Blazers Show How to Front the Post

From the Blazers versus Spurs game on Friday night, I took this clip because it showed how to effectively front the post. At the lower levels, you see a lot of teams front the post but they get burned on the high-low feed. Your weak side defense has to shift to take that away.

In this clip, the Blazers do a great job fronting Tim Duncan of the Spurs. Watch as Aldridge shifts from over the top denial with the right hand to a full-front. Also notice that Aldridge has weak-side help at all times protecting against the lob pass,




Fronting Over the Top:

From the high-wing area, the best fronting position is to come over the top with the arm outstretched in a denial position. The weak side help comes from the baseline who is in ball-you-man position taking away both the lob over the top and to closeout on a skip,


Fronting from the Corner:

Now if the ball is on the low-wing or corner position, then you can full front as Aldridge is in right now. The weakside help now is almost underneath the basket and at the top of the key, the far side defender has come up to take away the first pass. The far skip pass is left unprotected because that pass is basically impossible,


Summary:

The Blazers barely beat the Spurs on this night. They actually only fronted a few times that I watched in the first half. I'm not sure why because it was pretty effective when they ran it. Whenever they let Duncan catch the ball in the post, he was either able to score or find the open player.

For more defensive drill info, take a look at Steve Alford's DVD on Defensive Drill Progressions. Coach Alford is the head coach of University of New Mexico. Discuss this and the rest of your favorite basketball topics at the X's and O's Basketball Forum.