Basketball Bliss Point

What makes a great offensive possession?

This is something I get asked often, as someone who is somewhat of a curator of beautiful offense from around the world. On one hand, what is really good might be subjective and even somewhat ethereal and tough to nail down. On the other hand, it is something I think can be evaluated with some level of methodology.

To set this up, we of course need to start with food science and the consumable product development industry. Seriously, just follow me for a second.

In food science, there is a concept called the “bliss point.” The bliss point is like a three-way venn diagram with sweetness, saltiness, and richness (or fat), and when something lands in the perfect convergence of those three things–it’s scientifically going to be delicious (to 99.99% of people). The concept of the bliss point started as theoretical, but food scientists were actually able to nail down the actual concentrations of these three elements of taste, and find the allowable ranges of those three things that make something outrageously tasty. As you can probably guess, this data has been used in part for evil, making scientifically addictive foods that are not enriching to the human body. So, perhaps I shouldn’t be using the concept to compare it to the beautiful game of basketball–but ever since I learned of the bliss point concept it has remained stuck in my head and my “basketball bliss point” is something I have thought about extensively.

Something I also like about the concept of the bliss point is that it isn’t an exact ratio and something needs to be exactly this salty and exactly this sweet, but it allows for the ranges of the other two elements once you’ve established the main one. There is some room for flexibility, and that is also something that holds true to basketball. Not every play is going to have the exact same inputs that create greatness, or every play would look the same. There are a variety of great plays that would grade out differently, but I do think most great offensive designs fall into the “basketball bliss point.”

Before we get into the different flavors of offensive design, watch this play from Petkim. It stands as arguably my favorite possession of basketball I watched the entire season, and I think it perfectly encapsulates what I love about the European game, offensive basketball, and the basketball bliss point:

With that in mind, let’s get into the flavors of basketball bliss point.

This is semantic, but I am much more into the idea of “shape” than “spacing.” Boy, do coaches love to talk spacing! But if there is one thing I have learned from the European game, it’s that if there is real intention behind something on the offensive end, getting to the shape that accomplishes it is far more important than ideal “spacing” as drawn up on a white board to initiate the action. In this instance, Petkim’s 77 starts extremely high, with a ton of space between screeners–possibly this action was higher and wider than how the action was conceived and their “spacing” wasn’t perfect–but their shape was, and it got them the advantage they were looking to create. What is offense, but a system to create advantages.

In a perfect world, you can create a scoring opportunity right away with a single action, but if it’s not there–I want to get into a second action quickly that builds on the initial advantage. If the initial advantage wasn’t good enough to create a scoring opportunity, it inherently needs to be built on and I want to see that right away.

When you look at many of the offenses I don’t like–many of them have all kinds of false actions that isn’t putting any pressure on the rim. I never forget what the goal is of the possession–we’re trying to score, and therefore I want constant actions that could lead to a shot.

Petkim does something that’s very common right now in European basketball and it’s the exact opposite of what’s common in America–it’s a ball screen into a dribble handoff. In America, we see a lot of handoffs to initiate action before the ball screen, but in Europe it’s often the opposite. This is likely a reaction to more aggressive coverages you see in Europe, and I love it as something that compounds advantage quickly. Ideally Petkim could have got an immediate scoring opportunity from the 77, but when it’s not there they can get quickly into the handoff. Showing some support on the ball, the defender isn’t able to connect whatsoever on the handoff which makes it unimpeded and clean, and given the pace and angle it would be a difficult switch.

In order to be truly hard to guard, I do think there needs to be an element of deception where the defense doesn’t know exactly what is coming next. Building in optionality, with something as simple as setting a screen, ghosting, or slipping can add to this deception. In this Petkim possession we see two early slipouts.

Earlier I said I don’t worry about spacing as much as shape. That’s because I don’t really care about spacing at the start of the possession, but I care greatly about the spacing when it’s actually time to score. Because of that, “respacing” is something that matters greatly to me, and I always tell coaches they need to worry less about initial spacing and care more about respacing. So often in American basketball the play starts with everyone properly spaced, but then the action happens and suddenly the spacing goes wrong. To me, it’s pretty obvious that initial spacing before you’re actually trying to score doesn’t actually matter, but player placement while scoring actions are occurring is paramount. One of the most important elements of respacing is the timing of an action. Spacing can often get jumbled when movements happen too early or too late. In this Petkim example, the timing is outstanding. Watch how players that slip to the rim evaluate the space around them and time their exits meticulously.

I love a constant barrage of scoring actions that put pressure on the rim, but they can’t just be any actions–they need to connect. With Petkim here we have the 77, which flows right into the “Miami” DHO to step up, into the angled pick and pop, into that automatic slash action. The final scoring action, the 45 cut off the pop–is nothing new to anyone reading this. However, when you have a perfect balance of shape, compounding advantages, deception, respacing, timing, and connection–you get the basketball bliss point.