Check out Lebron James (Miami Heat) working out this off-season with his team!  This a great tool for you players out there to learn, take drills, tips from some of the best in the business!

Here are some of the NBAs best guards, giving tips on dribbling, go to moves and counters.  Every basketball player should have a “go to move” as well as a “counter” to the “go to move”.  Your “go to move” is the move that is your best move and the move  that you know can get you by a defender with the most success!  Your “counter move” is a move that you use in conjunction with that “go to move” in order to set a defender up to believe that your going to use your “go to move”, but you are actually not.  Some call it a “set up move” or a “decoy move”.  This “counter move” enables you to continue to use your “go to move” with a high success rate, so that the defense cannot “read” you and steal or stop your “go to move”.  Get to work and create your “Go TO Move” and “Counter Move”!!!

Here is the “Mikan Drill”, named after George Mikan (NBA great who played for the Minneapolis Lakers).  This  is a GREAT drill that helps you to improve on your footwork and ability to finish lay-ups with both your right and left hand.  You will learn to use the correct footwork on a left hand lay-up as well as a right hand lay-up.  This is a drill that we at Hoop Dreams use for our youngest players all the way up to our pro’s!

You are sitting on the floor and the ball starts in your right hand and you will be using a “finger-tip dribble”. 

1.  You perform 100 “finger-tip dribbles” with your right hand. 

2.  Then lift both of your legs up and and dribble under both legs (while still sitting) and perform 100 “finger-tip dribbles” with your left hand. 

3.  Then lift up your left leg and perform 200 “finger-tip dribbles” with both your right and left in a “1-2 rhythm/alternating dribble” in the middle of both legs. 

Once you get pretty good with it, you can time yourself and finish the drill in 2 minutes, then 1:45, then 1:30, so on and so forth.  Continuing to beat your time and making your hands work harder. 

Benefits of “100-100-200″

This will increase the speed and quickness in your hands, which you can use not only on the offensive end (getting shot off quicker, quicker and more intimidating dribble, pass the ball quicker) but also on the defensive end (deflecting passes and dribbles, stealing the ball, etc.).

Rip Hamilton of the Detroit Pistons (NBA) gives tips on how to move without the ball.  He also gives tips on how to move without the ball at a high level!  This is the hardest way to guard an offensive player (someone who constantly moves without the ball).  Add moving without the ball to your game and become a complete player!

Kumbeno Memory is refining Oregon’s basketball talent