Former NBA Head Coach and current advisor to the Charlotte Hornets Front Office, Steve Clifford, returns to the show this week! In a highly interesting and informative conversation we dive into pre-season foundations, including the three things coaches must address, and discuss lineup protection and dangerous skip passes during the always fun “Start, Sub, or Sit?!”
Transcript
Steve Clifford 00:00
To play well at any level of play. Player development to me is, are you on top of your individual game? Are you in shape? Are you getting enough sleep? Are you taking care of yourself? Are you doing a good job in the weight room? But then more important than that is, are you the absolute expert on our team game? Do you have a great grasp of how you have to play in order for you to play effectively and our team to play efficiently when you’re on the court?
Dan 02:01
And now, please enjoy our conversation with coach Steve Clifford. Coach, we are really excited to have you back for a second time.
Steve Clifford 02:14
It’s great to be back with you guys.
Dan 02:15
Appreciate it. Thank you. Pat and I wanted to dive in with preseason thoughts, order of operations, those first two to three, four weeks when you finally get your team back in the gym and you’re trying to get things all squared away. And the last time we talked, we actually talked about the end of the season, the review process. And so we thought we’d go to the beginning now. And so for you over the course of your career, things that you would think about, order of operations early in preseason.
Steve Clifford 02:44
I think, first of all, is you want to start every year, I think, with every player in with your group, regardless of how much of the team you’ve had together, as if you’ve never coached them before. And even maybe more so in the NBA than in college or high school because of the way things have transpired where we have much more limited practice time once the regular season starts, is, you know, you have to have a great grasp of your team, what you want each guy to concentrate more on, and what you need your team identity to become, so they can play as well and consistently as possible. Now, a lot of that would go back to what we talked about last time with summer study. I got this from working for Jeff and Stan Van Gundy. Everybody in the staff always had summer projects that they did. So as we got into August, we would share those. And I think then you formulate your plan for your team for the year. I think sometimes people don’t realize even one or two guys in your playing group can make a significant difference. For instance, shooting, or, you know, ability to contain the ball defensively, which can change your offensive plan, your defensive plan, actually quite significantly. Again, being the absolute expert on your roster, on your team, what you feel the team can become, and then your initial plan going into those three or four weeks.
Dan 04:13
Before we dive in maybe to tactical stuff or implementation, maybe focusing like you just talked about for a second, but on the players themselves and for us at the college level, anybody listening to this, you know, sometimes you don’t see them as much for certain periods of the summer and some players come back in great shape, some not as great shape, some have really worked on their games, you know, the whole gamut. And I guess how you start to talk and think about the players as they come back based off of how good they look in their off-seasons themselves.
Steve Clifford 04:45
Oh, I think that’s a big part of it because I think everything starts every year with where they’re at mentally. And I think the work that they’ve done in the off season gives you somewhat of an indication of how motivated they are. Listen, in our league, it could be, it’s a contract year, you know, some guys that are more motivated by the contract year, some guys struggle with the pressures of having to play for a contract. You know, it could be somebody coming off their first all-star. How do they handle that? You know, are they hungry for more or did they, you know, do the home run trot all summer and now playing catch up? But I think the biggest thing is to get to a comfort level with you and your coaching staff where you’re on top of where each guy is. Sometimes let’s be honest. I think whether it’s high school, college, or in our league, sometimes you’re going to be disappointed in guys and what they’ve done in the off season. The reality is, again, to be on top of where they are and then set the best plan for them going forward. And then the same with the group, you know, again, if you’re coming off a year where you were say a top 10 offensive team, but struggled defensively, maybe the decision is made to change pick and roll coverage, you know, make a significant change in the way you’re closing out or guarding the ball or changing your help, whatever it is, you know, again, as you guys know, you can only get good at so many things and especially to set a start to the season. In my opinion, you can’t skip on the fundamentals. So you’ve got to build a foundation every year, regardless of how long guys have played for you. You can’t take things for granted, you know, just because you have a majority of the group back and say you’ve always been good offensively or defensively, you can’t take anything for granted. I think you start from the beginning every year and that’s a big part of it. Now the second part for me is offensive, defensive, rebounding and then there’s the intensity part and the concentration part, which obviously still when you play 82 games, most nights the team that puts the most into it is going to have the best chance to win. You know, so how many times out of 82 can your group get to a good level of intensity and concentration and that will lead to hopefully the purpose of play that you need to win. Right. And so I think those things from the beginning, my feeling on training camp in the NBA is you want to work on your base and you want to play as much five on five as you can. I think it gets the conditioning level up quickly. They like it and it gets your concentration and intensity up right away. I don’t think players like doing a bunch of drills, two and a half hours of drill work every day, particularly NBA guys. I don’t think it’s a great way to do training camp.
Pat 07:43
When you get the group for the first time and you and your staff have figured out maybe the start point, kind of your thoughts on the first team meeting and what you want to present to the guys and the goals you have for the team. I guess where are you adding your thoughts with team meetings, like the first team meeting? Well, I think it depends, again, if it’s your first team, if you just got a job, if you have poor guys that are coming back for third or fourth year, I’ve had team meetings that were pretty long. I’ve had team meetings that were relatively short. I think that it’s good to have a theme for the year and then just talk to them exactly about where you think the group is, about what can be accomplished. And the things I like to hit on are three things every year, the work part, which is going to be different in our league from year to year. Young teams can work more than veteran teams can, but I think the right way to sell the work part to the players. And I think younger players probably have to hear this now, too. It’s the right amount of work. I think in our league, it’s important that guys understand. Like I believe in work. Our league is not the same type of work league it used to be 20 years ago or 25 years ago. That’s changed a lot. With the guys that we’re getting from college, I think it’s not the same in college because they don’t have the same work habits, most of them when they’re coming into our league. But I think the best way to explain work is it’s the right amount of work. You know, we’ve got to work. It’s hard for players at any level of play to disagree with the fact that working hard does give you a better chance to play well. And I would also make the argument that if you don’t work hard on your game, you’re not giving yourself the best chance of success. I think that’s almost common sense and it’s hard for guys to argue with that. Also, I think in our league, it’s important that they trust. Hey, he knows how to pace our team. You know, he’s not going to beat us into the ground. We’re not going to leave a lot of our best play out there in practice because whether people like it or not, you know, load management and how much guys play have become a big part of our league. And I don’t think you can fight that. What I do think you have to do is create an environment where, again, they trust that you know how much work needs to be done. But I do think they need to know how you feel about the work part. And for me, it’s a big deal.
