Some interesting notes on Rondos jumpshooting from ESPN

[BballTim]

For all the hand-wringing about Rondo's jumper, it's worth pointing out that he shot 41 percent from 16-to-23 feet this past season (up 8 percent from the previous year, and he attempted a career-high 3.3 attempts per game from that range). Yes, Rondo graded out as merely "average" among jump shooters, according to Synergy Sports. He was 100-of-260 shooting (38.5 percent) on all half-court jump shots last season. But zoom in closer and he graded out as "good" from 17 feet to the 3-point line, connecting on 67-of-162 attempts (41.4 percent). Dial it back to the 2009-10 season and Rondo was 91-of-272 (33.5 percent) on all jumpers, while connecting on just 48-of-134 shots from 17 feet to the 3-point line (35.8 percent) showing some decent improvement last year.

so, he is improving on his jumpshot slowly but surely. and I think he will continue to improve next year. and as he gets more comfortable with making that shot, he will have to be contested, and will make it while being so

I haven't read the whole thread yet, so this was probably already pointed out, but I think it is very tough to judge Rondo's jumpshooting against other NBA players.  It is fine to say he is improving (which is undeniable), however, it is very tough to say he is "average among jumpshooters", just because he is taking most of those shots with significantly less pressure than the rest of the NBA. 

He is generally left wide open on purpose, because they know that he is much more dangerous if he doesn't shoot it than if he does.  So, while the majority of NBA players (or at least perimeter players) are taking those shots with guys running at them, Rondo is taking a huge amount of them without any pressure at all, which obviously makes it a much easier shot. 

  It's true that Rondo is left open on purpose but I think people really downplay how many outside shots are wide open. KG's a very good perimeter shooter but he gets a couple of them a game. It's obviously hard to find stats on this but here's an article that alludes to what I'm talking about:

  http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/03/25/2132902/for-miami-heat-curious-numbers.html

  They're just talking about catch and shoot jumpers, but it looks like fairly close to  half of them are unguarded. It's IMO highly unlikely that all players (aside from Rondo) are guarded equally, in other words teams wouldn't guard Jason Kidd or Devin Harris on those shots as closely as the cover PP or RA or Kobe. It would logically follow that a good number of players besides Rondo are left alone when they shoot jumpers.

[Vermont Green]

I haven't read the whole thread yet, so this was probably already pointed out, but I think it is very tough to judge Rondo's jumpshooting against other NBA players.  It is fine to say he is improving (which is undeniable), however, it is very tough to say he is "average among jumpshooters", just because he is taking most of those shots with significantly less pressure than the rest of the NBA. 

He is generally left wide open on purpose, because they know that he is much more dangerous if he doesn't shoot it than if he does.  So, while the majority of NBA players (or at least perimeter players) are taking those shots with guys running at them, Rondo is taking a huge amount of them without any pressure at all, which obviously makes it a much easier shot. 

Where this is important is that if he continues to improve, he will hit a tipping point, where teams will have to cover him, and that is when we will see how he really stacks up against other NBA shooters. 

Don't get me wrong, I think Rondo is clearly making progress, and he is learning to work with what he has...I just think its a bit disingenuous to say he is now an average NBA shooter.

I thinks what Chris says it right on.  Anyone who concludes that Rondo is an average shooting NBA player or PG based on stats, probably hasn't watch too many games.  Rondo is a horrible shooter, up there with Ben Wallace.  But like Ben Wallace, Rondo excels in other aspects.  His shooting percentage remains reasonable because he has the sense not to take too many shots and because the shots he does take and in general, are completely uncontested.

Ben Wallace has a career shooting percentage of 0.475, only 5% less than Kevin Garnett's career shooting percentage.  So is Ben Wallace an above average shooting big man?

[deekhead]

I haven't read the whole thread yet, so this was probably already pointed out, but I think it is very tough to judge Rondo's jumpshooting against other NBA players.  It is fine to say he is improving (which is undeniable), however, it is very tough to say he is "average among jumpshooters", just because he is taking most of those shots with significantly less pressure than the rest of the NBA. 

