<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">With his back to the basket, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar takes a quick right-handed dribble. Then swiftly turns to his left as his outside arm follows the lead of a ball that is ascending toward the sky as the rest of his body begins to form into a shot that continues to marvel the world of sports. The skyhook. There is nothing like it. No one has done it to the perfection that he did. It is the most unstoppable shot in basketball history and no one uses it. It?s apparent the skyhook shot has virtually vanished from existence, thus leaving everyone from John Wooden to Abdul-Jabbar contemplating why. There were a lot of skyhook shooters before the Abdul-Jabbar era, such as George Mikan and Clifford Hagan, but Abdul-Jabbar was the last of them. He took the skyhook shot from his predecessors and shot it to another level. Indefensible he made it, as he made it his own. Jerry West and Bill Walton agree opponents cannot defend the skyhook. And they shake their heads as current basketball players continue to drive to the basket, shoot out-of-range shots and play outside the fundamentals of the game. Today?s game is far from how these two Hall-of-Famers played it. That alone has facilitated the loss of the most amazing shot in basketball. ?You look at today?s game,? said Walton, a two-time NBA champion. ?Guys want to dribble a hundred times and then jack up an ill-advised triple clutch impossible to define spinner or an ill-advised three-pointer. So where?s the team game, where?s the fundamentals, where?s the feeding the post, where?s the execution at the perfect opportunity?? That is one of the reasons the skyhook has been pushed away from the game of basketball, according to Walton. And West?s opinion is pretty much the same. ?Today everybody wants to dribble and do jump shots all day,? said West, who is also an NBA champion. ?The greatest shot in the history of this game was Abdul-Jabbar's. It was unstoppable. You could not guard it. It was just incredible how he could do it. And you would think that some young big kid would learn to do something like that. But for whatever reason, they forgot.? ?The shot is almost extinct and you wonder why sometimes,? West said. Abdul-Jabbar believes the skyhook?s turn toward extinction started taking place just before he began playing at the high school level, thinking he picked it up right at its last moment of vitality. As players became more skilled, they became more aggressive in attacking the basket as the game began to spark images of what it has evolved into today. ?In the 50?s a lot of people used it, especially in college. And the whole practice of getting closer to the basket for higher percentage shots was a lot more involved than it is now,? said the Hall-of-Famer Abdul-Jabbar. Abdul-Jabbar was taught the skyhook shot by a young man in his parish while in fifth grade. He practiced it habitually from that point on. ?After a week or two of practicing it, I pretty much had the mechanics of the footwork down, in a primitive way, but I had it down,? he said. </div> link: http://www.hoopshype.com/articles/jabbar_stitt.htm
It wasn't quite undefendable though. If you could bring the shooter off-balance, the shot wouldn't be quite as accurate. Also, the block sequence of Chamberlain on Kareem's sky-hooks is legendary.
Heres some clips of Patrick O'Bryant's sky hook fro msummer league: http://youtube.com/watch?v=Omtrvo7l6Wo&sea...ck%20o%27bryant Hes probably already got one of the best sky hoosk in the league, granted its still no where near Kareem's it seems to be pretty effective for him and should be just as effective in the NBA since he's got a 9'4 standing reach.
To answer the question: cuz it's really a cheezy/sissy looking move. It's still the best go to move in history but a lot of players are reluctant to do it because of their image. It's like shooting FTs underhanded. Back then when wearing short-shorts was acceptable, nobody cared that you shot FTs underhanded or that you did a sky-hook a 1000x. <div class="quote_poster">Quoting Phuzer:</div><div class="quote_post">It wasn't quite undefendable though. If you could bring the shooter off-balance, the shot wouldn't be quite as accurate. Also, the block sequence of Chamberlain on Kareem's sky-hooks is legendary.</div>Another way to defend it is to have a help defend come from behind and block it. It's not guaranteed to work every time but after a while the player has to worry about the help defender and that makes it a bit tougher to execute.
Most guys don't know how to do it, or if they do they can't do it well and don't feel it's an effective enough shot for them to be taking.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting og15:</div><div class="quote_post">Most guys don't know how to do it, or if they do they can't do it well and don't feel it's an effective enough shot for them to be taking.</div> Yup. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> To answer the question: cuz it's really a cheezy/sissy looking move. It's still the best go to move in history but a lot of players are reluctant to do it because of their image. It's like shooting FTs underhanded.</div> Yup. It has that sort of flare to it that just makes it look too... "elegant" and I think this turns off someplayers so they don't add it to their arsenal. So if it isn't part of their repertoire, how are they gonna use it?
Well, we may see the return of the sky-hook thanks to Andrew Bynum. KAJ is coaching him, and from what I have heard, he is really trying to help Bynum master that move.
It's hard as hell. It's all well and good if you've done it since the fifth grade like Kareem, but if you're a 20-something player you probably don't have the time or motivation to spend hours in the gym working on a sky hook instead of perfecting your jump shot.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Bahir:</div><div class="quote_post">I hope Andrew Bynum can bring it back to life.</div> Don't get your hopes up
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Run BJM:</div><div class="quote_post">Heres some clips of Patrick O'Bryant's sky hook fro msummer league: http://youtube.com/watch?v=Omtrvo7l6Wo&sea...ck%20o%27bryant Hes probably already got one of the best sky hoosk in the league, granted its still no where near Kareem's it seems to be pretty effective for him and should be just as effective in the NBA since he's got a 9'4 standing reach.</div> I didn't know POB had college three point range. Nice!
It is a move that coaches should be teaching youngsters, but I assume a good number of coaches do not really understand how it works. I am 5'8, but I am able to use it effectively in games sometimes. One of the things that makes it effective is your shoulders separate your shooting hand from your opponent. I remeber watching Andrew Bynum in the McDonald's game 2 years ago, he did a pretty sky hook, and I instantly thought the guy had potential based on one sky hook. One thing people and players seem to forget is that Kareem was able to play till he was in his 40's mainly because of the ease of using the sky hook.
Another thing people tend to forget is that KAJ could actually sky-hook with both of his hands. THAT made the move so effective, but it required years of practice... Apparently he had enough time to practice the move that well. Or he was born with a sky-hook gift.
That move was so effective, if I was able to make the NBA as a center, I don't care how lame it looked or how long it took to learn, that would be my goal to learn... Here's to hoping that Bynum can learn!
