The Comedian wrote:zoyathedestroya wrote:The Comedian wrote:I love the improvement finishing at the rim, last season he shot 62% within 3 feet, this year he’s up to 73%.
If you’re not going to get to the line a lot, you have to be an elite finisher, and he’s pretty much there.
Still need to up the volume. He's below league average in the rate he's taking threes, FTs, and shots at the rim. Not ideal in modern game. His insistence on taking midrangers is keeping him from being a truly elite and efficient scorer in this league.
Will do a deep dive once I’m home from work, but at least to the eye, it seems as though he’s significantly upped his threes and shots at the rim over the last few weeks.
Now he just needs to keep it up.
2019-20 (3PAr, FTr, % shots within 3 ft of rim): .383, .255, .248
2020-21 (3PAr, FTr, % shots within 3 ft of rim): .370, .228, .185
Decrease in all 3 areas from last season when we should be seeing an increase instead. He basically replaced those with short midrange shots.
So I thought maybe the reason why he doesn't get into the paint is because of the lack of spacing and the early use of double-big lineups. So I checked his 3PAr, FTr, and drives per game before and after Thompson was sidelined. Before TT got COVID, we mostly used double-big starting lineups. After TT went down and then after the Theis trade, it's always single-big lineups.
Pre-TT-COVID (3PAr, FTr, Drives): .341, .234, 13.1
Post-TT-COVID (3PAr, FTr, Drives): .436, .206, 10.1
Drives and FTs went down but at least he increased his three-point takes.
For me, it's less scheme and less personnel on the floor but more on Tatum's mindset. Whenever he doesn't take too much time deciding what to do with the ball, when he just catches-and-goes (JB has gotten good at this), he's much more effective. When he holds on to the ball too long, he settles for his jumpers or the defense is able to reset/recover and meet him in the paint leading to his awkward floaters.