Why "Reps" Are Overrated (And How We Can Make Training More Effective)

Foreign. Welcome to the Vision Gym Basket training Podcast. Appreciate you guys who tuned in today. Apple podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, Soundcloud, or you may be listening from. And of course everybody right now who's watching on YouTube. If you're on YouTube right now, do me a favor, leave a, like, subscribe if you're new. If you guys are an Apple podcast, do me a favor as well. Scroll down the bottom of the page and leave me a review. Let me know what you think about the show. As you guys who've listened know, when I get new reviews, I read them at the beginning of the show. So I'll have one new one today. And it's kind of a callback on a review that I actually already read, which is results for tryouts. Last episode I asked about tryouts and I made the team. Thanks, coach. Your podcast helped me so much to get here. Now I just have to perform well in games, so. Which is awesome to hear. You know that I think it was either last episode or one before where we, I kind of talked about that. But if you, like I said before, guys, if you've not left a review, scroll down. Do that. You have a question for me that you want me to answer or you have, I don't know, whatever, it doesn't really matter. It can be something like this as well. Go ahead and do that for me. Helps the show out a lot and I really do appreciate that. So today I want to talk about reps. And you know, reps are, I mean, think about the amount of quotes that you can hear on a day to day basis about the importance of, you know, getting your reps in or whatever, right? Maybe it's, you know, practice makes perfect. There's, there's maybe the most cliche, most commonly used quote when you talk about reps or practice. Or maybe you hear the one where it's okay, it's not practice makes perfect. It's perfect. Practice makes perfect. Or whatever you want to, whatever variation of that quote you want to say. There's the other one where it's like reps are the mother of skill, right? Or whatever, whatever the. Again, whatever the variation of that may be, ultimately the point of that is that reps are viewed as super, super important and the foundational piece to becoming great at anything. And of course, in basketball, there's nothing that's more celebrated, nothing that's more revered than going and getting your reps in every day or getting more reps in than the other per. Than another person's doing and outworking everybody. And that's what everybody wants to focus on. And, you know, I agree with a lot of that, right? I agree with the fact that reps are super important. Practice is super important. And the way that you practice absolutely has a. A major impact on how you're going to perform come game time, come performance time. So my issue with the focus on reps, though, is that I think that it's viewed from a little bit too narrow of a focus. And I think that the way that we view it should be a little bit different. So there's, you know, we can talk about the actual word first of all, which is reps or repetition. And just so we have an idea of what I mean when I say reps or repetition, the definition, the act of repeating or doing, saying or writing something. Again, repeated action, performance, production or presentation. So let's think about how reps are usually done when it comes to basketball training. Right. When we think about shooting reps, for example, typically that's going to mean, like, you know, you're gonna stand in a certain. Let's say you're on the way, you're standing on the wing, you're gonna shoot X amount of shots from that spot, and you're just gonna repeat the same shot at that spot over and over and over and over again. And maybe you'll do that at all five spots around the perimeter. And maybe you'll get up 150 reps at those at those spots, right? Maybe it's 30 shots at each spot, maybe it's X amount of makes, whatever. But that's how people would view your reps. Hey, did you go get your shooting work in today? And typically what that's going to mean is that did you go and get those sorts of reps in? And that's. That's an example. When it comes to, you know, shooting, there's no major adjustment that has to be made from shot to shot. It's just kind of you standing there. You can be an autopilot almost. You can almost turn your brain off and just shoot and not think about anything. Not have to make any decisions or read and make any adjustments to what's happening around you. It's just you being able to do the same thing over and over and over and over again. And then when we look at ball handling reps, right, what does that usually look like? Usually that's going to mean like some stationary ball handling where you're pounding the ball, you're doing crossovers or whatever, or maybe it's something on the move where you're going to go through some cones, you got some cones set up, and it's going to be one dribble. Then you dribble through a cone, another dribble, dribble through the cone again, take another dribble, dribble through the cone again. And that's generally people are going to view as your reps for ball handling. Again, there's no adjustments that have to be made. There's no reactions, there's no anticipation. There's. That's required for you to be successful in those drills. There's no defense trying to take the ball from you in those drills. Nothing that you would actually see in the context of the game. But yet