Is Ryan Anderson's 3-point percentage an artifact?

It doesn't make sense to me that on the one hand, we know our talent last season was mediocre beyond Harden, and so it stands to reason that Anderson should not have done well. He was being guarded by the best PF/C defender every game. This is precisely why we had to get more stars.

OTOH, the hypothesis here is that Anderson is only shooting well because a huge volume of open 3's were available to him unlike any other time in his life. Just doesn't make sense. These two things contradict each other.

It also doesn't explain the splits. Is he being left open more often on the road? Highly, highly unlikely.

On Harden, I'll say: he's not a great 3pt shooter. He's probably well above average on 3's where he can dribble into the shot and he's relatively open. On all other 3's, his % dips heavily. He is not excellent at hitting wide open spot up 3's. Similar to Kobe if you ask me. He's not an elite 3pt shooter, but you don't want him taking 3's against your team when it matters - if that makes sense.

 

Ryan Anderson is a spectacular shooter and an extremely valuable offensive player. There's nothing wrong with not shooting contested 3's. If the beard takes a bit of the Anderson mentality next to CP3 his 3% should spike

Unfortunately he gives a lot of that value back on the boards and defense. He was still a big part of the team turnaround last season, but there's such an anti-Anderson sentiment that people act like he is just a huge scrub that does nothing of value.

Having Anderson helped us win all those games, and be good enough to get the likes of Chris Paul's attention.

 

Must have learned it from Portions.

 

Harden took the most contested 3's in the league last year.

 

Stats (dot) NBA has tracking metrics

 

Yes, Anderson’s shooting percentage would go down if started shooting more contested and difficult shots.

Believe it or not, there’s often times when advanced analytics aren’t needed to draw conclusions.

 

Anderson's value is not so much that he can make a 3 point shot, it's the space he creates by pulling players well passed the 3 point line. I call it offensive gravity. There aren't many players in the NBA that aren't superstars that can that. Though I do wish he didn't pass up open shots. He should just let it fly.

 

If he had a quick trigger and a fast release he would arguably be an all star.

 

Stop it

 

PF version of Kyle korver, who was an all star

But honestly if he had that quick trigger shooters mentality and fast release (I'm thinking klay Thompson) at his height he would be dangerous and considered fringe all star.

But alas, he is unathletic with a slow release and hesitant to shoot a lot of the time. Thus, he is a role player.

 

If every other rocket took fewer contested shots, you would expect Anderson to take more, or our overall turnovers to go up.

The number of open shots isn't fixed

 

Will, I don't have the time to look at the numbers. So how do Harden, Gordon, and Ariza compared to Anderson in shooting uncontested 3s?

My hunch is that some players shoot better off the dribble. Some do better spotting up. It's not just about contested or not (though it's obviously important). It's also about how a guy gets his shooting rhythm.

 

I always think people here go to these metrics at nba.com now on a regular basis, rather than look at boxscores only or old-style stats....especially since they are so important to Morey/MDA and reveal a lot about each game.

But I guess not. Last year @SamFisher, @BigMaloe and I were forever posting these 4-6' and 6+ stats, to illustrate that we were missing Wide-Open threes....when threads got started about how we shoot a lot of contested threes. In fact, when defense stick to the perimeter, these percentages are still the same (especially when you discard Harden), what happens is our 3FG attempts drop noticeably below norms in those games -- while our layups and FTs increase. That is most always the case.

@Will, this is also true of most every team. Contested 3s are not that common. We just have a system that creates much, much more open threes. Thus the league-wide 35% is not really measurably harder or easier across teams. What can change a single player's 3FG% tremendously is moving from one system where he shoots mostly above the arc, to another system where he gets much more looks from the corner. Almost everyone shoots significantly better from the corners.

To that last point: This year, Ryno may very well get more looks in the corners. And he shot like ~55% from there, last year. Our strategy is typically to give the corner 3s to the lesser shooters like Ariza/Bev and let the Elite guys (Ryno/EGo) shoot above the arc ... to create better success around the full arc (and the spacing that comes with it). But this year with Paul and Harden about to run plays where they are outfront, Ryno can slide to corners, more often.

 

I wish Ryno were a more dynamic player that could actually attack when defenders close hard, but if he can consistently draw opposing bigs out to his range (25ft) that's good for our offense in and of itself.

 

Looking at these metrics and Harden, it appears to me that he shoots a significantly higher percentage on open catch and shoot 3's. Not everyone seems to agree. Am I missing something? I know he gets few uncontested open looks from behind the arc, but that should change with Paul being on the court with him.

 

Thanks for the metrics. It backs up what I thought. Basically if teams do a good job of closing out on RA and spooking him, he will pass.

Andrerson is the most frustrating player to watch on the Rockets. Half of his value is just him being on the court "creating gravity" to open driving lanes for CP and Harden. Otherwise, if he doesn't hit his shots, he is completely useless. I would imagine RA's good +/- numbers are a direct result of his "gravity" standing around to help Harden rather than his inconsistent 3pt shooting.

 

I guess what those metrics do not tell is the combined contested/uncontested - pull up/ catch and shoot splits. How many of Harden's "wide open" shots are dribbled as opposed to caught and shot, and vice versa?

Those stats compare wide open to contested. They also compare pull up and spot up. But they do not compare wide open pull up to wide open spot up, contested pull up to contested spot up. I guess Will's question is still partially unanswered.