The second part to me is accountability. And that’s the hardest thing to get to at any level of play. It’s accountability of play. You know, it’s not difficult, for instance, to have discipline within your program. Guys shows up late. You don’t start them or in high school or college and find them in the NBA, whatever you want to do. Guys shows up late for the plane. You have same thing. You have fines or you don’t play them or whatever. But the trick is not having discipline where they show up on time. They dress a certain way. The trick is discipline of play is getting them to play. So everybody’s playing a purposeful, offensive, defensive, rebounding game where you have rules that you’ve come up with that you think will allow the group to be successful. And they all buy into that. That’s the trick where obviously a lot goes into that. And then the third thing is spirit. And that, again, gets back to knowing your players, having a good feel for where they’re at.
Steve Clifford 11:12
And then I think throwing it to them where this is going to be your team. You know, every guy every day gets a chance to either positively or negatively impact team spirit. Let’s be honest. Training camp is not hard. You know, there aren’t a lot of games. Guys aren’t sitting out. Guys aren’t as concerned about how many shots they’re getting. So until you start to win or lose, the spirit part is pretty easy. But obviously it becomes a critical, critical part of developing a team that has a group mindset to make progress and still work towards getting better, regardless of if it’s good for them or not. you
Pat 11:53
I like to hit the court now when you mentioned, of course, the importance of fundamentals and building a solid base. In general terms, when you approach building your fundamentals, are you more of the mindset to get your defense in so it can kind of pace your offense or get your offense in so then it can push your defense? Or is it more like a 50-50? We’ll work on concepts. We’ll work on defensive scheming kind of all at the same time.
Steve Clifford 12:21
I think some of that depends on your group. I’ll be honest, I’ve always to get really good offense is a lot harder than defense. You know, it just is. I mean, it takes a lot more feel learning how to play with each other, you know, defense, you can make more strict rules. This is how we help. This is how we guard the ball. This is this technique. These are our pick and roll coverages. Although defense, there are still a lot of reads, obviously, but it’s much harder to get to a consistently good offensive team than it is defense. I would say over the years, I don’t know this for sure, but I would bet that most coaches spend more time offensively than they do defensively. Also with your planning, a lot of that is what you’re doing in the player development part of your practice. However, you’re structuring that in training camp, you know, there can be on both sides of the ball, whether it’s two on two, three on three, four on four, there can be smaller group work to work on both, you know, again, offensive and defensive concepts. The biggest thing is building a foundation and challenging each guy to become the absolute expert on what you’re doing. I think a lot of times, and this gets into player development, younger guys in particular, their idea of player development is dribble moves, pivot game, you know, shooting, playing one on one. To play well at any level of play, player development to me is, are you on top of your individual game? Are you in shape? Are you getting enough sleep? Are you taking care of yourself? Are you doing a good job in the weight room? Are you improving your conditioning level, whatever it is, different things for different ages, obviously. But then more important than that is, are you the absolute expert on our team game? And do you have a great grasp of how you have to play in order for you to play effectively and our team to play efficiently when you’re on the court? You look at our league, and especially as we’re bringing more and more younger players in, there’s a bunch of guys that can score 12, 13 and nine, and they kill your team. There’s no way to know unless you’re in a locker room and are in practice every day, who really plays well for the team and who doesn’t. If you’re 27 a night, you cannot play defense. But if you’re 15, 16 a night, and you’re just crushing offensive execution, and you’re playing no defense, and there’s a bunch of guys in our league like that, it’s hard to win. And I think they need to hear that starting from day one, and they need to challenge themselves to know they should know the technique that the coaches know. They should talk the same way. You can’t have guys out there that are going to blow spacing, blow sets, blow coverages. With 22nds and the age and the IQ of the older players in our league, you just can’t have them as out there doing that night in and night out and win.
Dan 15:29
Talking about mistakes and things like that and I know pre-season and early in the season is a place where a lot of mistakes are taking place as you’re building an offense and a defense and learning for you over the years of the balance between Allowing certain types of mistakes and the patience for those types of mistakes Versus ones you don’t have as much patience for and I’m talking in this first few weeks here as you’re building. This is
Steve Clifford 15:54
just my opinion and this is working for different coaches with both and I mean I work for some great coaches in college too that I’ve learned from and I think over reactionary it was never good in my opinion and it doesn’t work at all anymore. I think that a lot of the getting back to discipline of play, purpose of play thing, a lot of that can be communicated in my opinion one-on-one. If you’re playing five-on-five in practice and a guy just tries to make a home run play and it’s a bad decision and you’ve never discussed that you have turnover issues here, you got to get your turnover per minute down, you’re going to be in a different place to coach them than if you’ve already spoken with him about. Then it can be blow your whistle, that’s what I’m talking about and you move on versus you know a minute and a half dissertation about teams that turn the ball over rarely win and so I think so much of that does get into the planning and spending time with guys individually look in our league you know we have we’re almost 18 guys now because you know we have the two ways right three two ways and those guys are going to be there with every team in training camp we’ve got like 12 coaches I mean there’s no reason there can’t be great communication with every player in terms of expectations from the coaching staff and have them getting constant reinforcement of how they have to play again so that they’re playing effectively and the team plays efficiently when they’re on the court there should be no now there can be disagreement and if there isn’t disagreement and there isn’t some conflict particularly offensive about a guy’s role or what a guy’s capable of doing then I would say you probably don’t have the right learning environment because let’s face it without some degree of conflict there’s probably not going to be a lot of growth during the season look you can communicate with guys all you want and if you never get a call them out or tell them like that’s not going to work again there’s not going to be that much growth but I think the whole thing starts all of this starts with the way players are today with the communication and the work between the head coach the assistant coach that’s working with that guy and trying to get on the same page about how they have to play I would throw this one at you too just being older I’m 62 when I was 22 I was a varsity coach in the state of Maine and back then I can remember walking down the hall I was a teacher and seeing the place and sometimes I would say hi to him sometimes I would not you know back then coaches had credibility because you were the coach you know I might see the parents in the grocery store and I say hi to I was the coach even at 22 23 years old and I remember working for a great coach in college and he used to tell us listen I’ve got the first nine or ten guys the last four or five guys I won’t be able to spend much time on you guys are going to be on top of those guys well I would say that we’ve changed to the point where as the head coach if you really want to be on top of things you better have a great relationship with your playing group and those seven or eight guys including the two ways you had to have a pretty good relationship with them also you’ve got to coach them all and to be honest in our league listen I’m not teaching a class you know I’m not doing anything else I mean you have to do speaking engagements sometimes or things like that but you know you can take a guy out for breakfast you can take a guy out for it you can spend a lot of time in the off season talking to them about what you feel their game should look like so to be able to foster a team that does have good spirit that will grow and be a together type team it’s all going to start with to me the relationship between the head coach and the players now obviously if you’re here in charlotte that relationship with mellow and brandon and miles it is more important than the two-way guys but I just think if you want to give yourself the best chance at a coach to have the environment where you have togetherness and spirit you need to spend the time with each guy
Pat 21:33
When you’re talking about player development, you mentioned the guys become experts on your team and in terms of two vocabulary that you and your staff have kind of built with calls, what are your rotations, whatever it may be. How do you as a staff organize installing your vocabulary within these first two, three weeks?
