The Eurostep was exotic when it came to the NBA. Now it’s universal for today’s youth basketball players.
This crafty move was considered exotic when it came to the NBA two decades ago. It looked downright foreign to see a player do what Zhang described: plant one way, take one long step at full speed the other way, avoid contact and sneak around the defender for an easy layup.
.. The slow normalization of the Eurostep is obvious anytime you watch an NBA game. The last two league MVPs, James Harden and Russell Westbrook, are masters of the Eurostep. LeBron James flashing his Eurostep on the fast break turns defenders into foie gras. But the most revealing sign of the Eurostep invasion once appeared on his Instagram from someone who happens to share his name: LeBron James Jr., better known as Bronny, had the basketball world admiring his own beautiful Eurostep. He was in fifth grade.
.. “Every single trainer teaches the Eurostep,” said Josh Burr, the founder of The Skill Factory in Atlanta, where a variety of players from Harden to boys on the Southeast team have trained. “Every one of those kids can do it.”
The players and coaches at the first Jr. NBA World Championship this week say it’s almost a prerequisite for playing these days. Something that didn’t exist not so long ago has stitched itself into the fabric of the game to the point that it’s becoming impossible to envision basketball without it.
“In a year or two, it’ll be as popular as the triple threat,”
.. 2. He picks up his dribble and freezes his defender with a hard step to the left. The idea is that he’ll finish with his dominant left hand.
3. But he doesn’t. After planting his left foot, he quickly changes direction, taking a long step to the right. That creates the space for Ginobili to get around his defender for an open layup.
.. It wasn’t that way when the Lithuanian guard Sarunas Marciulionis helped import the Eurostep to the NBA in 1989. His nifty way of avoiding contact around the basket was partially inspired by the legendary Croatian player Drazen Petrovic, he said, but it didn’t stick right away in part because Marciulionis was an unlikely source of innovation.At his own Hall of Fame induction, Marciulionis called himself a “strange duck.”.. the widespread adoption of the Eurostep is such a recent development that young elite players today are being trained by coaches in their 30s and 40s who say they went their entire careers without attempting a single one. But one unexpected benefit of NBA players oversharing on Instagram is that it’s easy for anyone in the world to copy what they’re doing. A boy like Phoenix Johnson can steal Kyrie Irving’s moves, including his Eurostep, by studying him on YouTube and Instagram.
Melania Trump issues statement in support of LeBron James after president insults him
The president took to his favorite medium and attacked James’s intelligence Friday night after CNN aired an interview in which the NBA star told anchor Don Lemon that he thought Trump was trying to divide the country by using sports as a wedge.
.. “What I’ve noticed over the past few months,” James told Lemon, “is [Trump has] kinda used sports to kinda divide us, and that’s something that I can’t relate to.”
While James has not commented on Trump’s tweet, others have responded both directly and indirectly — like the first lady.
“It looks like LeBron James is working to do good things on behalf of our next generation,” said Melania Trump’s spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham. “And just as she always has, the First Lady encourages everyone to have an open dialogue about issues facing children today.”
.. During the interview, James told Lemon his first interaction with the white community was on the basketball court, where divisions melted away. “Sports has never been something that divides people,” James said.
Why LeBron James (Still) Trusts His Teammates
On the first basketball team of his life, every player went home with an MVP trophy. It’s a lesson that LeBron James has never forgotten.
But what happened that night is something that James has never forgotten: Every player on the team went home with his (or her) own MVP trophy.
.. But what most impressed John Reed, the head coach of the Summit Lake Hornets, was his precocious star player’s intuitive passing ability... “At 9 years old,” Reed said, “he knew how to pass to 7-year-olds without knocking them down.”
One of those boys, Sonny Spoon, was too young for the league and sat on the Hornets’ bench only because his dad was a team manager. He was such a pipsqueak that it was actually a problem for his teammates.
“Nobody could pass him the ball without him falling over,” McGee said.
.. LeBron James could. In one of the last games of his first season, James took it upon himself to make sure the smallest guy on the team scored.
.. The only way to get his teammate a bucket was to get creative. “He rolled him the ball on the ground,”
Laura Ingraham doesn’t really want to debate David Hogg
Ingraham’s effort to marginalize Hogg does not mean that she is afraid to debate him. Ingraham is a lawyer, and even the best lawyers — no matter how strong their arguments — would rather see cases dismissed because opponents lack standing than try to win on the merits.
Then again, we are talking about cable news, not a courtroom. Yet Ingraham — author of a book called “Shut Up and Sing” — often attacks opponents’ standing instead of their substance.
When NBA stars LeBron James and Kevin Durant suggested last month that President Trump is racist, Ingraham did not make the case that the label is unfair; she told the players to “shut up and dribble.”
.. Ingraham has taken the same approach to late-night TV host Jimmy Kimmel, a critic of Republican health-care policies.
“Leave it to the pros, Jimmy,” she said in December.