Our COD work for the duration of the off-season focused on three types of cuts: shuffle to shuffle, shuffle to sprint, and sprint to sprint.
At the start of the off-season when cutting was introduced, the first drill we implemented was a shuffle to shuffle cut of about four yards with the cut location marked by a cone.
We started with the cutting point visually marked to allow the athletes to focus on their footwork without having to be concerned with reacting to an outside stimulus. While we rarely see incidences in sport where an athlete has to change direction based on a pre-determined constraint, it can have its place here with the goal of preparing for real COD work. Having fewer degrees of freedom to deal with can isolate the joint positioning and angles and be a better teaching tool than when the athletes are having to react unexpectedly.
Here we can see athletes working through predetermined cuts in shuffle to shuffle, shuffle to sprint, and sprint to sprint: