Pure Advantage Coach’s Meet with John Townsend, Portland Trailblazers Shooting Coach

Tom Klutz (7th Grade Girl’s Coach) John Turner (7th Grade Boy’s Coach)

Here are some key notes from our discussions.

Key Indicators John Looks For In A Shot

1)  Your feet must match your elbow. If your elbow is out, your feet need to slightly turn left.  For example, Steve Blake, naturally truns his feet left because he lifts the ball to his hairline to shoot, so his shooting elbow is slightly out.  His right hip and right arm line up with the basket better this way.

2)  Hand Placement. His shooting hand should be in the middle of the basketball.  He should do his form shooting drills close to the basket with no foot movement.  Before lifting the basketball up into his form shooting shot, place the second knuckle of his middle finger over the air nozzle on the ball.  The air nozzle is consistently the middle of ANY basketball.

3)  Lift. Every player should at least try to lift the ball to his/her hairline or higher.  He will be able to do this the more he jumps on his shot.  Most really good shooters are at their hairline or above.

4)  Balance Hand. The shooters non-shooting hand is important in maintaining balance on a jump shot.  He wants to make sure to allow the “balance hand early”.

5)  High Elbow. Shooting elbow should finish each shot above the shooter’s eye.  This allows the player to shoot the basketball up and over the rim instead of at the rim.