I am very strongly against signing a center who is predominately a jump shooter, especially one who takes a siginficant number of threes.
People can say what they what about the benefits of having a center who can stretch the floor...the fact of the matter is that even the most efficient three point shooters shoot maybe 45% at best from outside the arc.
True fact. As a means of comparison, the most efficient forwards shoot maybe 55% at best down low.
Even the most inefficient low post scorers will shoot over 50% inside the restricted area. The most efficient low post players tend to shoot 65% - 70% inside the paint.
A very good midrange shooter will shoot aroudn [sic] 50% from midrange - even Rondo shot 50% from midrange last season.
Stats here are slightly flawed given that most ineficcient low post scorers will shoot as low as 30% in the restricted area. The second statement is accurate.
Kevin Garnett, who is debatably the best mid-range shooter in the game, couldn't even shoot 50% from mid-range. "even Rondo" makes no sense given that Rondo led all NBA guards in mid-range field goal percentage.
The idea here is that you want somebody you can get the ball to, and almost guarantee you will get two points out of it. A great low post player like Al Jefferson (or even a somewhat capable low post scorer like Josh Smith) is going to score more often than not if you get them the ball in the restricted area.
You will never find a great low post player who will "almost guarantee you will get two points out of it" but you can get one who gets it in a smidge over half the time. As a previous poster alluded to, that's about a point per possession.
Sure you need shooters on the perimeter to stretch the floor and keep the defense honest, but that's what your perimeter players are for. With guys like Terry, Pierce and Green on the perimeter the defense has to contest - you can't leave any of those guys open. Even Sully if he's out there can hit the three at a decent rate.
Terry and Pierce are good from downtown, but even they shot 37% and 38% respectively. Not 45%, but it's good enough. Our other players, Green, Bradley, Sully can't make three pointers and they definitely shouldn't be shooting them.
Another important thing to consider is that good low post scorers, if they don't score, often get to the foul line. Not only does that generate extra scoring opporunities, it also puts the opposing team into greater foul trouble (putting them at further disadvantage). There is close to zero chance of a three point shooter drawing a foul. It probably happens two or three times every season for each team.
Your examples Al Jefferson and Josh Smith shoot 71% and 65% from the free throw line (career), so that's not exactly killer. And plus, looking at the numbers, out of the top 30 players to get to the line, only nine play frontcourt positions. Nine out of thirty. Only one was really able to shoot over 76% (LMA at 81%).
Not only that, but Al Jefferson was 91st in the league at getting to the line, and he's a premier post player. (KG was better, and he's a jump shooter) Josh Smith was 35th, but again he can't shoot.
So forget about the softies out there...we need a tank. We need a Jefferson / Gortat / Cousins type guy who (if he catches the ball inside) has the size and strength to simply overpower the defender and put the ball in the basket. That last two legit big men we had were Kendrick Perkins and Shaquille O'neal, and we were a DOMINANT team anytime we had either of those guys on the court.
Al Jefferson's shooting percentage was 49.4%. DeMarcus Cousins was 46.5%. Josh Smith was also 46.5%. Marcin Gortat was 52.1%. None of these provide the DOMINANT shooting that you'd want down in the paint. They'll score the ball around half the time just like the stats say.
It's funny how people look at the leagues tendancy to play small ball, and use that as a reason why you should go small too. Wrong approach. The fact that every other team is going small is all the MORE reason for wanting to go big. It's not like in the past (Ewing, Hakeem, Mourning, Shaq, Robinson) days where every team had a strong big man, and you needed a superstart 7 footer to dominate that position. In this day and age all you need is a CAPABLE man with a legit big body and you can dominate the vast majority of teams out there.
I agree with this. Every team that wants to contend needs a legit 7 footer to dominate the inside. We had KG but he wasn't enough: it'd be nice to get someone here.
Perfect example is to look at what Indiana and the Spurs have done so far to the Heat. When Indiana were beating Miami, it was the quality and size of their front court (Hibbert and West) that the Heat had no answer for. Now again the Spurs can dominate them with Splitter and Duncan.
Only time will tell.
If you fight a small-ball team by building a small-ball team, then the only way to win is if your small-ball guys are better AT small-ball than their small-ball guys. It's pretty tough to find better small-ball guys than Lebron James and Chris Bosh, so why bother fighting fire with fire? You'll only make the flames bigger. Instead fight fire with water - then you might extinguish the flames entirely.
Bahhhh