we still look at those reps, those stationary ball handling reps, or those reps through cones as the important piece when it comes to being great as a ball handler. Now, I'm going to say this multiple times, but the first thing to understand, guys is that I'm not demonizing these sorts of things. I think they have a purpose and they have a place. My issue is that this tends to be the go to. When you look at mainstream basketball training, you look at what most people are doing and if you walk into any, you know, the majority of gyms in America or the majority of parks in America and probably a lot of places across the world. But I'm just speaking from what I've seen and from the people who I've talked to, what they see, generally that's what you're going to see when it comes to reps is going to be a lot of stationary shooting. And really the, the point that I want to make with all of it is that you can almost turn your brain off while you're doing it. Like, there's almost very little need for you to actually be thinking or be actually using your brain at all. Because once you get into a groove of, okay, this is how I shoot on the wing. Once you shoot two, three times, you're shooting 10 times. By the time you get to rep five or six, you're just kind of going through it because your brain's already set. Okay, this is what we got to do. We're not making any adjustments. It's just autopilot at that point. It's the same thing. We're going through those sorts of stationary ball handling drills. So again, I'm not demonizing everything in general, but when this is what makes up the majority of training, this is where we see that lack of transition from practice to games. And, you know, where the question Becomes are those reps as valuable as people want to make them seem? And then even thinking about finishing, right. What's the go to drill when it comes to finishing? Probably. I mean, I think of the mic and drill first, where you're just going back and forth on the basket, finishing on both sides, and again has a place. But also there is no need to adapt from rep to rep. There's no defense trying to throw you off right there. There's no adjustments have to be made. There's no anticipatory reactionary elements needed to be able to be successful in that drill either. Maybe, you know, full court layups is another one where if you're at a certain level where full court layups aren't a challenge for you, then there's not really any point of doing it, you know, and that's where. How valuable are those reps right there? And the point is that when we look at mainstream basketball training and the way that reps are accomplished, is there an actual relationship to those reps and the demands of a real game? And a lot of times the answer to that is no. And we're just going through the motions of doing reps because that's what we've been told is important. Oh, it's important. You got to go get your reps in. You got to make sure that you stand at that spot and you make at least five shots and you go to the next spot, you make five shots there. Okay, we got to do a micro drill. You got to make 10 in a row right here. Okay, we got to do our ball handling. I'm going to do 50 stationary pounds right here. And that's just what it's always been. And this is where the sport of basketball is just miles behind. First of all, what the science would support, right, because the majority of coaches, trainers aren't out there reading about skill acquisition. They aren't reading about motor learning, they aren't. They aren't reading about that sort of stuff. They aren't learning from people who know that sort of stuff. And so it's a constant cycle of, okay, what did I do growing up? That's what we're going to do now. And there's very little evolution when it comes to the game. And that's why I posted about this on Instagram. But obviously there's. There's different factors into this, so I'll preface it with that. But when we look at the NBA, right, the as a league, the three point percentage has been stuck at about 35% for the last two decades, last 20 years, it's been about 35%. When you look at the total decade shooting percentages now, can you say that there's other factors that are involved, you know, as the NBA has. First of all, we're taking way more threes these days. So the first thing I'd say is we're taking significantly more threes in an NBA game on average than we were 20 years ago. So you would think that with that being such a much bigger part of what teams are doing, that that would be a way bigger focus in terms of, okay, hey, we need to make sure that we're drafting guys who can shoot. We got to make sure that we're bringing in the best shooting coaches that our teams can hit threes. And teams are going to be putting a lot of emphasis into shooting, probably more so than they were 20 years ago. Yet the shooting numbers haven't gone up. We haven't gotten more efficient from the three point line. And again, there's, I've heard theories that, you know, as volume goes up, efficiency is kind of conversely related to that. And that's a theory that's out there and maybe that's part of it. And then you also, you can think about, okay, has, you know, defenders, for example. Now we have just more length on the court. You have skies who are, you know, think about a guy like a mellow ball six, eight and a point guard. You have guys who are six six, six, seven six eight, running point guard, who are super athletic, who are now