BLOB Box Cross

A box is the easiest baseline out-of-bounds alignment to teach, because every player starts on a line they can find without thinking. This version runs the two bigs against each other and then gives the inbounder somewhere safe to throw it.

5 screens across the lane, 4 walks his defender up and then cuts underneath to the ball-side block. While that happens, 2 screens 5 and he pops out to the wing as the safety. The inbounder passes and steps in.

The read

The inbounder has two seconds and two options, in order.

If the cross screen works, 4 is on the block with position and the pass goes in low. If the defense switches or fights through it, the man coming out to the wing is open, because his defender has just been screened watching something else.

There is always somewhere to throw it. That is what stops five-second calls.

Teaching it

Cross screens get called for fouls more than any other screen in a baseline set, because the screener drifts into the defender as the cutter leaves. Set the feet, take the contact, do not chase.

The cutter’s setup is what makes it work. Walking the defender up two steps before cutting underneath is what creates the angle, and players who cut straight from their starting spot never get separation.

Practice the entry pass itself. A bounce pass to the block under a defender’s arms is a different throw from a chest pass, and it needs reps.