07 - No Emo, No Drama, Just Balls

What's up berasap, y'all? If you haven't been paying attention, this is the blog for NCBL 2K11. No need for further introductions, so let's get on with it. This is part 7 of the 10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11, and this post is about the three most common scenarios that can get your teammates in a drama trip, and suggestions on how to avoid or deal with it. It's going to be a short post, because I don't really like blabbering about non-basketball stuff in this blog but I still think it's crucial for people to know this before playing in NCBL or any other basketball tournaments, be it closed or open. Can you dig it?

Anyways, the first scenario is when a player on a team hogs the ball, sometimes forcing a bad shot or committing a turnover. More often than not, these players are the stars or ball-handlers for the team. These players may sometimes be fueled by emotions, and force their way into making a sweet-ass play for the team. Regardless of whether or not the player is successful in his attempts, the player's teammates will usually get demotivated, show less enthusiasm on defense and become less reluctant to pass on offense. The dilemma lies in how to deal with the player if he keeps on caru-ing because this type of player can be a double-edged sword. Here's my advice on dealing with this situation:

• Player caru but scoring, team is leading with big margin - take him out for at least 5 minutes and ask him to be less assertive on the game and let his teammates get some feel for the game.
• Player caru but scoring, team is down by big margin - take him out and tell him that even though he is making plays for the team, his style of play is hurting his teammates and they can't perform at their best because of it. 
• Player caru but scoring, team is leading with small margin - call time-out and ask everyone to just ride the hot hand on offense. Only change the style of play if the caru-er takes a bad shot or commits a turnover on consecutive possessions.
• Player caru but scoring, team is down by small margin - take him out for a few possessions. Ask him to help his teammates get a better feel for the game once he is subbed back in because although he is scoring, the team needs everyone to be involved on offense to win. 
• Player caru but not scoring - bench him and ceramah about the importance of playing a team game.

The second most common cause of drama in basketball is the officiating. In almost every single game I've watched, the losing team would complain about the referees making some bogus calls or missing some fouls or being biased or simply being seorang ref kayu. Does that mean that all referees are crappy? Of course not! What it means is most players feel like the officiating is bad because the referees make/miss calls that the players don't agree with. But not all players realize that the referees' job is not to call every foul, but instead just maintain order in the game. Even more players don't realize that most referees are ballers too, and they have had actual lessons on signals to look out for when calling fouls (like position of hands, body movement, etc) so most NCBL players sebenarnya tak layak pun nak marah-marah referee macam diorang tu takde self-worth. Players should be aware of this the next time they think about blowing up in the ref's ear.

The third highly probable cause of drama is rough play between teams. This is especially true when a fresh team meets a more seasoned team. The fresh team, being new in tournaments and not knowing about the regular physical play in the NCBL (bukan main petang, game official bang, jangan main pasif, kita main aktif), will usually get emo when they face experienced teams who are already familiar with the bumps and bruises that come with NCBL. If NCBL 2K11 is your first basketball tournament, please don't get annoyed when you get a little bump here and there. Tournament basketball and ball waktu petang have different levels of intensity, which is why the play in NCBL is a little bit more physical than your regular pick-up games. So, if you're a rookie, don't get scared when you face the physical play, aite. Just mentally  prepare yourself for it, don't hope for the ref to award you calls and just ball.

Anyways, that's all for this post. Three more posts to go before we wrap up this list. Can't wait for NCBL, man. Bila nak mula ni dah kering aku tunggu..


P/s: I know Parts 6 and 7 is not as basketball-heavy as the first five parts. I'll get back to the good stuff in part 8, aite. Bear with me. Oh, and lagu iklan untuk korang layan. Layan.

06 - Respect Your Elders

What's berasap, y'all? Selamat datang kembali, silakan buat macam rumah sendiri. Kalau kau tak kenal lagi, nama aku afiqPG, and this is part 6 of the 10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11. After such a long and exhausting trip in part 5, we're going to go away from basketball for a while. But not too far away, though, no I don't stray that way. Part 6 is all about respecting your elders, and there's a few situations for this. Mostly, youngsters deal with people older than them in 3 situations; between teammates, between player and coach/manager/owner, and between players and otais outside the court. Now on to the three scenarios!

In case you haven't noticed, NCBL is not like MSSD or PPM where there's a specific age-range for teams. Instead, most teams have a mixed balance of youngsters, rookies, veterans and old guys. Now, I know ballers, and ballers are full of passion and they wear their hearts on their sleeves. Because of this, there are almost always 'pergaduhan kecil/dingin' that happen between the older guys and the younger guys. To avoid conflict because of generational gaps, there needs to be an understanding that all young players are panas baran while all old players are cepat terasa. Orang muda seharusnya lebih menghormati orang tua dan control sikit bila nak communicate dengan mereka. Orang tua pula seharusnya lebih memahami darah orang muda dan jangan mudah ambil hati bila orang muda ni 'agresif'. Baru team boleh main dengan peace, love and harmony, betul tak?

