On defense or offense?

For defense in a 5 on 5 game:

If the guy is smaller and quicker than I am I will try to do a few things:
1) Stay in front by anticipating the spot he's gonna go to and cheating off a bit.
2) Try to bait him into a long or mid-range 2.
3) Contest the shot even though I'm never close enough to block it - if possible get as much of my hand in between his eyes and the basket.

If I know he's a good 3 point shooter or I find that out, then I essentially front his 3 shot and take it away and make him go to wherever I think our D is better. If I'm guarding this guy for the whole game, I let my team know what I'm doing or I switch up taking away the 3 and giving up the 3, kind of dancing back and forth just a bit to keep him off balance.

If the guy is bigger than me I do a mini-fist pump b/c I really like playing guys bigger than I am.

1) I won't let them set up on the block when running downcourt.
2) If they get kind of set up I may decide not to front, but I probably try to front.
3) I try to keep them off balance by applying pressure somewhere on a part of their body I don't intend to guard. (Like if I expect a move to their right, I cheat that way but put pressure on their other side to entice them).
4) I body "foul" at several points when they have the ball but they are dubious fouls that can't or don't get called in pickup. This is also called "being physical" except I don't try to go strength vs. strength or play them straight up in the mismatch.

I wish I knew more "dirty" type things to get people more off balance or hook without them realizing it or whatever. But I don't even know how to do these things and don't commit almost any fouls not on the actual shot release. So when I say "foul" above, it's not something that gets called, but I say that b/c if the player was releasing his shot, it probably would get called. If that makes sense. But I don't know how to truly shove, hook, step on feet, set a nasty screen on purpose, etc. It may sound bad but some of those things I wish I knew b/c I'm pretty sure it happens to me in games and is never called.

On offense in a mismatch I usually pass the ball or spaz out with some post move and get a maybe okay shot off, lol. But then I get the offensive rebound so it's okay, .

It's pretty discouraging to think I'm already using 80% of my muscle .

Ok, ok. I know I'm a novice, but I am not a novice at doing dumbell lifting things so I was hoping a bit more would translate. If anything, I think it's made progressing a bit harder as I'm just not used to using all those other muscles that weren't getting worked out in isolation.

Dave Tate said he was using 50% of his when he was squatting something like 860. That's probably a conservative estimate, but I doubt you're using much over 50% yet. I think your gf is using less % than that for sure.

8/17 log

Went to the chiro. I swear he's doing more and more ART each time. I want it all and all right now! Lol.

It's funny the most painful thing he does has to do with the hip of my right leg (my left is the one messed up and my neck is what's crooked structurally). Man...

I also heard a cool story about Joe Nathan and graston.

I went to the gym and there were people to play bball with! I was quite out of shape and was blown by the end of the 1st game, so I blame that for the 3rd game results:

First two games we played 2vs.2. Me and this guy a bit older than me vs. two guys who just graduated HS. Both much more athletic than us (especially my teammate).

We killed them in the first game. I was killing down low offensively for like 3 straight baskets and then my opponent blocked my move (I still don't have good counter moves or fakes ) so the rest of the time I was MUCH more tentative. *sigh*

In the second game we barely won. I really struggled to dominate offensively. I of course shredded them on the boards, but man, it seems I need to be able to do more offensively against guys who I can just manhandle in terms of body positioning. Who cares that they can almost dunk and I can't touch the rim.

Third game two more guys joined. They chose "the tall guy" lol and my free rebounds ended. We *barely* lost that game. I got the offensive rebound on our 3 to win (next basket would win) and then turned right into a guy on the other team. Kind of flukey and I was frustrated but, meh.

Brag: After this game "the tall guy" (not that tall, maybe 6'2" I dno) specifically came up to me and said he basically never has played with anyone who has blocked him out that consistently.

Beat: He probably hasn't played anyone I'd consider *good* (hint: I don't consider myself good).

Variance: We lost anyway.

I thought I told you the Joe Nathan story. I know I told Greek. That's really cool that he got Nathan almost 100% healthy that quickly after Tommy John surgery.

Yesterday when I was there, I told him my left shoulder was all messed up. He worked on both and seemed to find more stuff in the right one than the left. A lot of times, stuff is wrong that we dont notice, but he does.

Yeah. I think he does notice a lot of stuff. I mean, it isn't quite as efficient, but just saying nothing, ever, and just doing what he says will get the same results imo. I'd like to think I'm being helpful with my feedback but, ehhhhh, he finds so much else, lol.

My g/f is somewhat skeptical of the whole thing. But I can't imagine any other process to try and fix my leg would have been less expensive. And likely less effective. If you told me it would take $X,XXX to get my leg and neck fixed 100%, I'd probably begrudgingly do it anyway. So, this should help with even more and while not 100%, also shouldn't be surgery or "real medicine" type #s. I'm somewhat convinced that a PT alone won't be able to help me fix those things based on the types of things I've tried the last 2 years.

Were those kids on their hs basketball team? You'd be pretty damn good in my book if you beat two hs bballers with a random out of shape guy.

My experience with PTs says they are about 1% as effective as Dr K.

I cancelled my next PT appointment because he's given me nothing I wasnt already doing on my own except for stuff that McGill says is either useless or bad.

