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hello ballers and coaches,
this is rali todd, Iam a profesisonal basketball performance enhancement coach down in miami, Fl. Iam a five star basketball coach along with a strength and conditioning coach for mimai dade colle, speed consultant for a few pro teams and work with the best ballers in the south florida area. I have just seen so many players continue doing one thing wrong that i have set out to inform all ballers of the situation. You might be suprised when i tell you what it is , but it is so crucial but yet over looked. what is it you may ask.
Bending your knees!
thats right, almost every ball player i have worked with has the bad tendency of what i call playing tall. Why is this so bad? well for first i wnat you to try something!
Right now I want you to stand up and put your feet together. Next I want you to try to jump with out bending your knees. Most likely you tried it but you still bent your knees. So this time I want you to really try and jump with out bending your knees. If you did it correctly you would find that it is nearly impossible to perform a jump without bending your knees. So what does this mean? Well I will get to that in a second. The next one I want you to try is a defensive slide. I want you to try to slide across your room or wherever you are without bending your knees. Again, if you performed it correctly you will find that it is impossible to do effectively. Now I want you to go back to the first one and bend your knees. So now I want you to bend your knees and jump. You will find that not only did you jump significantly higher but it was also a lot easier and more effective. Now try the same with the defensive slide. Again, you would have found that you can slide laterally a lot easier and effective with your knees bent!

So what’s the point?
The point is that almost every basketball player plays with their legs straight and knees not bent. This plays a major role in all aspects of the game. Because as you demonstrated that it is almost impossible to move and jump with your legs straight. So what does your body do? It does it for you. Let’s look at an example:
Let’s say that you are coming off a screen preparing to catch the ball and shoot but you are playing tall, and not bending your knees. When you catch the ball you will have to dip down (bend your knees) in order for you to jump and shoot the ball. This will take slightly longer that if you already had your knees bent and did not have to dip down to shoot the ball. It may not seem like a big difference, but in the game it could be the difference to someone blocking your shoot and you getting your shoot off faster.
Another great example would be rebounding.
If you are under the basket preparing to rebound a missed shot with your legs straight, you will again have to dip down and bend your knees in order to jump. But if you already had your knees bent you would just simply have to jump straight up while your opponent had to take the time to bend their knees and then jump. Again, this might only be half of a second, but that is all it takes to grab a rebound.

So do you see how important it is to bend your knees and stay low? That’s why almost all shorter players are faster than taller players. Their center of gravity is lower to the ground which provides them with an advantage.

So how do we correct this problem?
Well besides consciously trying to remind yourself to bend your knees all the time, it is all a form of muscle memory. You have to train your body and the muscles that are most used in this position (your gluteus, hamstrings, quadriceps, and calves) I will tell you that this position hurts and most players are very uncomfortable in this position because it is painful. But if you are truly seeking ways to improve your game you should be willing to do whatever it takes to get better.

I cna guarantee you that if you train your body to stay in this position all the time you will start to reveal your tru basketball potential.
so get out there and do it.
Untill next time

Yours in hoops,
Rali todd

training hurts… sitting on the bench hurts more!
www.gobasketballpro.com

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