Steve Clifford 21:51
First of all, you let the players know, hey, everybody has to talk the same language. The younger guys, not so much when you have trades, you get veteran players and maybe they played in three or four places. They understand that, listen, one guy can’t be saying back screen and another guy say rip, because that split second is the difference between a clean coverage and an open shot or a layup. So I just think emphasizing we got to be a talk team. And it starts with talking to each other, the same thing on the offensive end of the floor and talking the same language. And I do think that that’s a place where you got to draw a line in the stands. If you’re going to be, how can I say, not as demanding about how they talk in practice, then it’s not fair to get upset when they make a mistake in the game. So I think that’s just laying it out, making sure, obviously within your staff, especially when you hire new assistants, it’ll come up in meetings or when you’re walking through stuff before training camp starts on the floor and you’re giving guys opportunities to lead the group. It’s critical that they understand. Don’t talk your language. You talk like me. I’m the one that determines what we’re saying, what the coverage is, what the set is, how we screen. And everybody has to talk like me. It’s a good question because it’s a critical area.
Dan 23:15
In the early pre-season, your methods of evaluating players and what you’re putting in, whether it’s working or not, in my experience, you always have a couple of players competing for jobs in certain areas, whether it’s backup roles, starting roles, and one, how you evaluate that, who’s playing better, who’s better for your team in these early practices, and then the second part is whatever it is that you’ve thought about all summer, all the special projects, offense, defense, you put it in, and then how you evaluate whether or not that’s working for that team too, so sort of a player standpoint and then a system standpoint.
Steve Clifford 23:50
I think that what you’re talking about is the whole key to getting off to a good start in your early games. You know, it used to be with us, we used to play eight preseason games. And I think we had about five weeks. You knew. I mean, it was actually too much, in my opinion. Now we play four or five, so it’s much more challenging. We have shorter pre-seasons, less games. But I just think, again, you have the tape, you know, and if you scrimmage a lot, like I believe you should. And then you have four, like this year, we’ll play five preseason games. I think that’s more than enough to see. Or you can make this, you know, again, let’s just say that you’re going to make a change in your pick and roll coverage, and they’re not comfortable with it. And then your read has to be, okay, do we spend more time on it? Is it going to be worthwhile to do? Do we go back and change, you know, because there’s a reason why you’ve changed it, obviously. But I think all of those decisions, you know, who plays well together? What’s the playing group? What are the different combinations we can use on the floor? Again, that’s why I like the scrimmaging so much early in camp, because then you can sit and just watch. You know, the answers, for the most part, it’s on the film, you know, it’s on the film, you know, that’s why. And again, this is just my background. I find it hard to believe that you can be totally on top of your team if you’re not watching film closely every day. That’s where the answers are. Now, I would also say this. With a veteran team in our league, take the Celtics next year. They just came off, obviously, a championship team, so they played deep into the playoffs. Those guys don’t get as much time to rest. They had three guys playing in the Olympics. So when you’re coming out, I’m not sure, evaluating Drew Holliday, Derek White, and Jason Tatum, it’s going to be all that critical. You know how good they are and it’s going to be, what are we going to change, if anything, or whatever it is. But those things all impact what you’re thinking. But one of the worst things you can do is misevaluate one of your own players or misevaluate what you’re doing in terms of playing. And that just comes down to me. Watch carefully, study, meet with your staff, get their opinions, make the best decisions. You want to commit to things, but you’ve got to be adaptable and open.
Pat 26:15
At the very beginning, you mentioned the importance of intensity and concentration, building those habits and the role they play in winning. In these early weeks, how you go about building the habit of concentration.
Steve Clifford 26:28
I think one is just emphasizing it constantly, right? I just think it’s hard to play well if you’re not good at concentrating. Some guys do it naturally. Some guys, it’s a struggle for. I think it’s good for them to hear it. I think it leads to mistakes. So I think, for instance, even in training camp in our league, you’re going to have days where you’re going to have much shorter practices. And regardless of what you’re doing, I think it’s good to always point out today’s going to be lighter, no contact, short period of time. We don’t want to take your legs. But the concentration and the intensity have to be the same. That speaks also to how you run practice. For instance, if when you walk through an opponent’s plays on game day, if you just walk through the plays and you’re just kind of showing the players the plays, to me, that’s not nearly as good for building habits of concentration as if you do it. So we’ll say the coaches are going to walk through these plays at half speed. But we’re going to use the same talk we will in the game tonight, and the talk part is going to be 100%. So the movement, the way we’re defending, or what we’re doing with the body position, getting into the ball, use of hands, everything like that, that’s 100%. And that gets concentration up.
