Every James Harden Midrange Jumper From The Start Of The 14-15 Season To Now

Its self evident in some cases, eg when the cause of 3s not falling is tiredness then its only natural, logical and self-evident that youll be more precise from the midrange area because it require less physical effort...
I ball on the amateur level and theres no way in hell i am hitting the 3 when i am exerting myself physically a lot... not even gonna try...

well i dont know of any evidence in the absolute sense... some statistical analysis statistics or whatever... but it is a common basketball knowledge and self evident psychological fact and the fact of life if you will...this is how human nervous system is built and working...

first you crawl then you walk, even when getting out of bed in the morning first you sit then stand up...at least that is the optimum way, i guess many people jump out of bed LOL... and we as humans in general need preparation, and we need heating up... we go from simple to complex... we need tuning up and shooting midrange is for some players a tune up procedure, and a tune up mechanism, a tune up for 'the aiming mechanism' in the brain and muscles that is...

and if we accept the fact that the shooting is, in part at least, a matter of psychology and confidence plays a great part in how one performs, then its a given that seeing the ball going through the net from the middy can in some cases improve 3 pt shooting, i emphasize in some cases like when you are down, arent hot, or hit the cold stretch or if the cause of the misses is psychological in nature...
if you are tired or injured and missing the shots then obviously shooting easier shots first probably wont help

 

LOOOOOOLLLLLLL

Please sir. Do enlighten us. We are all interested in your thesis/theory on statistics and analytics in basketball.

We want to learn more.

 

Yep, it's only makes so maybe the thread title misleads some.

 

It's basketball 101 for shooters that if your shot is not falling, get closer, see it go in, build some confidence.

So much so that you see players take shots after a play is dead to try and see it go in (and defenders sometimes block the shot to deny them that) and yeah, tired and weary legs affect shooting.

So much so it's even been a feature in NBA 2k, where if you are cold, you won't hit 3s or difficult shots, you need to get something easier to knock off the ice indicator, then you can get going again.

I just always see coaches say that on any level, see it go in.

Confidence is a HUGE part of shooting.

You know how we always let scrubby mcscrubb go off on us in random games because we start off playing defense lazily and a the guy sees a few open shots go in and now he can't be stopped?

To be fair to Harden he gets enough layups and stuff that he doesn't have to take midrange to build confidence...but some nights he doesn't get calls because the refs have decided its open season on him...those nights he can't get going, can't get layups (because defenders are fouling him) and can't get FTs (because the refs are letting defenders foul him) these nights are nights he should probably rely on his midrange a lot more .

 

We're only saying to avoid the missed 3s, you see? Surely he can swap in a few pull-up 2s.

 

Sure why not, but a few more mid range jumpers still do not solve the real problem, the increasing double teams and suffocating D schemes that Harden has seen last 2 postseasons.

 

I don’t get why Simmons and Lowe types never bring up the traps killing our offense. It’s always “harden can’t get it done again” nonsense.

 

don't forget that chucked 3's also lead to a lot of fast breaks via long rebounds.

 

I think shooting threes was just a part of the system, I do think James harden will probably shoot more mid Rangers this year especially with a new coach and a new system, especially if we had a big men as well

 

BEAUTIFUL ARGUMENTATION
thank you!

 

BEAUTIFUL

 

I don't think it includes every Harden's mid range shot, it doesn't have Harden's game winner against GSW in the 2016 playoffs to say the least.

Harden was never a great mid-rang shoot, in his best mid-range season (2015-2016), he made 1.56 mid range shots per game at 40.5% FG%. As a comparison, MJ made 7.17 mid range shots per game at 48.9% FG% for his 96-97 season. Harden's mid range shot, in terms of volume and accuracy, are both very far from being great.

That being said, I definitely agree that he should have abandoned his mid-range game, for two main reasons. First, I believe had he put some focus on improving his mid-range game, he could be a good, maybe not great but good, mid-range shooter. Averaging 2 mid-range makes shooting 45%, something like that. Second, mid-range shot is not as efficient as other means of scoring (layups and threes), but it adds variety to Harden's game, making it less 1-dimensional and even harder to stop. Also, mid-range is the best way to score in clutch time, as the paint will be very packed, and three is just not nearly as stable when the shooter is tightly guarded. I remember Harden being lethal with his mid-range shots in clutch time 4 - 5 years ago, we see less and less of that now.

 

Send the video to Morey. I'm sure he'd be thinking: What the heck? We'd be winning chips if he'd taken all those shots behind the 3pt line!