Is there precedent for a truly horrific shooter becoming adequate?

Good thread Chilly! Inquiring minds want to know!


Go Rockets!!!
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https://www.barttorvik.com/playerst...nd=career0501&threeperSelect=-1&pickSelect=-1
These are some guys with 25% 3pt numbers in college. You can increase it a bit to get a lot more names to judge. I threw in some minimum 3 attempts and draft pick filters just to help with the list, but maybe those are not reasonable.

You can decide for yourself if you think they managed to learn to shoot.

 

Purely from a shooting standpoint I would say Lonzo Ball. First year in the league was 30% from 3 and 45% on free throws. Second year in the league was 33% from 3 and 42% on free throws (lol). His last two years he was 38% from 3 and 78% on free throws, then 42% from 3 (!!!) and 75% on free throws. He's also a good example of someone that came in with horrific form, and improved it drastically with a complete rework.



https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/b/balllo01.html

 

Jason Kidd

 

https://www.barttorvik.com/playerst...-11101&end=all0501&astSelect=-1&pickSelect=-1
For the "feel" thing, here's a variation I have for that. I'm assuming that high usage (>=20) with low AST% (say less than 7) means low feel, but that's up for interpretation.

https://www.barttorvik.com/playerst...-11101&end=all0501&astSelect=-1&pickSelect=-1
If you want basically the same list, but filtering out big guys (6'10" or so).

I've been trying to find guys that came in with very low AST% numbers with high usage (either via college and/or rookie year), and see if any vastly increased AST% over time. I haven't found any, but I'm dumb and not really figuring out an efficient way to do that. Probably some examples, but my gut says that is harder to find than guys that shot 25-30% and managed to get to decent levels at some point.

And yeah, maybe AST% isn't a good metric, but I swear it seems to check out with some random examples I use (assuming you want a guy to be a primary/major decision maker for your team).

 

Jason Kidd was shooting 33% from 3 in college. He ended up shooting 35% on 3pointers career in the pros, but only 40% from the field. He improved his long range some, but overall didn’t improve that much as a shooter.

Russ Westbrook shot 35% from 3 in college, but only 30% career in the pros. Never became a good shooter in general.

Marcus Smart was a terrible 3pt shooter in college (30%). And while he’s been shooting 33% the last 3 years; he’s only 32% career. Another guy who who only got marginally better at shooting.

Those are three examples off the top of my head. And Amen is probably starting below their college shooting production. I do think that Amen’s other skills can make up for a lot. He has a chance to be a better defender, and facilitator than Westbrook, but if you draft him you have to assume his shooting is gonna be a liability. That’s why I’d put Scoot a tier above Amen. If you can surround him with other shooters he’ll be fine. But I don’t want a prospect who projects as a poor shooter at #4.

 

Also, on Amen specifically, I think his OTE 3pt numbers are not necessarily apples to apples to college 3pt numbers (or NBA 3pt numbers). Duh. Everyone knows the obvious reasons why, but I'd also point out the sample size is fairly small-ish due to the number of games. If Amen had a hot streak where he went like 8/9 across a few games or something like that, we'd maybe be calling him a sharpshooter just cause he made a few more 3s overall on the season. Of course, his mechanics would tell you that he's definitely not a good shooter, but just wanted to point out that his exact percentage is a bit more in flux than most. I wouldn't laser in on that 25% specifically due to those variance factors.


It might be closer to 15% in reality.

 

Rondo and Lowry come to mind as for improving their 3 point shooting. Rondo never improved his free throw shooting though.

 

Michael Kidd Gilchrist even became worse........

 

This is a great post, but u need to be applying these percentages to high school statistics and understand he’s playing kids who are 4 years younger than he is. Once you add all that to the equation you’ll realize he will REALLY suck as an NBA player. Run for the hills on this guy as we can’t afford to screw this pick up.

 

NEVER was a plus shooter, became ADEQUATE only.

DD

 

Sam Perkins got better at 3s over time. He was always good at free throws for a big man, though, so that might be an indicator.

 

He said he was looking for someone who became ADEQUATE

 

Brook Lopez, Al Horford. There are lots of players.

Most people can improve their 3pt shot with practice. There's only a small minority players who are really resistant to improvements in their shot but you can kind of see it in their game. Hindsight is 20/20 but there are always some clues and it's an important part of the scouting process I'm sure. You can't always predict it right but with Amen his coordination is very off and he's already 20 or 21. It's a legitimate concern and it could alter the way we have to build the team. It would be ridiculous to not practice caution and do some due diligence on his training habits. A lot of people would call Westbrook a hard worker but that hasn't helped him improve his shot whatever the reason.

We just have to do a check to make sure he's not one of those guys. If all the signs are good, hallelujah we all win. If the signs are not great then you make a grown up decision and move on to the next best player available.

 

Giddey?

 

Kawhi’s not a bad example. Shot 20% from 3 his freshman year, 29% his sophomore. The difference, however, as compared to Amen is that Kawhi always shot above .7 on his FTs. My biggest concern with Amen isn’t the shooting in a vacuum, but rather the poor shooting AND poor FT% for a guard.

 

Funny people call players Udoka players when Udoka has not said a word about it.

 

I was gonna say Giddey and Scot Barnes. Although they still both suck at shooting, but they everything else makes up for it considering how hyped they are