closing out to, to these guys when 20 years ago your point guard was six one, you know, six two, maybe. And so defense and closeouts have probably gotten better over the last 20 years as well. But again, we're shooting significantly more threes these days than we were back then. So why have the numbers not increased at all? That, to me seems like an important question for us to ask ourselves. And does any of that have to do with the way that we're training? And I'm giving shooting as an example, but basketball in general, you know, I don't think anybody can deny that over the last 20 years, athletically we've continued to progress. Basketball wise, we're seeing these insane athletes where every team has guys who are, you know, jumping from the free throw line, dunking. We have these incredible guys like Giannis who are, you know, seven foot plus and can, you know, are the most athletic players on the floor and do these incredible athletic feats that we weren't seeing 20 years ago at, at the scale that we see now. But shooting has been the part that stayed stagnant despite the increased emphasis on that. And these, the, the upped access we have to, whether it be training, whether it be just online knowledge, like all the stuff that we have now, you'd think that shooting would be better. And so my question becomes, is there a way that we can adjust how we train this so that we can get over the plateau and start to see those student numbers adjust? Is that a part of things that we can look at? And even we look at other sports who have adapted more of a scientific approach to this. You look at tennis, for example, is a big one. Soccer is another one. Or football, if you're not from America. And even you look at a sport like skateboarding, like shout out to Coleman from Bina Maze basketball. He did a post on this on Instagram, I believe was last week where he was kind of talking about why, like the differences between how basketball training is conducted and how these guys at skate parks who are really good skateboarders, like how they go about it and what we as a basketball community can take from that. And it was very interesting to see how, you know, when those guys train, it's very, very different from the way that typically we're going to do things from a basketball perspective. But, but the way that they do it, if we approached and we took some of the stuff that they did and some of the approaches that they do, we probably see more progress, especially when it comes to the in game results. So again, this is not to sit here and demonize reps like it's a bad thing. It's not a bad thing. And there's plenty of times that I'll get up reps in workouts with my players. We'll stand and we'll say, okay, we're going to make this amount in a row. We're going to do this and that and we're going to get reps at times. But the thing to understand is that there's no one right answer. Always, you know, there's always going to be an it depends. So sometimes the best thing you can do is work on those reps. Maybe it's to get some sort of footwork to get comfortable with it. Maybe it's just to see the ball go through the basket a few times. There's always going to be an it depends when it comes to what's the best way to do things. So there is no one best way to do everything. It's always going to be situational. But this the question Becomes is there a better way generally to go about getting reps? And I think the better question to ask even is how can we get the most valuable reps possible that are going to translate directly to game results? The most. Okay, so are there ways that we can get more valuable reps? Essentially is a question that we should ask. And can we get those reps without having to repeat the same thing over and over and over and over again? Because almost never in a game are you going to be doing that. Almost never in a game are you going to repeat the same shot two times in a row within like three seconds of it happening, which is what you would do when you would stand and shoot the same shot over and over again. Rarely is that going to be the case. Probably almost never. Even if in two consecutive possessions you shoot the same shot, you're probably going to play defense first. So you're going to be in a different state. Maybe you're going to, you know, your heart rate's a little bit higher the next time you shoot that shot. Can that have an adjust, an effect on that next shot compared to the first one that makes it two different sorts of shots. There's an example of why that would be. So let's think about how we can adjust the way we get reps to kind of simulate that. So, for example, let's say that we want to look at shooting two drill pull ups, which is a very important shot to be able to make. And you know, obviously maybe we start off just working on two dribble pull ups, four steps into it, just getting that footwork down and getting comfortable with it, working the ankles, the timing of the pickups and all that sort of stuff. But then at some point we add in a defender who maybe the offensive player starts out in the wing just dribbling the ball, and they have a defender who's kind of walking around them in a circle. And at any given point, that offensive player can decide to get into their two drill pull up right away. But now they have a defender who as soon as that offensive player goes, that defender is chasing down and trying to contest that shot. So now that offensive player has to read