I did this for @BigMaloe's thread of W/L splits, but put so much work into it and found the results so startling, thought I'd make a thread of it. Pretty cool stats Rockets are #2 in the league when shooting <=33% Is MDAs "Keep Shooting" philosophy helping us win at a impressive league-wide rate, even when shooting poorly? That is: when you are cold, it's still better to be cold from 3, than cold from 2? W/L Record when shooting <=33% UTA 11-8 HOU 8-7* (fwiw: we have no games at exactly 33%, and only 2 above 32) SAS 6-5 OKC 13-12 BOS 8-8 CLE 5-5 GSW 6-6 CHI 11-14 CHO 8-10 ATL 8-12 WAS 7-11 TOR 6-10 LAC 5-9 DET 6-11 LAL 6-12 MIN 6-13 MEM 6-13 SAC 5-12 IND 5-12 PHI 4-11 NYK 4-12 POR 4-12 MIL 4-12 DAL 4-13 MIA 4-17 ORL 5-20 PHX 2-11 NOP 2-14 BRK 2-18 DEN 1-14 * I put HOU higher that SAS in the near tie, based on Net Win Pct between games shooting less than 33% and games shooting more for each team. that is, SAS performs worse vs their record than we do. ---------------------Also Check this Out----------------------- Rockets are 7-1 when making 11 threes while shooting <= 33%. KEEP SHOOTING! The next closest team only has 2 wins in that criteria, because most teams don't keep shooting them enough to make 11 of them.
This is the same philosophy that Golden State uses. The problem for the Rockets right now is that the best 3pt shooter we have is down with injury. We need Splash Gordon to come be a thing again, we were winning games by the buttload when he was healthy.
Interesting but not surprising. The law of big numbers, Morey was saying that all along. But if you look more closely, half of our losses were on these games, which is [Edit: ONE of] the biggest percentage in the league correlating bad shooting nights from 3 to losses . [Edit: Golden state has an even higher percentage, San Antonio just don't shoot as many threes to be considered relying on the 3] Question remains if in the playoff it will still be worth continue to chuck from 3 even on a bad shooting night. I think yes, but time will tell. We never had any team shooting so many 3's before, or even close to it.
Golden State has already won a title based on this recipe. Even the Cavs adopted it and won last year, too. This is the future of the NBA but you need the right players and I still think the Rockets need to add a few more shooters. Would be nice if we could acquire a big that could shoot threes (no Dmo references please), but if we can't we need to go after other shooters who may be had, such as Lou Williams and Leandro Barbossa. The more consistent 3pt scoring options we have, the better we will be.
Williams is a scorer but not elite 3 point shooter, 34% for career. He is shooting just over 37% this season however .
What? Half our losses are not due to this. We have 15 losses, and 7 here. Further other than Utah and HOU, every playoff team in the West has at least half their losses in these games. MEM and OKC are particularly bad at your measure. And 5 of the playoff teams in the East have more than half their losses here. Regardless, If you have too many of these games, you won't have a good record. HOU, GSW, SAS, CLE, TOR, BOS and LAC are in the top 10 of fewest games played under 33%. Of those, we have the best record in those games. We don't die by the three as much as they do
Well, we need a Shaun Livingston coming off the bench for us and Lou Williams is currently the best option for that.
hey heypartner your work is stunning its so energizing and motivating making a life more magical experience!
We take the least amount of long 2's in the league. As a consequence of that we take the most threes + rim + free throws in the league. All you are saying is the higher our efg is the more we win. We don't have to prove anything there. That's logic. And Gordon is the most important piece if that puzzle because he takes and makes so many threes. That's why of all our shooters our eins and losses must closely track what Gordon is doing. When he shoots poorly our record falls off more drastically than when others shoot poorly. Because he's the biggest piece of the shooting puzzle. ========================= To understand our weaknesses and what makes us lose and win you have to subdivide the season and look at days against teams with winning records and ignore data against the dregs. The data against the dregs doesn't matter. We're so much better than them that Harden can turn it over ten times or we shoot 40% from three and we still have a 70% chance of winning the game. Because they are a bad team with either low talent or a bunch of kids and we are a very team with a superstar and considerably more developed talent. So we're 11-11 against teams with winning records. When you look at the data in those games it starts to paint a picture of what we have to do to win a championship. The rest is noise.
Shaun Livingston is not a three point shooter. He's a paint shooter that drives and creates and either finishes or has a great pull up from 15 on in or he dishes for a great look. But I do agree. Livingston would be a great fit here because he takes care of the basketball with minimal turnovers, he distributes well, and even though he's not a three point shooter, he's very efficient with the few shots he does take. He'd be a great fit here. But to compare him to gunners like Lou and Barbosa is a misnomer.
Great stuff @heypartner as always. Looking at this from an offense point of view, it's clear we need another Gordon type of player. That way we aren't so reliant on production from certain players. Having another dead eye shooter would be wonders for us. It's why I so much wanted korver. Having off nights will happen. Sometimes everyone is cold at the same time, but the more great shooters you have, the less likely you are to dip below that <33%. Interior defense is still our biggest weakness. It's funny because last night while laying in bed I started theorizing. How efficient would you have to be in order to be a great team at the expense of defense? " Defense wins championships, it's impossible in playoffs without defense. " Theoretically, if you had a team full of elite offensive players who were all bad to horrible at defense, could you still dominate? Case in point, let's look at this roster formation. James Harden / Isiah Thomas Jr Stephen Curry / Zach Lavine JJ Reddick / Kyle Korver Kevin Love / Ryan Anderson Brooke Lopez / Kelly Olynyk Not a single defender worth a damn on that team. But how efficient are they offensively? Could that team win a championship by simply taking our current offensive Philosophy and put it on steroids? That team will routinely get out defended and out rebounded every single night. But is the efficiency enough to overcome it. This is all hypothetical but I would conclude that it could win a championship just by strictly being able to always outscore the opponent. The pressure to keep up offensively would be devastating I think.
Interesting concept. I've considered it many times. But you should put the theoretical roster realistically. There's no way Thomas and Curry in their primes are going to be on the same team. Change the roster to something that could actually happen then re-examine your theory.
Ha. Totally false. Livingston has a higher .efg than everybody on our roster except our 3 centers and his TS% is higher than everybody on our roster outside of Harden, Anderson, and our centers. Livingston shoots 77.5% at the rim, and 76% from 3-10 feet, and a combined 61% between 0 to 16 feet where he takes 87.6% of his shots. Livingston is one of the top 3 midrange shooters in the league. He's incredibly smart and savvy and wise in his basketball decisions. And he's a plus defender. Livingston is the quintessential Morey player.
I know who you meant. It's not a realistic roster. Replace Steph with his brother and IT with somebody like Barea (who is an offensive dynamo). Theorize on something that's possible. Harden, curry, Thomas on the same roster at this stage of their careers isn't possible.
Pretty obvious though, that we win when we hit our 3s....it puts so much pressure on the other team to try to keep up and they fall into the trap of trying to shoot their own 3s, when they generally do not have the same level of 3pt shooters we have. Now, when we miss them...and the other team is disciplined and attacking the paint, we lose. DD
The problem and logic is they think even if they go for 0-21 on 3's that their next 20 3's in a row is right around the corner.
