How does an NBA Coach use the CLA to Develop Their Players with LA Lakers' JD Dubois

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Hey coaches, welcome to the Transforming Basketball Podcast. Today, delighted to be joined by JD Dubois, assistant coach of the LA Lakers and head coach of the Lakers Summer League team from this past summer. So JD, great to have you on. Thanks for joining us.

Man, thank you for having me. Excited to be here and continue to learn and share whatever little bit of information I have on your platform.

So, J.D., I mean, first question, we both share a passion for evidence-based ideas, and it's something we've been speaking about a lot just in our conversations. I'd love to know, kind of, when you hear this term evidence-based ideas, like, what does that mean to you?

And I think more importantly, how do you think these ideas have the potential to be applied within either an MBA or high school setting?

Yeah, so as soon as I hear evidence-based, I just think of research, right? Like right now I'm getting my master's degree in sports psychology and ultimately want to get my doctoral in some therapeutic realm. And a lot of the things that I'm looking at is research-based and people much smarter than me that are being funded to look specifically into certain areas.

They're finding the trend of the recent research. So if we're going to use research in every aspect of the world, why wouldn't we apply that to the sport that we love? And if there's things that research is showing that's helping players develop, be better decision makers, be more well-rounded, I feel it's only right for me to try to follow what the research is telling us is trending.

Yeah.

And in terms of the application of these ideas, just Practically, because I think this is one of the— well, this is the reason I started Transforming Basketball, to bridge that gap. And I think there are huge barriers. We've spoken about it. It can be very difficult to apply this stuff.

So it's like, why are these ideas of significance for basketball coaches of all levels, NBA or high school? Why is it important that coaches actually look at some of these ideas and try to incorporate it into their practices?

Yeah, I think one, if you want to continue to develop and be cutting edge, You don't want to use the iPhone 1. If I want to communicate properly and at the highest level, like I'm going to try to get the iPhone like 8, but most people are going to get the most recent up-to-date technology.

And the same goes for development and coaching is like, how can I extract the most recent and up-to-date information that is factual or is evidence-based? And I think if we could start with what is the research saying, and then we can still implement our kind of baseline foundational beliefs, but at least we know it's supported by some form of evidence.

I love that.

So, I mean, I'd be really interested because you have, you have a unique background. You played to a high level professionally in Europe, and then I believe you've been with 3 NBA teams, right? The Raptors, Pistons, obviously now the Lakers. So yeah, within that journey, how did you first discover this world and realize that There's a very different way that we can approach things.

How did you come across all this?

Yeah, I think you kind of mentioned it, right? The, the starting point of having the opportunity to play in Europe and just see a different style of basketball and be able to watch the younger kids and the U15s, U14s, youth programs practice. And then in the offseason, having the opportunity to be around Delon Wright, and he would go and work out with a guy named Noah.

And Noah down in LA uses a lot of evidence-based approaches, and just different conversations with him led me to do a little more research. And what it really allowed me to do is now have language to what I already kind of believed. And to me, I think that that's sometimes the most important, is there's a lot of things that we're sometimes already doing in the sport, and we don't even recognize that it is evidence-based.

But the more information that I was able to extract, I realized like, okay, there's a baseline of understanding and now how can I expand on that? And really what I realized was important is that as I started to see a lot of the players that I worked with develop and improve, I started to say, okay, it's not necessarily just me.

There's a lot of evidence that also supports the philosophy in which I choose to develop players in. That's Not a rocket science thing, but there is research behind it. It's not just a drill that a coach that I played for does or used to do, or this coach I used to work with likes to do this drill, so I'm just going to apply that to the next player that I work with.

Love that. No, Noah LaRoche, I think, is a name that every coach should check out. I know he's got a busy schedule, so I gotta try hard to get him on a, on a podcast soon. I love all of Noah's stuff. I mean, he's living this on a daily basis and doing it at the highest level.

So after finishing a successful Summer League stint, what would you say, JD, were your biggest learnings from that whole experience and anything you could take away from that and apply, you know, back on the Lakers bench this year as an assistant?

Yeah, I think improving my ability to observe. A lot of times we spend a lot of time talking and shouting out commands and fix this and do this, but I feel that I'm much better at observing And okay, what is the common theme?

And having intention on what I'm observing. So that proactive front-end approach to the day now allows me to say, okay, I'm watching for something specific. I'm not necessarily coaching every single mistake that happens. And then from a development and even team structure is how can I apply as much variability as possible in my development?

So if a player is working on his finishing, How can I give him a variety of fenders and their strengths, a variety of weak side help, a variety of angles? Because the game is going to present so many variabilities and variables that are going to dictate what finish he will need.

And if I can expand the variety that I present to him in the training environment, then that just gives him a lot of different options that he's comfortable getting to once there's a problem at hand in front of him.

