GoBobs wrote:I am not to worried about it. Contagious bad shooting happens to teams sometimes. Two of the guys who let us down the most, Lance and G Neal, are already out of here. Our best player, MKG, showed major improvement in his shooting last year and even if he doesn't take 3s his % is decent as a jump shooter now.
We were really hurt by injuries last year. Kemba went out when he was playing good and came back looking rusty. Biz got hurt when he was playing well and finally starting to get minutes after Al was already hurt. MKG was hurt for almost a third of the season. Jefferson was out and then playing injured for a while. Henderson started the year recovering from an injury as did Lance. It seemed like the injuries made it harder for a lot of guys to find their rhythm during the season.
Part of it is coaching. We need to be more aggressive on offense. We need to push the ball and try to find more open looks in transition.
Here is the Hornets true shooting % ranking and league ranking
1. Biz .578 (51)
2. Marv Williams .541 (143)
3. Cody Zeller .530 (180)
4. MKG .519 (217)
5. Gerald Henderson .514 (233)
6. Al Jefferson .500 (282)
7. Brian Roberts .495 (292)
8. Kemba Walker .486 (310)
9. Gary Neal .483 (313) - he was actually even worse then this for Charlotte though his shooting number picked up after he left
10. Maxiel .455 (349) - thanks again coach Cliff : /
11. Lance Stephenson .419 (365) - 2nd worst in the league
That's a horrific TS assortment for a team. I don't think you'll be able to find anything comparable in the last decade tbh.
I don't think Lance and Neal really 'matter' though. Lance didn't play enough, or shoot enough imo, to standout as a big catastrophe for our shooting as a whole (ironically, I think he may have done a decent job *at times* creating shots despite is general habit of being a net negative on both sides of the ball but w/e he's gone). Neal though... Kemba basically shot the same % from 3 as Neal. And while Neal's biggest problem was the fact that he simply couldn't help but take bad pull up 3s at a shameful rate, Kemba and Mo weren't far behind at all - they just happened to be able to score and contribute in more areas while Neal would directly tank the entire team with his rapid fire bricks.
And I don't think pushing the ball would help. We'd only take more bad shots (our ability to get to the rim and finish was just as bad as our 3pt issues but its hardly every talked about) and create more possessions for a taxed defense to try and limit.
Its not as simple as just being more aggressive. Our lack of an offensive system was on full display when Clifford was trying to play Kemba off of Mo near the end of the system. Kemba just had no idea what to do. One of our most active players in the past 4 years was just flatout clueless as to how he was supposed to contribute without the ball in his hands. That should never be the case at the NBA level. Kemba's as aggressive as anyone on the team but a lack of a real system means that he's gonna do exactly what his stats suggest - throw up bad shots and fling himself at the rim because the entire team stands around together.