I'm a scrub! Alright, I admit to trying to practice the Pappas short, fast, hard sticks from standstill. It's because I'm having getting the mechanics down when dribbling. Standing still let me set my position consistently, just like a 3-rod offensive set-up, and leaves less to chance where a moving ball might introduce tons of other variables (ball position, speed, etc.) - although this might be just because my dribble isn't yet consistent - or because of the slight spray you mentioned.
LOLOLOL!! I knew it. No prob, almost every aspiring rookie I've known who saw those lightning passes wanted to emulate them! You can do it, but you can't omit the thousands and thousands of repetition (AND ON THE VENUE TABLE, NOT YOURS) passes you have to do. Pros and PMs accept this, and so should you.
OK, so what I'm reading from this is that regardless of whether I'm doing a lane or wall stick pass, the ball should spray slightly, so my 31 should catch the ball slightly closer to me than where the 51 struck the ball for the pass.
Nope. I'm saying that a normal developed and reliable tic tac, where you can "idle" in neutral, like a swimmer treading water calmly in water, neither going faster or slower, will result in a slight spray (Newtonian physics) if you don't use technique to square it off or reverse the angle. And for a natural stick, you shouldn't need to. A good "natural" tic tac pass with your 3bar learning to catch the passed ball as it sprays slightly from either player is all you need at first. This way you don't have to add anything extra, just wait till the defending 5bar freezes, slows, and leaves the front of one your tic tac players open. They you just learn to move your 31 or 32 to the same spots to catch the ball. Even when you're tired, straining or getting stressed in a tough, close, game, your natural lane should always be consistent. AND SIMPLE. The added option of letting the tic tac bounce off the wall and just tapping it through with your 51 or 55 player, without trying to guide it (staying natural) is also a great addition that adds the changed timing to a tic tac pass series.
Sorry, didn't quite catch you here. Are you saying my lane pass should be ~1.5" from the wall? I thought the best case scenario would be for my lane stick to be executed as far as possible from the wall while still out of reach by the opponents 54.
The "best case scenario" you're talking about, is going through the sweet spot by the opponent's 54, which you can go through with a high stick or a brush or bounce up from off the wall and your own 51. That is one of the options of any more advanced passing series, where you have to practice redirecting the ball thousands of times. Now I clearly recall in my 50-50 5bar D that that particular "sweet spot" is one of the two basic areas you have to defend when facing any advanced passing, but I don't ever recall describing the offensive side of it. You're extrapolating that you have to learn to pass and attack those two areas, which is prolly correct, but you don't even have a stable tic tac yet, OR a smooth brushdown wall pass, OR a reasonably quick click pass into a square wall pass or into a simple bounce up pass, so first things first.
The "natural" stick I'm talking about, which is a lot easier to start with and should get by most scrubs or beginner/rookies after you master a tic tac dribble, just waits until the defender pauses, slows, or stops blocking the front of either tic tac'ing player. Then you just push or tap through the opening, and your 3bar better be at the other end. That is your basic beginning stick passing series. The advantage of just tapping through is there is no tell or doubletake for a defender to key on. Smooooooooth is the word.
THE REAL BEST CASE SCENARIO IS: HAVING BOTH, OR EVEN MORE, PASSING SERIES. As I mentioned earlier several times on this board, more options is more weapons. Take a major league baseball pitcher: it's nice to have that unhittable split finger fastball that drops to Hades, or that screwball that curls like a nasty low tennis backhand slice, and a breaking ball or slider that just moves weird, screwing up the batter's timing. But the dominating pitcher still better have that basic high-heat top-shelf natural fastball to just blow by a slow or confused batter. And even when the mechanics aren't working on the more advanced pitches, the basic ones should still work, especially when you really need to hit that strike zone.
Practicing lightning stick passes before you master your basic passes is also like going into a heavyweight championship match with only a roundhouse knockout punch. No dangerous well-executed jabs, or a 1-2, or driving hooks or uppercuts to the chin or to blast the body. Need a lot of luck to go far with that.
Good luck in Kuala Lumpur! May you hack with a smack and demolish with a flourish, Kev!
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