He is generally left wide open on purpose, because they know that he is much more dangerous if he doesn't shoot it than if he does.  So, while the majority of NBA players (or at least perimeter players) are taking those shots with guys running at them, Rondo is taking a huge amount of them without any pressure at all, which obviously makes it a much easier shot. 

Where this is important is that if he continues to improve, he will hit a tipping point, where teams will have to cover him, and that is when we will see how he really stacks up against other NBA shooters. 

Don't get me wrong, I think Rondo is clearly making progress, and he is learning to work with what he has...I just think its a bit disingenuous to say he is now an average NBA shooter.

I thinks what Chris says it right on.  Anyone who concludes that Rondo is an average shooting NBA player or PG based on stats, probably hasn't watch too many games.  Rondo is a horrible shooter, up there with Ben Wallace.  But like Ben Wallace, Rondo excels in other aspects.  His shooting percentage remains reasonable because he has the sense not to take too many shots and because the shots he does take and in general, are completely uncontested.

Ben Wallace has a career shooting percentage of 0.475, only 5% less than Kevin Garnett's career shooting percentage.  So is Ben Wallace an above average shooting big man?

Rondo misses fewer than 1 FT per game.  I suspect based on these stats that he is an average to above average FT shooter too.

DH

[paulcowens]

 A lot of shooting has to do with body mechanics, but a lot of it has to do with what is going on in a person's head.   Being all alone and free to shoot becomes a high pressure situation when the player has a reputation for being an awful shooter.  One gets the impression that knocking down a shot is sometimes easier for Rondo on the run, perhaps in part because of this.  But the important thing is that he IS improving, and that we can have confidence that he is the kind of guy who is almost certain to keep improving;  some day we'll all suddenly realize that he's turned into a solid shooter.  Could be as soon as next year (one can dream)...

[PosImpos]

As much as I'd like to see Rondo's jumper improve, these stats are extremely skewed.  Rondo is one of the few guards in the league that is left wide open and encouraged to shoot by the other team's defense.  With that in mind 41% is actually pretty poor.

well, in 09-10 he was left open and shot 33%, in 2010-11 he shot 41% thats an improvement..he gets that to 45-47% by next year and is comfortable with it, guards will have to contest him...he needs to get comfortable with that shot and he will make them.

and lets be honest, its not like Pierce/KG/RA are have defenders draped ALL over them when they shoot either...ALOT of their shots this year were wide open as well...you find the open man to take the shot...ALOT of KG's long 2's were wide open.

and to posimpos. Im not sure how you can say that Rondo has "reached his ceiling" when theres no evidence that he has stopped improving. stats/evidence would suggest that he's been improving in all areas each year since he entered the league. last year his PPG went down. but IMO thats mainly due to the fact he had his worst injury year. considering Rondo is an anomaly anyways as a player(usually you dont find top5 point guards at #24) theres no telling what his ceiling will be

http://espn.go.com/nba/player/hollinger/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo

check out the year-by-year stats here for me.  i'm not really seeing the evidence for this great year to year improvement that you're talking about.

  I would say that Rondo was considerably improved this year, to the point that he was pretty high in most of the lists people put out for potential MVP candidates. His passing was clearly better, which showed in the fact that he was leading the league by a decent margin before his late season slump. Also his defense was terrific when he was healthy, to the point that his defense was below par for a month+ late in the season and he was still comfortably 1st team all-defense.

  His biggest improvement was how well he ran the offense. First of all there were the gaudy assist totals and the easy shots that came from them. But additionally he was doing a great job of directing the players and creating mismatches, and he was getting a lot of hockey assists where he'd swing the ball over to someone who would make the entry pass for that mismatch. This doesn't show up directly on the stat sheet, but before the all-star break our team fg% was .493, when the team that finished 2nd in the league this year was .481, which would be closer to 7th place than the numbers we were putting up.

in any case, he'll be 26 in February, and he's already played in this league for 5 seasons.  i think it's reasonable to hope that he will steadily improve his shooting, as many guards do, as he ages.  other than that, i think you're expecting too much if you think Rondo will suddenly take it to another level on a consistent basis.

