Is basketball a new hobby or passion of yours? Do you want to become as good, if not better than your peers? If so, you may be wondering how good you can get at basketball in a short period of time?
This depends on your habits. If you shoot around every day, you won’t get very far. You have to be intentional when it comes to practicing and training, both physically and mentally. In order to improve your skills quickly, you should focus on specific aspects of the game, such as dribbling and shooting and other things based on your position.
Below we will go into more detail as to what you need to do in order to get much better at basketball in a short period of time.
Working On Your Skills As a Whole
In order to be effective on the court you need to be able to shoot, dribble, and do the basic things. If you want to get better you need to work on these things.
Layups With Either Hand: Laying the ball up with either hand is important. So if you can’t do it effectively, make sure you work on it. While working on both hands, practice taking layups at different angles, not just straight up on each side.
If you have weak hand when it comes to layups, you can do a drill where you stand directly under the rim, and work on shooting the ball off the back board with that hand. Eventually you will be able to add in the footwork, but focus on getting the coordination to make the shot first.
Dribbling With Both Hands: Dribbling with both hands is important when it comes to being a great player. If you can’t use both hands, you become too one dimensional and the defense will be able to hone in on your weaknesses.
One simple drill to get better at dribbling is simply get in square stance, and dribble the ball with each hand x amount of times. The key to this drill is to do it as fast as possible, which will better your
Shooting From Every Spot On The Floor: Even if you’re a big man, it can’t hurt to shoot from all over the court. Being able to space the court as a big man could help your team tremendously.
While practicing your shot, you want to focus on a few things. These things include shooting with balance (going straight up and down), releasing the ball as quickly as possible so defenders can’t block your shot etc.
Another thing you could do if you really want to better your shot is to seek a shooting coach. A shooting coach will make sure your form is efficient, which will allow you to work on the other things about without having to worry about if your form is right or wrong.
These are skills you should work on no matter what position you play. This is because getting better at these aspects of the game can’t hurt you in any way.
Working On Game Scenarios
Let’s pretend you’re a shooting guard. Often times, shooting guards come off screens and shoot the ball. So, if you want to get better as a shooting guard, or someone who models their game off of a shooting guard, you need to practice coming around the corner getting your feet set and shooting the ball.
This goes for every single position. If you’re a big man. You need to get in the paint and practice post moves over and over again, until they become second nature.
You need to think of scenarios where you’ll have to read and react, and make that become second nature.
Lazily shooting around, won’t help you with game speed and real-life situations. Instead, you need to put in the time and effort to practice making decisions quickly and effectively on the court.
You want to get the fundamentals down based on your height and weight, and then build on that to expand your game. You’re not going to get better faster if you don’t start with the basics.
You Need To Mentally Learn The Game
A lot of people put too much emphasis on being able to cross over or hit pretty shots. The mental aspect of basketball could put you far ahead of your competition.
So, if you have the agility and physicality to be a great player on the court, but lack the mental acuity, you’re going to come up short every single time.
There’s so many things to learn in general, but you should start with the basics. Learn what to do vs certain defensive coverages and how to read the other team’s defense. If you can do this, it will give you a huge advantage over your competitors.
For example, you won’t play the same way against a zone defense as you would against a man-to-man defense. You need to take advantage of different situations and make quick decisions, which can only be done if you understand the game mentally.
Knowing every single rule to the game could come in handy as well.
This step is especially important if you’re a player who hasn’t played in the early years of your life. You learn the most about the game when you’re young playing travel basketball. If you’re someone who’s trying to compete with people who learned much earlier than you, you need to put in the extra work to improve your basketball IQ.
Double Everyone Else’s Output
Take a look at this video of Kobe Bryant explaining how to double everyones output. This is the schedule he mentions.
- Wake Up 3 A.M, go to the gym from 4 a.m to 6.
- Go home and eat breakfast
- Go back at it 9-11 a.m
- Go home for lunch
- Then go back at it 2-4
- Go home eat dinner, then get back at it 7-9
- Call it a day
You don’t have to follow this exact regimen obviously. But this is the approach that Kobe has taken in his career to get ahead of everyone else.
You may not have the time Kobe had, as he was a professional basketball player, but you can model it in a way to get ahead of the rest of your peers.
Ask For Feed Back
Every player has weaknesses they need to address. If you ask someone their honest opinion on what you would need to work on to get better, they will likely be able to give you valuable feedback.
Most people try and avoid criticism, but you should embrace all the criticism you can get in order to become a better player. If they say you need to better your handles, incorporate more dribbling drills and so on.
The best players ever use the criticism and go out and try and be better. For example, for years Lebron James was told he couldn’t shoot. As he’s gotten older, he’s worked on his shooting tirelessly and now could shoot 10 x better than when he came in the league.
Kobe Bryant was told he’d never be able to win without Shaq, he listened to the criticism and proved everyone wrong.
Don’t Only Focus On Your Skills Focus On Your Strength And Conditioning
Part of the game is being able to out hustle and out muscle your opponents. Having the conditioning and strength will help you use your new skills more efficiently, as well as make you less prone to injury.
We’re not going to give a specific routine for you to follow, as a cookie cutter approach isn’t good for players trying to improve their game.
This is because if you’re a big man, your goals may a little bit different than a point guard. It’s important to consult with a strength training coach in order to tailor a workout specifically for you.
Michael Jordan used weights in order to overcome the bad boy Pistons. They would bully him and push him around, until they couldn’t. Take a look at this footage of Jordan lifting weights.
Watch Film Of Great Players
Watching film of great players and how they react in certain situations could give you a blue print of how you should react in certain scenarios. Don’t only look at individual play.
Where most people fail is they lack the knowledge of team game play. So make sure you pay attention to that as well.
Every player that has been successful in basketball has modelled their game after another player. Look at Kobe Bryant for example, he modelled his game after Michael Jordan to a T. So much so, there’s this video of them doing the same exact moves.
It’s also ok to take certain things from a wide variety of different players, as you want to be a well rounded player.
Put Your Practice To Use
All of this work, both on and off the court, will be useless if you don’t put it to use. It’s key to play pick up basketball to see how far you’ve come. Don’t only pay attention to the leaps and bounds you’ve made as a player, pay attention to the things you’ve had difficulties with and work on making those aspects of your game better.
While playing pick up, don’t only work on the things you know you’re good at. Also focus on the things you know may need work. It’s easy to avoid your weaknesses to play better, but don’t do this, as it won’t help you in the long run.
Lastly, when it comes to the level of competition, you need to focus on playing against players that are better than you. If you play against players that aren’t as good as you, you’re not actually making yourself better.
So if you feel as if you dominate the competition at the park you currently play at, consider going elsewhere to find tougher competition.
Conclusion
If you follow these tips, there’s no reason why your game can’t get at least twice as good in the span of a few months. Just remember to keep your head down and work.
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