2020-2021 AROUND the NBA: Archived

[SleepingHero]

Overall most guys are underperforming, not overperforming  but I agree that without Curry and more minutes for better defenders with mediocre percentages the 3-point shooting probably won´t reach last seasons level. That is obviously not great but I think the coaches expected a slight decline when they decided to surround Luka with better defenders.

First off, this is a great post and I like the points you made.  But some comments:

Mavs rank 22nd in 3-point percentage.

That they do, however, this is skewed for sure and has a lot of noise. Luka is 2nd in 3PA for the Mavs. His horrid 5/31 start to the season has tanked the Mavs overall 3pt% alone. Taking Luka out puts the Mavs at 13th in the league in overall 3pt% and that's before even approaching Richardson who's our 3rd highest in 3PA. Of course this isn't weighted properly, but more of an exercise to demonstrate that the Mavs overall shooting % is misleading and isn't really indicative of how they've been performing on the season. 2 guys are tanking the stat, while 4-5 guys are overperforming anywhere from 5-10% points. Especially when 4 core rotation guys are shooting above 40% from three so far (THJ, Burke, Maxi, and KP). I do not believe that has ever happened in the history of the NBA. Maybe GSW during the height of Splash town so don't quote me on that. 

THJ already was a 7 attempts per game / 40% 3-point shooter last season. Don´t expect a huge decline.

By all accounts, THJ's season last year was an outlier for his career as I've said in the summer. In his 6 seasons before Dallas, his highest 3pt shooting % was his rookie year in NYK where he shot 36.3%. After that he averaged anywhere from 5-7 3PA, with a range of 31.7-35.7. Meaning he was consistently a below average 3pt shooter with high attempts. 

Suddenly in his first full season in Dallas he starts shooting 39.8%, and we think that isn't an outlier? Further, in the playoffs/bubble THJ shot a putrid 33% from 3 in a sample size of 14 games. Now after an 8 game stretch where he's nearly shooting 50% from 3 we shouldn't expect a regression? THJ as a player is one of the most hot-cold players there is. Put it this way, I think him playing next to Luka+KP stops THJ from succumbing to his chucker tendencies and that alone bumps him up 3-4% above his 34% 3pt career average, but he is not -and will never be- this flamethrower we're seeing at 45%. It doesn't mean he's bad but we need to be realistic. 

DFS: 37.6% last season / 32.6 this season / 33% career 3.3 3PA
Brunson: 35.8 % last season / 31.8% this season / 35% career 2.3 3PA
Richardson: 34.1% last season / 32% this season / 36.2% career 4.5 3PA 
Doncic: 31.6% last season / 27.3% this season / 31.8% career 7.9 3PA
Iwundu: 34.1% last season / 14.3% this season / 31.3% career 1.1 3PA
Johnson: 36.3% last season / 28.6% this season / 30.9% career 1.7 3PA

I agree with the core principle of this. However, taking into context of who these players are and how many threes they are shooting, not all of these numbers are of the same importance.

To be fair I'm exhausted and I know that last sentence didn't come out too well, but maybe explaining it this way will get my point across. 

Johnson: 36.3% last season / 28.6% this season / 30.9% career- 1.7 3PA for his career.
Iwundu: 34.1% last season / 14.3% this season / 31.3% career- 1.1 3PA for his career. 

Even if these guys got to their career averages, they don't take enough volume for it to really matter in the first place. And even then their career averages are actually horrible as well. Which leads me to my next point

Luka isn't that good of a 3pt shooter, and the difference between him making 31% vs. 35% is significant, but not enough to hold a team or offense back. Tim Cato pointed out that last season, Luka would've made about 1 more three per week had he shot 35% versus the 32% he did. If Luka can ever get anywhere near 40% on 7 3PA, NOW we're talking about a huge difference. Like the kind of difference that is instead of making 171 3pt we're talking 200+

DFS has been a below average 3pt shooter for his entire career besides last year (much like THJ to be fair). It's plausible as well that last season was fools gold and he's right back at his career average this year and has regressed. However, I'm more optimistic that DFS returns to his elite shooting given his first 3 years are what really pulling him down, and there isn't enough data yet to be as confident it's a regression. Versus THJ who's entire career is a bit of a rollercoaster ride regarding his 3pt shooting. 

Overall most guys are underperforming, not overperforming  but I agree that without Curry and more minutes for better defenders with mediocre percentages the 3-point shooting probably won´t reach last seasons level. That is obviously not great but I think the coaches expected a slight decline when they decided to surround Luka with better defenders.

In any case, Kleber(+10%), Burke (+10%), and THJ (+7%), are overperforming more than the guys that are underperforming (and the ones that actually matter, like Luka/DFS/Richardson. Not Iwundu or Johnson). Luka (-5%), DFS(-0.4), and Richardson (-4.2%) will hopefully improve and stabilize, but what I fear is that when those guys do, the 3 dudes that are going supernova are going to stabilize as well and their resulting 3pt% will plummet.

Sorry it got wordy. Late night ramblings tend to make me wordy. But I like your optimism and I really do hope you're right and I am terribly terribly wrong.