Welcome to Boston, Svi Mykhailiuk!

[Smart2Nesmith43]

I like the idea of Pritchard, Mykhailiuk and Hauser gunning on the 2nd unit.

Offensively, yes that works. Just now sure if those 3 guys on the floor together against a team of legit NBA players would hold up defensively. We might give up lots of points and then Joe has to quickly scramble to put starters back in - especially if Kornet is also on the floor.

Tiny sample size alert but Pritchard/Svi/Hauser (+Brissett/Kornet) played about five minutes together bridging the first and second quarter of yesterday's game against Philly. So that was when the Sixers were still playing their real rotation guys and yet the Celtics won those minutes 17-15. Against reserve heavy lineups, that group can probably tread water just fine.

[165bows]

I like the idea of Pritchard, Mykhailiuk and Hauser gunning on the 2nd unit.

Offensively, yes that works. Just now sure if those 3 guys on the floor together against a team of legit NBA players would hold up defensively. We might give up lots of points and then Joe has to quickly scramble to put starters back in - especially if Kornet is also on the floor.

Tiny sample size alert but Pritchard/Svi/Hauser (+Brissett/Kornet) played about five minutes together bridging the first and second quarter of yesterday's game against Philly. So that was when the Sixers were still playing their real rotation guys and yet the Celtics won those minutes 17-15. Against reserve heavy lineups, that group can probably tread water just fine.

All this Kornet slander lately as if he wasn't a +5 overall last year.

[BK_2020]

I don't think Svi is as good a shooter as he's been in a couple of pre-season games so far. He's a career 76% free throw shooter and 36% from the three. The chances are he's a decent shooter who can put the ball on the floor a little but it's not realistic to expect him to turn into a Dana Barros or a Steve Novak. His shot also looks a little flat but honestly with almost 1000 3PA in his career he's got enough of a track record to not need dissection of how his shot looks.
Still could be a contributor, just saying dampen your expectations if you think we have a dead-eye shooter in the fold.

[threrf23]

He was a very dependable shooter throughout his four years at Kansas, shot 42% last year, also shot rather well for the Pistons early on in his career. Is 26 years old and has never really gotten a chance to settle into a role on a good team, maybe the '22 Raps idk. No he's not Ray Allen or Steve Novak, he could still be Malcom Brogdon or better.

[ryan in Maine]

I don't think Svi is as good a shooter as he's been in a couple of pre-season games so far. He's a career 76% free throw shooter and 36% from the three. The chances are he's a decent shooter who can put the ball on the floor a little but it's not realistic to expect him to turn into a Dana Barros or a Steve Novak. His shot also looks a little flat but honestly with almost 1000 3PA in his career he's got enough of a track record to not need dissection of how his shot looks.
Still could be a contributor, just saying dampen your expectations if you think we have a dead-eye shooter in the fold.

[BK_2020]

He was a very dependable shooter throughout his four years at Kansas, shot 42% last year, also shot rather well for the Pistons early on in his career. Is 26 years old and has never really gotten a chance to settle into a role on a good team, maybe the '22 Raps idk. No he's not Ray Allen or Steve Novak, he could still be Malcom Brogdon or better.

An elite shooter just doesn't shoot 76% from the line (74.6% for his 4 years in college).
Brogdon shot .444 for us and is a .388 career shooter from the three and .879 career from the line in the pros and college. There's absolutely nothing to suggest he can shoot better than Brogdon.

[zoyathedestroya]

A lineup of PP-Svi-Hauser-Tatum-Porzingis against the Hornets and Wizards intrigues me.

[Smart2Nesmith43]

He was a very dependable shooter throughout his four years at Kansas, shot 42% last year, also shot rather well for the Pistons early on in his career. Is 26 years old and has never really gotten a chance to settle into a role on a good team, maybe the '22 Raps idk. No he's not Ray Allen or Steve Novak, he could still be Malcom Brogdon or better.

An elite shooter just doesn't shoot 76% from the line (74.6% for his 4 years in college).
Brogdon shot .444 for us and is a .388 career shooter from the three and .879 career from the line in the pros and college. There's absolutely nothing to suggest he can shoot better than Brogdon.