Now, for the second situation, it can be seen that most team managers/coaches/owners adalah lebih tua daripada mereka-mereka yang bermain dalam team tersebut. And because of this, isu yang paling selalu menjadi punca perselisihan adalah pemain-pemain tidak dapat faham halatuju sesebuah team. Ini sering berlaku kerana coach/manager/owner tidak berjaya communicate the direction of the team to the players. Dalam apa jua situasi, team korang sepatutnya kena bawak berbincang dekat luar court sebelum tournament mula. Buat la program karaoke macam Phantoms ke, pesta pantai PD macam Zero ke, kenduri kahwin macam UBSA ke, janji semua player/manager/coach/owner boleh sit down, drink and agree on the direction of the team, the style of play, expected performance and minutes. Kalau boleh make everyone clear on those things before season mula, insyaAllah berkurangan konflik dalaman di masa hadapan.

Lastly, between players and otais outside the court. If you notice, whenever there are matches at NCBL, there will always be some unfit-looking older people who come and watch teams play. If you've been to Batu 11, you know who I'm talking about. Yup, those old Chinese pakciks who come and watch simply because they love watching people ball. Anyways, I don't think there has been any real conflicts between the NCBL players and those people, but I just want to remind everyone (including myself) to be aware of them when they are there. If they look your way, just smile. If you sit close to them, don't scream too loud. I you're sitting and they're standing, offer them your seat. Sounds like I'm preaching but I'm just reminding, Itu je aku nak cakap sebenarnya.

Anyways, sorry if this post doesn't really talk about basketball. But I still think people should know about it before playing in NCBL. Just sharing some thoughts, aite. Peace!

P/s: Lagu iklan untuk korang hilangkan bosan. Layan.

05 - Proper Team Scouting

What's up berasap, y'all? If you haven't figured it out yet, you're reading part 5 of the 10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11. In this instalment, we're going to discuss team scouting. No, it has nothing to do with camping or being a scout. Please stop reading this if you actually thought I was talking about pengakaps. Anyways.. First, we'll look at things to look out for when assessing the other team's defense (half-court and full-court) and offense (systems and setplays). Then, we will look at player roles/types that you should watch out for when scouting a team. This is one of the longest and boring-est of all the parts, so get some eye-drops ready. Here goes.

Saranan dari afiqPG: Scouting is not physically tiring, but it is mentally tiring and time-consuming. Why? Because, from my experience, if team aku main pukul 1 manakala team yang aku perlu scout tu main pukul 8 dah memang confirm aku terpaksa duduk, mulut ternganga, mata terbeliak untuk 2-3 jam. Tapi berbaloi, beb. Jauh mana sekalipun jurang antara dua pasukan boleh dirapatkan jika pasukan A tahu akan kekuatan serta kelemahan pasukan B.  

Generally, when assessing a team's style of play, the first thing you should try to determine is their favored style of defenses in two situations; half-court and full-court. When assessing the other team's half-court defense, look at noticeable holes in the defense. This can be done by roughly calculating where most of the points are scored against the team that you are scouting. For example, if the other team is playing zone defense and the other team keeps on scoring in one certain spot/play more than the others, there must be a weakness there! Meanwhile, when looking at the full-court defense, try to draw up the other team's play on a piece of paper. Be aware of who they are pressing in the defense (either the ballhandler, or they let the ball-handler free but press the inbounder, or they press and funnel the ball-handler to a certain spot, etc) and when they do it (some teams call it after every time-out, some after every time they score, or some are called at random on the spot by a player on the court). This generally covers the defensive stylings of the team.

When assessing a team's offense, you should be aware of two situations; offensive systems, and set-plays. To understand the other team's offensive system (or if they don't have a system, the style of play that they are most accustomed to), the first thing to watch is how the post-players move without the ball. For instance, if there are two players playing inside, see if the two players only move diagonally (PF moves from left high-post to right high-post and C moves from left low-post to right low-post), vertically (PF moves from left high-post to left low-post and C moves from right low-post to right low-post), or in rotation (PF and C moves according to weakside/strongside). Next, watch how the perimeter players move. Are there a lot of backdoor cutting from 45 to the opposite baseline? Does the PG like to 'push' his players to one side to make it 'heavy'? Do they make use of screens? Once you've seen this, determine if any of those things pose an alarming threat to your own team and prepare for it.

