Basketball Drills: Penetration Reads with Trainer Mike Lee

Dr. Dish Basketball is excited to bring you another Mike Lee drill for this week. Today we worked on penetration and kick action but really focused on reading where our defender was and also relocating after the pass was made. 

Offensively, it's very important to make sure you continue to move on the court so that the defense has to be accountable for their assignments. It's easy to guard a player that stays in one place because you can ball watch, help and recover very easily. The Golden State Warriors in the NBA do a great job of constantly moving after drive and kicks and that's why they get so many open lay-ups and open shots.

We set the Dr. Dish All-Star on tempo and set our goals for the day in each drill to make sure we were pushing ourselves. Each player had to hustle to each spot so that the drill flowed properly. Take a look at these two different drills and see how you can incorporate this into your practice and training plan!

PENETRATION READS

STRAIGHT LINE DRIVE WITH RELOCATION

In the first penetration read Coach Lee talks about attacking the hoop with a straight line drive. By doing this you get you defender on your hip and it forces the strong side defender to help. The offensive player who's man helps needs to relocate to the 3 pt line so that the pass can be made. If the player slides down then its hard to make that pass because the help side defender can guard both. 

Coach Lee mentions that it's natural for players to drive and kick and stay in the lane line waiting. That player needs to kick the basketball out and relocate so they can become available for a shot themselves. This keeps the defense at bay and keeps them guessing as well. In the video you can see the offensive players attacking the paint hard then kicking out and relocating for a shot after. It's important to make sure and hustle to your spots and train at game speed throughout the entire drill.

DRIVE MIDDLE- DRIFT CORNER

In the second drill Coach Lee talked about the help side defender ball watching and not seeing their defender. Usually you would go back door on this but we are simulating the lane being tied up with players, so the other option the offensive player has is to drift to the corner area for the shot. The offensive player driving to the hoop will basically make a pass right behind the defenders back to the player in the corner area for a shot. 

Once again the player attacking the lane needs to relocate to an open spot after they make the pass. In the video you can see the players driving, making the pass, and relocating back to the top of the key for a shot. The Dish was set to make several passes so that both playewrs involved in the drill were able to get shots.

Dr. Dish continues to to push the envelope on player performance and for more great content and drill be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel! 

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