where that defender is. And then they have to decide to go, and they have to be able to get the shot off quick enough that the defender's not there. They also have to be able to get enough space that they can take the shot. And they also have to be able to pick the ball up in a way that's going to allow them to get into that Shot off of the speed that's going to be necessary to shoot it. So now all those things add into there having to be some adaptability between shot to shot because maybe one possession the defender's walking a little bit slower and the next best possession they're walking a little bit faster. And so you're going to have to get into that shot differently. You might have to go different directions. Maybe the first rep they're a foot and a half away from you, and the next rep they're two and a half feet away from you. That's going to be an adjustment as well. So now we're getting those same reps of those two draw pull ups, but it's way more game like because you have an outside factor that weighs into the way that you get that shot. And so every shot's going to be a little bit different. It's going to be from a little bit different of a spot, it's going to be a little bit different timing wise, it's going to be a little bit different. Do I have to lean more on this shot? Do I have to elevate more on this shot? All those different things are going to change shot to shot. So now we're getting way more value out of those reps because each of them is a much more game specific action, game specific look. And every rep is going to be slightly different, but we're working on the same thing. So now we're getting those reps but without it being inaccurately repetitive like it usually is if we were just there with no defense or no nothing to have to react to. So adding an outside factor to have to read and react to is probably the best way to make those reps more valuable. But we can also do this with audio cues as well. So, you know, maybe that means that you're going to start off with a freestyle dribble and then you're going to attack off of that. And then maybe there's a call that says stop or a call that says pull up or a call that says whatever. And now again, every rep is going to be a little bit different than the one before just based on what the cue says. So there's another example of how we can add that into training. And I would even say that, you know, with audio cues, it's such a great way to mix up the monotony of drills, especially with finishing. I find that just by adding in audio, audio cues to change up the side of the rim that you finish on or the hand that you use or whether it's an overhand finish or an underhand finish or a floater or one foot or two foot. It just is a way to add, to mix up the monotony of things. And then even when we talk about by yourself, right, if you're training by yourself, how do you add in or how do you go with this idea of reps without repetition or reps without inaccurate repetition. And I think a great way to do this is just two things. First of all, you can change up the shots that you shoot. So maybe you're not shooting the same sort of shot two times in a row. I love doing this. Even with just like it can be super, super minute. Maybe you're working on pull ups but you're changing up how long each dribble is into that pull up. So maybe the first shot you're taking, maybe it's a two dribble pull up and those are two dribbles where there's as long as possible so you're getting as far as you can. And then maybe on the next rep, the first dribble is a super long dribble and the next one's real short. So now we're getting a little bit of variability from shot to shot and that's all very game like because sometimes you're going to have to take that longer dribble and sometimes you're have to get into it quicker with that shorter dribble. So that's just an example of how you can add in those, that variability to make those reps more valuable. And you can do that in so many different ways. That might mean you're getting, you're working on, you know, getting into shots in the mid range, but maybe you get into different sorts of pull ups. So maybe it's not just a normal inside, outside foot pull up. Maybe you're mixing it up with outside inside foot. Maybe there's some hops in there. Maybe you get into it off of a step back or off of a punch or off of a snatch or something like that, where you're just changing up the type of shot you're getting, but it's still a rep. But obviously you know that in games it's going to be a little bit different. Something you can look at is like if you go back and you can watch your game film, you can look at, okay, how many, like how different are my shots? When you really look at it and you look at it in a detailed way where you say, okay, if I look at my footwork from that shot to that shot, is it different? Chances are that's going to be yes. Chances are when you shoot a three, your feet are going to look a little bit different. When you're coming off of that pin down to get that shot, your footwork is going to be a little bit different each time. Maybe you don't even realize it, but when you look back at it, hey, I hopped that time or I stepped one to that time, or my feet were really wide that time on that pull up, or they were really narrow on that pull up right there. Or maybe on that finish I, I was really leaning a lot to my right and maybe in the next finish I was going straight up and down. Everyone's