Shaq, Wilt, Dwight Howard, it goes on and on....
Why can"t the Biggest players on the court make a 13 1/2 foot shot?
I'll give you my two reasons that Big guys have a harder time than most making their FREE Throws.
First they are spoiled. Yeah, I'm sayin that! The big guys get picked first weather they can play or not (this from a 5'10" white guy-lol-). There is always a spot on the team for a 7 footer. Did you ever see Mark Eaten (spelling?) play?
All they have to do is be able to catch the ball near the basket and dunk. Why (they feel) do they need to learn how to shoot a basketball?
You'll notice a guy like Lew Alcindor had to learn how to shoot. The rules of college basketball were changed to keep him from dunking! So, he had to learn something else.
That's when the most dependable and unstoppable shot in the history of basketball was born the "Sky Hook". Further he became an excellent Free Throw shooter. Now Called Kareem, he is an exception to the 'rule'.
There are others, Dirk Nowitski and I remember Jack Sikma, Dan Issel were outstanding shooters. But for the most part the taller a player is/was the worse their outside shooting percentage is/was.
Ok, so I said they just plain didn't need to learn how to shoot to play the game. Whereas the little guy almost has to shoot well or not play at all.
The second reason is the fact that they are so tall, makes their release point very high. That gives them the feeling that they don't need to shoot up. Rather, they shoot at the basket with a low trajectory. They don't 'get' that the lower the trajectory the smaller the opening is for the ball to go through.
Imagine holding a ring between your fingers. Now look through the hole. Turn the ring so that the hole appears to shrink into a different shape. An Ellipse rather than a circle. And the more you turn it the smaller that opening gets until it looks like a straight line; with no hole at all.
Can you see that the lower the trajectory of the basketball the less chance it has of fitting through that space. Yes it's still a circle, but you have made it nearly impossible to put it through there if you don't get it up and over the front of the rim. In fact there is an optimal trajectory (Science is Good 'm kay). And that trajectory is much higher than most folks understand. I had to learn that after long years of shooting incorrectly.
In fact I completely transformed my shot several times in my quest for the perfect jump shot. That is no easy task, let me tell you. That's another reason guys like Shaq couldn't figure it out. They simply would not take the time necessary to change those bad habits and recreate a more perfect shot.
There comes a time when one realizes everything they've learned is a bunch of bull @#$& ! And that's when you find that there is nothing left to do but Scrap it ALL and Start Over. Ah, but more on that later...
GymAlien Said So!
No comments:
Post a Comment