Can You Make Reads Like Jalen Brunson? (Take The Test)

Jalen Brunson is one of the best point guards in the NBA and he plays the game with a super high level of understanding, physicality and skill. And it's something that every single player can learn from. In this video, I'm going to test your basketball IQ and pause each clip right before a decision is going to be made. Then you're going to assess it, make that decision. And we'll go through a brief breakdown after each clip and make sure the end of the video you drop a comment down below. Let me know how many you got. Right. I'm super interested to see how many people can get all of them right. Let's get into it right here. Jalen Brunson uses this transition drag screen. His defender ices the screen to force him to stay sidelined. So the screener ghosts the ball screen. Should he bounce it to the outside and try and take that screener's defender with him? Should he hit the screener on a roll or should he try and split the screen himself? The Kings are playing an ice coverage right here to not allow Jalen Brunson to use the ball screen. By doing this, they change the way that they have to play a Dr. Drop coverage. So now that screeners defender has to defend towards the sideline, leaving up the middle, which allows for an easy pocket pass to the roll guy for an open shot. Here's one with a little bit more detail right here. He gets the ball coming off of a handoff that leads to almost a Spain action. Right after that he gets downhill. Should he kick the ball out to the wing here for a three, continue to try and attack and get a paint touch or should he stop and get to some sort of separation shot foreign. Like I said, this one's a little bit more detailed. Once he attacks and gets downhill, his defender turns to recover and flip his hips, which essentially means he's gonna have to take a cross step. And if Runsa can stop when his defender takes that cross step, he's going to be able to create space and get his shot off. The ability to recognize defender's momentum is such an important skill, especially for an undersized guard, because it's generally going to be much better to try and get a shot in the mid range or on the perimeter and than it will be to try and get to the paint and finish amongst the seven footers. Here we have another ball screen situation where we again see ice coverage where they don't let him use that screen. So the screener ends up flipping and he takes it the other direction. I'll tell you now, he makes a pass here, but which guy and how? I'll give you a little bit of extra time to figure this one out. So we've again got to get real detailed with this one. By the time he touches the paint, he doesn't have very many good options in terms of passes to make. And that's really because Julius Randall's defender, who's in help right now, hasn't fully committed to helping in, so he's still able to potentially get in the passing lane and affect that pass. So Brunson forces him to make a decision by getting downhill and going up into a shot before he passes the ball last second to the corner. And even though it looks like he goes up into his shot at first, I think the entire time he only did this in order to create that pass to the corner. As an undersized guard, there's going to be many times where you get to the paint and you just won't be able to shoot the ball because of all the people around you. So it's crucial that you're able to manipulate, help defenders to create open passes to your teammates. Here we've got Brunson in a high ball screen. What should he do in this situation? In this situation where Minnesota plays more of a soft hedge with that defender playing over on the ball screen, Brunson is just worried about Kyle Anderson, who's the tag defender and essentially is going to make his pass. Based on what Anderson does, Anderson decides to help in and tag the role so that he takes away that pass, which leaves Julius Randle open on the lift. So Brunson turns to hit him for an open 3. The Bucks play over the top and drop in this ball screen situation. Should he try and hit the roll here, get himself into either a shot or a floater, or try and thread the needle, do a kick out to the opposite side. Because of his ability to play with pace coming off of this ball screen and keep Carter behind him the whole time, he's essentially creating a five on four situation, just waiting to see which advantage the defense will allow. Brook Lopez decides to stay with the roll guy and all the help side defenders decide to stick with their guys instead of collapsing to take away Brunson's shot, which leaves him with the option of creating that floater for himself. Being able to play with pace, coming downhill off a ball screen and keeping that defender in jail to essentially force the defense to give you some sort of opportunity is a crucial skill to have you want to be an elite point guard? Right here we've got a ball screen where the Bulls play over and then have that big drop. What should he do in this situation? If you picked anything up so far from watching Jalen Brunson, it should be that it's so important to be able to be patient and allow the defense to make choices for you. Brunson puts a ton of pressure on Vucovic right here as that drop defender to either decide to step in and stop Brunson from driving or recover back to the roll. And because Vucovic gets caught there for a second too long, that leaves the paint open and Brunson can throw this lob. Right here we see our first ball string clip the defense plays under. What's the right decision here now? Maybe to you this one seems obvious, but it illustrates a bigger point. If you're watching this and your goal is to be elite as a point guard, is a pick and roll player or anybody who has the ball in their hands, you have to be a threat to make shots when defenders do not take away your space. The reason that we saw mostly drop coverage with the defender going over in all the other clips is because teams can't guard him this way because they know that he can make this three if they play under it. He only gets those other opportunities because they have to take away this 3. Drop a comment down below and let me know how many you got right. And if you guys have any other suggestions, drop it in the comments below as well. Make sure you click the top link in my description below to get my free lead perimeter score workout. I'll to you guys soon. Peace.