By: Jason Markum

I get asked this question all the time, especially by parents who are anxious to start their younger children down the path to basketball excellence.

What is the question they always ask? It is this: What’s the best practice workout that my young child can do to make them a great basketball player when they get older.

This is a great question. It’s never too soon to start instilling good practice habits in your younger children.

I don’t know what it’s like in the area of the country (or in the area of the world for that matter) that you currently live, but where I’m from we started pee wee basketball when we were in roughly fourth grade.

Granted, it was very loosely organized. A couple of the parents of the kids on the team were the coach. But we did play teams from other towns, well towns that were close by. And we did have practices and such.

On the other hand, not many of us could hoist the ball all the way up to the rim, and dribbling the ball down the court, even when not defended, was a comedy show in itself.

But I’m getting off the point. First, when should you start practicing for real with your children? I’d say at around the age of fifth grade or sixth grade. Before then, they’re just too uncoordinated to get much use out of it.

Plus they will grow around that age and that is a factor that you should take into consideration.

So what is a good workout for a child around fifth or sixth grade?

Well, at that age, it’s not so important WHAT you do, it’s much more important THAT you do. Get in the habit of shooting baskets with your kid for a half an hour a day. If they can do more, and they really want to do more, ease it up to a whole hour a day.

The trick is to do it everyday if possible. Don’t force them to do it, it really has to come from them or they will just come to regret practicing and get fed up with the whole sport.

My high school coach said that his father would ask him every night if he had practiced that day. He would answer yes or no whether he had practiced or not. His father didn’t say a single word else. He didn’t berate him for not practicing. He just said nothing.

But my coach said, “that was enough”. He knew that his father was disappointed when he didn’t practice, even if he didn’t come right out and say it.

That was enough for my coach to get out there the next day and make sure he had practiced.

I recommend this for younger kids. It’s a good way to keep tabs on them, and in a very gentle manner keep them focused. Kids are kids, they aren’t going to practice everyday. But as long as you be sure to ask whether they practiced or not, it keeps the wheels on the bus.

Jason has been writing articles online for over thirteen years. When not writing about basketball, Jason runs a wildly popular dinnerware web site where he reviews dinner plates of all kinds and prices.

By: Jason Markum

On question I get asked over and over again, and I mean *over and over* again, is this: How do I become a better three point shooter?

Everyone wants to be a three point shooter because that’s where the glamor is, unless of course you can dunk the ball like a mad man.

So in this article I will discuss in detail, my method for becoming a really good three point shooter. I will talk about what you should do to practice three point shots, and how long you can expect to take to become a great three point shooter.

OK, so the first thing you need to understand is this. To become a great three point shooter, heck to become a great anything at basketball, there is only one way to do it. And that one way is to practice

It almost doesn’t matter how you practice, just as long as you do practice

Of course, once you reach a certain level of competence, it very much *does* matter how you practice Things like expenditure of energy and efficiency come into play eventually.

So here is my specific method. Pick five major spots along the three point line. I choose the two opposite ends of the baseline, the two opposite ends of the elbow (we’re talking roughly here, basically what you want to do is choose a spot roughly equally between the head of the key and the baseline diagonally out from the basket), and finally the last spot is at the top of the key.

Can you visualize those spots? Good. These don’t have to be exact spots, just roughly five spots equally apart from each other along the three point line.

Next step up to the first spot and start shooting. When you make five baskets in a row, move to the next spot. Do the same thing at the next spot, shoot till you make five baskets in a row, then move on to the next spot.

Do all five spots like this. When you first start out, it will take a very long time to make five in a row. This work out may take you two hours or longer when you first start.

Eventually, you will find it easy to make five in a row from each spot. When this finally happens, move it up to ten baskets in a row. This is much harder, but once you get the hang of it, you will be able to knock out this workout in less than an hour.

Do it every single day. Always shoot from the same spots because it is important to build up muscle memory from specific spots.

In conclusion, that is my simple and very effective way to practice to become a great three point shooter. Do this for a summer, and when you start the season you will see huge improvements in your shooting. Do it for a few years, and you will become an all star. The trick is to do it every single day, day in and day out.

By: Jason Markum

Basketball is all about the fundamentals. Passing, shooting, boxing out, defense, free throws, three pointers, endurance. Sure, everyone knows that.

That stuff is all great, but what we all really want to see is high flying dunks!

The problem is, unless you were born massively taller than everyone else, it’s going to be hard for you to dunk it! Especially when you are younger like high school age.

There are several things you can do to build the necessary muscles that allow you to jump high enough to dunk a basketball. Most people think that jumping is all about leg muscles. But it isn’t!

Jumping is also about the muscles around your mid section, like your abs and you lower back muscles. If you focus just on building up your leg muscles, you may be missing out by not strengthening your mid section muscles.

That’s not to say that you should neglect your leg muscles.

The first thing you should do is wear ankle weights at all times. You can pick up a pair fairly cheaply at any sporting goods store or at a local Walmart or Kmart or Target type department store. Obviously, the heavier the leg weights, the more bulky they are going to be and the sillier you are going to look.

Don’t worry about it! You may look goofy now, but no one is gonna be laughing when you throw down a massive dunk that sends your high school stadium to its feet!

Next, focus on strengthening your calf muscles. There are an infinite number of exercises you can do for this. I like putting something sturdy on the floor that sits off the floor by a couple to a few inches. A weight from your weight bench, or an especially big book or something. You can also use a step from a staircase.

