“We have never arrived. We are in a constant state of becoming.” — Bob Dylan
Our focus has always been about the other side of the highlight reel, the hard work and discipline that happens not under the bright lights but in the local gyms, playgrounds and driveway hoops when no one is watching.
In that spirit, today we are announcing the release of HomeCourt 3.0, a redesigned experience laser focused on helping anyone improve their core basketball skills on their own. It is our first take at a core skill improvement system that helps players know exactly how they’re performing and what they need to work on.
HomeCourt has come a long way since our first public demo at the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference just two years ago. We are so proud of what we have built and how the community has grown.
45+ million shots. 70+ million dribbles. 170+ countries
At the same time, our culture has been one that emphasizes self-reflection, learning, and growth.
To that aim, we took some time to take a step back and asked ourselves if we knew now what we knew back then, how would we do things differently to better serve our mission of unlocking potential and bringing joy to basketball players worldwide.
Today’s release is a continuation of many steps in that journey of continuing to become the best we can be. We can’t wait for you to take the new HomeCourt out for a spin.
HomeCourt 3.0 is available for download today on the Apple App Store.
Introducing Skill Ratings
Skill Ratings, developed in partnership with the NBA, is a scoring system to help you measure your work and improvement across a variety of core basketball skill areas while using HomeCourt.
Skill Ratings helps you assess your skill level, track your improvements, set goals and compete with your peers.
Our goal has always been that using HomeCourt over time should help better prepare you for what really matters: the actual game.
With that in mind, we designed “Skill Rating” to be based on 4 criteria that reflects performing well in an actual game: accuracy, speed, consistency, and difficulty.
Put simply, the more accurate you are at executing challenging exercises at game speed over time, the higher your score will be.
Our scores are benchmarked by answering a simple question: how would a skilled player at this position perform on this exercise across those 4 criteria?
For example, Joe Harris and J.J. Redick, two of the best 3 point shooters in the NBA, would be able to score a 90+ in the 3 point shooting category, meaning they would be able to complete difficult 3 point shooting drills with high accuracy, at a game speed, on a consistent basis. Similar logic applies across all core skills on HomeCourt where we provide a Skill Rating.
If you have been using HomeCourt for awhile, your Skill Ratings on your profile will auto populate over the coming weeks.
Introducing NBA Global Scout on HomeCourt
“Talent is equally distributed, but opportunity is not.”
At HomeCourt, we have always believed that while talent and potential can be found anywhere, opportunity is not. When done right, technology has the power to democratize opportunity for everyone, especially in sports.
We went back to our own early experiences where most of us did not have easy access to sophisticated basketball instruction and infrastructure. Despite this, we still fell in love with the game but always wondered how unlocked potential could be further realized if the right resources and access to opportunity could be made more accessible.
Today, we are excited to be partnering with the NBA to launch NBA Global Scout, the first-of-its-kind mobile experience that allows basketball players of all ages to measure their athletic potential as well as their skill development progress over time and be discovered.
Players can get their own NBA Draft Combine measurements and participate in different positional skill development exercises inspired by the NBA Draft Combine that helps players showcase their potential just by using their HomeCourt app on an iPhone or iPad.
Our new mobile AI tech gives the ability for players to measure their hand span, wing span, vertical, standing reach in addition to providing an assessment of your shooting, agility, and ball handling skills.
By completing the program, users become eligible for different showcase opportunities provided by Jr. NBA, Basketball Without Borders, NBA Academy, G League, WNBA, and Basketball Africa League. You can find a list of the specific opportunities the HomeCourt community can become eligible for here. Expect this list to be updated overtime.
While there is so much more to a players’ potential than their NBA Global Scout assessment or their HomeCourt Skill rating , we believe this never before captured information can help tell a meaningful story for scouts and other talent evaluators to take a closer look at players who may have never been noticed and provide even more validation points for what they may already be seeing.
“Even though we can analyze game footage, being able to see workout history and historical individual shooting data for prospects would be immensely valuable in getting a better sense of their growth, improvement, and work ethic overtime, all things that are needed to be an NBA pro.“
- RC Buford, CEO of San Antonio Spurs, GM 2002–2019, 5x NBA Champion, 2x NBA Executive of the Year
We will continue to work with different partners like the NBA to provide even more exposure opportunities for the HomeCourt community int the near future.
Back to the Fundamentals
To incorporate all of this, we have simplified the HomeCourt experience to focus back on the player, their work, and their growth and progress over time.
In addition to “Skill Ratings” on your Profile, there is now quick access to your “Workout History.” Tapping in brings you to all your workouts chronologically, so you can review your work and progress.
The “Statistics” section gives you a deep overview of your shooting percentages by zone, filtered over time as well as your cumulative workout stats. Stay tuned for more ways you can reflect your basketball proficiency on HomeCourt in the near future.
We have also replaced the Train tab and Play tab with a new “Activities” tab that is a one-stop shop for all the different workouts a player can do on HomeCourt to improve their core basketball skills and knowledge, including new instructional videos from NBA stars like CJ McCollum and Alan Houston. Expect many more additions to this library of activities over time.
Thank you for your continued support. We look forward to getting your feedback as we continue on this journey with you. See you on HomeCourt.
