Back to back season low assist games of 14.

[mctyson]

  Not only are they season lows but they tie 2 year lows with 1 game last year.  The ball movement has completely disintegrated.  Brad must be using these games trying to improve at attacking the basket as it has become pretty clear many players have been instructed to do so.  Hopefully it produces some positive results because it has resulted in some very ugly games and 35 turnovers over the last 2.

You can't have assists if you don't make shots.

[The Oracle]

Miserable shooting continues to be a problem for this team.

It'll continue to be until the personnel changes significantly.

This is why I think adding capable, proven (not just theoretical) shooters is a higher priority than the common refrain "We need a center!"

Yeah, it's hard to look past the numbers.  Boston is nicely in the top 10 in so many important categories, but in FG% we are still ranked way down at 24th.  And we've been near the bottom in every year of the Brad Stevens era.

And if folks want to chime in and say, "FG% doesn't matter!  It's all about eFG and TS!!"' -- sorry, no.

eFG is a better measure of an individual's shooting efficiency.  And TS is a better measure of scoring efficiency.

But raw FG% is still critically important -- especially at the TEAM level -- because it relates to miss rates.  Missed shots are killers.  On average, 76% of missed shots get grabbed by the defense.  So effectively a missed shot is about 76% as bad as a turnover.    If you are missing 4 extra shots per game, that's almost like having three extra TOs per game.  Opposing team's score more efficiently off a rebound than off a side-in.

If you go back over the last 15 years, almost every single one of the finalists was ranked in the top 5 for FG%.  And that continues today as both SAS and GSW are currently tied at the top of the FG% rankings (with OKC the only team that is remotely close).

To be a title contender, you need to look like a contender.  You need to do contender things.  We do many things that look like a contender.  But we don't make shots like a contender.

 

As far as miss rates go your approach to missed shots is that they are a negative event when they are actually not.  Each shot taken is a scoring attempt and should not be looked at as anything like a turnover.  In basketball missing shots is just a reality,  you have an expected return over time and the individual result of each one is not significant.  You use an example of 4 extra missed FG, those missed FG result in 1 offensive rebound that is an actual real, additional scoring opportunity.  The 3 defensive rebounds for your opponent are nothing more than them getting the ball back.  It is actually an advantage to shoot higher value(3's), lower FG% shots in that it results in more missed shots, resulting in additional offensive rebounds and thus more attempts to score.
   
  As an example.
Team A shoots 33% on 100 3 point FG attempts
Team B shoots 50% on 100 2 point FG attempts

Team A missed 17 more shots than team B.  Using a 24% offensive rebounding rate for both teams, team A should have 4 additional offensive rebounds and scoring attempts, team B 13 additional defensive rebounds instead of taking the ball from out of bounds.  You are correct when you say that defensive rebounds result in a higher FG% than taking the ball from out of bounds although I have no idea how significant that is.  Even if that results in a 10% bump in FG% for Team B on those 13 rebounds that would in no way be as impactful as the 4 additional scoring opportunities Team A has.

I like reading your posts as they are very informative but I do believe you are wrong on this one.  I am always welcome to being proven wrong myself.  FG% holds no real value as a statistic as it doesn't give accurate information as to what is actually occurring due to the increased value of the 3 point shot.

[mmmmm]

Miserable shooting continues to be a problem for this team.

It'll continue to be until the personnel changes significantly.

This is why I think adding capable, proven (not just theoretical) shooters is a higher priority than the common refrain "We need a center!"

Yeah, it's hard to look past the numbers.  Boston is nicely in the top 10 in so many important categories, but in FG% we are still ranked way down at 24th.  And we've been near the bottom in every year of the Brad Stevens era.

And if folks want to chime in and say, "FG% doesn't matter!  It's all about eFG and TS!!"' -- sorry, no.

eFG is a better measure of an individual's shooting efficiency.  And TS is a better measure of scoring efficiency.

But raw FG% is still critically important -- especially at the TEAM level -- because it relates to miss rates.  Missed shots are killers.  On average, 76% of missed shots get grabbed by the defense.  So effectively a missed shot is about 76% as bad as a turnover.    If you are missing 4 extra shots per game, that's almost like having three extra TOs per game.  Opposing team's score more efficiently off a rebound than off a side-in.

If you go back over the last 15 years, almost every single one of the finalists was ranked in the top 5 for FG%.  And that continues today as both SAS and GSW are currently tied at the top of the FG% rankings (with OKC the only team that is remotely close).

To be a title contender, you need to look like a contender.  You need to do contender things.  We do many things that look like a contender.  But we don't make shots like a contender.

 

As far as miss rates go your approach to missed shots is that they are a negative event when they are actually not.  Each shot taken is a scoring attempt and should not be looked at as anything like a turnover.  In basketball missing shots is just a reality,  you have an expected return over time and the individual result of each one is not significant.  You use an example of 4 extra missed FG, those missed FG result in 1 offensive rebound that is an actual real, additional scoring opportunity.  The 3 defensive rebounds for your opponent are nothing more than them getting the ball back.  It is actually an advantage to shoot higher value(3's), lower FG% shots in that it results in more missed shots, resulting in additional offensive rebounds and thus more attempts to score.
   
  As an example.
Team A shoots 33% on 100 3 point FG attempts
Team B shoots 50% on 100 2 point FG attempts

Team A missed 17 more shots than team B.  Using a 24% offensive rebounding rate for both teams, team A should have 4 additional offensive rebounds and scoring attempts, team B 13 additional defensive rebounds instead of taking the ball from out of bounds.  You are correct when you say that defensive rebounds result in a higher FG% than taking the ball from out of bounds although I have no idea how significant that is.  Even if that results in a 10% bump in FG% for Team B on those 13 rebounds that would in no way be as impactful as the 4 additional scoring opportunities Team A has.

I like reading your posts as they are very informative but I do believe you are wrong on this one.  I am always welcome to being proven wrong myself.  FG% holds no real value as a statistic as it doesn't give accurate information as to what is actually occurring due to the increased value of the 3 point shot.

I'm sorry but that's simply not a correct way to think about it.

On a given possession, your goal is to score points.   If you miss the first shot of a possession, two immediate outcomes are possible:

a) An ORB extends the current possession, giving you a certain percentage chance of still scoring on it.  Still no guarantee it will result in points.

b) A DRB completely ends the current possession.  Zero percent chance of scoring on it.

There is nothing positive about a missed shot.  A missed shot has, on average, a 76% chance of ending the possession with no points.

If you miss your first shot, you have very little chance of getting a second one on that possession.  Thus first-shot efficiency is critical.

The correlations (between high FG% and title-contending teams) that I laid out are extremely high for a reason.

The importance of first-shot efficiency is further illustrated by the number of title-winning teams over the years that have basically put ORBs at an extremely low priority.  In recent years, title contenders like San Antonio, Miami, our own Celtics, etc., have routinely been among the _lowest_ ranked in ORB%.

Even this year, SAS is ranked only 21st in ORB%.  That's not because they are poor rebounding team.  SAS is 3rd in DRB%.