So I do think that there’s ways that you can constantly reinforce intensity and concentration. I worked for coaches before where, and I mean, obviously the two that had the biggest impact me were Jeff and Stan, where you might take a day off on the road when they’re tired and just walk through like six or seven plays for the next day. Well, listen, you know, I’ve seen Tracy McGrady do it, Latrell Sprewell do it, Rashard Lewis Dwight Howard do it, where the body position was right, the stances were right, the use of hands was right. It was half speed, but it was total talk. All I know is as an assistant, when I walked out of those sessions, I’m like, you know what? We got something out of that today. And that’s how, to me, you can build the level of concentration in detail that you need to play well consistently.
Dan 28:52
Coach, thanks for all your thoughts there. We want to transition now to a segment on the show that we call Start, Sub, or Sit. I know you played this with us last time, but just for a reminder, we will give you three different options around a topic, ask you which one you’d start, you’d sub one, and sit one. So, Coach, if you’re all set, we’ll dive into this first one.
Ready to roll. This first one, we’ve titled Skips of Concern, or Skip Passes from an offense that would really concern you defensively. So, these are three different types of skips that your start here would be the one that most concern you from a defensive side. So, Start, Sub, or Sit. Option one is the post skip out pass. So, maybe you dig or send a double in that post that can skip it opposite. The second skip is the one that’s done in transition. So, maybe a hit ahead cross court, but a point guard that can skip it quickly in transition. Or option three is a pick and roll skip pass, say to the corner or to an opposite side of the floor. So, something in that on ball that they can throw that ball out on a dime. So, Start, Sub, or Sit. Post skip out, transition skip, or pick and roll skip.
Steve Clifford 30:01
For me, the first one would be the transition skip and in our league last year, I believe I’m correct on this is the advanced pass, whether it’s up the floor or across the floor is one of the most effective things that you can do offensively is throwing the ball ahead because obviously it creates wide gaps, right? Advantage situations, matchup issues, whatever. I’m also, I’m fairly sure I’m right on this. I believe that last year the most efficient possession in our league was a shot in the first eight seconds where the ball hit the paint and a good number of those possessions come from either the pass up the floor or across the floor. So I think emphasizing that is a great thing to do offensively.
And when it’s a good decision that those guys usually have so much room over there to attack. So when you don’t get back or they have numbers ahead and the ball is skipped, that one scares me. I would say the second one is hard. I mean, the pick and roll one to me, it just depends on who the ball handler is. And obviously who we’re skipping it to, but again, more and more teams have gotten back to protecting the paint as the priority defensively, which means that, you know, on the weak side of the floor, there are going to be guys either in the lane or coming into the lane, depending on the role. And so that skip pass creates long closeout. You know, I might even create an X switch or whatever exhortation and you get the defense shifted and on the move. For instance, when that’s a, you know, LeBron or, you know, Halliburton or one of those guys that’s got size and the ability to just pass it across court on target, you know, that’s going to be a problem. I think the third one is a great thing to do offensively. I just don’t think there are that many guys that can make the pass, but I think when the ball is in the post, what’s hard and is really, I think a part of our league is going to continue to grow, but it’s the cutting basket, you know, the better teams and the better players score cutting baskets and a great way to do it. Obviously, Golden State for years or so and still are with Draymond with the ball or, you know, if you remember the other guy, they were great when Bogut was playing and they had great cutting action on Bogut, but with Draymond, especially in all the different cutting things, I think those skip passes are also, they’re difficult, you know, they’re difficult, especially the dig, and not to get into this, but the dig to me is as hard to play as there is if there’s a good shooter in front of the ball with a good passer in the post. And that opens up a lot of things on the weak side too.
Dan 33:03
I want to go, I guess would be your sub a little bit, which was the pick and roll skips. And looking at the defensive side of the ball, when you were facing a player that had that ability, the types of coverages, the types of tagging, the types of handwork, anything that you felt made it more difficult to attack or cover a player that could make that pass.
Steve Clifford 33:26
Listen, and this is just fundamental stuff, but it’s brutal to do against better pick and roll players in our league, is to me, it’s controlling the ball. Look, the best thing that you can do in any pick and roll is drive away, reject the screen. And that’s by the numbers. So, you know, most of the really good pick and roll players in the NBA, the first thing you gotta do is not let them drive away. And that means getting up, getting into the ball, which is easier said than done, as you guys know.
The best, best pick and roll players, unfortunately, they crushed the drive. You know, like Luca, you know, you can say, we’re gonna mix it up, go drop against Luca. They score every time, they score every time. That’s where he’s in the paint, he’s getting fouled, you know, he’s throwing lobs, I mean, he’s doing everything. And then when you double team him, it’s almost what he wants too. He’s still, that’s where he throws a lot of skip passes, but he always looks at the rim first and he gets people in the lane and creates those things. So I think that the primary coverage, what you’re gonna do with the two people involved is obviously the best thing you can do is switch it. You know, the switch is the best coverage, not even close. You can stay out of rotation, out of tags, but for the most part, not as much. It makes everything simpler. One of the great reasons why Boston was so good is they have seven guys who are exceptional defenders and they had the ability to switch everything. So it keeps everything simple. For me, and it didn’t work as well these last couple of years for a lot of reasons, I like being aggressive. You know, we’ve always been both here, both times in Orlando, probably top four or five in blitzing. And I don’t think the best players, as great as they are, I don’t think they’d like to be blitzed. I think it’s good coming into a game if they know, okay, we’re playing them. There’s a good chance they’re gonna blitz me tonight. I like them knowing that there’s a good possibility. And I do think along with this, and this isn’t really skip pass based, but I do think you have got to be a multiple pick and roll team. You can’t just go into a year in our league and say, okay, listen, we’re just gonna switch one through four and put five in a drop. Or if you can, keep that team because that’s incredible personality.
