Baynes shot 34% on 1.2 attempts per 16 minutes. I feel like he wasn't completely ignored, but I'd like defenses to pay a little more attention than they did to him. ~3 attempts in 26 minutes I think would do the trick if he can hit at > 34%
You raise an interesting point: if he takes more, the defenses have to pay more attention. But if the defenses are paying more attention, that means more of his shots are challenged, and the % likely goes down as well.
The more that defenses pay attention to him, the more open the lane is. there are a lot of moving parts here.
There are, but I'm not sure I've ever seen it happen where an added 3 point shot hurt a team.
Well, too many of them taken at lower efficiency starts to erode your overall scoring efficiency. And even a lot of them taken at "ok" scoring efficiency still has the problem of low field goal efficiency, which means despite scoring an okay amount of points, you are fundamentally missing shots (compared to scoring at the same efficiency on 2PT shots).
Scoring efficiency (as measured by TS%) loves the 3PT shot and is rightfully one of the most important metrics. But classic FG% is still important because a low FG% means you are missing a lot of shots and it is a fundamental of basketball that the other team will grab about 75% of your missed shots. I.E, each missed shot is almost 75% as bad as a turnover. Not quite as bad, but bad.
One other fundamental that is important: Teams score more efficiently off defensive rebounds than when they have to in-bound from under their basket. So when you miss a shot, you are helping their offense.
Excess misses have a real cost that impacts winning. Just plain old FG% still correlates heavily with contending for titles. This last year, here were the top 5 teams by FG%:
1. GSW
2. SAS
3. MIL
4. IND
5. TOR
and here are the top 5 teams by lowest opponent FG%:
1. MIL
2. MIA
3. GSW
4. BOS
5. TOR
No surprise that TOR and GSW were on both lists. This has been the case forever in basketball.
Because of this, it is not really true that a 33% three point shot is just as good as a 50% 2PT shot. To be equally scoring efficient net the negative cost of the extra missed shots, a three point shot needs to be well above that.
Now, compared to long 2PT jumpers that are typically hit at say, a 40-45% clip, you don't need a super-elite 3PT% in order to overcome that cost and to be a better, more valuable option.
But for players like Baynes, Kanter, Lopez -- the opportunity cost isn't really a long 2PT jumper. If those guys aren't taking threes, the bulk of their shots are high percentage layups, dunks & tip-ins within 3 feet of the hoop. Those are shots hit at ~60% or even higher.
So to equal the scoring efficiency of THOSE shots, again, accounting also for negative cost of increased missed shots, a 'stretch 5' type player really needs to be hitting well above 35% and probably needs to be close to 40% if he's taking a lot of threes. Because that may make his individual TS% look good but it isn't necessarily helping the team versus scoring down low.
The Bucks ostensibly want Lopez outside the arc taking a lot of three in order to try to keep the low paint clear for Giannis to drive at. But I personally don't think that's really the best way to do this.
Brook Lopez shot 6.3 threes per game at 36.5%. But only 0.4 of those attempts per game had a defender within 4 feet and on 4.0 of those he had no defender within even 6 feet. That tells me that he wasn't really pulling his defender way outside with him.
So this tells me that the effect of a 'Stretch Center" might be seriously over-rated. I think big men defenders were still willing to give Lopez that shot.
And having Lopez way outside like that definitely had a rebounding cost as Lopez' own ORB% dropped to a microscopic 1.5% this last year. He's a career 8.1% offensive rebounder, a huge 7 footer who was arguably that team's best pure rebounder yet he's contributing pretty much zero to that end on the floor.
And at 36.5%, that's imho, not really all that efficient to justify not using Lopez' impressive low-post skills. The guy has a career FG% within 3 ft of 66% and really, since around his 4th season, it's been closer to ~70%. Earlier in his career he used to take twice as large a percentage of his shots down low and was a beast at it.
If you ask me, I would rather use guys like that to facilitate attacks at the hoop the old-fashioned way: With their bodies. Hold a seal. Set a baseline pick. Footwork and muscle. This is basic fundamental basketball.
I know, I'm sounding like an old curmudgeon. In truth I don't mind if our bigs add the extended range. Versatility is good and the ability of Baynes before and maybe Kanter this year to once in a while pop out to launch a 3PT bomb can add an edge. Keep the defenders on their toes. But I am not convinced that we want these guys really going all out and launching over half their shots from out there, ala Brook Lopez.
We aren't dependent on a lead scorer (Giannis) who isn't a deep threat and who's own defender often sags in anticipation of a drive. ALL of our non-center players are decent-to-very-good outside shooters. If we play with 4 wing/guard shooters on the floor with a single post big, there is really only going to be one defender in the paint that our 5 needs to seal off the play to support a driving attack by one of our wings.
If Kanter takes 10 FGA in a game, I darn well want 8 or more of them to be from within 6 feet of the hoop. Or we are just plain doing something wrong.
Golden State has quietly made heavy use of and been extremely successful giving large minutes to 'true bigs' who don't shoot threes. Bogut. Zaza. Javale. Looney. Ezekiel. Names I'm forgetting. These guys all logged huge minutes on the Warriors over the last half-dozen years and all now have championship rings. And they have combined to shoot probably less than a dozen 3pt shots. The only two big men during this run by GSW who shot more than a couple of threes were Speights and Cousins. Speights was mostly a 3rd stringer while at GSW and Cousins missed a ton of games (and ultimately is the only big man I just named who didn't get a ring).
Okay. I've rambled enough on this topic. I'll go back to my dark room now and huddle in the corner watch old vids of 1970s & 80s basketball ...
TP. One of the best posts I’ve ever read.
I don't know how to say this without coming across as rude but his entire post is a logic exercise that was not taken to its logical conclusion. He got 2 or 3 steps into a 5+ step problem and declared the problem solved, in doing so the conclusions he makes are under informed and incorrect. Virtually everything he posted can be easily refuted by math, logic and analytics. The NBA and the analytic community have spent large amounts of time and money and the resulting evidence is clearly in complete disagreement with mmmmm's post.
You obviously haven't been watching closely at how Golden State has actually made use of bigs the last few years, have you?
G.S. can get away with playing bottom of the barrel centers because they are so extremely talented at all other positions. I don't think a single big man (other than Draymond) that has played for G.S. in the last 5 years has went on to sign a contract for more than 5 million a year. Most are bench guys playing for the minimum or out of the league. What does that tell you about their perceived value around the league? Correlation does not mean causation, the big men (other than Draymond) that G.S. has deployed have very little to do with what G.S. has accomplished.
It's not just about GSW. Until this last year with Gasol, Siakum and Ibaka, go back and look at the lineups of both Finals teams over the last ten years. By far, the vast majority of big men minutes on those teams have been given to guys who don't shoot threes.
