In case you haven’t heard yet, Jason Richardson is now a Charlotte Bobcat! On June 28, 2007, Richardson, along with the draft rights to Golden State’s 2007 draft pick of forward Jermareo Davidson with the 36th pick, were traded to the Charlotte Bobcats for the draft rights to the 8th pick. Brandan Wright.

But you probably know that J-Rich is one of only two players, along with Michael Jordan, to have won two NBA dunk contests. In the 2003 competition, Richardson wowed the basketball world with a successful one-handed, between-the-legs, back dunk.

In fact, Jason Richardson’s unlikely dunk between the legs and behind the head to win the 2003 dunk contest was voted the best dunk of the dunk contest by NBA.com users. With 94 percent of the fanatic judges giving Richardson a perfect 10 for this color, J-Rich beat out Michael Jordan, Vince Carter and others for the overall title.

“I really wanted to win the dunk contest. It was something I’d been dreaming about since I was a little kid. To really be there and have to ‘spin the wheel,’ I was hoping it would land on Dominique. Wilkins’ dunk because I knew them all and could do them all. I was lucky… I think there was one more pin and it would have landed on someone else’s dunk, but it ended up on Dominique Wilkins’ dunk.” -Jason Richardson

Although J-Rich always had crazy jumps: “For me, jumping has always been a given”, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t work on it at all. For example, J-Rich used to jump rope
1000 times a day, 2 sets of 300 and one set of 400, 5 times a week! After each week he increased his reps per set by 100.

Jumproping is one of the most efficient exercises that works to increase the vertical. It works all the major muscles of the lower body (calves, quads, hamstrings) and, to a lesser extent, the upper body. But be careful: do not jump every day, you will only overwork your legs and lose verticality.

Here are the other exercises he used to improve his vertical:

Cone Hops:

Lay out 8 cones in a straight line (at 3-foot intervals). Now quickly jump over the cones, one at a time, with both legs. Do not make more than 5 passes at a time. You can also use just one leg.

depth jump:

Starting position: Stand on a 2-foot box and hold a 10-pound medicine ball in your hands. Now drop down, land on two feet, and quickly explode up to touch the hoop (or dunk the ball). Do 10 to 15 repetitions.

For more jumping exercises and crucial things to know about vertical jumping (like why what you “don’t” do is often more important than what you “do”), take a look at this page. I highly recommend: