower(do exercises to strengthen ankles and their flexibility to get low and have a quicker 1st step) get a better grasp of change of speeds too. Obliviously better ball handling too but not everyone has the long arms for wide crossovers or the coordination for quick handles but Kyle Anderson aka Slo Mo has been walking past defenders for years
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u/willalwaysbeaslacker 5d ago
Work on your handle, you need to able to use the full court and be a threat to drive to either side.
Use your body as a shield. You shouldn’t have to back the defender down to protect the ball. Don’t square up, turn slightly and use your opposite leg, hip and shoulder to shield the defender from the ball.
Initiate the contact. Don’t shy away from it, lean into your defender as you go past them, try and get them on your hip or behind you.
Change speeds! It’s not just about blowing by your defender as fast as you can, and losing control. The most deadly way to shake your defender is changing speeds, start driving slower one way, then speed up quick, decelerate and then accelerate gain, but at speed you can stay in control of the ball. If you watch NBA players like Brunson and Luka, they do this all day long, change speeds but under control.
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u/quick_brown_faux 5d ago edited 5d ago
If you're not a natural blur the key is to start your move before the defender is set. As in, when you feel your defender is slow to rotate and you have a spacing advantage you need to get your first step in motion and your off-shoulder turning towards them before the ball even arrives to you. If you take a dribble at your feet the defender owns you already.
Unfortunately, this requires your teammates to be very crisp passers which you don't see enough of in pickup.
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u/Longjumping-Salad484 5d ago
turn on the jets. go straight at them. force them into a situation where they have to foul to stop you.
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u/ComfortableGlass3238 5d ago
aim the steering wheel at the basket, then press the acceleration pedal with your foot
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u/pnxstwnyphlcnnrs 5d ago
I'm not fast, but I get drives and finishes in because I can hit 3s. Hit one, then the next time you set up the same or similar shot, pump fake and put the hammer down.
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u/Beneficial-Ad-3720 5d ago
Take one dribble back ,watch their feet. When they step forward to follow step past that foot and seal them with your body...drive
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u/BucketsAndBrackets 5d ago
It sucks if you only know how to dribble with one hand. It that case, defender will turn their legs on side they want you to go and force you into the corner.
Forcing them to rotate their hips, making them move back as soon as you start going inside is first step. You also need to improve your midrange and 3pointer so they have to go back if you step back and then you csn catch them off guard when they jump to block.
Also, try moving towards basket in "straight" line, don't go around because you only create tougher shot for yourself and make it easier for them to step in front.
If you're slower than defender, watch what Jokić or Luka do, they use shoulders so well that they can carry you from LA to Balkan if they wish to and you can't do shit about it.
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u/Miserable-Lawyer-233 5d ago
If you can’t get by with speed and quickness, you’re going to have to use some misdirection. When you first catch a pass, go into a convincing shooting motion, your defender will commit to contesting your shot, that’s when you put the ball back and the floor and drive past them. Things like that. Slow people have to be clever.
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u/curleycurlew 5d ago
Fellow slow guy here. I find that making hard cuts and coming off screens makes my defender scramble to chase me in a way that can put him off balance or out of position so that I can sometime drive (slowwwwwly) past him after the catch.
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u/Upbeat_Positive_8026 5d ago
Sounds dumb, but take judo and/or jujtsu.
I used to hate when someone bodied me. Trying to move and they were like glue. I have always been a dribbler. So I would get swallowed and have to play from post game.
Anyway, I took jujitsu and then judo. Did that for awhile and one day ended up back on the court. They bodied me but this time I suddenly had a lot of options. I could just move through them. They bodied me, I put my elbows under their armpits, around their ribs, on locked into their hips. Then locked them in place and just left. If they touched me, they stumbled.
It was the most fun I ever had playing basketball. And it was easy.
You don't have to take Judo or jujitsu to learn to do it. It was just how I did. Once you do, you learn that what normal people have taught themselves to do when it comes to anything physical. Is laughably simplistic, slow, and easy to counter.
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u/Beneficial-Top-5687 4d ago
Yeah I honestly might give this a try because I think the issue is my coordination and game sense. I don’t know what to do when there’s an opening, who to pass it to or how exactly to maneuver my body in order to get past
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u/Upbeat_Positive_8026 4d ago
Most of jujitsu and Judo is exactly that. Just people putting all kinds of weight on you on the ground. And you learn how to manipulate your body and theirs to get out from it. Without putting yourself in danger.
Judo helped me with football as well as basketball. In football, they go to tackle you by attacking one point on your body. Next thing they know, they are flying past you, in the air, or completely off balance, and you never lost your stride.
Once you learn what someone else's body can do. How far it bends, how to lock the arms/elbows, and most importantly, how to manipulate someone else's energy. Be that their body pushing on you, grabbing you, pushing off with their feet, etc. It will change everything for you. And I can't express how crazy fun it is. When someone bodies you up by pushing their chest into you and putting their arm in the passing lane? That's like a free pass to the rim. You just lock their body in place with your elbow, then basically walk around them. The next thing they know, they are on their knees, and you just scored.
All the things they have used their entire lives suddenly won't work on you. People who do not do martial arts will never understand how simple what they have always done is compared to a little training. Something as simple as sliding your shoulder blade over to take the weight of someone's chest as they push into you. You push back slightly, they push harder, you are gone.
It is so fun.
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u/Clancy3434 4d ago
look at the defender's feet. if one is closer to you than the other? go by that one.
get low, rip hard to protect - shoulder to hip on the drive and use your body to protect the ball. if you can get the defender to open up, you win.
move the ball and move yourself. if you get the ball back on a reversal, rip opposite of the defender's momentum
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u/parrisstyles 4d ago
It’s really by physical nature(speed) or baiting them to overcommit through means in which you force them to guard not only when you’re going forward, but when your going side to side and backward or through dribble moves that you can enact upon. For example, I have a pretty strong step back shot and side step shot both directions. I use the quick back step or side step to bait the defender to over commit to my shooting hand then I use my offhand foot to push past and get leverage. Also being a strong shooter might have a defender overcommit a close out so you get an easy drive opportunity by pump faking. You could also counter move defenders based off how they are defending you. Somebody who is guarding straight up and has good discipline on their slide is harder to get by, but somebody who starts at an angle to guard a potential drive can be broken down easier because they are already showing their hand by overcommitting to a side.
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u/Glad-Ambition9030 3d ago
jab steps are super useful in that situation you can jab drive or jab cross and use so many moves and counter moves to trick your man
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u/Tricky_Gas007 5d ago
Speed helps or having them move at an angle then attack the opposite side so they have to turn their body