shrink wrote:FrenchMinnyFan wrote:TimberKat wrote:That is right. How the hell can you be a max NBA player and never learned to shoot a 3 pt shoot?
I tend to agree in modern NBA where defense is definitely not a priority.
When Towns said that he changed the game, many people laughed at him, but it’s kind of true.
With the exception of Dirk Nowitzki, bigs that shot three pointers was virtually unheard of for decades. Junior high and high school coaches basically forbade their bigs from outside shooting, demanding they get down in the post. Towns himself only shot 8 3PA in his career at Kentucky and made 2, though he claimed he could make that shot. In his rookie season, he was only allowed to take 1.1 3PA a game, but the NBA could see what a valuable weapon that could be against immobile opposing centers. In his second year, 2016-17, Towns was taking 3.4 3PA. GSW in 2016-17 was showing the effectiveness of the three pointer for all players. Porzingas was called a “unicorn” back then, because a tall center that could shoot three’s was such a rarity. Players like Brook Lopez, who had made 3 three pointers in the first eight years of his career, made 134 in 2016-17! In the years that followed, centers that could shoot three pointers became less of a novelty, as young developing centers picked up those skills, and coaches at all levels allowed them to take those shots. Towns actually did change the game.
So why didn’t Rudy? It’s not like it wouldn’t help if he set those massive screens up top, and also had a three point shot, right? I suspect we didn’t see it because he didn’t have any aptitude or shot mechanics to even pursue that goal. And of course, Gobert was already one of the NBA’s best offensive rebounders, plus he is an incredibly impactful player you want on the floor, even without the three pointers was shot.
After nine years, the game has changed so much that centers who could shoot three pointers went from “unicorn” status to become an expectation. Centers that couldn’t do that were often replaced by young centers that could. Rudy though is so good, he is still incredibly valuable without that shot, despite the way the game has so quickly changed.
100%
Gobert is a career 63% FT shooter that has never shown range outside of 3 feet. He has poor mechanics and no touch at all.
Brook Lopez, in contrast, is a career 80% FT shooter and in the 8 years prior to shooting 3s was a respectable mid-range shooter - and even a ~40% shooter from the "long two" range.