Pat 35:52
Coach I’d like to follow up on the X out rotation when the ball is flying to the corner and I guess kind of going back To the detail concentration part. How do you work with that X out defender? So if kind of paint the pitcher it’s to behind the pick and roll that top guy who’s gonna X out in terms of maybe positioning and Handwork at the point of the pick and roll where he should be to give him the best chance to get to that corner
Steve Clifford 36:16
I think that where players make mistakes on this is that it all starts with reading the role. You know, people say different things, right? Some teams say, low man, the ball’s going away from you, you’re the low man. Some people say, the big, most important guy, whatever it is. But again, what those guys on the weak side are responsible for is the role. They’re not responsible as much for the ball handling. The ball handler is really the responsibility of the two guys in the coverage. I think the players that are not as good at reading the role, like when a ball handler comes off, say it’s like an angle type pick and roll, and a ball handler comes off, most guys to their right hand are better than the left, they come off to their right hand, and the guy’s not a quick roller. And you see that bottom man, the low man right at the rim, you’re in trouble right there, you know, because regardless of how good a job you do on the ball, and what you’re talking about is Miami to me has always been as good as this as anybody is, their coverage on the ball, not allowing driveaways, their pursuit, once the ball handler uses the pick and rolls, and then their use of the hands, high active hands, so they’re not snapping passes around them. And that’s what most good pick and roll defenders try to do. But the other part of it is that low man, you should be reading the role. So if that’s a guy like a Nick Claxton, who’s a quick sharp roller, you should be in a little bit earlier. If it’s a guy that’s rolling slower, and you see the guy standing at the rim and the roller still at the top of the key, you’re opening up that whole backside. So I think that is the one key is on the weak side, you don’t want to over help there. You don’t want to over help their read is the role. Okay, those two guys in the coverages, they’re responsible more for the ball, you know, for me and a lot more teams are doing it this way. I don’t think you can both bump the role with the top guy and get to the weak side corner. I just don’t see it. I mean, I don’t see anybody that can do it. So to me, you know, we’re going to give ground a little bit. He’s going to read the role too. If the role gets below him, he’s going to start to drop more. And then that’s where you’re going to get more extra rotations. But again, we spend a lot of time just a little two on two drill, where we read the role, don’t over help read the role and try to get good at the excels.
Pat 38:50
If it is like Claxton in that situation where the big, the low man is going to pull in and offenses are so good with the spacing behind that 45 guy are like really shakes up almost to the top. What are you then telling that ex out guy in terms of his positioning when it’s going to be, does he follow the shake or hold your position for the corner?
Steve Clifford 39:08
Then it’s personnel related. To be honest with you, that’s the play. I mean, that’s what we show them offensively. I mean, this is 25 years for me. I’ve never been involved in a game even in the last few years where that’s been a real issue, where it’s happened more than once or twice. But if it does, I’m just changing the coverage. That is where as a coach, you can’t get beat by an action. That’s to me where your team being comfortable blitzing is a great plan B or plan C every night. There’s always going to be a way when you’re in drop to get an open shot. If the coverage isn’t really good with a good ball handler. So that for me, I’m more comfortable. Like I tell them the first day, we need to be a multiple coverage team, and we have to be able to get the ball out of the best player’s team. If you’re going to let the better ball handlers, I mean, I use Luca because he’s just such a great pick and roll player. But if you’re not doubling him somewhat, you’re not stopping him. If you’re drop, you’d have to be all the way up to touch. He’s going to make every play. You can change it too because you don’t want to let him know you’re always going to double team. Again, I think that the coverages are multiple, and that’s where again, as a coach, you got to be on top of the pick and roll stuff, and one of the great players see something like that. If that’s Luca to Kyrie and it’s an open three, then I’m getting out of that coverage right away.
Pat 40:40
You mentioned something pretty interesting there. You said coaches can’t get beat by an action. And that just made me think in terms of looking at now in-game coaching along those lines, are there certain trends that as a coach, you should always keep in mind to know you should probably make an adjustment. This is something you have to solve. Whether it’s an action, a lineup, or maybe some things out of your hands. You just got to dig in on your base and maybe it’s more like players, just superstars.
Steve Clifford 41:06
First of all, within your defensive build-up, you have to have the great player defense stuff now. We always have, obviously, again, working for the Bay and Gundys, I think they did as much of that or more than anybody else through the years. I’m very comfortable teaching double-teaming, double-teaming in the post, double-teaming in the wing, double-teaming picking roles, and I think your team has to get comfortable doing that. In terms of the game-planning stuff, to be honest, there are many more possessions now where when you’re watching the film, they’re not defendable. When you’re playing five-out, you’re playing like Denver or you’re playing Boston, and they’re coming down in the shot clocks at eight, and Tatum’s got it going, and you go step back three from 25 feet, three times in a row, there’s only one thing you can do, run at them. There are a lot of it where you just have to say, the way the game is right now, some of that stuff is not guardable. In terms of the game-planning stuff, to be honest with you, it’s much, much simpler. Teams are harder to guard now because of the way we’re playing, but in terms of just accidental stuff, preparation, it’s much more individuals now to me and concept than it used to be, say, 15 years ago. You know, 15 years ago, teams played a lot of different kinds of offensive basketball. You might have a week where you had to go to Utah with Jerry Sloan’s cutting options, and then go play the Lakers with Phil Jackson running the triangle, and then maybe go to Sacramento, and George Carle was going to be running and iso-ing and three totally different ways of how to play. You still get that in college. Our game, to be honest, I think because we’re all playing a game that’s impacted much more by analytics, we’re all playing a pretty similar offensive game. We really are, and everybody’s running, some better than others. Golden State is still unique with the way they cut. Miami cut more. I think those teams are a little bit different, but it’s not like it used to be in terms of guys having very, very different ways to teach offense and systems and stuff. That part, it’s actually a lot simpler.
Pat 44:46
And keeping it moving here, our last start subset for you, Coach, we call this players on the edge. And so I’m going to give you three ways us as coaches can help decrease pressure on a player. When players, you can kind of notice they’re fighting for maybe a roster spot, a contract, or to crack the rotation, and the pressure is starting to get in their heads and really affect their play. And so ways coaches can help this player to get back to playing. So option one is simplify their role. Option two is simplify their reads or maybe their actions they’re involved in. Or option three is we call it lineup protection, just surrounding them with four pretty solid dudes, whether their deficiency is defensively or often, you know, protecting them with strong lineups.
