It can be quite revealing what you find out about your game, when you actually practice parts of it.

Long story short - I plant, heel down first with no slide. I'm working towards sliding now so to the foul line drills. Something I've discovered is that it DEFINITELY improves the Mark Baker "Flat Spot" in my release to get much better leverage on the ball for improved revolutions, rotation, and projection. So now to work my way back from the foul line a step or two at a time till I can do all 5 steps with a slide. Excited to see my game develop more this season.

Anyone else make the transition from planting to sliding and notice this or something else in their game improve?

When I went more of a mini hop into a slide rather than hop to a plant, my flat spot increaded a ridiculous amount. Nowadays I basically need to have my timing and spine tilt match to have my optimal flat spot allowing me to be super accurate when needed.