Josh Smith's jumpshot: It's not hopeless.

wigglestrue · Post #1 » by **wigglestrue** » Mon Apr 21, 2008 8:30 pm

He's not doomed to be an unreliable shooter. All it takes is a good diagnosis of his technique, a willingness on his end to take advice, and lots of practice. NBA teams seem to treat shooting form like it's a player's personal business. It shouldn't be like that, it should be more like it is in baseball, where a hitter with holes in his swing will have them corrected by a hitting coach. There are certain things every basketball player should do and not do when shooting. I don't know exactly what all of Smith's shooting flaws are, I'm sure you guys do though. One thing that sticks out is the excessive arc. A player who's 6'9" doesn't need that kind of arc. Anything else stand out about his form?

Skyhawk1 · Post #2 » by **Skyhawk1** » Mon Apr 21, 2008 10:01 pm

When you do not have the talent to do something, you just don't. Just think about how many people who tried to teach O'Neal how to shoot FTs. What I hate the most is that we have a coach that lets him do this over and over. Some people might say, but there's only 5 secs on the clock so he's got to take those 3s or long jump shots. NO. HE DOESN'T. The fact is he looks for those shots by standing away from the paint where any impact PF should be. I'm just over him at this point though. Many here know I do not like his game, but hey, he doesn't make it any easy for me or anyone else to like it. I'm more than willing to see him in another uniform. He gets on my nerves.

Harry10 · Post #3 » by **Harry10** » Mon Apr 21, 2008 10:33 pm

i was always one of those guys who couldn't hit a jumpshot to save his life, but i always did better off the dribble. so i just decided to start taking a dribble on every shot, and it helped out my rythem alot.

JoshB914 · Post #4 » by **JoshB914** » Mon Apr 21, 2008 11:05 pm

There have been guys with awful jumpers that have made them better. Just look at Al Harrington.

Master8492 · Post #5 » by **Master8492** » Mon Apr 21, 2008 11:20 pm

-Too much arch... it's really hard to aim with a rainbow shot every time.

-Too much cocking the ball behind his head... why can't he just put the ball in front of his shoulder (ala manu or prince) and shoot it? It's really easy to aim that way.

geeman · Post #6 » by **geeman** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 12:32 am

I think he improved a lot this year from last ( his overall game) I think he needs to wor on a jumper ( maybe like majic johnson)

CWell · Post #7 » by **CWell** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:01 am

he should have never changed his form from high school.Now he has a long wind up type thing,Takes it behind his hand and throws up a rainbow.In highschool his form was alot better,quicker and out it front of him.

conleyorbust · Post #8 » by **conleyorbust** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:24 am

CWell wrote:he should have never changed his form from high school.Now he has a long wind up type thing,Takes it behind his hand and throws up a rainbow.In highschool his form was alot better,quicker and out it front of him.

yeah, i went back and watched some highschool clips and the biggest thing I noticed was that his release was a LOT quicker.

tontoz · Post #9 » by **tontoz** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:30 am

Harry10 wrote:i was always one of those guys who couldn't hit a jumpshot to save his life, but i always did better off the dribble. so i just decided to start taking a dribble on every shot, and it helped out my rythem alot.

Strangely enough that is also the case with Smith. I noticed this in his rookie year and it is still true.

The reason is simple. when he shoots off the dribble he gets his legs into the shot much better. The problem is that most of his jumpers are catch and shoot.

conleyorbust · Post #10 » by **conleyorbust** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:34 am

tontoz wrote:-= original quote snipped =-

Strangely enough that is also the case with Smith. I noticed this in his rookie year and it is still true.

The reason is simple. when he shoots off the dribble he gets his legs into the shot much better. The problem is that most of his jumpers are catch and shoot.

Seems like he is a pretty bad shooter on the move too.

My hope is that he never takes shots outside of 15 feet. If he can get that down enough so that defensive players don't just give it to him, I'll be happy. I don't really have hope for Smith to become much of a marksman, nor do I want him to as he is best used around the basket.

Hopefully the new coach drills it into his head to stay closer to the basket and crash the offensive glass (although the offensive glass is one place where he might be sticking to a defensive strategy, he is our best transition defender and Woody might want him to get back on D because of that which isn't necessarilly a bad strategy considering Chil will stand under the net on ever shot taken).