  Just looking at the players on the "Player" index page on basketballreference, point guards that took it to another level at Rondo's age or older include Billups, Kidd, Payton, Stockton, Nash, Ainge and Cassell. I didn't check them all, but it must run close to half.

Tim, I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.  Your estimation / valuation of Rondo's abilities and potential is just a lot different than mine.

[BballTim]

I haven't read the whole thread yet, so this was probably already pointed out, but I think it is very tough to judge Rondo's jumpshooting against other NBA players.  It is fine to say he is improving (which is undeniable), however, it is very tough to say he is "average among jumpshooters", just because he is taking most of those shots with significantly less pressure than the rest of the NBA.  

He is generally left wide open on purpose, because they know that he is much more dangerous if he doesn't shoot it than if he does.  So, while the majority of NBA players (or at least perimeter players) are taking those shots with guys running at them, Rondo is taking a huge amount of them without any pressure at all, which obviously makes it a much easier shot.  

Where this is important is that if he continues to improve, he will hit a tipping point, where teams will have to cover him, and that is when we will see how he really stacks up against other NBA shooters.  

Don't get me wrong, I think Rondo is clearly making progress, and he is learning to work with what he has...I just think its a bit disingenuous to say he is now an average NBA shooter.

I thinks what Chris says it right on.  Anyone who concludes that Rondo is an average shooting NBA player or PG based on stats, probably hasn't watch too many games.  Rondo is a horrible shooter, up there with Ben Wallace.  But like Ben Wallace, Rondo excels in other aspects.  His shooting percentage remains reasonable because he has the sense not to take too many shots and because the shots he does take and in general, are completely uncontested.

  Comparing Rondo to Ben Wallace is absolutely ridiculous. Rondo's pretty much an average shooter (inside the arc) in part because he's left open, Ben Wallace is a historically bad shooter despite being left alone to shoot. This is similar to the thread that compared Rondo's scoring to Dennis Rodman's around the time the playoffs ended. Rondo's closer to being an above average shooter than he is to shooting like Ben Wallace.

  

[BballTim]

Tim, I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.  Your estimation / valuation of Rondo's abilities and potential is just a lot different than mine.

  I agree with this, but it's still likely to be one of the more prevalent discussions in the protracted offseason (ugh).

[CelticsFanNC]

 Rondo isn't a great perimeter shooter.  He's not a good shooter either but comparing him to Ben Wallace is ridiculous.

  I believe his struggles are more mental then anything else.  You will see him hit them when he shoots them within the flow of the offense when he doesn't have to think about it or it is at the end of the shot clock.  It is when he is left there wide open and everyone in the arena is looking at him that he most often misses them.  

  I'm not nearly as bothered by his difficulties shooting from the perimeter as most people seem to be.  Dennis Johnson and Tiny Archibald were also guys who were left wide open on thee perimeter during their Celtic careers and it never stopped them from winning or in the end becoming HOF players.

 It bothers me more when he has the open perimeter shot and doesn't take it.  That hurts the teams offense.

  

[Chris]

I haven't read the whole thread yet, so this was probably already pointed out, but I think it is very tough to judge Rondo's jumpshooting against other NBA players.  It is fine to say he is improving (which is undeniable), however, it is very tough to say he is "average among jumpshooters", just because he is taking most of those shots with significantly less pressure than the rest of the NBA.  

He is generally left wide open on purpose, because they know that he is much more dangerous if he doesn't shoot it than if he does.  So, while the majority of NBA players (or at least perimeter players) are taking those shots with guys running at them, Rondo is taking a huge amount of them without any pressure at all, which obviously makes it a much easier shot.  

Where this is important is that if he continues to improve, he will hit a tipping point, where teams will have to cover him, and that is when we will see how he really stacks up against other NBA shooters.  

Don't get me wrong, I think Rondo is clearly making progress, and he is learning to work with what he has...I just think its a bit disingenuous to say he is now an average NBA shooter.

I thinks what Chris says it right on.  Anyone who concludes that Rondo is an average shooting NBA player or PG based on stats, probably hasn't watch too many games.  Rondo is a horrible shooter, up there with Ben Wallace.  But like Ben Wallace, Rondo excels in other aspects.  His shooting percentage remains reasonable because he has the sense not to take too many shots and because the shots he does take and in general, are completely uncontested.