It's unusual for a long range sniper to be this bad on free throws but it's not unprecedented either. Joe Harris is a career 43.7% shooter from 3 (over 2300 attempts so not some fluky hot streak) and 77.2% free throw shooter. Ingles is another guy that's 40+% from three in his career with a similar success rate on free throws (77%). If you want to throw him in there, Horford cans three at a pretty high clip but usually doesn't crack 80% from the line either.

So I don't think you can just dismiss the notion that he is a good shooter based solely on his free throw percentage. That being said I agree with the other part of your post that we shouldn't expect him to shoot better than what Brogdon did last year. Brogdon is a far more proven shooter at this level and I still wouldn't expect him to match what he did last season ever again. 44% on the kind of volume he had last year is really, really hard.

[BK_2020]

Good call on Joe Harris and Ingles but they appear to be the exceptions. In any case, Svi's 3 game hot streak in pre-season is not likely to be what he really is.

[165bows]

Good call on Joe Harris and Ingles but they appear to be the exceptions. In any case, Svi's 3 game hot streak in pre-season is not likely to be what he really is.

Well I think it’s fair to recognize that the shooters off the bench all have had some real streakiness to them. Which isn’t even remotely uncommon but they’ve at least got some upside to them shooting wise.

[threrf23]

It's unusual for a long range sniper to be this bad on free throws but it's not unprecedented either. Joe Harris is a career 43.7% shooter from 3 (over 2300 attempts so not some fluky hot streak) and 77.2% free throw shooter. Ingles is another guy that's 40+% from three in his career with a similar success rate on free throws (77%). If you want to throw him in there, Horford cans three at a pretty high clip but usually doesn't crack 80% from the line either.

I mean, it makes sense. IMO there is no reason that the ability to hit an unrushed, uncontested, out of rhythm jump shot as the center of everyone's attention should be indicative of a player's ability to hit jump shots within the flow of actual game play. More generally, lots of players can knock down 3 after 3 in practice, it just doesn't typically translate to real games.

Hence, a good free throw shooter is not always a good three point shooter, and there are lots of examples of this. It figures that the best three point shooters should be able to hit shots unconditionally, and hence should also be great free throw shooters, and that a good three point shooter will usually at least be a decent free throw shooter. But it also makes sense that there are players who function better in rhythm and/or with less time to think.

Svi shot 75% from the line in college? Ray Allen shot 78%. Paul Pierce shot 70%, including 61% as a freshman. Just cause I can copy it from a previous post, as freshmen in college Steve Kerr shot 69%, Jason Richardson shot 55%, Jason Kapono shot 68%, Robert Horry shot 64%, Reggie Miller shot 64%, Joe Harris shot 64%.

I know that most of those guys shot over 80% from the FT line over the course of their careers, but there is the Joe Harris exception S2N mentioned, there is also Jason Richardson who developed into one of the league's best shooters for a bit, shot 70% from the FT line over the course of his career.

[BK_2020]

IMO there is no reason that the ability to hit an unrushed, uncontested, out of rhythm jump shot as the center of everyone's attention should be indicative of a player's ability to hit jump shots within the flow of actual game play.

Data shows that FT% is one of the best indicators of a player's ability to shoot. An ordinary shooter can still make 40% from the three if the shooter's shot diet is wide open corner threes two or three times per game. See Bruce Bowen, PJ Tucker, or Grant Williams. Svi is more than enough of a shooter to do that, for sure. It's something else though to be a great pure shooter, and those guys almost always shoot at least in the 80s from the free throw.
Anyway the point is Svi has a track record and it doesn't paint him to be a great shooter. That record is made up of both 3p% and FT%. Make of it what you will.

[threrf23]

Data shows that FT% is one of the best indicators of a player's ability to shoot.

Correlation vs causation. Data also shows that 3PT% (or ideally an adjusted 3pt% that takes context into account) is an even better indicator of a player's ability to shoot 3s.

[BK_2020]

Data shows that FT% is one of the best indicators of a player's ability to shoot.

Correlation vs causation. Data also shows that 3PT% (or ideally an adjusted 3pt% that takes context into account) is an even better indicator of a player's ability to shoot 3s.