Set-plays are different than offensive systems. If you don't know the difference, then I'm sorry. I can't discuss it here because this piece is already longer than my hair. Anyways, on set-plays, the first thing you should watch for is how it is initiated, usually after an inbound or a call by a player (ie: the PG holds his closed fist up in the air). Either way, look at the initial positions of the players, then the position of screens and player movement. If you can see the other team do this 2-3 times and reproduce it on a piece of paper, then you can figure out a way to stop it or at least prepare for it.

When assessing every team, there are usually a few individual players that you should look out for. These players often fall under certain labels and I'm going to put them here:

• The athletic ones - watch out for the ones that look young, fit and athletic because these are usually the ones that go for fastbreaks or crash the board unexpectedly in games. Prepare for them by making your players aware that athletic people are usually slowed down by physical play. Point in case - Dwight Howard in the NBA. Hehe..
• The finishers - These are the ones who are usually given "lesen caru" by the team/coach. Usually, these guys don't pass anymore once the ball gets into their hand because they are the designated finishers in the team. So, just be aware of that. Cough*tamak*cough. Prepare for these people by denying the ball to them. Make the other players score.
• The kaki pukuls - Don't know if I should write about these people. Hurm, nevermind.
• The shooters - Refers to those who always shoot when they get open at the perimeter, and makes a high percentage of those shots. Get someone to shadow him or something. That ought to cool him down.

Of course, what I discuss here is just the tip of the iceberg, but it's a good start. If you guys want to make additions, amendments, comments, etc, please do so down here, aite. I've already written too much as it is. I'm signing off. Peace!

P/s: Lagu iklan untuk korang hilangkan bosan. Layan.

04 - Half-Court Offense

What's up berasap, y'all? Welcome to the fourth installment of "10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11". Since we've already covered half-court defense, transition offense and transition defense, the next step is learning a proper half-court offense. A proper team should have one "offensive system" that they can be most comfortable with. Offensive system, in this context, refers to a team's designated ball movement and player movement during a half-court set.

Saranan afiqPG: Most teams in Division I play "high-post/low-post" although there are some teams who start out with four players on the perimeter instead of three. Most teams in Division II pulak cuma reti rotate bola kat 3-point line, tak yakin pass ke inside/post-player bila ada hanya sedikit pressure, ending up taking long jumpers and not playing more in the paint. Kesimpulannya, the team needs to learn how to play in an offensive system (or simply put, belajar a proper way to move the ball) so that the ball can rotate in and out and make the defense move. 

Okay, out of the 10 things that I'll discuss in the list, Part 4 is the most complicated for me because there are a whooooooooooooooole lot of different offensive systems that teams can learn and try. So, I'm going to take the easy way out and just give the basic guideline for what you need to be aware of when you're playing in a "high-post/low-post" system. Remember that this is not the only way to play, it's just an example:

1. Start out with three players outside (one middle, two at 45s) and two inside (both at low posts). The two inside players should wait for the point guard to pass the ball to either wing and determine the weak-side. Once the ball is passed, the inside player from the weakside have to go the high-post. This is what creates the first "high-post/low-post"passing opportunity. 
2. The player at 45 that receives the ball will decide between passing to the high-post or low-post. Whoever gets the ball should immediately face the rim and get in a thriple-threat position. The other post-player should then cut to the basket.
3. The post-player who gets the pass then would have three main options - finish at his position (low-post), pass to the cutter from high-post or dish the ball back to the perimeter player.

Seperti biasa, lukisan tadika afiqPG!

So the ball gets passed to the left. The inside player at the right (weak-side) then comes up to the high-post.

In this example, the ball gets passed to the low-post. In this case, the player at the high-post immediately cuts to the basket after the perimeter player passes the ball.

Now the player at the low-post has three options, to finish by himself, dish to the cutter or ditch outside.

Anyways, aku rasa dah cukup untuk instalment ni. Watch out for Part 5!

P/s: Lagu iklan untuk korang hilangkan bosan. Layan.

03 - Transition Defense

What's up berasap, y'all? If your team can play defense in the half-court, force turnovers/get rebounds, run out and score on the fastbreak then you can basically survive in the regular season of NCBL Division II. Trust me, I've seen many teams make runs simply by playing defense and scoring in the open court without waiting for the other team's defense to set-up. Now, to up the ante, your team needs to be good at transition defense. Why? Because if the other team can't score on their fast-breaks, then they have to deal with your team's half-court defense. So, if your team's already tapau-ed the concepts of half-court defense and transition offense (like we've discussed in parts 1 and 2) then your team would already have the advantage over the other team.

