Is "Getting Shots Up" A Waste of Time? (Block Training vs. Random Training)

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And if you guys are on Apple podcast right now, do me a favor, scroll down, leave a review, let me know what you think of the show today's episode. Really, really good question I got from a guy, Ian, and you know Ian's inside the Perimeter Score system, Elite shooter system, Elite ball handling. And so Ian has a question and I told him like, this is a really good question I got to talk about on the podcast. So he DM'd me the other day and he said, yo Ethan, I got a question. So I know how you always preach quality of reps over quantity of reps, which I agree with. It's better to get like 150 really good game speed shots rather than 500 during a three hour long half speed workout. I have access to one of those shooting guns now and I can get up like 500 quality threes in an hour with it. Would it be beneficial to combine that repetition training with something like the Elite shooting system or should I not use that machine? That's a really good question. Because you know, kind of my first point I want to make is like, I think in a sense I'd say over the past year, maybe two years, you know, when it comes to like the basketball training industry, it's very much shifted towards this whole idea of random practice, random practice, you know, not shooting the same shot twice. Like that's what it's become is we have to make practice as much of a game simulation as we possibly can every single time. And that's kind of where it's shifted towards and I think that that's in a way a really good thing. But I think there's also some. I think, I think it needs context. As with everything, it needs context at times. So this is a great question. It's almost like a pendulum, right? You might have the pendulum that swings too far to the, oh, let's get just, you know, reps, mindless reps, you know, one after the other. Then you can go the other way, which is, oh, let's never do that and let's only shoot, you know, varied shots, change the shot every single time, never shooting the shame, the same shot twice in a row. I think that in general, the pendulum should be like, the needle should be somewhere in the middle of that. So that's kind of what I wanted to talk about today. The first thing is just kind of understanding this whole concept, right? If you're, if this is something that you're familiar with, with kind of what Ian's referring to, I talk about it all the time. You know, the most important thing when it comes to your workouts, especially your shooting workouts, is just the quality of it, right? So it's better to, you know, have 150 shot workout where you're going game speed, every shot's purposeful and those shots are actually going to be what transfers, what translates to the games where, you know, you have to be going game speed, obviously, and you have to actually be mindful of what you're doing. And you know, as, as opposed to a 500 shot workout that, you know, you've got to rebound every shot for yourself and it takes you three and a half, four hours to do it. By the time you get to about, you know, an hour, hour and a half in, you're starting to jog, you're going half speed on those shots. You're kind of mindless the whole time. That 500 shot workout to me is, is almost a waste of time, right? At least a lot of that workout is going to be a waste of time. I would much rather have that 150 shot, super intense game speed workout, purposeful workout, and honestly, one that will probably take you an hour, right? Maybe less than that. So that's really the concept that I'm referring to here. And I made videos talking about how to have quality workouts and kind of delving deep into that. So make sure you check out the rest of my podcast episodes. You'll see plenty of stuff talking about that. So we obviously don't want to have those low quality workouts where we're not going full speed. We're trying to chase a number arbitrarily, even at the expense of the quality of our workout. That's certainly not what we want to do. And I think there's a balance between that. Right. So the next part of it goes, you know, kind of the block versus random comparison. Right. And block just means repetitive. Right. So if I'm going to do. If my. If I'm doing a shooting workout that's, you know, mostly block practice, that would be, you know, I shoot 100 threes in the corner, then 100 threes in the wing, then 103s in the top, and 100 from the other wing, and then 100 from the other quarter. Right. I'm just repeating the same shot over and over and over again. That would be an example of block practice. Okay. And then with. With random practice, that might be I shoot one shot from the corner, then I shoot a shot from the wing, then I shoot a pull up at the elbow, then I shoot shot from the other corner, then I shoot a shot, fake one, dribble on the wing. Like, that's where I'm changing up the shot every single time, making it more random and more varied. Okay. So just to kind of put those terms out there. And yes, random shooting, random workouts are certainly more game like. Right. More game applicable. You're not really ever going