There are so many things as coaches that we love about this game which other people just can’t understand. Celebrating with your team in a tiny, dingy locker room after a big road win. Team dinners where the rookies have to sing. The camaraderie and brotherhood that coaches and players share only comes from being around each other every single day. These are all things that are only special to you if you’re a coach. One aspect of the game that doesn’t get talked about very often is terminology. We all have our own secret code whether we know it or not. We repeatedly use certain descriptions to present situations that arise.
Having a consistent terminology helps you in a couple of ways. The most important is that it allows you to get your point across more quickly. This makes sense because you are generally using less words to describe something. You can paint a picture or describe a situation to your players using one simple word you’ve made up as opposed to using an entire sentence to do the same. I always want to be as short, concise, and to the point as possible when addressing our players. What’s important is for them to get the information and use that information playing the game, rather than standing and listening. I will list a few examples of what I mean.
I am a huge believer in individual breakdown drills. We are a big pick and roll team so our pick and roll attack is something we work on frequently. One thing I always want my ball handlers to do is look to beat their man away from the pick and roll. If the big is screening such that the ball handler is coming off to his right hand, I want the ball handler to see whether or not he can beat his man by not using the screen. We always told our players to “be a threat to beat your man away from the screen.” That takes a long time to say. So I came up with one simple word that inherently has nothing to do with pick and rolls or basketball. I call beating your man away from the pick and roll “bingo.” At first our coaches thought I was nuts, but if you ask any of our guards about “bingo,” they will know exactly what you are talking about.
Terminology becomes very useful during a game when you can use it to quickly tell your players what kind of action the opponent is about to run and how you want to guard it. Lets say you hear the call for a team to run a side pick and roll. We would normally call out “side pick – blue it.” This is what play they are running and how we want to guard it. But many teams these days don’t set a traditional angle side pick (screeners back to the sideline). Instead they set the screen with the screener’s back to the baseline, bringing the ball handler to the baseline instead of to the middle. We have a special call for this type of side pick. We call this a “hat pick.” Why we call it this I have no idea, but it’s unimportant. What’s important is that our players know what it is and know how we defend it. A traditional side pick we would “blue” but a “hat pick” we would “red.” Now, we can quickly relay to our players “hat pick – red it!” as opposed to “side pick but bringing the ball handler baseline – red it!” That’s just too long and clunky to say.
The following are terms we used to describe offensive actions:
“Floppy” – baseline screening action with 4 & 5 setting pin down screens for 2 & 3.
“Hawk” – post up with 2 starting at the top of the key and getting a pick from a big (4/5) at the elbow. Similar to a UCLA cut.
“Hammer” – 1/3 hat pick. As 1 drives baseline 2 (top of the key) gets a double flare at the weakside elbow getting him open in the weakside corner. 1 throws a pass along the baseline for a corner three point shot from 2.
“Horns” – 4 & 5 at each elbow with 2 & 3 in the corners. 1 can use either big for a pick and roll.
“Munch” – Out of a box set, 1 swings the ball to opposite side of the floor and then the big gets a double back pick for a postup.
“Pinch Post” – guard with the ball at the top of the key, big at the elbow. Guard passes to the big and gets into a 2 man game off the elbow.
I also think that using special terminology helps promote a sense of culture on your team. It’s something that is unique to your team, that no one else does. I know I would think it was pretty cool if my high school coach used college terminology when I was playing. If I’m a college player and I’m dreaming of playing in the NBA, I would think it was pretty cool to be learning NBA terminology. I overhear our players using our team terminology talking with one another all the time. These may be words that we have totally made up but they have meaning to us. Those words are our terminology. Its part of our team.
Here is a list of some other random NBA / Nets terminology.
“ATO’s” – after time out plays
“Basket cut” – guard feeds the post and cuts over top (middle) of the big.
“Go cut” – guard feeds the post and cuts below (baseline side) of the big.
“Butter” – our call at the end of the shot clock (5 seconds remaining).
“Drag” – pick and rolls in transition
“Lifted” – refers to a big being high, spaced for a jumpshot, as opposed to low on the block.
“Pocket pass” – the pass we make when a guard curls versus a hard show. On the catch we immediately look to bounce pass to the screener since his man showed up and left him open.