So at a public HS like they just graduated from, I am almost positive neither are on the Varsity squad. Maybe 1 of them was on JV but my guess is that they simply are guys who have played a lot of pickup.

No way I'm beating two Varsity public school HSers with that guy on my team.

The Italian kid I played 1on1 a few weeks ago *did* play on his HS team. I assume Varsity. He is way better than me, and the guys I was playing with. I'm happy with going toe-to-toe for much of a 1 on 1 game vs. a HS Varsity stud though imo. Even if it's a HS in Italy, .

8/18 log

Did rolling/mobility/activation. The activation stretch for my quad zinged my problem area in my left leg more than last time I did the stretch but not much more. However, on spidermans holy crap I was feeling a lot of zingyness in my left leg. Not sure if that's good or bad. My chiro hasn't really told me if it's good or bad when I bring it up. I guess it's just supposed to get better the more my muscles get repaired.

Box squats
45x5x2
60x5
90x3
120x2
150x5x3

My speed was a bit better on my work set than last time. My g/f said my knee cave is WAY better than it used to be and there is only a very little wobbliness on my last set. I'd move up but I'm still not getting from sitting to standing as explosively as I'd like.

Bench
45x5x2
75x5
105x3
135x2
152.5x5x2
141.25x2 (one side of the bar wasn't loaded with 8.75 pounds, lol)
152.5x5 (I got it anyway, new PR wooo!)

Bench felt really good today. I think I failed at 150 last time but said "f it" b/c I did 150 the time before that and then got sick or whatever.

I just realized this means my bench is higher than my squat (box squat though). Does this mean I'm as ripped as busto yet? (lolz)

Planks
15 seconds x 5
15 seconds x 4
15 seconds x 3
15 seconds x 2
15 seconds x 1

Supersetted with Pullthroughs:
27.5x10
52.5x10
52.5x10
57.5x10
57.5x10

My g/f did:

LBBS
24x5x3
45x3
60x2
80x5x3 (PR as she finally was "ok" increasing. Made it look easy imo)

Bench
24x5x3
45x3
55x2
62.5x5x3 (PR)

She may or may not have done 5 reps on her last bench set. I am notorious for not counting (just as Cha) and thought she did 4. So she probably did 5. We're counting it.

My only real question right now is that this workout is taking ~2 hours from beginning to end. Which is just sooooo Fing long. I would say we could go somewhat faster I guess during the lifts but we're not just hanging out, we're setting up the new weight, doing a set, setting up the new eight, doing a set, etc.

What can we do to reduce the time this is taking? Less mobility? Fewer warmup sets? Any other tips?

Time yourself between sets to make sure you don't go too long. At this stage you shouldn't need much more than 3-4 mins between sets. I wouldn't skimp on the mobility work or warmup sets. It just takes a bit longer with two people too, at least if you need to share the same rack, bench etc. From experience it's 15-25 mins longer, partially due to breaks naturally stretching out a bit.

My workouts generally take two hours too. I take 5 mins between most sets though, and generally use 20-25 mins warming up and doing mobility work. Plus I don't care too much if I spend a bit too long due to socializing.

I feel we've cut most of the "fat" out of waiting in between sets. We're pretty efficient and don't rest at all between warmup sets (the rest is setting up the other person's weight and getting set up).

We definitely don't rest even 3 or 4 minutes between sets. Maybe I do between work sets sometimes if I'm really lagging. I'd say we wait ~1-2 minute between warmup sets tops (60 secs to set up new set, 30 seconds for new set). For work sets maybe we spend ~3 minutes between sets. Mayyyyybe 4+ every once in a while if someone comes up and talks with us or we get into a conversation.

I just did some calculations on base time necessary:
8 sets squats
8 sets press
5 sets DL
2 people
37 total sets @ 30 seconds a set = 92:30 which is over 1.5 hours.

@#$@#. I swear when my friend talked me into SS he said at the beginning just the lifting takes only like 30 minutes. Which is obviously wrong as 50% of 92:30 != 30 mins.

This seems spot on though as mobility/activation type stuff takes like 15-20 mins and there's probably 10 extra minutes of deadish time in between everything.

My g/f doesn't even roll at the gym but I do before she gets there so I really take like 2.5 hours maybe - 6-8:30.

My big worry is that this is simply something we won't be willing to sustain long-term. Too much time - it completely obliterates our evenings after work.

Too lazy to do the math, hopefully you did it right

Anyway, you won't be on SS forever and some intermediate programs take less time. Personally I don't see it as a time sink since I enjoy my time in the gym and socializing with my friends and other guys there. I can see that not everyone would have that view though.

Meh. The gym's alright. I'm much more willing to have 2-3 hour workouts with Cha since it really feels like socializing, fun, and worth the extra time (plus it's 40 mins drive each way).

My g/f and I see each other plenty since we live together so extra time together in the gym to talk isn't valuable in comparison to the other time we spend together and while I do talk a bit with ppl in the gym I like to be mainly business and efficient and then go have my life elsewhere.

I know from history I like lifting weights enough to hopefully stick with it, but I don't like them enough for it to be my main hobby of all time. Maybe my primary one from time to time.

I dont have an opinion on this.

Aside from my rehab stuff, I generally work out for a couple hours at least, and then rest 1 - 3 days.

You'll figure out what works best/is most enjoyable for you.