to shoot the same shot, the exact same shot twice in a row in a game. Now, you might on occasion, but generally you're going to have to shoot a catch and shoot three in the corner, and then your next shot might be a pull up at the elbow, and then your next shot might be a catch and shoot on the wing. You're probably going to end up shooting, for the most part, a different sort of shot every single time. A ton of studies out there that back the concept of, okay, random practice. Generally, if you practice in a random manner, you're going to miss more shots. If I have a workout where I just shoot even a drill, Right. If I have a drill where I shoot from the top of the key and I shoot 50 shots in a row, I'm probably going to shoot a higher percentage than if I shot 50 shots. The first shot was from the wing, the second shot was in the short corner, the third shot was from the corner, the fourth shot was a pull up at the wing. Like, if I change my shot every time, I'm probably going to make less than I would if I just, you know, stood at the same spot and shot the same shot over and over and over and over. Again, because your body has to adjust, right? Mentally, you have to adjust every single time as you know, as opposed to the block practice where you don't have to, you can kind of lock in and almost go into autopilot and just kind of rep things over and over and over again. Right. But studies show that that random form of practice actually translates better to games. Right? So if we take two groups of people and I have one group do block practice and then one group to random practice, the block group. Right. Maybe we just do free throws. The block group is going to shoot way better in practice with the block training and then the random group is going to shoot worse. But when we put them into an actual game situation or a test situation where it's not going to be blocked, obviously in the game, it's not blocking it, it's random. Right. The game is random. So when we put them into a test, that group that practice randomly is going to be more prepared and therefore do better than that block group did. Okay? That being said, it's not always better to practice in that random form of training. A good example of this is that there was a story about Steve Kerr back when he was playing and he was struggling to shoot. He was coming off the bench and one of the things that he was struggling with was like coming off the bench cold and having to hit threes immediately. That was what Steve Kerr was. He was a shooter. So he come off the bench and you know, he was cold and he had to be able to go in the game and immediately be able to hit shots. Right. That's not an easy thing to do. So what he did with the shooting coach is they would shoot a shot and then immediately after that shot he would go sit down for five minutes and after five minutes he would get up, sprint back on the court and then immediately shoot another shot. And they used to do workouts where it would be like a 30 minute workout and he only shoots six shots. Okay. And that's a fantastic way to go about things if you're Steve Kerr. If you're Steve Kerr, you're already a, an elite, elite shooter. You're one of the top 00001% of, you know, the percentile of shooters in the world. Right? That's where, you know you're getting paid millions dollars. Shoot the basketball. You already can do it at a very high level. Okay. So that's where really getting down and randomizing it is very, very beneficial because that's what he's struggling with, Right. Steve Kerr can stand in the corner and he can make, you know, he'll make whatever 85 out of 100 threes if you just let him stand there, catch and shoot it. But that's obviously not going to translate in his situation quite as well as that other form of training they're doing with those one shot every five minutes. Okay, does that mean that, you know, the 13 year old kid who is just learning how to play basketball should train like that? No, they definitely shouldn't do that. Actually that would be a negative thing because they'll probably miss all six shots and then they've only shot six shots, you know what I mean? So we have to understand that while making something completely random for one player who might be at a certain level is the right way to do things for another player who maybe isn't at that level, it might be the, you know, the wrong way to do things. Right. If you're not, you know, let's say you're Steph Curry, well, you're never coming out of the game really. So there's no, there's no need for you to train the way that Steve Kerr trained there. Right. So you have to understand that again, that's why I'm going back to what I started with. The context of things really, really matters when it comes to what form of practice you should actually be going with. So, so that's why I say that random training isn't necessarily always better. You know, you can think about it like this. If you're only making 14 out of 100 shots in a block setting, like if you shoot, if I tell you, okay, we're going to shoot 100 shots from the wing here and you only make 14 of them, then me. Now randomizing things is just going to make that even worse for