Like, what were the first kind of ideas when you knew you'd be head coaching the team What came into your head in terms of how you wanted to go about it and what you envisioned the practices looking like?

First things first, I was thinking of just the timeframe that you have to teach before you have to play games. And even when there's a normal season and you get to training camp and then the regular season starts, I've always felt that you get to the end of camp and you feel like, man, we haven't played enough, which to me is a trigger word of we haven't made enough decisions as a group and as a collective.

And so the first thing that came to mind is, okay, let me understand what Dar wants on both sides of the ball. And then how can I get our group to make as many decisions as possible on both sides of the ball so that once the first game comes and there's random situations and there's a variety of constraints based off of the opponent and their skillset, like how can I get our group to make the most decisions possible as a collective before our first game?

And how can I structure practice so that pretty much everything that we did from our startup practice was more development-based, more individualized development? How can we have decisions implemented into really everything that we did?

That's amazing, man. I've got so much in that. So I guess next question, and like for coaches practically, what could this look like in terms of like, were there any specific small-sided games that you guys went to? Like, what were some ways that you were able as a team to kind of foster decision-making within practice?

Yeah, so we will first kind of do more one-on-one or a player and just one weak side help and understanding that the spacing was the first key. So, okay, this is the most important spacings on the floor. You're going to be attacking from these different areas.

And instead of just doing random finishes, now it finishes from Different spots on the floor with just one weak side defender. And then the second part of our development stages was more small group. So instead of it being 1 versus 1 help defender, now it's 3 versus 2 help side defenders.

And now the spacing isn't just the corner. Now I'm receiving the pass from the slot, but I also have my teammate in the opposite corner. So I'm still thinking about finishing, but now I'm reading at least one guy on the weak side. And And implementing passing and respacing as well.

And that pretty much was all based out of the offensive structure, which was 5-out, which is how we wanted to play. But what finish you used was up to how much of an advantage do you have. Is the weak side defender a big or is it a smaller guy?

There were so many varieties of ways that could happen that dictate which finish, but the goal was— Sprint to these spots, play out of the closeout, and once you're in the paint, make that decision with a teammate. And that was kind of the start of practice, first 30 minutes every day.

So what did you notice, just like, because obviously this is this type of approach, it's brand new, right? It's not really been done yet in the NBA level. So, you know, what did you notice with the players just in terms of like their skillful behaviors and how they adapted during the whole process from the first day of practice to the last game?

Like, what did you notice through practicing this way?

I really just felt you had a— it was easy to see what patterns emerged. Specific players really good at driving this direction, or specific players really struggle at paint decisions when it's crowded. And instead of trying to go in and say what I think the focus is, well, I allowed the theme to emerge amongst this group because this group is different than our main team.

And so instead of wasting time emphasizing a a checklist of things that I think will be important. It really gave me a chance to be better at observing, okay, what is happening over and over? Like, man, we're really good at playing out of the closeout, so I don't have to spend time talking about an area that we're really good at.

So I just thought it allowed me to observe common themes.

I love that. Such a great response. I think just the biggest strength is JD is by playing more representative in a more representative environment, it's so much easier as a coach to actually observe the behaviors. And I think it's when, like, exactly like you alluded to, then how you respond to that, it's actually based on what they need the most versus, like you said, wasting time going to something which might not even be relevant.

So I mean, I'd love—

it kind of flows into the next one. So something I hear a lot is this is a very difficult approach to implement. It's very difficult to get coaches is understanding this. So I know during Summer League you were actually— you organized— it was amazing.

We had an educational session where we were just a roundtable, and we were— I came in, we were just sharing ideas, talking about skill acquisition. And I just thought it was amazing how you use Summer League as a format to develop your staff.

But what were some of the conversations you had with your assistants during that process to kind of get them familiar with this approach and then actually be able to do it?

Yeah, well, kind of once I identified— to stick to offense, for example— just my base principles of how we Wanted to play offense, wanted to be able to attack in the first 5 seconds of the clock. I wanted to make sure we created an advantage, and then I wanted to emphasize multiple actions.

So once I kind of let the staff know, like, hey, there's the 5,000 things that may happen. If we can be spaced and ready to attack in 5 seconds, if we can emphasize, did we create an advantage? If we didn't, I don't care what else happened.

We need to emphasize why didn't we? But first we have to teach how do we create an advantage? And then if the ball is stagnant, well, did we get multiple actions? And if we didn't, what actions have we taught? How can we retrieve what we've already worked on?

And but I think kind of giving them a framework of, okay, getting to the corner is important because again, for us to be spaced and attack in the first 5 seconds, this is what we have to do to be successful. And then what was the end part of the question?

