Modern Moves: Kyrie Irving’s hang dribble
Kyrie Irving is one of the most electrifying scorers to watch in the NBA. Defenders are forced into a Catch-22 type of situation every team he handles the ball because of the array of moves and shots he has in his repertoire. No one can combine shot-making and dribbling as efficiently or consistently as Irving.
The key with dribble moves is tricking the defender by using their uncertainty against them. It’s why the players with the best handle have so many counters to their go-to move. They combine hesitations, crossovers and tricks to get their defender off balance and scoot past them. It looks easy most of the time, because when the dribbler finally gets to his finishing move, the defender is tied up and unable to do much of anything to get in the ball-handler’s way.
The move from which all else flows for Irving is the hang dribble. Typically, it’s the move he starts his drives with, as it puts the defender off-balance before Irving goes into his next move. Because Irving can follow up with a pull-up jumper, a drive to the rim, a pass or another dribble move, that split second of off-balance uncertainty is all he needs.
You will see Irving follow up the hang dribble with a crossover quite a bit, and it’s the quickest way for him to blow by an individual defender in isolation:
What makes this combination so jolting is the stutter-step that initiates it. As a right-handed player, Irving will keep the ball in his strong hand for a half-second longer than normal, sizing up the defender’s tilt as he surveys the rest of the floor. Then he’s off.
That hesitation — or hang — leads right into a powerful crossover, as Irving bends closer to the ground and gets a head of steam toward the rim. As he drives, he begins to lean into the defender, keeping them off-balance. At that point, the defender is beat and needs help at the rim.
Matt Bonner just gives up and tries to foul here, after watching Irving dance circles around Marco Belinelli. You see the complete chaos that Irving’s handle can throw a possession into.
Early in his career, Irving consistently drew fouls on around 10 percent of his shots, according to Cleaning the Glass — numbers that put him in the upper echelon of guards in the league. As the degree of difficulty on his shot attempts went down playing next to LeBron James, so too did that number. But we still see his elite ability to finish through contact when he soars into big men for strong layups.
Another skill of Irving’s that makes the hesitation hang dribble so fearsome is his footwork, especially when he goes to the eurostep driving to the basket:
In the clip above, Irving once again takes advantage of his incredible balance and athleticism at full speed. We say that the game slows down for a lot of players, but there’s an elite few for whom it’s technically true. Guys like Irving (and James Harden and LeBron James) truly benefit from their ability to do things at full speed that others struggle to do alone in a gym.
Against Joakim Noah in this clip, Irving gets so close to the rim before he busts out the hang dribble that Noah must react to the possibility of him leaping at that point for a layup, floater or pull-up jumper. Instead of any of those things, Irving takes advantage of his last few feet of space heading to the rim to take a few extra eurosteps, gliding past Noah for a smooth layup.
Here’s what it looks like when Irving actually goes straight into the shot, like Noah may have been expecting:
Defenders must also respect the threat of Irving pulling up and shooting over them when they see his hang dribble. He shot 56 percent on pull-up jump shots last season, according to NBA.com.
His playmaking is the subject of scrutiny each season, but it’s been better with the Celtics, and it’s something defenses still must guard. He sees the floor extremely well, and while he can play single-mindedly on certain offensive possessions, Irving can still slice up a defense with his passing if they allow it.
It’s really all about buying time and space. In the second clip above, watch how Irving earns room for himself with a spin move after a weaving high pick-and-roll with Al Horford, then hangs his dribble to let the rest of the play unfold in front of him. Within that split second, Jaylen Brown cuts to the rim, as the defense scrambles to recover onto Irving. He hits Brown for an easy layup.
These are the kind of passes that Irving has learned to make since his heavy isolation days in Cleveland at the start of his career. He buys himself time with his strong handle, and launches smart passes. Boston’s offense features more player and ball movement, and Irving’s skill set makes it more dynamic.
Altogether, it’s Irving’s creativity that makes him elite as a scorer. He can do a lot of things incredibly well, and the hang dribble is the go-to move that sets up so much of his offense.
He changes the complexity of a game when he catches fire. An Irving heat check is a teetering dribble drive on the verge of a spinout. Except he doesn’t check his heat, he strokes it. The shots seemingly always go in.
Irving scores 8.4 points per game on drives while dishing about an assist per game, truly elite numbers considering he has the highest field goal percentage of the top five scorers off drives in the league. Though the Celtics offense has changed, Irving’s ability to drive and create good shots has allowed Boston to weather the departures of three starters, as well as Gordon Hayward in the season premiere.
Next: The Encyclopedia of Modern Moves
Before that, he played in three straight NBA Finals next to LeBron James, using the terrifying hang dribble to set up a 3-pointer over Stephen Curry that effectively clinched the 2016 championship.
Irving is an undeniably elite offensive player, and a lot of that comes from defenders simply never knowing what to expect.