Actions Offense – Introduction

The Read and React Offense.

I am a big fan of Rick Torbett’s Read and React Offense.

For those not familiar with the Read and React Offense, it is an offensive system that teaches players how to play the game of basketball instead of a system of plays that players execute.

The offense is built on principles that dictate what the player with the ball can do and what players without the ball can do.

These principles provide freedom to the players, ensure that great spacing is maintained, and creates multiple scoring opportunities for the players.

The offense is also an excellent choice when you have a diverse skill set of players on your team, which for those like me that coach at smaller schools is essential for the success of the team.

It is taught in “layers”; different principles are available at different layers.

In the past, when I have had more experienced basketball players, it was easier to teach.

It becomes a bit challenging when, for example, your team is composed almost completely of volleyball players who just want to play with their friends.

While athletic, these players don’t put that much effort outside of practice or games into getting better, and you know what, that is all right.

Early on in my coaching career I used to fight all the things I didn’t like about our team, for example, some schools are “vacationing” schools. Whenever there is a break during the school year, be it two days or two weeks, parents and players are off on vacation, which leads to players missing practices.

It is what it is.

As coaches we need to realize that everything can’t be the way we would want it to be, and instead of fighting it, figure out a way to deal with it. The season certainly doesn’t care how many players you have, how many practices you have or how many players are missing practices.

I just deal it, treat it as a puzzle that needs to be solved.

The Actions Offense.

Why all the background? It was things like this that made the “layers” approach of teaching the Read and React Offense challenging.

I needed a way to break it down into an even simpler format, and that is where I came up with the idea of the Actions Offense.

The Actions Offense, like the Read and React Offense, starts with Spots, players start on spot and end on a spot, and can be played from any Formation, 5-Out, 4-Out 1-In, and more.

What makes the Actions Offense different from the Read and React Offense?

Instead of teaching players “layers”, players are taught “actions”.

It starts with Basic Actions.

It starts with Basic Actions.

Basic Actions are the fundamental actions players can do in the game of basketball, for example, pass, which is called a Pass Action, or dribble, which is called a Dribble Action.

Basic Actions have Triggers.

Triggers determine when a Basic Action could – not should, because there could be multiple – be executed, for example, a Cut Action can be triggered by a Pass Action.

Basic Actions have Styles, which determine how the Basic Action can be executed, for example, a Screen Action could be executed as a Flex Screen.

Level up with Advanced Actions.

Advanced Actions are variations of the Basic Actions, for example, the Drive Action is a Dribble Action, but in the direction of the basket.

Put it all together with Stacked Actions.

Stacked Actions are multiple Basic Actions or Advanced Actions that are “stacked” together for the purpose of being executed in sequence, one after the other.

For example, the Zoom Action starts with a Dribble-At Action, which triggers a Down Screen Action, which then triggers a Fill Action in the direction of the Spot vacated by the player doing the Down Screen Action.

Stacked Actions are applicable to one or more Formations.

Now I can introduce Actions to players, in the hopes that they are easier to understand than Layers.

This is a work in progress, it could be an absolute success or a miserable failure, but I am going to give it a try this season and see how it works for the team.

This is going to be resource for players and coaches.

• Actions Offense – Introduction
• Actions Offense – It Starts With Spots
• Actions Offense – Formations
• Actions Offense – Basic Actions
  • Actions Offense – Basic Actions – Pass Action
  • Actions Offense – Basic Actions – Cut Action
  • Actions Offense – Basic Actions – Fill Action
• Actions Offense – Advanced Actions
  • Actions Offense – Advanced Actions – Hand-Off Action
  • Actions Offense – Advanced Actions – Hold Action
  • Actions Offense – Advanced Actions – Relocate Action
• Actions Offense -Stacked Actions
  • Actions Offense – Stacked Actions – Laker Cut Action
  • Actions Offense – Stacked Actions – Chin Action
  • Actions Offense – Stacked Actions – Zoom Action