“What ‘Posting Up’ Really Means”

Ruth Riley (USA Basketball/images)

You are big or at least bigger than the person guarding you. Mismatch! One of your teammates, the one that likes to tell everyone what to do, starts barking, “Post up, Post up”. You think, okay, I haven’t touched the ball in the last fifteen possessions, can’t hurt to try. So, you run down to the block and look and look and look for the ball to be passed in. No ball. Nothing. What’s up with that? Your teammate, who it turns out came off the bench for a team that went to the Sweet Sixteen in the mid-80s, is not impressed with your “post up”; obviously just being “in the post” does not qualify.

During the next break in action, here’s what your teammate will tell you to do: make contact with your back against your defender. Lean right into him/her so that you can manipulate and react to any movement the defender may make. Almost like boxing out for a rebound. So, you run down to the post, to an area above the block, around the first marker. Still running forward, you run INTO the defense (arms across your chest). You then turn while continuing to push into the defender, but this time with your back and backside. (The bigger the backside, the better the post up!) You bend at the ankles, knees, hips and waist, anywhere you can bend, bend. This provides stability and strength so when the defender pushes back, you won’t give up the position you’ve established. Next, turned, you make eye contact with your Sweet Sixteen coach-on-the-floor and you get your “arm bars” up: elbows out to the side at shoulder height, hands up at ninety degrees. You spread out making yourself big. Bigger and bigger yet. And you start yelling “BALL, BALL!!!” Now, everyone in the gym knows you are really POSTING UP!

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“The Technique of the Backdoor Cut”

The first thing you need to do to set-up the backdoor cut is make a couple of jumpers. Preferably long ones, drawing defense way out from the hoop. Now you’ve given the defense a reason to want to stop you from catching the ball. You’re killin’ ‘em from out there! Next, you walk the defense down toward the block or wherever. The defense is thinking, “oh, he’s walking me down to the block because he wants to pop out, catch and shoot. I know what he’s doing”. When you’ve got space to do so, you pop out, i.e. make a quick move away from the hoop. The key now is to recognize, almost f-e-e-l when the defense’s momentum has them slightly out of control. A defender who is running out to stop you is easy picking. A defender who is low and in “the stance” is a little more difficult to breakdown. Sometimes you can go backdoor after going out just one step, sometimes more. The key for you is to change direction as the momentum of the defender is moving away from the hoop. As she is pushing off to take a next step or slide out, that is the moment when you want to ‘quick’ change direction and go to the hoop. Also, and this is subtle but important, your outside foot, the one that is planted and pushes you toward the hoop, should pivot slightly as it lands so that the toe points in the direction in which you will run. (That’s the case with every change of direction or v-cut.) Additionally, it helps to start the process of putting your hands up as if you are putting them up to catch a pass. Remember, it’s change of speed and change of direction. Slow, slow, slow, like you’re doing nothing, like you’re Mickey The Dunce, and then, bang, quick to the hoop, timed to go against the defender’s momentum.

“The Thinking Behind the Backdoor Cut”

It’s sort of joke, isn’t it, to be writing just a paragraph on the backdoor cut, the move that dominated the Ivy League (and frustrated all ilk of opposing teams) for decades and, eventually, changed (and revived) the NBA? It also feels presumptuous of me to be writing this. Pete Carril (I’m sure he had predecessors, and he certainly spurred a legion of followers) is the expert, the Moses with the holy tablet on this one. But, I have no idea how Pete and Bill Carmody (Northwestern) and Joe what’s-his-name taught and teach this at Princeton; I have no idea what they say, so here, at least, is a fresh perspective.

(Okay, two paragraphs.) The idea behind TBC is: the more the defense extends away from the basket, the more room you have behind them (between them and the hoop) to cut, catch and score. When introducing TBC at our clinics, we tell players that when someone denies you the ball out away from your hoop, that you should stop, turn and shake his hand, saying “thank you, I’m about to score two points on you”. Basketball’s a game of deception, right? I mean at its core. So, what we do is set-up the backdoor, create a situation that looks like you REALLY want the ball passed to you moving away from the hoop, or, additionally, moving out AND toward the ball (my preference as a set-up). You want it bad so, naturally, the defense, your opponent, wants to deny you that which you most desire (nice guys, huh?). Get the defense running, stop and pivot and change direction on a dime for the bounce pass and score. See how many times they deny you then. They’ll give up on that idea. At which point you start practicing your three-point shooting.