LL Cool Scott · Post #11 » by **LL Cool Scott** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 2:14 am

Smith's jumper (along with most other aspects of his game) has improved by leaps and bounds from when he first entered the league. Don't forget how raw he was 3 years ago. He works his ass off every offseason, and it shows every year because he has improved drastically every single year. If he continues this rapid improvement each offseason, he could turn into a real threat both inside and outside. Add that to his defense, passion, intensity, and hard work - and the sky is the limit for this kid.

tontoz · Post #12 » by **tontoz** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 2:46 am

LL Cool Scott wrote:Smith's jumper (along with most other aspects of his game) has improved by leaps and bounds from when he first entered the league.

Not really. Smiths EFG on jumpers was 27.7% in his rookie year.

http://www.82games.com/04ATL9A.HTM

It is 30.7% this season.

http://www.82games.com/0708/07ATL11A.HTM

There is nobody in the NBA who takes as many jumpers as Smith and shoots them worse.

http://www.82games.com/FGSORT7.HTM

tontoz · Post #13 » by **tontoz** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 2:49 am

Seems like he is a pretty bad shooter on the move too.

My hope is that he never takes shots outside of 15 feet.

Bad in his case is relative. But there is no doubt in my mind he is better off the dribble.

Also when he shoots off the dribble it means two things;

-he is trying to get to the rim
-he is going to be shooting from closer in that he usually does in catch and shoot situations.

NDaATL · Post #14 » by **NDaATL** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 3:18 am

Yeah, Smith's shot form doesn't look THAT bad, he just can't make it. He definitely has a few things to work on with it, but he doesn't have that far to go IMO.

But for some reason, as of now, he just flat can't shoot. Maybe it's just a complete lack of confidence in his shot or something..

I don't want him to stop working on it in the offseason though, because if he adds a decent midrange jumper to his game he'll be a dangerous scorer. He's great at driving to the basket, but when defenses back off him begging him to shoot it's much tougher to drive and they can limit his offensive game.

HoopsGuru25 · Post #15 » by **HoopsGuru25** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 3:27 am

There are some players who just can't shoot. I actually watched him in pre-game warm ups twice this year and he actually looked like a good shooter(as a side note Salim is probably the best practice shooter in the NBA). He just can't make shots in the actual games. I'm sure he's not the only player with this problem.

Rip2137 · Post #16 » by **Rip2137** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 4:52 am

I am always baffled by some peoples scouting of Josh's jumpshot.

If he catches the ball with his feet set, and goes straight up, he is simply going to make the shot. Not every time but nearly everytime.

If he takes a dribble, he is going to miss. If he moves his feet like he does alot (moves one foot behind the other for some reason) he is going to miss. If he steps back, he is going to miss. If he fakes a pass, he is going to miss.

The reason he is such a good shooter in pregame and warmups is because he gets his feet set. he seems to never do this in the game and will keep missing until he does.

I think he just lacks focus offensively honestly.

tontoz · Post #17 » by **tontoz** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 11:31 am

If he catches the ball with his feet set, and goes straight up, he is simply going to make the shot. Not every time but nearly everytime.

LOL that is just a joke. The vast majority of his jumpers are taken without a dribble and he consistently misses them.

conleyorbust · Post #18 » by **conleyorbust** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:03 pm

Like I said, all I want is for him to become OK at hitting an open midrange jumper. If he can force defenders to play him close like that he'll get past them literally every single tim.

wigglestrue · Post #19 » by **wigglestrue** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 2:17 pm

If the Hawks had any notion of signing a player to the veteran's minimum next season or upgrading their concession stands or whatever, I would take that money and instead invest it in a personal shooting coach for Smith. Hire a former NBA sharpshooter to live next door to him all summer. If Smith develops good form and improves his shooting from midrange, beyond the arc, and at the line...you're talking about an extra 5-10 wins per year, IMO.

Rip2137 · Post #20 » by **Rip2137** » Tue Apr 22, 2008 2:22 pm

tontoz wrote:
If he catches the ball with his feet set, and goes straight up, he is simply going to make the shot. Not every time but nearly everytime.

LOL that is just a joke. The vast majority of his jumpers are taken without a dribble and he consistently misses them.

Did you read the post, or just stop here?

Just because you don't dribbly doesn't mean that you set your feet. Its probably the first thing a shooting coach would change about him. He has a tendancy ot catch, move his foot back some, then take the shot. then he misses.

The absolutely only time he hits, he catches and goes straight up. He actually jumps higher on this release where he doesn't change his footing first.

Simply put though, its too slow of a release to ever be effective outside of being extremely wide open, meaning if he ever did start hitting it, it would be east to shut down.