anonymous
Years ago
Ben Simmons' major flaw is not his jump shot
Just an observation of Ben Simmons from the early part of the season and his young career so far.
Ben is a super talented basketball player with a unique skill set and physical abilities and is still only 22 years old and still developing but he has a major flaw (and surprisingly its not his jump shot ) that is both hurting himself and his team.
Its his lack of a right hand dribble and driving right.
Ben is super left hand dominant to the point where he is limiting his options for scoring/creating.(not counting his right hand finishes, only dribbling/driving).
He makes a lot 'straight line' drives to the basket going left and although he gets away with it a lot due to superior size/athleticism, a lot of times he becomes predictable and easy to defend, resulting in having his shot blocked, missing a contested shot, or having to pull up and pass out.
If you watch him closely he never takes more than 2 dribbles on his right before bringing the ball back to his trusty left.
Holistically speaking being so left hand side dominant means he also doesn't work the ball naturally into the space available right that would normally allow for most effectiveness. Instead the ball ends up going back into congestion to the left leading to less effectiveness.
One of my pet hates in basketball (and Both Simmons and Dante Exum do this at times, only for a dribble or 2 of course) is dribble the ball on the side closest to the defender. The ball should always be dribbled on the side of the body that is furthest away from the defender. Its a bad habit that needs to be eliminated.
If you look at Lebron James and most top players they are 50/50 right and left. One top player that mostly drives left is James Harden (and this gives me hope for Simmons). But the reality is Hardens right hand is just as good as his left and he just prefers/ends up driving left and his set up moves (jump shot/right dribble) are legitimate and allow him to drive left effectively. In Bens case he has very little set up moves resulting in straight line left handed dives that i mentioned before. Forget about the jump shot, if Ben had legitimate right hand side ability then that alone would be sufficient for him to become the dominant NBA force we are all hoping for.
It may be too late to add these new skills during this current NBA season but I only hope that the Sixers coaches and trainers see what i'm seeing and help him develop in these areas in the off season and in years to come.