Steve Clifford 45:39
the first one would be who they’re playing with, protecting them with finding a group that’s best for them to play with. Basketball is still a game this way. There’s only five guys out there. Whoever has the best player on the floor at any given time has an advantage. Most of the time when Jokic is on the floor, they’re the better team. That’s just the way it is. It always has, man. I mean, it’s just the way basketball is. I think that for sure, trying to find ways if a guy is really struggling and to get him into rhythm, finding maybe different guys are a better lineup for him to play with. I think the second one would be what you’re saying about actions. Maybe just dummy down his offensive menu. Because this one to me, you could even do it with a player development piece is maybe you even change his player development part. So you’re leaving out, say he’s not playing well in pick and rolls and he’s doing great off like flares and pin downs. Maybe for a couple of days you do just players and pin downs and try to get him locked into something that way. Look, I mean, I’ll be honest, there’s some guys that when they’re struggling, if they’ve been really good before, I say you just force feed them. Just tell them, we’re just going to work through this. You’re a good player, you’re going to make them. You got to get yourself in the right frame, but that ball is coming to you because we’re not going to win without your offense. I think that could be a way to do it. I mean, I think a lot of it also is the age of the player, how much success he’s had. The third one would be simplifying the role, which again, I think sometimes with younger players, I would even say maybe simplifying his idea of what his role is. Making sure that he is playing to his strengths and not trying to do a lot of things that he can’t do. But over 82 games, as you guys know, even the really good players go through stretches where this is a good question and it’s something that you need to be on top of because some guys can just work their way through it and other guys can really fight themselves.
Pat 47:54
When a player is struggling, how do you use the film aspect? So as a coach, the fine line between simplifying his reads, helping him, but also if we get to micromanaging and the game changes on him the next day, now we’re kind of also being counterintuitive or part of the problem with him as well.
Steve Clifford 48:13
No question, because I mean, I think this, first of all, for any player, you don’t want to be one dimension. The more aspects of offense, for instance, you can be good at, the better you’re going to be. If you’ve got a pick and roll game, you can score off the ball, you can iso. That’s a lot different than a guy that can just shoot spotups or can just do one or the other of those. Just like where the team wants to have a balance of offense, the better individual players have a balance of offense also. I think the other part of that is, I do think before I really got into changing his menu and things like that, my basic feel, I think it’s the same way with a team, is when you play 82 games against the best players in the world, you better work and compete your way through it. And I mean everybody, from the GM to the coach to the owner to the players. This is no league for looking for easy way else to help guys. Guys who go through this, and that’s the first thing I would do, they got to hear it. Everybody goes through this. You got to work and compete your way through it. You’re not going to be able to back down into great games. And that’s really hard a lot of times for the younger guys. But I do believe in that, where you can challenge somebody, I think, without taking their confidence away. And maybe on the film part, maybe what you do is go back to an earlier set of games where they were making more plays or making more shots or just playing better and showing them that. So this is what I see. This is what you’re capable of. We’ve got to figure out why you were playing with more energy, more purpose, more aggressiveness here. But I do think that they got to work and compete their way through it in this league, because if you’re not at your best, nobody’s feeling bad for you.
Dan 50:02
Following up on sub and sit here, which the simplifying the actions and simplifying the role. And you just mentioned confidence. And when you are asking a player to sort of decrease the number of things they do, or they’re not going to be a pick and roll player, they’re going to be more, I don’t know, 3 and D or whatever it is, and you’re scaling down the number of things that you want them to do in order for them to be more successful, that gray area where you’re still giving them confidence, they still feel good about their game, but you are asking them to actually do less than anything you’ve learned about that conversation in general.
Steve Clifford 50:33
I think a lot of these are just a different situation. So one, would be the younger players coming into the league, who were in college programs where maybe they were the high score, the second high score and the ball was being brought to them, and all of a sudden you get to the NBA where you’re like, the ninth or 10th best scorer, and you used to be in more high volume, and you have to learn how to be able to get things done with touching the ball less. Maybe that could just be working harder in practice. Maybe it could just be getting more shops up, working on your game more in the player development or extra. So that’s one aspect of it. The second part is, the tougher one in our league, in my opinion, is the older guys whose skills are starting to diminish a little bit. They probably have more know-how, a lot of them, but when you take guys who have been more primary type scorers, and they lose a little bit, and then them figuring out ways that they can compensate for that to play. But to me, this is the essence of coaching, because this is an issue with almost every player. Then when your team changes, you can have a guy who had a great year as your fourth best player, but he’s not good enough to be the fourth best player, if you’re going to win. And then you ask him to take a lesser role, and then you got him not happy, whatever his college coach saying, I don’t know what happened, his agent talking to him. And that’s just life in the NBA, because the sacrifice part, and I always go back to the same thing. Are you playing in a manner so that you play well, but that we can play efficiently? Those are the tough conversations, because you do have to be able to bring guys in and say, hey, listen, you were the second option last year, right now you’re the fourth option. That’s the way we’re doing it. And then you work from there. Thank you.
Dan 52:34
100% well said coach. Well, you’re off the start, sub, or sit hot seat. Thanks for going through those with us. We’ve got a final question for you to end the show before we do. Thanks again for coming back for a second time. This was a really fun conversation today.
Steve Clifford 52:47
I do have one favor. If I ever do this again, I want to do that segment with Coach on the edge.
Dan 52:56
It’s a good idea. We’ll mark that down for round three. Or you know what?
Steve Clifford 52:59
Coach on the Edge and then let me pick which guy you’re going to interview. I got some guys I’d like to hear how they answer that.
Dan 53:07
Ooh, that’s perfect. Thanks coach. So coach, the first time we had you on, we asked you the best investment question. And so the second time through to finish the show, we’re gonna ask the question of, what are you most curious about right now when it comes to basketball or coaching or leadership?
