The Importance of Creating Variability in Practice

This chapter highlights the significance of incorporating variability in practice for basketball coaches. It emphasizes the need to try different drills and variations that may not occur in the actual game. The chapter also discusses the role of decision-making in shooting drills and the importance of injury prevention through movement variability.

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Guest: Rob Gray, Professor, Researcher, Podcaster, and Author

Professor, researcher, podcaster, and author Rob Gray joins the Basketball Podcast to discuss the way we coach and practice sport skills.

Rob Gray is a professor at Arizona State University who has been conducting research on and teaching courses related to perceptual-motor skill for over 25 years. He received his MS and PhD from York University in Canada with a focus on the visual control of movement. An important aspect of his work has been applying basic theory to address real-world challenges which he has done in positions with Nissan Motor Corp, the US Air Force, serving as an expert witness for driving accident cases, and consultant roles with several sports teams and organizations. In 2007 he was awarded the Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contribution to Psychology from the American Psychological Association.

One of the accomplishments he is most proud of is the baseball batting virtual environment/virtual reality that he developed over the course of several years and which has been used in over 25 published studies. In 2017 (Gray, Frontiers in Psychology) he published the results of a 10-year study using a virtual reality training protocol which led to clear evidence of transfer of training to real performance.

In his career, Gray has strongly emphasized the communication and dissemination of scientific knowledge. In 2015, he started the Perception & Action Podcast (perceptionaction.com) to help bridge the gap between theory and the field. With over 350 episodes and 2 million downloads, it has become a critical resource for individuals working in areas including coaching, talent development, training and rehabilitation.

Breakdown

1:00 - Ways Where Coaches Can Do

6:00 - Player vs Coach Led Development

8:00 - Evidence-Based Ideas

11:00 - Shoot The Lamp

14:00 - Interventions in Games as a Coach

18:00 - Block Practice

21:00 - Progressions

24:00 - Constraint Ladder Approach

28:00 - Googles

31:00 - Individualization

34:00 - Constraints to the Defense