Hands Free Basketball: Balancing Beneficial Versus Detrimental Use of Your Hands

#49- Hands Free Basketball
Balancing Beneficial versus Detrimental Use of Your Hands
by Alan Lambert
Introduction
The title of today's Playground Pointer is a bit of a misnomer but I chose it to make a point to you young players.  In the modern world of technology we live in today electronics devices are only useful if they come with "hands free" tools.  Our cell phones have voice dial activation, our TV's come with one button memory remote controls, and even our cars can tell us where we are at with one button or voice activated satellite navigation.  I am not at all suggesting by the title that you must learn to play completely without your hands.  But the theme of today's Pointer is to learn to develop your most fundamental basketball skills so they do not rely exclusively on your hands saving you, or even worse where become detriment to your game.  I want to give you some simple reminders of how and when to effectively use your hands in the game of basketball.  "Hands Free Basketball" simply implies your hands being constantly in the correct position for the skill you are performing to permit their proper use and save you a load of grievance as you grow your game.
Where Do You Want Your Hands?
I am a firm believer in importance of body balance in basketball in all phases and stages of the game.  Coach Wooden has spoken as well for years about balance on and off the court.  Some years ago I wrote an article on Teaching Balance which was well received by many other coaches.  In that article I describe what balance is in scientific terms.  Essentially it is keeping your center of gravity (COG) over your base on support (the area encompassed by any parts of your body in contact with the court.  If you have two feet on the court fairly wide apart, you have a broad base of support which makes it easier to keep your balance because it is more difficult to movement to draw your COG outside of that base.  If you are pivoting, or pushing off a drive foot to penetrate to the basket, for a brief moment in time, you have a fairly small base of support (the area under the ball of the foot) which makes it easy to lose your balance or be physically pushed off balance by an aggressive opponent. You ask, what does this have to do with Hand position?  The Answer is many things.  When you extend your hands you are more likely to break your balance.  This is because, first, your arms are attached to your body and if your hands extend enough your upper body must come with them.  And second, because your hand and arms have weight which, when moved outside of the base of support, change your center of gravity.  If you move them enough you can pull your body out of balance.  That seems simple enough to understand.  Players who use their hands wildly and as the primary source of influencing play become like the novice trying to keep their balance on a balance board.  They can do it, but without much body control.
Why am I telling me with this information?  Your hand position (and head position as well) probably contribute more to problems of losing balance (or getting out of position to react and move in any direction at any time) than any other factor in basketball.  This is, again as a reminder, because they have weight and can significantly alter your body's center of gravity.  So, where do you want your hands?  In, general, (I repeat in general), you want them relatively close to your body in a central position.  Now this sounds contrary to what many coaches teach where you keep your hands active and into the face or passing lane pressuring the ball when on ball defense, or the passing lane when off ball.  I am not contradicting what they are teaching and in fact have taught that kind of defensive pressure for many years as a coach. But keep this in mind, if your hands are flayed about in a wild and reckless manner you are more likely to lose your balance and get beat to a position because of your inability to react and move because of lost balance.  Instead make your hand pressure intelligent pressure and with short flicks and jabs so that the result is balance, not loss of control of your body.  That is the key point in today's Playground Pointer. 
There is one other point I'd like to make about hand position.  Movement takes time.  The more distance you must extend your hands the longer it takes to recruit the muscle fibers to initiate a bigger movement, and to slow the movement down to alter direction quickly.  There are certainly times when a fully extended hand and arm is critical to stopping a pass or challenging a shot, but the better avenue for a player is to keep the length of your hand movements minimal unless experience tells you without full extension you will be unable to deter the ball or a position.  This is why coaches teach the five basic passing lanes (under the arms, by the ears, and over the head) because when the hands are fully extended it is difficult to reach back into these passing lanes to protect them from a defensive standpoint.  Quick aggressive jabs of the hands that enable you to maintain balance both discourage these passing lanes from opening up, and make it more likely you will maintain your best body balance and be in a position to react and move quickly to any movement by your opponent.
I would be remiss if I didn't give you some examples of how this applies to various basketball skills so let's proceed to some simple tips for using your hands effectively.