Steve Clifford 53:25
Well, I think the biggest challenge right now as our game changes, you know, I love the old NBA where as a coach, it was Jerry Sloan one night off the next night, Larry Brown, very different ways to play. And yet I love our game right now. I think that you take a guy like Rick Carlisle, who’s gone from like a really structured, great offensive coach that way, to up tempo, great now of teaching concepts and the offensive aggressiveness and purpose that they play with. That’s hard to do. But the toughest thing and just coaching to me is as society has changed, it’s the players, the youngest guys to coach in our league are the younger guys. And I just don’t think that we don’t have great youth basketball in our country anymore. You know, I was for a long time in college and you know, in the summers they weren’t playing AAU. They were going to five star. They were going to teaching camps. They were going to team camp. I remember, you know, you would go watch a high school team play in Brockville Center or you know, South Jersey and the high school coach would be with them and they’d be doing the shell drill in the summer and they’re not getting that anymore. So guys coming into our league, the shot creation shot making much better than ever before. Guys are better with the ball understanding of how to play without the ball, how to space the floor, how to play team offense. And all aspects of defense, not even close to the way it used to be, not even close. And they don’t want to practice. You know, everybody now has an individual coach when they’re young and that’s what they want to do. And so it’s made it much more challenging to coach the majority of the young players. And yet they’re still really good, really good. And our league is filled with like these young, young superstars. But I do think the challenge of getting them to understand how they have to work and what they have to learn when they get into the league, I’ll just end it with this Brandon Miller, you know, and I’m sure the staff at Alabama, you know, NATO did a great job with him, but you know, also getting to know Brandon’s parents a little bit brand, his dad played football at Alabama. His mom is very supportive. They moved here to Charlotte, but I knew in two days of practice like watch out for this kid, he’s different. He wants to know the technique. He wants to know coverages. He doesn’t want to let his teammates down by blowing actions or not knowing a baseline out of bounds. He constantly went to the coaches and said after practice, what are we doing? What are we doing? And you just don’t see that anymore. And I’ve got to think that a big part of that was he probably grew up in a household where they were supportive, but when the coach said push the ball to the outside, he pushed the ball to the outside and I just don’t think we’re getting that as much anymore. So for me, that’s the big challenge here going forward.
Dan 56:34
All right, Pat, jumping into this, Coach Clifford, always just a wealth of knowledge, doesn’t matter the subject or what we’re talking about and great having him back for round two. Last time we went kind of post-season thoughts. This time we flipped over the pre-season and one of those ones where we could have just recorded probably for another hour and still just had a ton of stuff coming our way. So really fun podcast today with him.
Pat 56:57
Yeah, you hit on it. A wealth of knowledge. Thanks, Coach Clifford. As always, it was a really top conversation.
Dan 57:02
Let’s dive in with our top three takeaways and Pat, I will kick it to you for takeaway number one.
Pat 57:08
I think we’ve been talking about this a lot with our podcast with Dr. Kline too on just communication and meetings. What stood out for me was Coach Clifford’s three things he tried to hit on in the first team meeting, kind of defining the work, how much work is necessarily the right amount of work as he clarified the accountability piece and the spirit piece. And within the work and accountability piece, I really like the distinctions he made with work in that not only you’re trying to sell the right amount of work that the players need to do, but also instilling confidence that you as a coach can pace them properly. I mean, for sure, in the NBA, when there’s 82 games, I think that’s a big, big piece that you’re not going to burn them out. Like he said, not going to take their legs into practice, but in a game, but still in general, I think seasons are long, no matter what, you’re going to be seeing these guys every day and instilling the confidence that you can kind of properly pace a season. And then within the accountability piece, it’s kind of the rules, the standards don’t be laid, all that stuff, but the accountability due to the discipline of play, he said, and that holding guys accountable to kind of your non-negotiables and how you envision the team playing offensively and defensively. And I also like that distinction to be made in a group setting under accountability.
Dan 58:26
Yeah. And to your point, there’s a couple of moments within all this that he gave the thought of, Hey, this is the plan, or this is what I like to do. Or he mentioned, you know, playing a lot of five on five or whatever it is. But then some of our follow up questions, he made a good distinction about that is the art of coaching these moments where you don’t have the blueprint and a player like shot selection or role clarification or players a lot of shape or confidence issues. And it’s like, okay, in the preseason, here’s a general plan of how we’re going to install, how we’re going to work, how we’re going to put these things in. But then he had some good stuff about the art of coaching within all this is being able to recognize that be able to work through that. It reminded me of a podcast we did a few years back with Regis University head coach Brady Bergison talked a little bit about preseason and he talked about approximate start points, I think was the quote he used if I remember back as far as whatever you put in preseason is going to be a base, but it’s going to change a lot. And you just want to kind of get the base right. And I think that’s what coach Clifford talked about the foundations, the three things that need to be in place. Dylan Murphy, about a month or two ago, talking about the big rocks that you got to get right. And I think that all the other stuff is going to change. Before we move on to part two, I like to how you talked a little bit about players get the quote expert on our team game as ways to get ahead. And then get another really good quote about there’s tons of guys that can score 12 or 13 points, but be killing your team. That’s a really interesting thought because I think everybody can think about that one or two people within the roster that is helpful to an extent, but we’re trying to evaluate that person, right? Are they helping enough with what they do scoring wise versus everything else that’s involved.
Pat 01:00:10
Yeah, those like empty calorie guys, are they really impacting winning? All right, Dan. Well, let’s keep it moving here. I’ll throw it to you for the second takeaway of our conversation.
Dan 01:00:20
Yeah, I’m going to steal from your start subset here because you and I were talking about this question beforehand and credit to you on coming up with this question. And it’s a really good one. And we were thinking about players on the edge. You mentioned next time doing coaches on the edge, which is a really good suggestion. But especially as we’re talking about pre-season and stuff and players that are playing for contracts, playing for minutes, there’s a lot of stress on those players to perform well. And sometimes, despite our best coaching or trying to help them in whatever way possible, they’re struggling to fit in and just play the game. And I think that was a really good idea that you came up with. And my takeaway was his start, the lineup protection. And I know this is so situational, but it’s so true that a struggling player can be helped so much by the right combination of people around them. And usually probably doesn’t happen with a point guard. I don’t know, like point guards gotta be pretty solid. But if you’re able to throw a wing or a foreman in for a few possessions and you have a really great point guard on the floor and in a score where they’re not asked to really score, they can just get into the flow, or like a shooter that plays with a point guard that can just get them a great shot because they understand how to get them a rhythm three in the break and have them feel good. That’s pretty big. I think we all think about that a lot when we’re trying to fit in a player that’s struggling into a game when it matters and who’s around them is very, very important.