Data doesn't show that because 3pt% is way more context dependent. Bruce Bowen is a career 40% 3p shooter. He's not a better shooter than Brogdon who is 38% for his career or Tatum who is 37.5% for his career. FT% is a better predictor.
In any case Svi's large career sample of 900+ 3pa doesn't paint him as an elite shooter.

[Hal14]

Data shows that FT% is one of the best indicators of a player's ability to shoot.

Correlation vs causation. Data also shows that 3PT% (or ideally an adjusted 3pt% that takes context into account) is an even better indicator of a player's ability to shoot 3s.

Data doesn't show that because 3pt% is way more context dependent. Bruce Bowen is a career 40% 3p shooter. He's not a better shooter than Brogdon who is 38% for his career or Tatum who is 37.5% for his career. FT% is a better predictor.
In any case Svi's large career sample of 900+ 3pa doesn't paint him as an elite shooter.

So you're weighing the 3 point attempts he took as a 21 year old rookie (including just 3 games that season he played for Detroit) just as heavily as you're weight the three's he took last season when he was a consistent member of the Hornets rotation at age 25?

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say he was a little bit more comfortable with the NBA game and a little bit more developed as a shooter when he was 25 than when he was a 21 year old rookie.

Oh, and now this season at age 26, he's likely to be even better than he was last season - a season where he shot 42.4% from 3.

2 other thoughts on the subject:

1) FT% *can be* a good indicator of 3 pt shooting projection. But it's by no means the end all be all. As others have pointed out, there are exceptions. Like Svi, for example..

22-23 season: 42% from 3, 67% FT
21-22 season: 31% from 3, 86% FT

Looking at the data, Svi seems to be a guy where the FT% theory doesn't really apply. With that being said, since his 3 pt % and FT% have varied quite a bit from year to year, that does mean that we can't be completely sure what to expect from him this season.

2) Volume is a good indicator of future 3PT shooting ability. For example, if a guy shoots 40% from 3 and 80% FT but only takes 1 three per game, you can't really call him much of an outside shooting threat. For his career, Svi has shot 10.6 3PA per 100 possessions which is very good volume. Not many guys in the league take more threes per 100 possessions. His career 3 pt % of 36% might not seem elite, but that is actually a very high mark, considering he shoots 3's at such a high volume. And also considering a good amount of attempts he's taken so far in his career were when he was just a 21 or 22 yr old kid, still adjusting to the NBA game and adjusting to a foreign country.

Most guys don't hit their prime till age 26. Svi didn't even turn 26 over the summer. But late last season, he was certainly showing signs of entering his prime - his last 10 games of last season in Charlotte he shot 39.4% from 3 on 7.1 attempts per game.

Lastly, I don't think anyone said he's an elite shooter. I think he's a good shooter, but not an elite one.

[zoyathedestroya]

Read on Twitter

[ParticleMan]

Been very impresserd with Svi. Not just the shooting but the BBIQ, ability to attack closeouts, make nice passes, move without the ball, be active around the rim. I thought it would be tough to get minutes given Hauser but they actually do well playing together. The Hauser/Svi/PP lineup spacing is unreal.

[hugepatsfan]

Been very impresserd with Svi. Not just the shooting but the BBIQ, ability to attack closeouts, make nice passes, move without the ball, be active around the rim. I thought it would be tough to get minutes given Hauser but they actually do well playing together. The Hauser/Svi/PP lineup spacing is unreal.

It’s a fun idea relative to bench players, but other than injuries to the top 6 I hope Joe doesn’t line rotations up to play that defense-lacking trio together all too often.

[steefP2]

The main area where guys like Svi can help a title contender is to maintain big leads. One of the reasons why the Celtics would get up by 18 or so and then after bringing in the bench, they’d need to bring the starters back in the last 5 minutes; was always a lack of creators in the bench units.

They just couldn’t score.

So Celtics up 21 with 10 to go; you put in Pritchard svi stevens brisset wenyen or whatever combo of deep bench you want. Svi’s shooting and secondary ball handler in those scenario’s could be low key valuable in preserving the top 6. Maybe he can do more stuff during more crucial times but even if it’s just this; it’ll be more than Justin Jackson ever did.

[BK_2020]

Implying Pritchard would pass the ball in garbage time.