you. Like it's not going to help you because you're already shooting 14% when it's easy, when there's no sort of randomness added to it. So there's no point in making it more random. So that's where we're going to keep on sticking with that block training until you got to build up your ability. And then, you know, once you get up to being able to make, you know, a good amount, I won't give a certain number, but like a good amount of shots, you know, 50, 60, 70 of those hundred shots, well then maybe that's where it becomes valuable for us to then transfer that into a more random way of training so that we can kind of get beyond that next part. Okay, but you have to first value where you're at, if you are, if you struggle with a certain shot, you struggle with a certain area. Well, just repping it out with a sort of block style, shooting 50, 100 shots in a row the same shot is not a bad thing at all. And it's probably the most, the most beneficial way to do things, right. If I have a player who's struggling with their footwork coming into a shot, then we're going to rep that out until they are comfortable with it. And that might take multiple workouts, right? That might be okay. So for a whole workout eight, it's, it's repetitive shots because we're trying to work on, you know, efficient footwork or whatever it may be, right. And that, that's an important step in development for sure right there. If you're trying to build a new habit, then repping something out in a block sort of manner is also very, very beneficial. Right? If I'm trying to work on, you know, finishing with a higher release point, well, just being able to shoot the same shot over and over and over again, where I can focus on keeping my release point higher is going to be more beneficial than me trying to throw it into a sort of random style a little bit earlier than that, you know what I mean? So there's a lot that we can, we can look at right there. But ultimately it just comes down to context. Where you're at, what level you're at, what your goal is. And that's going to tell you, okay, do, should I make this more difficult? Should I change in my shots every time or is it okay for me to get those reps up? You know, if I have a player who's a very, very solid shooter, right, and they have the basics down and, and I can put them in a spot and shoot 100 shots and they're going to make a lot of them. Well then that's where we might start to change things up and make them more random. For example, I was just working with one of my players the other day and we were going through a footwear drill, working on different sorts of shooting footwork, coming off of a ball screen into a mid range pull up. So the first one that we worked on was just normal inside, outside. So a left, right, pull up. And then the, the next shot would be, we're coming off of that ball screen. This time we're going to step outside foot, inside foot into the pull up. So now we're stepping right, left into it. And then the third type of shot was just a hop landing on two feet, right into a shot. So the first thing that we did was just rep out those shots over and over again. So we worked on the left, right? Okay. And then we made a certain amount with that. Then we moved on to the next shot we made a certain amount might have been 10 of the right, left, the outside, inside. And then after we made those, we moved on to the hopper. And once we were comfortable with that, that was when we progressed on to making it more random. So next we might go. Okay, now we've got to go every single time. We're going to go to the next one. So the first one is going to be inside, outside. The second shot is going to be outside, inside, and the third shot is going to be hop. And we're going to repeat that until you make a certain amount of shots. Okay. They get comfortable doing that. Then the next part of that could be, okay, now you're going to come off of this ball screen, and I'm going to call out, what kind of what foot? You know, what kind of foot were you going to do? So you might come off. I might say inside. That means you're going to step inside, outside. Or I might. You might come off. I might yell outside. That means you're going to step outside, inside. Or maybe I'll yell hop. Or maybe whatever. Like, there's a ton of things that we can do right there to randomize it. But the most important part is that first we had to actually master or get a solid grasp on the basic footwork. Okay. Because if you can't get into the footwork, then making it random, there's no point, Right. If you aren't able to consistently get into an outside, inside, pull up, or if you can't ever make that shot, then there's no point of making it random. We would be better off just blocking it and just working it over and over and over again until you have a good grasp on it. Right? And then once you do, then we can start to change it up a little bit and make it a little more harder. Make you have to think about it a little bit more. Okay. Make you have to react to something or. Or whatever the case may be. And that's typically how you want to gauge things, Right. If you're struggling with learning something new or building a new habit, balk