Hand Position by Skill
Steady and calm hands are important to shooting because great shooters have the same start and finish position with their hands and arms.  Defensive pressure can and does force you at time to move the ball to relieve this pressure, but the calmer your hand position the more likely you will make the shot.  Tip: If you must fake to relieve pressure keep your fakes small and movement to a minimum to help you maintain your body balance, and be quicker to stabilize the start point of your shot.
Hand position is important to passing for a couple of reasons.  First to get power to your passes the energy your body is able to generate and impart to the ball is dependent on the hands proximity to your body.  The further you move your hands (and ball) away from the body), the less "mustard" you can put on the pass.  Even with the two-handed overhead pass holding the ball just off your forehead (the proper technique) allows you to better maintain your body's balance, and more quickly generate force to make a snap skip pass.  Long wing up overhead passes allow the defense more time to interfere with the pass or pressure the passing lane and because the arms are extended more difficult to stop and alter when the defensive pressure unpredictably is altered just prior to the pass release.  The rule of keeping the hands close to the body when faking is also critically important to passing.  Long extended arm ball fakes are neither believable, nor easy to control in terms of altering the passing target quickly.  In addition, too much extension increases the risk of your Center of Gravity being pulled outside your base of support and throwing you off balance.  No balance, no power, get it?
Keeping your hands up and central to your body assists in catching the ball because when your hands are down (a common error when young players run on the court) it takes time to recruit the muscle fibers necessary for larger movement to lift the hands into position than if the hands are already in position to begin.  When a passed comes at a less than expected time, there is often not enough time to react and move the hands into position the results being a missed, dropped or fumbled pass and turnover.  The body naturally wants to move the hands up and down when running, but this can and should be retrained for basketball players.  For the passer it's critical to pass the ball to a consistent point so the receiver knows where the ball will arrive the greatest percentage of the time.  Poor hand position prior to catching the ball and unpredictability of the location of the pass have an exponentially bad effect on success in catching the ball.  This is why showing with your hands where you want the ball and the passers ability to consistently deliver the ball to that target cement passing success.  Wild hand and arm movements again constantly change the body's center of gravity and pull a player in and out of balance.  In the low post a player who is constantly to maintain balance is less likely to be able to move and snatch an errant pass than a player in balance under control.  Use your hands purposefully when moving to catch the ball and keep your balance.
Probably the most pointed example of hand position and its importance to dribbling is keeping your off or non-dribble hand up and in a position to receive a cross-over dribble or deter a reaching hand into the ball space by an aggressive opponent.  When the offhand is held down and to the side, it again takes time to move the hand into position and locate the ball as it changes position on the fly.  When the non-dribble hand is held up in a protective position is aids not only in discouraging the reach by an opponent but in reducing the time to gather a crossover dribble and change direction to accelerate past a gambling opponent.  In addition when the ball is kept somewhat close to the body then farther away you have more time to react to a steal attempt and you are more likely to have your body on balance to alter course and beat your opponent.  While there are some pretty impressive "killer crossover moves" (see Bernie Holowicki's Five-Star Inner City Moves and Inner City Moves II) or (Ganon Baker's 35 Street Moves You Can Use) it is my contention that to extreme of a movement of the hands in these moves becomes disadvantageous both time and balance wise.  The best moves are quick and almost magic like deceptive.  This requires both hands to be up and central to the body.  Finally in getting your hands (and attached dribble) too far from the body core, you slow your reaction time to alter the dribble against invasive pressure.  As a defender in my playing days I almost always would attack a dribbler who had the ball extended well away from the body core, especially one the ball had left the hand on the downward dribble where recapturing the ball and altering the course of the body and dribble are almost next to impossible for a half a second or so.