Stand on the edge of the step with the balls of your feet on the step and your heels hanging over the step over the air. Lift up on your tip toes, then lower yourself back down to the starting position where your feet are perpendicular to the step.

Do as many repetitions of this exercise as you can until your calves start to burn and you can’t take it any more. When this exercise becomes too easy for you, add weights to the mix. Add weights by picking up a weight bar with an appropriate amount of weights on it, lay the bar across your back and do the exercise like before.

This is a great exercise for strengthening your calf muscles.

And don’t forget to work on your abs and lower back muscles too! Crunches are good for the abs. Do as many as you can, as often as you can. Any other exercise you can think of to strengthen your abs is a good idea.

With just these few exercises you will be well on your way to dunking the basketball.

By: Jason Markum

Basketball is a complex game. But a lot of the time, it all comes down to one thing, and one thing only. What is that one thing? Free Throws. Don’t believe me? Think about it. How many games have you watched that all came down to a single free throw during the last few seconds of the game? Lots, that’s how many! Games are just often decided by free throws, both individually, and f.t. percentages for the team overall. When I played basketball in high school, the coach would end each practice the same way. We would shoot ft’s as a team.

Coach would call out a number, and we each got to shoot one or two ft’s (depending on the number that coach called out). If the team didn’t make at least as many free t’s as coach called for, we knew we’d be running sprints. Make the free t’s, and we went home without running sprints. This is a great way to practice free throws under pressure. On the other hand, it can be very frustrating when YOU make your free throws but the rest of the team doesn’t, and so you have to run sprints (the whole team runs, not just those who make their free throws!). As I said, this is a good method for practicing free t’s under pressure, but it isn’t very efficient because you aren’t shooting LOTS of f throws in order to build up your skill. Repetition is important when it comes to basketball, especially when it comes to becoming a great shooter. If you want to become a great fee throw shooter, here’s what I suggest you do.

Every day, no matter what, go off on your own and MAKE fifty fee throws. Don’t stop shooting till you make fifty. I’m not talking about SHOOTING fifty fre throws, I’m talking about MAKING fifty ft’s. I’ll be perfectly honest with you; when you first start this practice regime, you may have to shoot like two hundred free throws until you finally make fifty. Heck, you might have to shoot more than two hundred in order to make fifty. But if you do this every single day, day in and day out, you will get better at it very quickly. Before you know it, you’ll only have to shoot like a hundred and fifty free throws in order to make fifty. Then soon after that you’ll only have to shoot a hundred to make fifty.

Before you know it, you’ll only have to shoot like sixty or seventy in order to make fifty. You’ll discover that you will often make like ten or fifteen free throws in a row, miss one or two, then make another ten or so in a row, miss a couple, and on and on till you make fifty in no time. Once you get really good at it, you can knock out fifty made free throws in less than ten minutes (where it might take you an hour when you first start). It’s important to continue with the practice routine even when you get good. Reinforcing repetition is the only way to become a basketball superstar, and with this practice routine, you’ll be a long way there.

By: Jason Markum

Tall kids aren’t supposed to be able to handle the ball well. That is to say, tall kids aren’t supposed to be good at dribbling. I’m not sure if we think this because they are so much higher off the ground then shorter people or what, but it’s silly.

I am a tall person, so I know what I’m talking about.

But there’s nothing fundamentally that says a tall kid CAN’T dribble the ball well. There are no laws of physics stopping a tall kid from dribbling. In fact, most point guards in the NBA are tall compared to high school kids. Michael Jordan, for instance, is six foot six inches tall. That would have made him one of my high school’s tallest centers in school history!

But we don’t think of Jordan as tall because NBA centers are much much taller than that.

So if you are a tall kid and want to pick up some mad skills as a ball handler and dribbler, listen to the rest of this article carefully.

There is nothing stopping you from becoming a good dribbler. The only thing you need to focus on is practice. And when it comes to dribbling, there is only one form of practice. Know what that is? Yeah, you guessed it; it’s dribbling.

Get in the habit of taking a basketball with you EVERYWHERE you go, and dribble as you walk. Always. Try not to watch the ball when you dribble. Get in the habit of not watching as you dribble, make it just a part of you. Turn it into muscle memory.

And here’s another drill that you can do. Jog and dribble at the same time. Make it a point to jog at least one mile a day and while you jog, dribble the basketball. Jogging more than a mile is better, like three to four miles, but one mile a day is a good start.

But always dribble while you jog. Yes, it will look funny to those who see you, but do you care? You shouldn’t! And yes, it will be hard to do! You’ll dribble off your foot and lose the ball all the time when you first start doing it. But keep at it and eventually dribbling will become second nature to you, like breathing.

And a tall kid that can dribble is unstoppable at the high school level!

Here’s another good drill. You can make it into a game that is actually pretty fun. The only problem is, you need two or three other people, the more the better. Find yourself an open space, like a gym floor or parking lot. Then have one person dribble, and have the other two or three gang up on the dribbler and try to steal the ball.

Whoever steals the ball becomes the dribbler, and the others again try to steal it from them.

It’s an exhausting exercise but hugely beneficial and helpful in learning how to dribble well. If you can dribble around and keep two or three or four people from stealing the ball easily, thing how much easier it’s going to be when you actually get in a game situation and only find one person guarding you.

Dribbling is fundamental to the game of basketball. How well you can dribble, no matter what position you play, will determine whether you make the team or not, and whether you start or not, and whether you win or not.

So practice as often as you can on your dribbling.