re: Bird Writes Diagnosis of Early Team Woes

quote:

---

I find it quite annoying.

If you only take shots at midrange and 50%, you get a point per possession on average. If you his the three at the average rate, you get more. It is seemingly easy for some to switch some 2's to some 3's, so doing that some is good idea.

Fine.

To repeatedly a team for not taking as many 3's gets old fast. They had a high success rate and a low attempt rate. Based on the results last night (0 of 6 until Rivers hit one late, I think) bear out the conservative approach.

The team shot poorly and rebounded poorly. They also defended poorly. These are way bigger issues...

So, I see the love of the three as a wrinkle used to optimize once you are actually making shots. The blanket blasting of long 2's is what I find overzealous.

---

Statistics completely disagree with you.

First off, teams don't hit mid-range shots at 50%. So stop dreaming. The percentage of buckets made from mid-range and from 3-point range isn't much different. And 3's are worth an extra point.. so it's a more efficient shot.

quote:

---

The idea that every long 2 is bad and should be replace by 3's is a bad one. If you allow the defense to know "I will likely shoot from here," they will defend that spot and lower the make rate and attempt rate likely.

---

This is wrong, too. If your team is shooting 3's and getting lay-ups at the basket, your offense covers the whole floor. You can score inside, and you can score outside.

That spreads the floor, and makes it hard for teams to "key in" on specific spots.

If a team plays tight to defend the 3, the offense will drive to the hole for a lay-up or get it inside for 2. If the defense keys in and packs the paint, the offense will kick it out for 3.

There is no way to "key in" on a team that can score in and out.

quote:

---

Statistics completely disagree with you.

First off, teams don't hit mid-range shots at 50%. So stop dreaming. The percentage of buckets made from mid-range and from 3-point range isn't much different. And 3's are worth an extra point.. so it's a more efficient shot.

---

Actually, I was just explaining how it is a more efficient shot with some rationale. It is an illustration to make the same point you just made.

quote:

---

This is wrong, too. If your team is shooting 3's and getting lay-ups at the basket, your offense covers the whole floor. You can score inside, and you can score outside.

That spreads the floor, and makes it hard for teams to "key in" on specific spots.

If a team plays tight to defend the 3, the offense will drive to the hole for a lay-up or get it inside for 2. If the defense keys in and packs the paint, the offense will kick it out for 3.

There is no way to "key in" on a team that can score in and out.

---

Again, we agree. My entire point is that it is better overall to be able to score from anywhere, including the least efficient places and the most improvable places for the same reasons you suggest.

My issue is the idea of the dumb zone, implying any shots from certain areas are always bad.

That was QM's point and I was agreeing.

I singled out 3 offensive foci.

The person asking for the info seemed ok with it, and we moved on to talk defensive strategy.

Is it prrof positive? No. But what is? It is a hedge against either of us (original two) being completely out to lunch.

quote:

---

So, you take that shot and you make it more efficient to make them adjust.

---

this theory fails logic

if you're going to make them defend your 20 foot shite shot, they're already in a position to defend the 23 foot 3PT shot

you gain no schematic advantage b/c your spacing doesn't change, all the while you're taking a much less efficient shot

this is simple geometry, angles, and spacing

I don't know what is so tough to understand. A long two is a terrible shot compared to a 3 pointer.

Just a quick example:

Let's say you make 40% of those long 2s (probably too high of a number, don't feel like doing the research). Let's go with 2.4/6 (40%) from long 2 distance - that's 4.8 points.

Let's say you make 33% of your 3 pointers. That's 2/6 per game which equals - 6 ppg

That's me being pretty conservative as well, because so far this year Jrue Holiday is shooting 41% from 3, Eric Gordon is shooting 43% from 3, Anthony Morrow is shooting 63% from 3.

There's no reason for us to be taking as many long 2s as we seem to take -- this is from the naked eye, I haven't been charting our shots.

We have 3 guys, 4 when Anderson is back who are good catch and shoot guys. The drive and kick should be open. We should be much better at spacing the floor than we look so far.

quote:

---

That's me being pretty conservative as well, because so far this year Jrue Holiday is shooting 41% from 3, Eric Gordon is shooting 43% from 3, Anthony Morrow is shooting 63% from 3.

---

Vorped.com has a pretty cool shot chart tool where it shows points per shot from each zone, but it doesn't include last night yet.

It seems the closer Holiday gets to the basket, the less points he scores. He produces 1.13 pts/shot from 3, 0.8 pts/shot from 2s excluding restricted area, and 0.68 pts/shot in the paint.

As for the whole team, 1.22 from 3, 0.75 from midrange, and 0.96 from the paint thus far. More data will help reduce the noise, but the difference between long 2s and 3s is evident. Corner 3s are clearly most efficient thus far for the Pelicans.

Vorped shot charts

If you filter by 3rd quarters, it's depressing. We are terrible from 3 in the 3rd.

quote:

---

It seems the closer Holiday gets to the basket, the less points he scores. He produces 1.13 pts/shot from 3, 0.8 pts/shot from 2s excluding restricted area, and 0.68 pts/shot in the paint.

---

That may be bc it always seems like there is a couple of trees in the paint waiting for him. It looks to me that Grevis' patented floater has a better chance of going in than some of Jrue's shots.

quote:

---

It seems the closer Holiday gets to the basket, the less points he scores.

---

keep him at mid court, IMO.

quote:

---

That may be bc it always seems like there is a couple of trees in the paint waiting for him

---

Perhaps, but Jrue has never been a good finisher at the rim. The highest he's ever shot there is 55%. Gordon (when healthy) and Evans have both been consistently at or just under 60% for their careers.

I see a number of posts rehashing what I laid out in the posts above them, none of which was a novel concept. I am not sure the posters realize that my point was never that long 2's are just as good as a three, but that it is necessary to shoot some, and many good teams do.

There is no reason to try to prove or disprove an assertion that was never made.

Again, the entire conversation was about the "dumb zone" label and overzealous criticism of long 2's. Proper criticism was actually reinforced.