Your hand position is most critically important to your defense on the ball because hand aggressiveness is only beneficial if it does not draw your body off balance.  I think you've all heard these words before "don't reach".  It's not really the extension of the hand per se that create problem, as much as losing your balance and being unable to recover proper position to stay between your man and the basket.  If you can flick, and jab, or poke to keep aggressive use of the hands in their proper place you are more likely to maintain balance.  I believe that full extension of the hands is only purposeful when it is an obvious requirement to prevent ball advancement or movement to a dangerous threat.  This is not to say you can't have active hands.  Active hands are different because this implies movement without losing balance.  As I have previously stated there are special times where hand extension is warranted, such as the off trail hand to discourage the quick crossover dribble.  But if the extended hand is a constant source of losing the body's balance and position then it would be better to go back a step in your defensive footwork and gain skill and confidence in stopping a dribbler with footwork only prior to adding the "weight" of an extended hand back into the balance equation.
Hand position affects many aspects of off-ball defense.  When in off-ball denial position it is perfectly proper and accepted to have the lead hand up and extended into the passing lane to discourage quick ball movement by an opponent.  However if you aren't playing "hands free" defense and your extended hand is driven into the passing lane space as a gamble because your footwork hasn't put you into proper position to extend and pressure with balance than your hand becomes a liability.  A "hands free" off ball defender has such good footwork that they are in position almost to discourage the pass with their body.  The hand is then free to quickly jab and deflect an errant pass.  Keeping the pressure hand up and in a central position also reduces the amount of time to get the hand to the passing lane.  How many times have you seen in a game where a help defender is nearly in perfect position but because their lane hand isn't up are late to raise it and discourage or block the pass.  Hand in the central up position also allow the body to be more balanced and prepared to slash through off-ball screens where getting the lead hand between the defender and screener are essential to splitting the screen and breaking it down.  Finally when the hands are constantly in up then down and then up position the body's balance is constantly being altered.  This is subtle but it slows your footwork down and your ability to react and response quickly to changing events on the court.
Keeping the hand in the up and central position when rebounding assists both in being more prepared to get your hands to the ball quickly but increases the likelihood you will be able to react to an aberration as the ball comes off the rim.  In addition to helping you better maintain balance and your ability to move quickly, it is less likely your hands will be pinned or locked into a down position where your hands are essentially useless on the boards.  Players that learn to keep their hands up consistently as well are more able to keep a ball alive, especially on the offensive glass and they learn to control their bodies with the arms in this position increasing the probably of a successful 2nd or 3rd attempt tip-in.  On the defensive boards, players often fall into the trap of holding their arms down and back to seal in an offensive rebounder, but in reality it is very difficult to move your feet and react to the unpredictable nature of a ball rebounded from this position.  In nearly every case, a defensive rebounder will have to lift their arms to move to the ball.  Down position of the hands requires longer movement distance and time to reach the balls position and decreases the chances of getting the rebound as well.
Summary
Your hands should be the bonus points for proper footwork and effort of the remainder of your body.  If you develop the habit as a young player of relying on your hands to make plays without proper attention to your footwork, you will reach a playing plateau that will prohibit you from becoming the best player you are capable of becoming.  In the end, footwork is what puts you into position to surprise an opponent with your hands and make a key play.  Remember that your hands never go anywhere you feet can't take you, or at least without critically damaging your ability to maintain your body balance as you move on the court.  This is why coaches often practice defensive slide and stance with your hands grabbing your practice jersey.  Because it develops good basketball fundamentals and makes you a better player.  The concept of "hands free basketball" doesn't imply you ignore using your hands.  It simply means that your positioning on the court should be tied almost exclusively to your footwork, and your hands are free to be an unpredictable and influencing factor against your opponent. 
There are certainly situations where a specific hand position is diligent to smart execution on the court.  For example, coaches teach to have a low trail hand away from the dribble direction when defending the ball because it discourages a low quick crossover and buys you time.  When you are on the ball and an opponent picks up their dribble, hard hand pressure on the ball makes it difficult for an opponent to complete a pass to an open teammate.  Listen to your coach when they teach these exceptions to the "general rule".  However keep in mind that if you aren't playing "hands free basketball" you are mostly likely losing your balance a lot, getting beat where you shouldn't and slow to react to fast moving situations in the game.  Foot position prepares you, and quick hands with a balanced body enable you to finish the skill with successful results.  You are also less likely to be able to utilize all your quickness and athleticism because you are going to spend more time recovering your balance than beating an opponent to a spot. 
 
Check back next month for another Playground Pointers courtesy of The Basketball Highway®.