  Comparing Rondo to Ben Wallace is absolutely ridiculous. Rondo's pretty much an average shooter (inside the arc) in part because he's left open, Ben Wallace is a historically bad shooter despite being left alone to shoot. This is similar to the thread that compared Rondo's scoring to Dennis Rodman's around the time the playoffs ended. Rondo's closer to being an above average shooter than he is to shooting like Ben Wallace.

  

Agreed.  Rondo is nowhere near as bad as Wallace.

If I were going to compare Rondo's shooting to another player, it would be someone like maybe Gerald Wallace.

Anyone can see that they are both below average shooters for NBA perimeter players.  However, they do have the capability of hitting shots at a halfway decent rate, when they are left open, but not at a high enough rate for anyone to actually respect that shot. 

[deekhead]

Rondo isn't a great perimeter shooter.  He's not a good shooter either but comparing him to Ben Wallace is ridiculous.

  I believe his struggles are more mental then anything else.  You will see him hit them when he shoots them within the flow of the offense when he doesn't have to think about it or it is at the end of the shot clock.  It is when he is left there wide open and everyone in the arena is looking at him that he most often misses them.  

  I'm not nearly as bothered by his difficulties shooting from the perimeter as most people seem to be.  Dennis Johnson and Tiny Archibald were also guys who were left wide open on thee perimeter during their Celtic careers and it never stopped them from winning or in the end becoming HOF players.

 It bothers me more when he has the open perimeter shot and doesn't take it.  That hurts the teams offense.

  

When DJ or Tiny were left open, they recognized what the defense was giving them and took it. Rondo turns down regularly what the defense gives him including wide-open 15 footers.

That reluctance to try/fail hurts the team, slows his learning curve and frustrates his fans/supporters.

Rondo's  (ahem) "stubbornness" does not serve him nor the Cs well. Its completely mental.

And how do you fix that?

DH

[cman88]

Rondo isn't a great perimeter shooter.  He's not a good shooter either but comparing him to Ben Wallace is ridiculous.

  I believe his struggles are more mental then anything else.  You will see him hit them when he shoots them within the flow of the offense when he doesn't have to think about it or it is at the end of the shot clock.  It is when he is left there wide open and everyone in the arena is looking at him that he most often misses them.  

  I'm not nearly as bothered by his difficulties shooting from the perimeter as most people seem to be.  Dennis Johnson and Tiny Archibald were also guys who were left wide open on thee perimeter during their Celtic careers and it never stopped them from winning or in the end becoming HOF players.

 It bothers me more when he has the open perimeter shot and doesn't take it.  That hurts the teams offense.

  

When DJ or Tiny were left open, they recognized what the defense was giving them and took it. Rondo turns down regularly what the defense gives him including wide-open 15 footers.

That reluctance to try/fail hurts the team, slows his learning curve and frustrates his fans/supporters.

Rondo's  (ahem) "stubbornness" does not serve him nor the Cs well. Its completely mental.

And how do you fix that?

DH

thats on Doc Rivers to try and get Rondo to be more confident in taking that shot and to look for his shot more aggressively.  In games when Rondo makes a couple jumpers early on, you saw that he would contine to take/make them throughout the game..

if defenses know Rondo will score if they give him the opportunity and not look to just make a play, then it will make us much deadlier

with the big 3 getting older, I think Rondo has to bear more of the scoring burden this year IMO

[CelticsFanNC]

  When Rondo is on his game, perimeter shot or not he is a dominant NBA player.  He has dominated NBA games and entire playoff series'.  

 So to me the issue is more about his consistency then his outside shot.  If he plays the way he is capable of playing and does so night in and night out then his outside shot wouldn't the issue it is made out to be.  That means being the aggressor both offensively and defensively, breaking down the defense, getting everyone on the floor shots in their sweet spots and scoring when the opportunity arises within the flow of the offense or in the open court.  When he is doing that he is one of the most electrifying players in the NBA today and one of the few who is capable of dominating a game or series without being a primary scoring option.

