[The video clip below is an excerpt from Practice Template #2 in our DVD set, Read & React Clinics: Planning the R&R Practice. This is a 5 DVD compilation set taken from our 2011 clinic season and is now available.]
Ok, we admit it. Not everything in your practice (or basketball in general) can be addressed by the Read & React Offense. You will need to spend a certain amount of practice time going over specific details of other components in the game.
But, the amount of time that you spend on each item should be appropriate to the relative benefit you get from it.
We’ve all been there, of course, spending 30 minutes a day on our pet basketball drill (you know, the one we picked up from that famous coach or the one our favorite coach taught us) only to have that skill translate into points once every 5 games.
It doesn’t make sense to let tradition or emotion rule your practices. Be active in deciding where to spend your valuable practice time.
In the video below, Rick Torbett explains how keeping better stats and the Pareto Principle changed the way he drills fast breaks.
If you’re interested in that introductory story that Rick told about his creation of the Read & React, you can read more about it in his article: The Origins of the Read & React.
“But, the amount of time that you spend on each item should be appropriate to the relative benefit you get from it.” – Once in a while you read something so simple but at the same time so mind changing! Great line.
Trust me, that realization didn’t come easy. I’ve wasted tons of practice time over the years working on things that although deemed important by basketball tradition never translated into much benefit in actual games.
I still have to be deliberate in assessing why something is in my practice.