Just getting the staff like on board with this approach, just introducing them to You know, without even having to go into the CLA, just before this we spoke about how do we start in an NBA setting? What's the first thing we talk about?

And we both had variability as our answer. So it's like, is that kind of actually how you framed it to the staff, or did you actually talk about the CLA, small-sided games? Was it in them, like in a meeting before the first practice?

I kind of framed it in the general sense of we won't have enough practice time to do a bunch of drills. And so because we don't want to overload their bodies and practice for 3 hours, how do we maximize and have an intent with everything that we do?

Because if it doesn't involve some type of decision or something that they're reading, it's not really going to correlate to the game. And basically making sure that they knew that anything that we did from a practice standpoint, I wanted it to have some type of game model.

something they're going to see and some type of decision. And when you kind of break down like, hey, how many decisions can we get them to make? No one really fought back because ultimately, like, the best players have the ability to make decisions regardless of the challenge in front of them.

Like, they have an answer for it. So that was really kind of how I started, was just saying, hey, I want to emphasize maximizing how many decisions can we get them to make in a day.

That's such a great way to frame it. And I think it's all for coaches who are interested in applying these ideas. I think it's all how you approach it and the message that you present in terms of why this approach is just so effective.

And I think what you just alluded to there, you hit the nail on the head. So, I mean, on the flip side now, were there any real challenges that kind of emerged in terms of being able to do this and create those representative learning environments where players are making decisions?

Like, You know, were there any players that were maybe uncomfortable doing something that was quite foreign to them within a traditional landscape?

I could tell just as I watched the body language of players and even staff, there was a discomfort when I wasn't stopping every mistake. And so I knew going into certain drills, here are the 2 things that I'm observing, and this is the emphasis of what we're working on.

And if there's other things that— and I've tried to kind of get the staff to recognize, like, hey, There's going to be a teaching component, but once it becomes performing and they're out there playing live, I don't want to be stopping every possession for everything.

And I think that that was difficult for some to see a couple of mistakes, and I don't just blow the whistle and stop and address everything. But also sometimes not having enough observation time. I may stop because I saw a pattern and not having enough time to see the improvement because kind of either have to get to the next drill.

Or we have a game the next day. And even from a training camp and in between games, there wasn't really a lot of time to go from camp and introducing this format or philosophy of thinking and operating to game and then going back to the practice environment.

So I would say those 2 things specific to just that observation time.

Fantastic. So JD, something else I know that you really kind of believe in is the importance of the mental performance side of the game. And I think especially with everything that we've spoken about today in terms of the importance of players consistently making great decisions.

And, you know, when we look at how important mental performance is and how that obviously affects that, what were some of the things you guys did in Summer League to emphasize kind of this field of basketball?

No, that's a good question. So one, anytime you go into Summer League, you kind of can already predict that there's going to be some version of performance anxiety. You have rookies first time performing at the NBA level. Especially with our organization and the attention that we get knowing that we're on ESPN.

And then you may have returners who are feeling as though, okay, for me to crack the lineup, I gotta show some progression. And then even as a staff, every staff member has a role that is a little bit increased. Again, with our main team, I'm the assistant.

Summer league, I'm the head coach. And one thing that allows anxiety to settle sometimes is just basic breathing. And so teaching guys how to be present. So we started every practice With the breathing exercise. One, because in the midst of competition, a lot of players don't have the ability to slow their heart rates down.

It's a lot harder to make decisions when I'm breathing sporadically, my heart rate is high, and it's also hard to think and be present when my breath is super high-paced. And so just trying to give them, again, baseline tools to settle themselves emotionally.

And I thought it's funny, I was talking with Max Christie today because I remember, I think it was our second game of Summer League. He kind of had a rough start, and then I watched him after a timeout just taking like 2 really deep breaths, and he ended up having a really good game the rest of the game.

We ended up winning. But to watch someone kind of take something that— again, I didn't have a whole lot of time to dive deep into it, but we would start every practice and then pregame as well, we did the same thing of just allowing them to settle themselves mentally.

I thought was really, really important because we know the environmental constraints change from our practice facility to Thomas and Mack that's packed house. And the individual constraint of my confidence and practice is going to be one thing, but when I step into this new arena, how can I be as present as possible?

I love that example. And I think just getting Ural's constraints model alluding to, you know, environmental, individual task constraints, I think that's it. Because so many practitioners, they ask me, you know, why do I need to understand theory? Why is understanding this relevant?

But exactly like you just said, an awareness of the theory, it changes how you see the game, and then it changes, right, those organizational processes that you implement because of that. I mean, just on that note, is that kind of how you view the theory and the importance of, you know, understanding actually what constraints are and the influence they have in shaping movement skills in basketball?

And would you recommend to other coaches that it's actually worth the time investing in trying to learn about some of this stuff.

