AD 25 shots a game

[djpaul89]

How about setting a few screens for him to remove his man from the picture? Pick and roll? Pick and pop (as a last resort)? Right now our go-to play for AD is for the guard to miss the layup and hope AD can get a rebound plus 2 points on the put-back. It didn't work against either Portland or Sacramento in those 4th quarters, for whatever reason. We need to run some more traditional basketball plays designed to get AD open in the paint so we can get him the ball.

Most of their plays down the stretch in the Portland game were high pick and rolls with Davis. As has been said by a couple other posters, Portland elected to stay at home on Davis on most of those plays.

And I agree with Mythrol. I don't like the narrative that has been forming here recently that Jrue and Reke are selfish. Questionable shot selection at times, sure. But not selfish.

For Jrue specifically, he can't win for losing. Some fans have questioned his assertiveness since he's been here and wished he would be more aggressive. Well, lately we've gotten it. Aside from one bad shooting quarter (including a few of those close-range pull up runners hes normally money with), he's done well looking for his own and others.

[BallSoHard]

He's currently shooting 17.8 attempts per game and averaging 25.5 points on 58% field goal %.

Some math wiz please tell me how much he would be averaging theoretically if he was taking 25 shots a game please.

He's averaging roughly 1.4 PPS so if you give him 25 shots it's roughly 36 points. It's not really a fair estimate because it would be fair to assume those 8 extra shots wouldnt be as quality as the current 18ish shots.

[DRDJ1]

I think 22-24 shots/game would be ideal. Just had this conversation with Bob Licht tonight and he agrees. 30 to 34 ppg would be predicted.

[UNO Gracias]

I have nothing against Reke or Jrue, but instead of taking bad shots pass the ball. Get AD the shots. If you can take a bad shot you can throw in a bad pass to AD. Either way your not scoring, but at least your getting AD the chance to take the extra shots that you were planning to miss anyway.

Who's Dave Grohel and who are the rest of the Foo Fighters? Who's Ron Swanson, and who's...whoever else is on that show?

[RaisingTheBar]

The thing is are you guys OK with AD getting more shots if that means his overall efficiency drops? We all want AD to get his stats, but it is necessary for him to average 30ppg a game for us to win?

[HornetGuru]

He's averaging roughly 1.4 PPS so if you give him 25 shots it's roughly 36 points. It's not really a fair estimate because it would be fair to assume those 8 extra shots wouldnt be as quality as the current 18ish shots.

thank you sir!

[HornetGuru]

The thing is are you guys OK with AD getting more shots if that means his overall efficiency drops? We all want AD to get his stats, but it is necessary for him to average 30ppg a game for us to win?

to me its not about the stats, he is scoring a ridiculous amount per touch, lets up the touches and see what happens.

[sterlr]

My problems with Reke, Jrue, Austin and Ryno is that lots of times they don't recognize situational basketball. They will jack a jump shot as opposed driving to the basket when momentum has shifted. They play into the hands of the defense. How hard is it to run through your progressions over and over again if it breaks down the first time? Mature teams trust their plays. I see lots of times no crispness in the motion of the players in this offense. They seem to jog from one point to the other. Look at teams when they're on their game. They move quick and crisp. Our team needs to focus on that type of movement throughout the game.

[addictionary]

Different effects. If AD shoots 25 a game and averages Durant numbers, teams will exclusively set up defensive plays on him more intensively than now. But it is better to pass the ball to the open man all the time and play team ball both on O and D if you wanna win consistently. This 25 shots thing can be an experiment that could be tried in certain games, mostly against lesser power forward defenders to check AD's consistency in shooting 25 shots in a game.

[RaisingTheBar]

to me its not about the stats, he is scoring a ridiculous amount per touch, lets up the touches and see what happens.

Then what is it about, because I don't think you've explained that yet. You don't just "up the touches and see what happens" without a reason. That's why I asked if it's necessary for AD to average 30ppg for us to win.

[HornetGuru]

Then what is it about, because I don't think you've explained that yet. You don't just "up the touches and see what happens" without a reason. That's why I asked if it's necessary for AD to average 30ppg for us to win.

To me i don't care about his stats, I just want to win. He is being very efficient, I would try to up his touches and see if his efficiency remains. I would try it.

[RaisingTheBar]

So we are not winning right now?

[Mythrol]

AD taking more shots by itself does nothing for us. I want AD taking more GOOD shots.

All these people saying just pass the ball to AD and let him shoot - that's not any better if the look is still bad.

A bad shot by AD is the same as a bad shot by one of our guards. It's still a bad shot.

I'd rather a guard take an open look then force a pass into a covered AD. Especially until AD develops his offense more.

If he is getting 18 clean looks a game and is super efficient do I want him suddenly adding 7 more not good looks a game? No.

[MeSoHornets504]

Not saying Drummond is the caliber of player AD is, but you look at that experiment in Detroit right now. They are force-feeding Drummond shots he should not be taking at all and its just murdering his efficiency and value. I'd be in favor of upping AD's usage rate and shots per game, since he is infinitely more versatile as a basketball player than Drummond, but there are certainly adverse affects to just forcing players who are still developing their games into doing things they aren't comfortable with.

[N.O.Bronco]

If the only way to get AD more shots were through forcing him the ball in a low efficiency manner I would be against it. However every single game has shown that needn't be the case.

He is criminally underused in the fourth and we have numerous posters, myself included, who have shown that our guards are passing up good opportunities to get AD the ball on pick and pop or pick and roll or when he has a mismatch or when he is on fire and the guards just force bad shots instead.

