Correct Basketball Shot Motion

Arthur Jackson: Hi! I am Arthur Jackson from One on One Basketball. Now, we are going to talk about shooting motion. We talked a little bit about our stance, we want our feet shoulder width apart, right foot in front. We talked about the right angle method; we want to make sure that as we bring our hand up, our elbows locked in, do not want our elbow to come out. It is very important to keep the ball straight with our hand in the middle of the ball like we talked about; we must make sure our elbow is in. We start off, if we have to bring our forearm up and lock our wrist back in 90 degrees and we have the ball there, we want to drive our elbow underneath the ball. This is going to force the ball to get arch and the higher, the more arch, the more chance we have of the ball going in, even if it is a little bit off on the form. So, as we start, we drive the ball up, through the ball and then we are going to release with one hand, our left hand comes off the ball and we follow-through into our motion. So, it should look a little bit like this; as I drive up under, I release the hand and I follow-through. Notice, that it is a one hand release; very important, lots of kids, lots of players that start shoot with two hands and you want to teach them in an early age to shoot with a one hand, even if it is a push shot, where they are getting weight and elbow behind it, pushing the ball is much better than shooting with two hands with their elbows extended outward.

So again, we have our feet a little bit wider than shoulder width apart; our right foot is little bit forward if we are right handed. As I bring my hand up by my side, my elbow is locked in; I have a right angle with my elbow and my wrist. That is where I want the ball and now, as I drive up, I want to make sure that I keep the 90 degrees. My elbows underneath the ball, driving it up, my legs are coming up; I am extending my knees and this is the very important part of the consistency that we talked about. We want to keep that 90 degrees as we come up and we release the ball into the basket. Next, we are going to talk about following through.