Pat 01:01:48
Yeah, this is something I’ve been thinking a lot about, and he mentioned through the season, even your better players are going to struggle. I think you’re right, putting them with the lineups and what Coach Clifford hit on, getting them lines that protect them, but they can feel success without having to do maybe too much at the moment, or yeah, like less is more for them at this moment, give them a taste of success and build the confidence back up.
I really like Coach Clifford’s thoughts too on showing them film of like when they were successful or when they, you know, were flowing or playing at their best. And just kind of like, I think, a helpful reminder, because that was the other aspect of this conversation I was after with how do you use the film? And really, what do you kind of tell them? They know it, they know they’re struggling. And so, again, like the trap of, okay, you want to kind of simplify, help them like just, yeah, keep it to these two things. But the game is so dynamic. And, you know, that was my follow up question, like, then maybe in the next game, though, it’s like, ah, crap, he probably should have been doing this. And none of the two things I just told them to do. And so like how, yeah, you use kind of the film element to rebuild their confidence and not overburden them any more than they probably put on themselves.
Dan 01:02:59
Ben McCollum now at Drake but at the time Northwest Missouri State head coach when he was on, he had a good comment about these types of players or if they’re not your top two or three scores or players that obviously have the feel is the best thing you can do for a player at that point is to constrain them because it gets them out of their head of all the possible options and allows them to just kind of play into what they do well. And Coach McCollum spoke well about that kind of like on probably more on the simplifying of actions thought in this second one. Good stuff. Hey, let’s keep it moving to point number three. And for that, Pat, I’ll kick it back to you.
Pat 01:03:35
Yeah, so I’ll jump to your start subset, which I enjoyed both these start subsets. I think they’re a little bit different themed. And then I especially like this one because we are coming up with witty puns on the skip. Yes. Was a big part of our preparation that we enjoyed.
Dan 01:03:49
Yeah, just the naming of this was the fun part. It skips us concern. If skips could kill. We’re enjoying ourselves by two.
Pat 01:03:55
Yeah. So yeah, that was my last takeaway there. With this one, always interested in the XR rotation and getting to the positioning and details. And his answer just on the whole backside help. And he talked about reading the role as the MIG and the low man and the importance that plays. Okay, well, then if you got a pull in, and he just talked about the XR rotation. And that led to, I thought, an interesting conversation where he said you can’t get beat by actions and just kind of understanding some trends. And yeah, I liked his thoughts that followed just on so much more now about preparing for individuals and concepts than in the past where it was like systems.
Dan 01:04:33
I also enjoy, just to add to what you were saying about the great player defense, goes back to, I think, Coach TJ saying we had on a couple months ago, and he was mentioning how he’s thinking about spending more time on just great player defense because you set up for a scheme and you do everything perfectly and then a really great player can just burn you on a simple stagger and transition, whatever it is, and spending more time on that, which Coach Clifford was talking about, I’ll kind of pivot slightly and give you a miss. My miss was in this part of the conversation and it was on the offensive side when he was talking about transition hit-a-heads and skips and he gave some examples about how the advanced pass was the most dangerous one. First eight seconds with a paint touch was like the highest analytical action, I believe he said, on the show. I could have just spent more time asking, I guess, from an offensive side, the question of great guards, sometimes that decision to let the great guard keep it and sort of motor up the floor into a drag or into something to get a piece of the paint themselves, first teaching them, like he said, Halliburton, getting great at the hit-a-head. I don’t know, there’s like that gray area of every transition where you’ve got a really great speedy guard and of course you want them to throw it ahead for like a wide open layup. But if it’s not clear, rather just let them operate because it’s tough for the defense with someone maneuvering downhill and have them spray it out after a paint touch or quick drag versus teaching the quick skip or hit-a-head on the same side of the floor. I don’t know, I maybe would have liked to have asked him just his thoughts, having coached some really great guards that have the ball handling capability, what his thoughts would have been.
Pat 01:06:14
Yeah, that’s an interesting conversation for sure. Maybe a miss of mine and maybe more a miss in terms of a follow up. Another interesting conversation he hit on briefly was talking about having multiple pick and roll defenses versus a team that can just run one pick and roll defense. I mean, he said himself, if you have that team, keep them. Yeah, and I think that conversation I think in our last roundtable we discussed on and I’ve had with other coaches and you look at Coach Asolo who’s now with Memphis, but he had tremendous success in Europe kind of really honing in on one pick and roll defense. And I think that’s just, it’s a really interesting conversation and I wish maybe just to dig on it a little bit more, sit in that conversation a little bit longer as I mean, I think it goes maybe down to skill, you know, the guards you’re facing, maybe the level that you’re at one pick and roll defense multiple. But I think there’s benefits cons to all of them. But yeah, whether it was just get good at one and know all kind of the nuances of it, or let’s just be decent good at several, but be able to throw the opponent multiple looks. It is a really interesting conversation.
Dan 01:07:19
Yeah. And one more podcast to throw into your people. One of our more recent ones with Seattle University head coach Chris Victor, we talked about mixing up coverages in game and he likes to work with his team on multiple pick and roll coverages. And that’s pretty high level stuff for a college team to be able to flip back and forth or have guys make calls. He was talking about their color-based system. Yeah. Another one to throw into that conversation. Well, Pat, we both gave a miss. Was there anything else from your end? Any misses, of course, not by coach Clifford, but could have gone deeper on.
Pat 01:07:52
Within the first bucket, I think maybe a practice planning follow-up question. I think also would have been interesting within the preseason first two to three weeks for sure. I mean you would add great thoughts on it.
Dan 01:08:03
Yep, no doubt that would have been interesting for sure. Well, we got round three coming at some point with coach. So basically already committed. So he threw it out there. Yeah. So, so that was a confirmation to us.
Well, once again, we thank everybody for listening. Thank you to coach for coming on. Have a great week coaching. See you next time.