Midrange is a great way to close games, when you have the most efficient mid range shooter to ever play. Thats like saying every team should pull up from 30 because Stephen Curry does it.
i think gsw goes for layups/dunks or midrange out of some well elaborated plays more often than for 3s
They could shoot nothing but ISO long twos and post ups and they would still win 55-58 games, their offensive scheme an anomaly generated by overwhelming talent, not the norm. For all the praise the Spurs offense gets, it hovers around 15th-8th most of the time, the defense wins games for them.
Don't take this as argument against Midrange, but I just want to point out that POR's defense is rather unique, and we have destroyed it with layups as well...when they only allowed us 25 3PAs, our 2nd fewest ever under MDA. fwiw: going into last night's game, POR was top 3 at allowing fewest 3PA/100. There defense is designed to stick to the shooters. So, don't expect this look against all opponents. Also, if you recall from our monster comeback vs POR when Harden sent Vonleh diving on the floor and embarrassed Evan Turner, the layup drill for Harden was WIDE OPEN, too. In that defense where POR does not send help at all, our MVP just takes it all the way to the hole; whereas, Paul executes midrange jumpers as he comes around the pick.
What I'm afraid of is Dantoni is may be prohibiting the team from taking mid range shots, while clearly this is what can win you games in clutch time come playoffs. CP3, Harden, Gordon,Green and even LMBM could and should take mid range shots
It's funny. Because I notice we've been having lower scoring quarters & halfs. Even when we're ahead it seems like the other team is right behind us lately. The reason for that is because we're not taking as many 3's. I think the team made a conscious effort to take more open midrange shots with James out. The 3's & layups rule only seems effective with Harden out there. Nice adjustment
They seemed to allow 3s in games 1 and 4, where they went in at an unsustainable rate, in games 2 and 3, they bricked at an unsustainable rate, game 5 was the same story, and game 6 never happened.
There's no best way. Everything depends on the defense. If you specialize in 3's and layups and free throws, then teams like the Spurs and Warriors will try to take those things away. In so doing, they'll leave you with midrange shots. In that situation, yeah, you need to be able to take what they're giving you.
Moreyball is pretty dumb imo. We're way better when we shoot the midrange shot to stop a run or to close the game. Refusing to shoot the midrange is partly why we lost the Spurs series last year. Too many good teams are clogging the paint and running other teams off the 3 nowadays, the midrange is where you can dominate now. One problem this teams often runs into is when we get a dry stretch, we keep jacking up and missing 3s. Then we try to go into the clogged paint and it results in a TO or blocked shot. Those are the times you need to rely on your scorers to drop midrange bombs. This is what CP3 was doing last night, that's why we were able to keep lead of 10 or so points constantly throughout the entire night even though our 3 wasn't really falling.
We had the #1 offense in the NBA before CP3 went down again with 52% of our shots being 3s. We lost to the Spurs because the entire team seemed to synchronize their slumps and hot stretches of shooting (+45% 3pt G1 and G4, <30% G2 and G3), also thanks to a Pau Gasol elbow to Harden's head/massive choke job/ lack of a secondary playmaker. We would be no where near this good if the offense didn't emphasize the most efficient shots in the game, Last year we were 2nd to a team with 4 all stars in offense with ONE all star. I don't see much midrange-based domination nowadays, The 5 best players in the NBA all shoot nearly 40% from 3 and all on high volume. By the way, if midrange helps you against playoff defenses more than 3 pointers, can you explain why Demar Derozan is one of the biggest playoff underachievers for an all star that we have ever seen? Deadly to us that is, 29.6% from 3-10 feet, 40.7% from 10-16, and 23% from 16-3pt.
Anytime the scoreboard stops moving, we should be shooting what the defense gives us. This is especially true in the crunch time because teams know what our tendencies are. If we've known how we're going to be defended, we should adjust and take what's there and most open. A lot of times that's going to be a long two.
There is a reason they tend to give up the midrange tho. I'm not saying to never shoot one, its all situational. EG: if you are up 2 or 3 with a minute to go, and there is no open lane to the basket, or no wide open 3 point shot, then shoot an open midrange to make it a 2 possession game regardless if its a 2 or a 3. The smaller the sample size of possessions left, the more important it becomes to simply make the ball go in. we are 5-2 in games decided by 5 or less tho, CP3 simply breaks defenses by making the most inefficient shot in the game efficient.
Agreed, sometimes we just need the scoreboard to move. There are many situations where stretching the lead to 4 points vs 5 points doesn't matter. So the equation for efficiency changes in that type of scenario. It should be about the percentage chance that the scoreboard will move, not points per possession. If you shoot 42% from long twos and 39% from three, take that long two every single time. That extra point is worthless to us.
