Have you ever wondered just How Do Professional Basketballers get so good? Those players at the top of this sport have some crazy skills, and because of this, they can earn some crazy money. Do you have aspirations to one day make it, and become a professional like Lebron, Steph Curry, or Giannis Antetokounmpo? If this is your dream it’s going to take a lot of hard work, with constant training outside of your regular team coaching, and most importantly you need to have the passion and the drive to make it.

Current professional basketballers have regimented training sessions 7 days a week, involving focussed gym sessions, skills practice, drill practice, learning set plays, and learning regimented dietary requirements. But they have help, from all sorts of the coaching staff to keep them doing what they’re doing. But even when they finish all this work for the day, the best will still do even more to try and further themselves and become the best that they can be.

If you want to try and hone your skills but don’t have an entire team of expert assistants to guide you yet, then perhaps you can start with a few of the drills below. All you need is a basketball and a clean flat surface, such as an indoor or outdoor sports court. If you happen to be lucky enough to have your own home basketball court even better, but the main thing is that the ball bounces properly.

Dribbling Exercises using a Single Ball

Low Dribbling – Aiming to improve your “handles”: Stand with your feet a little further apart than shoulder-width, and begin dribbling the ball around and through your legs in a figure 8 pattern. The better you get the faster you can go. You may need to watch what you’re doing, to begin with, but over time you should keep your head up and not look down. Do this for about 30 seconds at a time.

Crossover Dribbling

To improve your touch and will come in handy when you try to evade your opponents and “break ankles”. From standing still and bouncing the ball from one hand to the other at about a 90-degree angle, and as hard and fast as possible. Ensure you are bent over the ball and when you get comfortable you can try incorporating this with lunges and bouncing the ball through your legs. It’s also important to do this drill with your head up, but it may take you a while to get to this skill level. Do this for 30 seconds and repeat about 10 times or more.

Dribbling Exercises using Two Balls

Crossover Hold double Basketball Dribbling – This will really help you with your hand-eye coordination. With one ball held to your belly with one hand, use your free hand to dribble the other ball. Then crossover the ball being dribbled, and quickly switch hands, so that you can intercept the ball being crossed over with the hand you were using to hold the ball against you. At the same time, the hand you were originally using to dribble now needs to quickly catch and continue to hold the ball against your stomach. Continue to alternate hands and increase the speed of the crossovers as you progress with this skill.

Alternating Circle double Basketball Dribbling 

You may have seen some NBA players use this drill as a part of their pre-game warm-up. This is an advanced drill so you’re best to start this off slowly. Taking a low stance bounce two balls simultaneously on each side of your body using each hand. On every second or third bounce you will need to feed one ball through your legs going from back to front, but ensuring the same ball returns to the same hand each time. When you begin you can just get it right with your preferred hand, but to progress this skill you’ll need to alternate hands each time. Given the complexity of this exercise, it might be best to keep an eye on what you’re doing until you get the hang of it. Once you do, you should be able to keep your head up, and then go quicker! up!

If you’ve watched any basketball documentaries of how the best got to be where they are is hard work. Constant repetition of exercises like these and there are so many variations on these exercises that are sure to keep you working towards your goal. You can also practice many of these with your friends and make a game out of it, or even better, install your own home basketball court and show your skills to your friends!