Now, as usual I won't blabber on about the finer details so I'll just give a few tips, mmmkay? If your team wants to stop the other team's fastbreak, always make sure your team has two last men at all times. I know, I know, most people say just one last man, right? Well, actually, it's quite logical. When your team puts up a shot, the big men would go for the rebound while one player from the perimeter will cut in to create a rebounding triangle. That means ada lagi dua orang kat 3-point line waktu a shot goes up. So, dua-dua orang tu kena la aware dan memikul tanggungjawab sebagai last man bersama-sama! To help you guys see this clearly, here's another lukisan tadika by me.

As you can see, once the small forward goes in for the rebound, there will be a rebounding triangle in the painted area. Also, there are two people outside who could be last men. Simple, right? Of course, this is just an example. In a game, the positions may differ and different players may be the one cutting or being the last men.



Saranan dari afiqPG: To always be ready for fastbreaks, having last men is only the first step. However, it's an important step. So, always try to create that rebounding triangle and leave two guys at the perimeter. Only the perimeter player on the weakside should crash the board. 

Now, the last men's job sounds easy. Just run back. However, it's actually a little bit more complicated than that. Between the two last men, one player should sprint towards the basket while the other player runs toward the opposing player who is closest to your team's basket. Once one player has slowed down the ball-handler, the other player who is under the basket should defend like a center until the big men comes back. Sekali lagi, a lukisan tadika to help illustrate my point! Dalam contoh ni, the outlet pass is given to the opponents' shooting guard, so the closest person goes to stop the ball-handler while the other defender goes straight under the basket and defends the paint.

I think that's it for now. If you guys have any questions, comments or pembetulans, feel free to do so dekat bawah k? Ciao.

P/s: Lagu iklan untuk korang hilangkan bosan. Layan.

02 - Transition Offense aka Fastbreaks

What's up berasap, y'all? Put away your books for a while. Because you're at THE blog, bai. We continue with the list. Let's get straight to it, aite. Number two in the list of the "10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11" is Transition Offense/Fastbreaks. This refers to the event in which your team brings the ball up the court after a defensive possession before the other team can set their defense up. Dalam erti kata lain, team kau main defend, pastu dapat bola sebab steal/rebound, pastu kau bawak bola nak attack laju-laju sebelum opponent sempat balik defend.

Saranan dari afiqPG - Now, fastbreaks ni ada seni dia. It's not just a matter of siapa berkaki kuda, lari paling laju. Tapi kalau nak tulis satu-satu pasal fastbreak ni memang tak cukup ruang beb. So aku fokus kepada tiga konsep utama dalam fastbreak yang berjaya. First, kena lari ikut lane. Second, kena sentiasa pass ke player yang paling depan dan kosong. Third, kena pandai-pandai tunggu member kalau defense dah set-up.

Anyways, untuk membantu menyampaikan isi saya akan menggunakan lukisan tadika ini ye rakan-rakan.

Ok, first concept - lari kut lane supaya sentiasa ada spacing yang elok semasa nak fastbreak. Ball-handler bawak bola ke tengah sementara wings (bukan band rock melayu tu, tapi player perimeter) bukak luas-luas supaya senang dapat space untuk operate. {Please oh please don't push the ball to just one side when fastbreaking. Gambarajah di atas memberi idea ringkas akan laluan mana yang perlu diambil oleh point guard, shooting guard serta small forward. Tetapi, tolong ingat bahawa yang atas tu adalah yang sebasic-basic mungkin la tu. Banyak lagi variasi dan peringkat-peringkat bagi fastbreaks ni, dan aku takkan sentuh pasal benda tu. Unqualified to talk too much la, bro. What to do?

Second concept to remember, always pass to the open player at the front first. If you keep on passing, the ball will advance up the court faster than it would if you dribbled it up court. There's actually no need for dribbling during a fastbreak if every player runs his lane and passes to the front. Try to get your team to remove the nasty habit of not passing to the front and you'll be fastbreaking some good times!

Third and last (at least for this post) concept is "having numbers". You "got numbers" if there are more players from your team than the opponent on the offensive side of the court. You have "no numbers" in the opposite situation. Dalam kata lain, "got numbers" is when you have a 2 on 1 opportunity, 3 on 2 opportunity, etc. On the other hand, "no numbers" is when you should chill the hell out, not go for fastbreak and wait for your teammates to come because there are more defenders that are set-up.

That's all for fastbreaks, I suppose. Anyways, watch out for part three!

P/s: Lagu iklan untuk korang hilangkan bosan. Layan.

