Kobe Bryant Shooting Form: Breaking Down Kobe’s Shot

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In my last post, I covered Stephen Curry’s shooting form and talked about what makes him a deadly 3-point shooter.

In this post I’m going to break down Kobe’s shooting form.

I decided to talk about it because, in my opinion, Kobe (may his soul rest in peace) is one of the greatest shooters of all time.

He played in the NBA for more than 20-years and his long lasting career is an evidence of just how good he was.

Even in his last years (before he retired), the Black Mamba was still considered to be one of the best players in the league.

In this post I’m going to talk about one technique that Kobe used to improve his shot dramatically which helped him become one of the best clutch scorers of all time.

Ready?

Let’s get to it.

Kobe’s Evolution Into A Pure Shooter

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Signature shot

In his first years as a rookie, Kobe was in fact mostly known for his athleticism, as he used to go to the basket A LOT, and he really loved finishing with authority dunks.

I remember as a teenager, me and my friends used to get together and watch Kobe and Shaq and all the highlights they provided during their years together.

At that time, Kobe was providing a lot of highlights inside the paint and was tenacious for getting to the rim.

But as time went by, Kobe gradually started to develop more of a shooter personality, and more of his points started coming from actually taking shots and less from penetrating.

Today Kobe has the reputation of a pure shooter, his lifetime percentage of 84% from the free-throw line clearly shows that he was a quality shooter.

But how did Kobe get so good at shooting?

Watch this video that explains the evolution of his game and the changes he had to make in order to improve his shot.

So as you can see there’s a few reasons why Kobe got dramatically better in shooting the ball, but perhaps the most prominent one is this – the finger.

The Finger

The finger is the first thing we notice which Kobe did differently. He held his index finger after he shot the ball.

If you haven’t noticed it by now it’s because you didn’t look deep enough.

Anyway, this is something Kobe did not invent, he actually took it from someone else.

Can you guess who?

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Holding the finger

You guessed it… MJ (Michael Jordan).

If you’ve watched the video above, you’d see the footage of Jordan doing it too. Thumbs up for Kobe for copying from the best.

The reason he does it is that the index finger is the straightest finger we have in our hand, and if we use it right when we shoot, we can make our shot go straighter.

Basically Kobe used the index finger to avoid shooting sideways and keeping his shot straight.

Here’s the thing though… you have to use the finger correctly to be able to rip the benefit from this method.

How?

You have to make sure that the ball rolls off your index finger.

A lot of you already know that, but what you don’t know is that once you follow through with your shot, the index finger should end up over and through the rim, otherwise it won’t work.

So, to sum things up, what you should do is simply hold your finger over and through rim, and that will help you facilitate your ability to become a straight shooter.

Remember, a quality shooter is a straight shooter.