  It is when he is passive both offensively and defensively that he is a run of the mill PG.  He seemed to have really stepped up his consistency in the first half of last season when he was being mentioned as an MVP candidate.  In the second half of last season for whatever reason(mounting injuries, Perkins trade)he really dropped off.  Even with this drop off though the teams was still better with him on the court then off of it.

[Roy H.]

It should go without saying, but Rondo has a long way to go with his shooting.  He shoots around 30% on jumpers from between 3 feet and 15 feet, he's a poor three point shooter, and he's an atrocious free throw shooter.  He's shown some progress on his deep twos, but he's got to work on just about everything else.  

Heck, we can't even say that he's made a lot of progress on his deep twos.  In '08, he hit them at 43%, and in '09 he was at 40%.  He really regressed in 2010 (33%), which makes his 41% look great last year.  However, he really wasn't any different than he was in '08-'09 (other than taking slightly more shots).  

The FT shooting is what I'm most concerned with, because that has a visible impact on his driving, and changes our end of game strategy.  However, his mid-range and three point shooting still isn't at an acceptable NBA level.

[cman88]

does he realy need to develop a 3point game though? I think a decent midrange game/higher free throw% would do wonders. especially free throws.

his jumpshooting is still a SLOW work in progress, but you have to admit Roy he did improve on his long 2's last year. with a higher sample size, shows hes becoming more confident with it. hed likely shoot a lower % if he took the same amt of jumpers in 09. and his form looks alot more fluid than it did in 09/10

either way, im confident that Rondo will be better next year and will continue to improve on his jump shot as long as he continues to work on it

[Roy H.]

does he realy need to develop a 3point game though? I think a decent midrange game/higher free throw% would do wonders. especially free throws.

his jumpshooting is still a SLOW work in progress, but you have to admit Roy he did improve on his long 2's last year. with a higher sample size, shows hes becoming more confident with it. hed likely shoot a lower % if he took the same amt of jumpers in 09. and his form looks alot more fluid than it did in 09/10

either way, im confident that Rondo will be better next year and will continue to improve on his jump shot as long as he continues to work on it

He improved on his long twos from the year before, but didn't really improve from 2008 and 2009.

2008:  43%; 2.7 attempts (16-23 foot jumpers)
2009:  40%; 1.9 attempts (16-23 foot jumpers)
2010:  33%; 2.3 attempts (16-23 foot jumpers)
2011:  41%; 3.3 attempts (16-23 foot jumpers)

I see last year as a bounce back from a very poor 2010, but don't necessarily see it as part of a steady progression.

Here's his other performances:

2008:  43%; 1.6 attempts (3-9 foot jumpers)
2009:  40%; 1.3 attempts (3-9 foot jumpers)
2010:  50.4%; 1.7 attempts (3-9 foot jumpers)
2011:  27.6%; 1.1 attempts (3-9 foot jumpers)

2008:  45%; 0.7 attempts (10-15 foot jumpers)
2009:  35%; 0.6 attempts (10-15 foot jumpers)
2010:  46.9%; 0.8 attempts (10-15 foot jumpers)
2011:  31.5%; 0.5 attempts (10-15 foot jumpers)

2008:  26.3%; 0.2 attempts (three pointers)
2009:  31.3%; 0.6 attempts (three pointers)
2010:  21.3%; 1.0 attempts (three pointers)
2011:  23.3%; 0.6 attempts (three pointers)

2008:  61.1%; 2.3 attempts (free throws)
2009:  64.2%; 3.4 attempts (free throws)
2010:  62.1%; 3.5 attempts (free throws)
2011:  56.8%; 1.9 attempts (free throws)

I don't see how anybody can argue that Rondo made any real progress in any of the above categories; almost uniformly, he's actually regressed from where he was two and three seasons ago.

As for three point shooting, he doesn't *have* to add that to his game (Andre Miller has had a successful career without being able to shoot from deep), but it sure would make his game stronger.

His free throws are most important, though, and we didn't see anything encouraging in that regard last year.  Not only did his percentage did, but his attempts were cut in half, indicative of his reluctance to drive inside relative to the past two seasons.