LeBron James & JJ Redick podcast: Explaining defensive idea for America's play, or BOB, from 'Mind the Game'

Stephen Noh

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LeBron James & JJ Redick podcast: Explaining defensive idea for America's play, or BOB, from 'Mind the Game' image

LeBron James and JJ Redick are embarking on a new podcast together where they hope to "examine and celebrate the game of basketball." The podcast, called "Mind the Game," is billing itself as an alternative to the hot take format that is commonly seen on other NBA shows and looks like it will focus on discussing the beauty of the game. 

Having LeBron's name attached to a podcast that goes into nitty-gritty basketball concepts is obviously attracting a lot of attention. The first episode was released on Tuesday morning, and a teaser that was put out on X on Monday had already received over 4.6 million views within its first 24 hours. 

What made that number even more impressive was that people still watched that initial conversation even though it was difficult to follow what exactly Redick and LeBron were talking about without a video accompaniment.

If you watched and were confused, we've got you covered. Here's a breakdown of the terminology, plays, and strategy that they were referencing. 

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Explaining LeBron James' new defensive coverage idea 

James started out the teaser by using the term BOB (also commonly called BLOB), to describe a very popular baseline out of bounds play.

The play, which Redick and James refer to as "America's play," is more commonly called "triangle" in the NBA and run by almost every team. It is by far the most-used action when teams inbound from the baseline. It can be quickly identified by coaches making a triangle shape with their fingers.

The HalfCourtHoops substack newsletter has a great explanation of the play, but essentially, it's what James calls a "pick the picker" (also called screen the screener) action where a player sets a pick, then runs off a pick. 

Teams will generally have defenders try to chase over that second screen, which can often create space to get a shot off. James suggests switching it instead, negating the effects of the screen. Here's NBA writer Joe Viray explaining LeBron's thought process, with accompanying visuals.  

Some teams already use James' idea of having the inbounder switch pick-the-picker action, and they have great success doing it. Hoop Vision's Jordan Sperber detailed some examples of it happening at the college level. 

MORE: JJ Redick calls out Doc Rivers

Counters to LeBron James' defense

So, why doesn't every team use LeBron's idea to switch, thus nullifying a play that they will have to guard against multiple times per night?

Redick mentioned one issue — when teams would try it against him, they would often mess up the coverage and send two defenders at him rather than switching. 

LeBron countered that if teams ran the coverage correctly, it would work. He is correct, but another factor to consider is that every coverage has counters. There are some that could be used to take advantage of a switching strategy.

Here's one from X user Bowser2Bowser that would capitalize on the mismatch that is created after a switch.  

Tinkering around with the screening action and the players involved in it could put switching defenses in a potential bind. Opposing coaches would begin to do that once they noticed that defenses were opting to switch. 

There are no perfect plays or defenses in basketball. If there were, then every team would immediately copy them and start running them all of the time.

High-level basketball is all about continual adjustments. LeBron's idea would add another good one to the mix, but yet another adjustment would soon follow it. He surely knows that as well, and he has even more adjustments to go to in his bag. That is part of the beautiful chess match that goes on every night, which this new podcast will highlight to new audiences. 

Stephen Noh

Stephen Noh Photo

Stephen Noh started writing about the NBA as one of the first members of The Athletic in 2016. He covered the Chicago Bulls, both through big outlets and independent newsletters, for six years before joining The Sporting News in 2022. Stephen is also an avid poker player and wrote for PokerNews while covering the World Series of Poker from 2006-2008.