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The Good and Bad From SL: Shot Selection
Posted on 7/15/19 at 12:45 pm
Posted on 7/15/19 at 12:45 pm
With the Summer League season done, and a soon to be offseason lull, now would be the perfect time to discuss some observations from the last few Summer League games. Individual play has been throughly examined, so I’d like to just focus on overall team play. Just a heads up, I am only referencing the last 4 games because of NAW and Hayes involvement. Also, I realize this is an extremely small sample size, but it’s sometimes fun to over analyze.
It’s been brought up in other threads that the FO and Coaches clearly see the best way for the Pelicans to be successful this year will be with a focus on Defense, Transition Offense, and improving shot selection. This team will be at its best when they are getting stops on defense, converting those stops to quick transition opportunities, and attacking the paint. This isn’t an exactly groundbreaking observation when you look at the strengths and weaknesses of the current roster, specifically Zion, Lonzo, Hayes, Jrue, BI, NAW, and even Favors.
We got a small glimpse of that style of play from the young Pelicans in SL, as well as things we need to try and avoid (REMINDER small sample size). Consider the following:
The Good: In the first two blowout victories against the Cavs and the Bulls, the Pelicans averaged 56 points in the paint and 18.5 points in the fast break. They also did excellent job in their shot selection, as less than 6.9% of their total shots came from between the paint and 3pt line (5.5 per game).
If you are a visual learner (like me) take a gander at the beautiful shot charts from those two games:
This is close to an analytic nut’s dream, as points in the paint, FTs, and 3pts made up 98.1% of all of our points.
It’s been brought up in other threads that the FO and Coaches clearly see the best way for the Pelicans to be successful this year will be with a focus on Defense, Transition Offense, and improving shot selection. This team will be at its best when they are getting stops on defense, converting those stops to quick transition opportunities, and attacking the paint. This isn’t an exactly groundbreaking observation when you look at the strengths and weaknesses of the current roster, specifically Zion, Lonzo, Hayes, Jrue, BI, NAW, and even Favors.
We got a small glimpse of that style of play from the young Pelicans in SL, as well as things we need to try and avoid (REMINDER small sample size). Consider the following:
The Good: In the first two blowout victories against the Cavs and the Bulls, the Pelicans averaged 56 points in the paint and 18.5 points in the fast break. They also did excellent job in their shot selection, as less than 6.9% of their total shots came from between the paint and 3pt line (5.5 per game).
If you are a visual learner (like me) take a gander at the beautiful shot charts from those two games:
This is close to an analytic nut’s dream, as points in the paint, FTs, and 3pts made up 98.1% of all of our points.
2
Posted on 7/15/19 at 12:45 pm to Baron
Now for the Bad: in the last two games, the shot selection wasn’t nearly as thoughtful. The Pelicans averaged 15 less points in the paint (41per) and only 13 points in transition (that’s including two overtime periods too!). In those two games, 16.6% of our shots came from between the paint and the 3pt line(14.5per), nearly 3x the number from the first two games.
The shot charts are not nearly as pretty either:
Woof. Again, I know this is only summer league, but the coaches are still installing concepts and ideas we hope to run in the season. This should reinforce what we already know: this team will be at its best when we can get into transition.
The shot charts are not nearly as pretty either:
Woof. Again, I know this is only summer league, but the coaches are still installing concepts and ideas we hope to run in the season. This should reinforce what we already know: this team will be at its best when we can get into transition.
This post was edited on 7/15/19 at 12:58 pm
Posted on 7/15/19 at 12:57 pm to Baron
If we don't knock those threes down at a decent clip the paint will be packed until we do.
It was clear as day what teams started doing.
It was clear as day what teams started doing.
Posted on 7/15/19 at 12:59 pm to Baron
We played a lot of pick in roll and getting the ball in the paint to stretch the floor. There is 2 things that made this happen. 1 thing would be our passing and being unselfish while getting the ball to the open man. Meanwhile other teams just threw up shots. The 2nd would be our defense and how effective it was to put us in good scoring positions. The way these young guys played with our pace and were disciplined enough to stay in the right positions helped us tremendously. We played very different with NAW on the bench because no one else has that vision even when all players rotated and positioned themselves correctly.
Posted on 7/15/19 at 1:02 pm to Baron
Overall a lot of the succes has to be given to the coaches. We played so disciplined and organized compared to other teams it was barely fair. The fact that we got these guys playing with this much chemistry and understanding of our system so quickly is astounding. This season is going to be great.
Posted on 7/15/19 at 1:07 pm to Baron
This team has been lacking the kind of shot creator it’s needed to succeed in the half court for a while. Defense leading to transition has been the way to play the last few years, they just didn’t have the talent on defense to make it happen consistently enough. I think the Pels will be much better than most anticipate because the personnel fits the way they want to play so well now.
Posted on 7/15/19 at 1:16 pm to Dantheman504
quote:
We played so disciplined and organized compared to other teams it was barely fair.
Good observation, and the numbers back it up. In those 4 games, the Pelicans were able to force turnovers (19per) while limiting their own (13.75per), winning the TO battle in every game.
I assume that SL teams turnover rate is much higher than the normal NBA teams, but it’s hard to find SL team stats. So for context, let’s consider where these numbers would rank in the NBA last year. Our 13.75 TO per would place us a little above league average (12-14th), but our 19TO forced would be nearly 2.5 better than league leader OKC (16.6). A lot of this has to do with the ball pressure and steals, as we averaged 10.75 steals in those 4 games. This was lead by NAW who had 2.8per, 3rd overall in SL (minimum 2 games).
Posted on 7/15/19 at 1:24 pm to Baron
Well obviously that wouldn't be our + - against NBA talent but yes it looks very good. You also have to take in account of how many time KBW or anyone missed a pass or shot from NAW that was a TO instead of an assist. It was probably between 10-20 those 4 games which is crazy to think of.
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