We've discussed Advance Scouting in the VSS 101 and you know by now the NBA has specific scouts on hand at NBA games to scout a teams upcoming opponents. This allows a team to get very detailed and up to date information on a teams play calls, rotations, personnel, etc.

For high school and college coaches the examples below are designed to showcase how in depth teams get with their information.

You will notice there is a difference between the report an advance scout will provide to that an assistant coach will provide the head coach.

Typically an advance scout will have every possible scouting detail from A to Z. Play calls for every second of the previously scouted games. The advance scout will have diagrams and call frequency for every play throughout every game scouted and usually three games in advance prior to playing them as an opponent. The advance scout will also provide every team statistic as well as every player statistic for the opposing team. Player personnel capsules will also be part of the advance scouting report. Player capsules are a general outline of the player, his statistics and most important tendencies. injury updates and/or anything going on around the team that could be helpful information for the coaching staff to implement. 

The information flow is usually from an advance scout to a select asst coach (most likely the asst coach that has been assigned that particular team). The assistant coach will then take that information and compare/combine with his or her current information that the asst coach has prepared via video/computer. The asst coach will then present this information to the staff or in some cases to the head coach specifically. At that point the coaching staff collectively decides how they will prepare for their opponent and what information is pertinent for the players to digest. Every team is a little different however this is generally the way the information flows throughout an NBA team. 

The first example is just part of an advance report and details the plays the upcoming opponent runs with their frequency from each game they scouted. As you can see this includes early offense, half court, BOB, etc. There will also be diagrams of each set.

The advance report will often provide various notes and key points for the coaching staff. This can very in length. Example below.

As you can imagine a sophisticated International team would be very similar in their advance report. The report below shows this. There is also an example of a rolling call sheet which an advance scout used to track the plays calls and actions during a game.

As we explained, once the assistant coach gets the report from the advance scout he will then prepare a report for the Head Coach. Here is an example below. These can all vary by team. This is just excerpts and not the entire report.