is the way to go. And I think that that's what is super important for players to understand. And so then the question becomes, maybe that's not your situation, right? Maybe your situation is you're a Good shooter already. And so now you're just wondering, okay, kind of like what Ian was asking if I have access to, you know, whether it be a shooting gun or whether it be just, you know, with a teammate, you know, should we be getting up those block shots? Should we be shooting? Okay, 20 makes in the corner, 20 makes from the wing. 20 makes it like, you know what I mean? Just like getting those, those repetitive kind of workouts in shooting wise. And there's always benefits to that, right? Again, I, the pendulum has swung really far to where it's almost, people are almost saying, oh, there's no benefit to that. There's certainly still benefits doing that. I think the biggest thing is just confidence, right when you see the ball go in over and over and over again, it, it builds your confidence. And confidence is such an important part of being a great shooter. Being great at anything. Confidence is so important. So certainly just from that perspective, I think it's important, you know, one thing that I, that I really, how I approach it is like, in the off season, if I'm working with a player who's a really good shooter, we're going to do a lot of stuff that's going to challenge their shooting and there's going to be some days where they're going to miss a lot of shots and probably not feel very confident in their ability to make shots. But that's going to be like, like now, like, you know, once AU is over and now we're August, September, October, and, you know, we can, we don't have to worry about going into a game and having to make shots tomorrow. Well, now there's an opportunity for us to be able to challenge, whether it be their footwork, their balance, different sorts of shots they can make. So that's where we're going to go with a more random style. And, and sometimes I don't even say, like, listen, sometimes you're just, you know, you might feel like, oh, I didn't get any better, or their confidence might be a little. But I, I'm not worried about the confidence thing right now. Now, as the season gets closer and we're all of a sudden in November and the season starts in two, three weeks, that's where we're going to really start to rep out those block shots. So then you, once you get to the season, you've like, you feel confident because you've been seeing the ball go in a lot, right? So that's just my personal style. But at the end of the day, getting those reps up is great. For you just to build confidence. So I think just that alone makes, it makes me say like, yeah, if you're able to go get shots up, do that, right? There's certainly, that's certainly not a negative thing at all. And you know, of course that also is just, it's a reinforcement of that muscle memory as well. So there's, there's definitely benefits to that. And the question just becomes, is this the best way for me to be doing things right now? Right. If you're able to make things more varied. So maybe you have the shooting gun, right? But instead of shooting, you know, just the same shot 20 times in a row, maybe you, you work a series where you shoot a catch and shoot three and then a pull up to the left and a pull up to the right and then cash and shoot three. Right. So you're changing up the shot every single time, but you're still able to kind of rep it out because you have that, that rebounder for you. Okay, so there's different ways to do things for sure. And of course I've talked about it too. Like, okay, it can be as simple as well, yeah, you, you want to get shots up and, but now you make sure that there's some sort of pressure on you. So you have to make four shots in a row to go to the next spot or you have to make nine shots, but you can't miss two shots in a row or you go back to zero. So there's different ways that you can, you can work in a more blocked form to even add some game like elements like pressure to that. So again, hopefully that is something that helps you guys out if you answers that question for you in general, in general, like block, getting shots up can be a really, really good thing for you. But of course, you know, it's always good to be able to mix in that random practice as well, assuming that you have a solid foundation as a shooter. And again, don't want the pendulum swimming too far to one side. It's always going to be right in the middle. It just depends on, you know, where you're at. It's going to determine which side of the pendulum or which end of it you're going to be closer to. So again, hopefully that answered you guys questions. Like I said before, guys, if you're an Apple podcast, drop a review for me below. You're on YouTube. Drop a, like subscribe, drop a comment. Let me know what you think, let me know what, how your training is going. You guys have any questions, any problems you're having, let me know. Give me a follow on Instagram at Vision Driven Basketball as well. I really do appreciate you guys who have been tuned in this whole time. Shout out to all of you guys. I'll talk to you guys soon. Peace. Sam.