The best example of recently was the poster that broke down Jrue ridiculously poor night the other game and showed how their were at least 2-3 opportunities where jrue had AD unguarded for either a roll or jump shot and just ignored him.

Our guards collective IQ seems to drop 50 points once the fourth quarter starts and I think if they just played smarter, even without drawing up more plays for AD(which we should do), AD would get 2-3 more shots in the fourth and bring his average closer to 20 attempts per game just through the natural flow of the offense.... That is if our guards can stop dropping their IQ.


And I should note that AD not getting more touches in the fourth is a symptom of the underlying issue that is awful offensive flow by our guards in the fourth. That is ultimately what is needing to be fixed.

[UNO Gracias]

While AD taking more shots is not a good thing (according to some), Jrue and Reke tossing up bad shots is certainly a bad thing (according to all). Hell, you don't even have to get it to AD for AD to score. Get it to the open man, and when people are swinging his way, he can get it to AD. It's not like we have a deficiency of players that know how to pass a ball.

Then again, it might just be that we lack players with a high Basketball IQ. An inability to find an open man (because if AD is being double teamed somebody will always be open) comes down to a poor iq. We are smarter than this. There is not much to think about with regards to who should be taking the shots, and it's not the players who always have the ball in their hands just because they have the ball in their hands. And if you are the open man it's because the defense believes what ever you are bound to do is low percentage, so take that into consideration. People leave Rajon Rondo alone when he is behind the arc, they don't when Ray Allen is.

[Biasvasospasm]

The one place where I feel like AD should be getting more shots is in transition. He's constantly there on the break and is a ridiculously good finisher. He's by far our best finisher. His hands are great and his catch radius is ridiculous. Too often, our guards ignore him for a contested layup which is generally missed but they get to the line.

[UNO Gracias]

The one place where I feel like AD should be getting more shots is in transition. He's constantly there on the break and is a ridiculously good finisher. He's by far our best finisher. His hands are great and his catch radius is ridiculous. Too often, our guards ignore him for a contested layup which is generally missed but they get to the line.

I noticed that a couple times in the last game. One case was Reke going to the bucket, he was fouled and made 1 or 2. Had he known he had AD right by him (maybe a couple of feet away) he could have dumped it off to AD and not only gotten the assist but AD would have been fouled.

[N.O.Bronco]

The one place where I feel like AD should be getting more shots is in transition. He's constantly there on the break and is a ridiculously good finisher. He's by far our best finisher. His hands are great and his catch radius is ridiculous. Too often, our guards ignore him for a contested layup which is generally missed but they get to the line.

That's good point too. I rememwvr one specific play where davis got those blocks(I think it was that play). And he trailed perfectly on the break and the guard just forced a shot. Got a foul, but a
AD should of got that.

Evans is particularly bad at not recognizing he has open trailers with him and forcing a shot into 2-3 defenders.

[BlueJay]

And for the 2nd time, 25per game is crazy number.

Dirk peak at 20
LBJ peak at 22
Kobe did 27 once, rest are well under 25
MJ did over 25 twice(25/27), rest are well under 25
KD peak at 20
and no, not even AI hit 25

unless you guys suggest AD >> all of them offensively

[Mythrol]

How about we let our players get a few hundred minutes playing together first before we try and pin some as ball hog stupid players? The fact that people are trying to put malicious intent behind our guards play in the 4th is just insane to me.

We are 10 games into the season. Let's give them time to gel.

[UNO Gracias]

You guys think Monty is trolling the fans?

[RaisingTheBar]

And for the 2nd time, 25per game is crazy number.

Dirk peak at 20
LBJ peak at 22
Kobe did 27 once, rest are well under 25
MJ did over 25 twice(25/27), rest are well under 25
KD peak at 20
and no, not even AI hit 25

unless you guys suggest AD >> all of them offensively

Yeah 25 shots per game is a lot. The NBA hasn't seen a total that high since the real AI was in the league.

[N.O.Bronco]

Most of AD's attempts are on put backs, inside passes around the hoop, fast break plays, off offensive boards etc.

What would people estimate? 10+ shots a game come from those and maybe 7-9 come from jumpers, isolation, hook shots etc.?

MJ, Dirk, KD and Lebron all probably take 12-15 or so shots a game where they are beating their man off the dribble, working to get threes and have possessions where they are with the ball the majority of the shot clock and almost every play has them touching the ball for significant time. Just dealing with natural shooter fatigue that comes with their style of shots and play. AD hustles but even if you have him 25 I don't think he would be taking as many stamina draining shots as those guys. Just because he doesn't play like that.


Basically 25 for AD looks a lot different then 25 for those guys. Hitting AD three times more in the fourth in the pick and pop or roll game and one or two set plays gets AD to basically 25. Where most of his points are still basically on hustle plays, around the basket and open jumpers.

[DefensiveMind]

My problem with both Tyreke and Jrue is not that they don't look for AD, they do. For Tyreke, its realizing that the running the offense to get AD a shot is better than running the initial action and falling back to 1 on 1 if AD isn't there. Run the inital action, if AD or the look you want isn't there reverse the ball and attempt to get the defense out of position then come back to want you want. For Jrue, he's got to be more decisive when he see's an opening to score. Bottom line. More of his missed shot's would turn into Tyreke (Kobe) Assists if he got the basketball more instead of relying on the midrange. In this instance, he needs to take a page from Tyreke who looks to get to the basket EVERY SINGLE TIME. Where as Tyreke needs to realize that he can create opportunities for his drives in the halfcourt by making the defense move side to side.