I think when you compare players across eras its important to adjust for the era. Like if I'm playing in 1950 when the league average TS% is 40% and I shoot 50%, I'm probably one of the best players in the league. Every time I shoot it's more efficient than the average guy, and if I'm shooting a lot then my team is scoring well and we're probably winning. My team is winning a bunch of games and I'm probably winning championships. But if I'm playing in todays NBA and I shoot 50% while the league average TS% is 58%, I really suck. Every time I shoot it's bad, if I shoot a lot my team is going to lose, and I should probably be benched or out of the league. So when I compare between eras, I think it's important to look at how good you were compared to the other guys you were playing against.
This is what I always say about Babe Ruth. Nowhere near as athletic as the guys who play today….but when you compare against his peers…and he had seasons where he literally hit more HRs by himself than entire teams did collectively…that’s absurd. And you can’t just say the number of HRs is comparable when no one else is doing that or has done that. Just an illustration of your point about context, really.
This is exactly my point. Babe ruth did it differently than his peers. Everyone is saying that Green needs to improve his 3 pt FG% to match his peers. I'm saying, nope. approach the game differently. It's not that important. All the shooting guards that carried their team to championships were not exactly great three point shooters. So let's not focus our attention there.
Interesting point. I would suggest that you can’t ignore 3 point percentage in the NBA right now…that it’s more important than ever…and that you can never ignore efficiency numbers for guys who are supposed to be your high volume shooters….at least you can’t ignore them relative to the competition they’re up against. I’m encouraged by Jalen right now. I was encouraged by his hot streak earlier this season. I just want us to see it be far more consistent than it has been before…hopefully this is his turning point.
I think you were totally correct all those times you called him a make or miss guy. He is actually taking more three pointers during this stretch (starting at the first Phoenix game where he scored 34 points)--9.3 attempts per game versus 6.9 on the season as a whole. The difference is, they are actually going in (38.1% over this stretch versus 32.1% on the season). I don't know if he can be convinced to change his shot selection at this point, as much as it would help his game in the short term. The best hope is that he just works hard on his jump shot and becomes good enough to justify being a high-volume shooter. If he remains so inconsistent/mediocre as a three point shooter I honestly just think he's Jamal Crawford with more highlight reel dunks and fewer highlight reel crossovers.
Imagine if you were at your job and it was normal to just scream at the top of your lungs even when not doing anything exciting, just because you want to. . . . .would be a weird, weird world.
You might want to explore the average 3 point percentage during each players career - Their numbers will be fairly close to average aside from the two outliers in Ray Allen & Reggie Miller. Hell, Gervin being on that list is really misleading as he was playing when there was no 3 point shot at all and he had one season where he shot 41.7% from 3.
Lets say he plays well from now to the end of the season - how do you approach the start of next season? I still don't (won't) trust that he's gonna do this for a full season - until he does it. You do have Cam waiting in the wings to take over should Jalen flop ..... and the draft is pending, maybe we end up with a shooter? But maybe you want more insurance than that at the 2 spot? What would you be willing to spend and who are some FA's you might target?
you are more likely to get into a good shooting rhythm by taking more shots. Averaging one three point attempt a game isn't a great indicator of a players ability to hit threes. Like i said, people who bring up Jordan's three point per centages don't actually look at it properly, that is why when he averaged more attempts per game in a season, he had very good shooting percentages.
actually you want to focus on the attempts per season. Look at Jordans when he averaged at least 3 attempts per game. https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/j/jordami01.html 37 per cent or better
We already discussed. 3 point percentage by decade on Stat Muse: 90's: 34.7 20's: 36.1 So only a 1.4% change over thirty years. No matter how you cut it, Most of the all-time greats who brought titles were below the average over their career by 2 or more percentage points. About the same as Green is now.
And you keep ignoring volume. Taking 1-2 per game is different than taking 7. In 1996 the average team took 16 3s per game. This season the average team takes 35 threes per game. The three point shot and how well you shoot it is infinitely more important in todays game.
What I said to that is that there are no great shooting guards that have emerged in the current era. Not even Harden has won a title. So we can compare him to his peers, but they haven't achieved any results. So why is it so important to match their numbers. I'd rather compare him to shooting guards who did something like carry their teams to titles.
Steph and Klay are shooting guards. 6 worst teams at 3s this season : Washington, San Antonio, Memphis, Portland, Charlotte and Houston. The Pistons aren’t far off. All of the worst teams in the league then us, fighting for the 10th spot. There’s just no way around it. If you are terrible at shooting the 3(relative to the rest of the league) your team will suffer. If you take the most 3s per game on your team you are the one contributing the most to your teams 3 point percentage. If he continues to shoot 7 threes per game at 32% he will be coming off some teams bench in the future. Of the top 50 players in 3 FGA this season only 2 are worse than Jalen Green in percentage. That’s not good. And we have seen how great things look when Jalen hits his 3s at a high rate. If and when Jalen switches his entire play style up and becomes a mid range master who only takes 1 or 2 three point shots per game, that will be when you can compare him to the greats of the past. As long as his volume is high his percentage will absolutely matter a lot more than those guys you mentioned.
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