Yeah, and even for me, I'm still, still learning, still trying to gain a better understanding, to be honest. So I wouldn't even speak from as if I'm an expert, but I do think the understanding of the different constraints allows you to see what may impact the skill and the development or the performance.

Because you may think that it's only the individual and it's just the individual isn't good enough, and it's like, well, Maybe the environment. We haven't given them a variety of environments to develop in, or we haven't given them enough different tasks so that when performance happens and the game presents a different situation, well, we have to give them a variety of things to develop within.

It may not just be on the player. And so I think it, for me, challenges me to not just put the onus on the player to either perform or not perform. But it gives me some form of a variety of checklists to see like, okay, have I changed and manipulated these different areas often and allowed them to execute in those different pockets of constraints as well?

That's a great point. Like, especially if you're not experiencing these things and your players are just in a traditional environment, it's— you're basically leaving development up to chance or just hoping that they encounter those decisions in the game. And they can cope with it, right?

Whereas, you know, if you're actually hitting these things in practice, you can actually create these decisions, AKA affordances. You could design them in the practice and players can encounter maybe more in one practice session than what they would maybe do in 6 months if they were only experiencing that within the game, right?

And I think that's exactly the importance of it.

To your point, there was a workout this morning. A player was going through a shooting drill and I could watch him struggling. Struggling both mentally, body language kind of was declining, and then he missed 7 or 8 in a row. And then I watched him again take a deep breath, center himself, and I asked him, what was your internal dialogue while you missed the 7 to 10 straight?

And like most athletes, it's terrible. You're talking reckless to yourself. And for me, being able to make athletes aware of the external environment that we see— crowd, Practice facility, family, whatever. But then also the internal environment that we can control and how to educate them on control that internal dialogue, because you can't really control the crowd noise.

You can be aware of it. I can put you in different situations, but the one environment that you can somewhat manage on your own is that internal one. And a lot of times that one shifts us from on the performance scale.

Yeah.

Whether that's playing well or not so well based off of how was our internal dialogue.

Fantastic stuff. So I want to finish just with this question, JD. I mean, every kind of guest that I'm getting on the podcast, they all share one thing in common. And I think that's a deep kind of intrinsic motivation to learn and have a level of curiosity in whatever field kind of the guests are that are coming on the podcast.

So I know you do a lot of learning and it's something you're really passionate about. I mean, what's the biggest kind of focus area for you over the next season in terms of something that you want to take a deeper dive in, or maybe something you've been doing already?

I know you mentioned you're doing your master's, which I think is fascinating. So what's your kind of intent in that regard over the next season?

Yeah, I would say 2. One, until I have my PhD and I'm an official clinician, bridging that gap between athlete and clinician, right? There's a space that we're in now where the athlete is being more vocal than ever about Things that they may be dealing with mentally on or off the floor.

And then we have some of the smartest clinicians in the world that are engaged with our sport. Sometimes the struggle is that gap of the information and the athlete that needs it. So for me, how do I stand in that gap and have the relationship with the athlete, but also have a baseline of information and a relationship with the clinician to where now we can provide that support?

And then 2, I kind of mentioned it earlier. Being a much better observer. Sometimes there's specific skill sets that we want to attain as coaches, but for me, just being an elite observer, because now I'll be able to suggest things that are consistently happening and not just speak on something that I see in the moment just to have my voice heard.

And not saying that I did that before, but I think I'll be a much better asset if I have an elite ability to truly observe What's happening in front of me, because we've all seen it. Halftime happens and we're frustrated about a specific play, but if you take a step back and when you watch the game again, you realize like, dang, that didn't really happen that much.

And in the moment, I was charged up and I went into the locker room and I addressed the group, but then now when I go back and look at the film, it didn't happen. And so if there's one or two bullets I could save Dar from using because I'm a better observer and I can give him some suggestions.

Hopefully that trickles down to players being a little more calm or a little more present and ultimately maybe 1 or 2 wins over the course of the year.

That's so good. It's the, like, those observational skills I think are the most important, especially when you're using a constraints-led approach because it's unpredictable. We never know quite what may happen. We might even have the same small-sided game with very similar or the same task constraints.

But each time we do it, something different might emerge. And then the only way we can respond to that, like you said, it's observing it and then knowing, all right, if we're going to change this constraint, manipulate this, maybe, you know, this is going to happen.

And that can only happen with great observational skills. JD, I just want to say thanks again for coming on the podcast. For me, it was just— I loved listening to all the nuggets that you shared today and just can't wait to keep hearing about you know, how you're applying these ideas in your, in your practice.

No, absolutely. I appreciate you for having me. And again, I'm still learning, and as we all should be, just trying to extract a little more information as we can each day.

Thanks again for coming on the podcast.

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