going to be a little bit different. So the way that we train has to prepare us for that variability that's going to be forced upon you in a game. Right. Practice and being great is not about being able to repeat the same thing over and over and over again. And that's the thing with shooting that a lot of people think is like, oh, well, to be a great shooter, you just have to be able to repeat the same shooting motion over and over again and you'll be great at it. That's a part of it. But also you can look at any gray shooter. Like I just said, every, like shots are going to be different, right? I did a look at Klay Thompson where if you look at a guy who everyone says, hey, this guy has repeatable motions, it's, it's very technically sound like if you're going to look at how to shoot a basketball, you look at Klay Thompson, there's plenty of shots he shoots where his feet are a little bit, you know, different. He's got his right foot farther back than his left foot. And, and that's just maybe what the situation calls for in that, in that certain situation, right? In that certain context, he has to shoot the ball that way. So being a great shooter isn't about you can repeat the same motion every time. It's can you make that little adjustment based on the situation and still be able to make the shot? That's what great shooters can do. And so we need to train to be able to do that. That's why I love something as simple as like bad or like bad pass. Shooting is a great one. We where someone's throwing you a bad pass and you have to be able to still be able to adjust and hit that shot. But I also love when we look at bad footwork shooting. So like just shooting out of the weirdest footwork positions possible and just working on that right where I'm shooting out of positions I probably never would in a game, but I'm. I'm giving myself multiple solutions to a problem. So I'm shooting from the same spot, but I'm working on different solutions to be able to hit shots. Whether my. When I pull up, my right foot's a little bit farther back than normal or it's a little bit farther forward than normal, can I still hit the shot when that's the case? And if I can do that, chances are I'm going to be a better player than somebody who can't. Really my goal whenever I train any player is just to give them the freedom and the solutions to be able to figure things out on their own. And no matter what the situation and what the defense is doing to them, they're able to find a solution to that problem. And because I understand that that is what makes great players, is guys who can just find solutions to difficult situations. And that, I think, is what our reps really need to prepare us for at the end of the day. Now, again, just to. To go back to what I said earlier, it's not that rep, normal reps in the way that we do it is always a bad thing. Okay. I think there's always a place for getting reps up. And I'm never going to be the one to say, oh, you can never do that, because I understand, like that's it. That's way easier said than done, right? So I'm not going to say that reps are never. Reps are always a bad thing. It's not true. But when is it possible to be able to get more valuable reps? And the answer, I think is yes, in. In terms of the way that we do things right now and how we could do things. And I would even say that when we get those reps that force more variability, force adaptability, I think those reps are. Or I think you're better off doing less of those than you are doing more reps the traditional way that we do reps. I think you're going to get more out of doing those more variable reps, even if it's less of them, even if it's less time, less shots total. I think you're going to see more progress and more direct results to games than you will if it's just your traditional repeating the same thing over and over and over again. Because that ultimately is not what happens in the context of the game. So hopefully this gives you guys some ideas. And some ways that you guys can start to adjust and think about, okay, how can I get these reps that force a little bit of variability? How do I mix up my shots that I'm shooting? How do I make my, my training more simulate the actual requirements of a game, the actual demands that I'm going to need to meet in a game. I want to be successful. But because the way that things are done now in basketball training is just not, it's just not cutting it when it comes to preparing players for those situations. So, again, I appreciate everybody who's watching listening right now. If you guys on YouTube, drop a, like, subscribe if you're new, like I said, Apple podcast, drop a review for me. Let me know what you think. Really do appreciate all the support that I've gotten from you guys. Gotten a lot of messages the last couple weeks talking about, hey, really appreciate your podcast episodes. Even a couple players that, like, literally, like three teams that I've coached against in the last two weeks, I've had a play, at least one player from each team come up to me and like, say, hey, I love your podcast. Which is crazy to think about that, to think about, like the reach that it has. But I'm very appreciative for everybody who is watching, listening, who's supporting, and if you guys have questions for me, suggestions, drop a comment below. Also give me a DM on Instagram as well at Vision Driven Basketball. Again, I appreciate all of you guys. Talk to you guys soon. Peace.