01 - Half-Court Defense

What's up berasap, y'all? I'm going to give you guys a list of the "10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11", licensed by afiqPG. Remember that afiqPG (that's me) is not a basketball expert, just a random guy who knows some stuff and wants to share. So, here goes.

At the top of my list is "Half-Court Defense". Not to be confused with the defense you play in a half-court game of 3 on 3, half-court defense actually refers to your defensive schemes once all 10 players are on the same side of the court. Dalam kata lain, half-court defense ni adalah benda-benda macam 2-3 zone, 3-2, half-court trap, half-court man, etc.

Saranan dari afiqPG: Kalau nak start out with a new team, do not try to train too many types of defenses with your team. Choose to train one type of man-to-man defense and one type of zone defense. Yang penting bukannya berapa banyak jenis defense sesebuah team tu boleh main, sebaliknya kualiti 'help defense' dan 'individual defense' di dalam defensive scheme sesebuah team tu.Anyways, dalam NCBL kalau Division 2 kebanyakan team main zone 2-3 or 3-2. Division 1 cam rojak sikit.

For every type of team defense, be it man-to-man or zone, konsep 'help defense' adalah teramat penting dan perlu difahami oleh setiap pemain yang ada di atas gelanggang. This is because any good offensive player can breakdown the first defender. A good defensive team is a team yang boleh tolong cover untuk member bila member terlepas orang yang dia patut defend.

Contoh, kalau orang yang berada di 45 belah kanan dimakan oleh opponent dia, lalu opponent dia makan ke arah baseline. Member yang tengah defend di low-post seharusnya aware dan anticipate perkara tu berlaku supaya dia boleh dengan pantas dan macho tolong cover untuk member dia. Kapish?

Ok. Aku rasa cukup dah kot aku mengarut untuk yang ni. On to number two in the list after this!

P/s: Lagu iklan untuk korang hilangkan bosan. Layan.

I'm Going Crazy

I'm writing the 10 Things You Need To Know Before Playing In NCBL 2K11 tonight. Here goes.

WEAK! side

Quickie post here. Against a zone defense, the easiest way to get an open shot is to swing the defense one way then pass the ball to the weakside. This requires minimal player movement and emphasizes more on just passing to the right guy at the right time. It is NOT the only way to get an open shot, but it's a simple one. I'll rant more on this in the future but for now, please master the whole "strong-side/weak-side" thing. Peace out!

First Post

What's up berasap, y'all? Makin aku tua, makin banyak benda yang aku nak cakap pasal basketball. Tapi most of the time aku cuma mengarut je. So this is a place where I'll be spewing out my random rants about basketball. On to the first post!

Main full-court petang-petang is very different from playing in a real game. However, players sometimes get into a 'zone' di mana secara tiba-tiba semua orang main hustle dan serius. This is most common when the players involved betul-betul reti main full-court, the game is close and the talent level is almost the same. Dalam situasi sebeginilah, some pickup games will have almost the same intensity level as a real game. Dan dalam situasi yang sama jualah, akan keluar perangai marah dan emo dan muka ketat dan caru masing-masing.

Some players don't really know how to play during times like this. This would often cause ire between teammates or misunderstandings between opposing players, because mistakes made in the 'zone' are not as easily forgotten as mistakes in normal pick-up games. So, here's some tips when you or your team is in this zone.

1. Be aware of the other team's score. Do not attempt caru shots if they are only 2-3 baskets away from game point. A failed caru attempt will often end up as an easy basket for the opposing team. Contoh: Score tied 11-11, kau caru pastu turnover, pastu team lagi satu fastbreak terus lay-up. Terus diorang dah game point. Teammates pressure gila babi kot. Kau punca dowh. Fuck.
   
2. Point difference is very, very crucial when determining style of play. A rough guideline would be to caru when up by 3 or more baskets, play safe when the game is separated by two baskets or less. Example: Malas ar bagi example. Obvious sangat kot.
   
3. In crunch time, when both teams are two or less baskets away from game point, there are only two options. It's either you rotate the ball and get it to your best player at the weakside, or rotate the ball and get your best shooter an open shot. Any good point guard should understand this. Contoh: Score tengah 12-13, your best perimeter player dah tunggu kat 45 belah kiri, defense dah heavy belah kanan so sah-sah player ko tengah kat weakside, tapi ko dribble bola ke kanan pastu nak try two-man game dengan post player waktu-waktu macam tu. Last-last turnover sebab defense memang dah ramai/heavy belah post player tu, pastu terus kalah. It's over.

Sekian bebelan afiqPG buat kali ini. Ciao.