How to drive like Derrick Rose in basketball
Chicago Bulls star Derrick Rose
Wouldn't we all love to drive to the hoop like Derrick Rose? For the kids, they watch this young man and try to emulate what he does in there backyard, we all wonder "how does Derrick Rose do that?" of course no one in the world at the present time can drive to the basket like Rose, but there is a few things we can learn from him. From his speed and quickness, how he has built his body up to the point where things are a lot easier for him than others and also his range of basketball skills which make driving to the hoop very achievable for him.
Dribbling
Firstly Derrick Rose is a fantastic dribbler, so in order for us to improve our driving to the hoop we need to improve our dribbling. We can do this in a number of ways, a good exercise that I recommend is to firstly get 2 basketballs, get into a crouch position and just walk slowly up and down a basketball court. As you get better at it go a bit faster and start looking from side to side as you are doing it. What this does is make you near perfect dribbler on your left and right hands so you will not have to rely on your preferred hand when you are in trouble, this makes it very difficult for the defense to trap you. Practice moves such as between the legs and behind the back when you are just standing there and in time practice them at a slow speed. It is essential to start of these drills at a slow speed to ensure that technique is correct, if you try to attempt these drills at full speed you will not see very good results, slow and steady while maintaining correct technique is the way to go. It is also extremely important to learn all of these dribble moves with both hands, if you're right hand is more dominant than you're left defenders will just cover you're right side, you need to make sure that they aren't able to do that.
Speed
Secondly, when Derrick Rose gets into the lane he is extremely quick, the defense barely has a time to blink before he is past you. So drills like suicides and other 20m sprint drills will make you a lot quicker. Going into the gym and working on your quadriceps and hamstring muscles will also help you greatly to exert full muscles power when you are going for a sprint or suicide. When you feel that your speed is at an adequate level you should practice running as quick as you can while dribbling a basketball so you can get used to the speed and the pace, as you get better practice changing direction as if your opposition are there trying to block your path. It is very important to not overdo high intensity training because it can lead to far greater risk of injury and if that is to happen than a lot of the progress that you made will likely be almost gone. You can now practice the in between the legs and behind the back moves at speed as you have already mastered this before your speed training. You should now be able to perform these moves with either hand and at great speed while heading towards the hoop.
Gym Work
If you're going to be driving to the rim a lot you need to put a lot of work into your body to make sure that you're body is going to be able to take all these hits and bumps that your going to receive and to also ensure that you are strong enough to push through the contact and manage to finish so you get "and one's".
Everything in you're body needs to be built up, your legs due to the added need for speed and quickness to blast past your defender and make it harder for the frontcourt to block you because you are coming at a great speed. You're core (abdominals) needs to be built strongly to ensure that you are able to keep your balance while going to the ring because if you are off balance it is extremely difficult to get a good shot up when there are lots of defenders around you. Your upper body also needs to be built up to ensure that when you take all these hits and bumps that will come you will not be affected as much as others and will have a greater chance at getting the ball in while getting fouled.
Shooting
Now you may be thinking on why I have put this here, shooting? What does that have to do with driving to the hoop and finishing off a layup or a dunk? Well here's the thing, if you're a great driver but not a great shooter what is the defender going to do? He is going to give you more space to tempt you into taking a jump shot because the further back he is the harder it is for you to get past him to finish in the lane. If you watch Tyreke Evans in the NBA who recently signed with the Pelicans he is a great driver to the rim, in his rookie year he averaged 20 points per game 5 rebounds and 5 assists, he was almost impossible to stop when he got on that drive so defenders gave him space to test out his jumpshot and found out he wasn't much good at it, as a result his numbers and effectiveness have declined.
So a lot of jump shooting and three point shooting is required to keep the defender honest and ensure that he/she does not give you space so you can hit that jumper, you want him up close so you can drive past him and keep him guessing which opens up more opportunities to pump fake him or take a fadeway because your defender will not have the time to react when he is really close to you.
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So if you follow these simple instructions and keep practising your driving to the hoop in matches and in training sessions you should be able to get past anyone, don't get to dis-couraged if you are beaten from time to time, just keep at it and never give up, everyone fails! Even Michael Jordan has, he said it himself that failure leads to success and to never give up, so don't be afraid to stick to your guns and keep driving to that hoop, what have you got to lose?
Practice
Practice is everything, you need to put this into practice at training and in games.There is not much point in doing all this if you are not going to try it in a game or at training. Its the old saying "practice makes perfect" the more you practice at your driving to the hoop the better you will become at it. You can never have to much practice, there is always something to work on and something to get better at, never think you have made it because when you think that you have soon everybody else will have caught up to you and past you. Driving to the rim opens up the floor for your teammates as all the attention will be focused on you so it will be quite easy for you to dish it out to the open man and get easy assists.