BeantownHoops Blog

DVD Review: The Encyclopedia of the Dribble Drive Motion Offense

As the season approaches, I will be reviewing some coaching DVD’s to help you prepare for the season. Today I am looking at Fran Fraschilla’s Encylopedia of the Dribble Drive Motion Offense (DDM). Just like any offensive or defensive trend in our sport, it has to have some success to get people interested. When Bobby Knight’s Indiana teams were at its best, everyone wanted to run a 5 man motion. A few year’s back, the Princeton Offense was all the range. Now the DDM is the offensive flavor of choice. The DDM was “invented” by Vance Wahlberg who later taught the principles to John Calipari when he was at Memphis. Calipari guided Memphis to the Final Four with the DDM only to lose a heartbreaker to Kansas (Make your Free-Throws!), but it was the system that attracted many coaches around the country to use this “Princeton offense on Steroids” as Calipari called it.

Fraschilla’s DVD does a great job of breaking the principles down and he shows, via whiteboard and on-court demonstration, the multiple variations of the offense. The DVD is well done and keeps your interest, but will the DDM work for your team? Here are the essentials for this offense to work: one to two players who can break their defender down off the dribble, a big man who can catch and finish (does not need to be a back to the basket post), and two sharpshooters who have decent dribbling and passing skills.

I ran this offense last year and it had some success, but my team lacked one more shooter to really exploit teams. The players loved the freedom of the offense and the opportunities it would create. There are some downfalls, just like any offense so coaches should be aware of those before heading full steam into revamping their team system.

1. If you’re a set oriented coach the DDM is really not an offense for you. The offense is based on players making decisions on the fly and calling sets disrupts the flow the offense is trying to create.
2. If you have a great back to the basket post, the DDM will limit his touches because the offense is based on dribbling and creating, not dumping it down low.
3. You have to have the right personnel. If your team doesn’t fit the description above, I don’t predict much success for them.
4. If you want to control tempo and keep the score low, this is definitely not for you and your team. The offense is fast and at times it will look “non-traditional” so stay away if this irks you as a coach.

I suggest buying the DVD to at least learn the offense because many teams are using it now. It can be a great offense for your team and the DVD will help your understanding and teaching of the DDM.
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Just the thought I had when I started my first season as a head basketball coach.  As mentioned in my blog “21 days?”, it is hard for a coach and team to be great at all aspects of the game.  My teams were good, not great, and I knew a change had to be made.  I started to work camps in the summer and picked the brains of many coaches across the nation.  I also found great use in having a mentoring coach.  There are many great websites that promote this type of help, but the best two I have seen are Coach RB (www.coachrb.com) and Coachesacademy.net (http://coachesacademy.net/dap/a/?a=1718)

The sites offer both free and paid content, but the strongest point they both emphasize is the use of mentoring.  If you are unsure about what this entails, let me tell you my example.  I had a former coach who I communicated via email and phone that I sent practice and game tapes to and gave him two or three things to look at.  He would give me constructive crticism and praise, but most of all he gave me an unbiased view of my team.  It was of tremendous help and I feel it made the kids better which is the most important thing.  I feel you are never too young or too old to have a mentor in coaching and I would suggest highly that you look into it.
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Take a look at this quote from the Coaches Academy:
“Research has shown that it takes 21 days of intentional thinking and focused practicing to break a bad habit and replace it with a proper and instinctive habit that is done without conscious thought. Keep that in mind as you do your long term basketball practice planning in season or out of season. That is a natural law that there is no way around.”

It is an interesting quote and a dilemma that has plagued head coaches forever. In a short amount of time, what do you focus on to make your team better. I have seen many young coaches, including myself when I first started, try to be great at every aspect of the game. The end result is that the team is pretty good at a lot of things, but not great in any of them. As I moved on in my coaching career, I focused my practices into three specfic areas to be great in and tried not to be o.k. in everything. What are you focusing on as a coach for your team to be great this season?

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When starting the BeantownHoops.com site, I stated that I would report on all that is good about our game.  The latest incident with Memphis where NBA star Derrick Rose supposedly had someone take his ACT test for him to qualify does deserve a mention.  When coaching in Chicago, I witnessed first hand what a great player and person Derrick was.  He was criticized for being “not selfish enough” and not averaging 40 ppg.  It was refreshing to see the best player in the state average a triple double and make the players around him better.  I should know.  In his last home game at Simeon High School, he put on a clinic and led his team to a 30 point victory…that was my team that lost by the way.  It hurts me to see what has happened at Memphis, but I do know this is not the first time this has happened in NCAA history.  Unfortunately there is a dark side to college athletics and these types of happenings just reassures me why I am doing this site.
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As the start of school draws near, coaches and players are preparing for the season already. What coaches can do during this period with their players differs from state to state, but you can bet that coaches have instructed them what to do in these critical months. My teams in Seattle and Chicago were given a workout schedule and were expected to show improvement by the start of practice in November. However, the amount of players that are fully committed to these workouts can be usually counted on one hand. Check out the Coaching Corner on the website to hear what high school coaches are doing around the country to prepare for the season and coaches can also take a look at the links to some great coaching sites for their playbooks.

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