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Cavs Free Throw Shooting

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I love this mentality of well, hey, I can make 9 out of 10 in my backyard all day, or I made 9 out of 10 in HS ball. :chuckles: Well, Chauncey Billups, Ray Allen, Ric Bary, Larry Bird all need your phone number because only mark Price and Steve Nash averaged 90% over their careers.

The X Factors of playing in a game and doing it multiply the difficulty quotient to a million as compared to just about any other situation imagineable.
 
I love this mentality of well, hey, I can make 9 out of 10 in my backyard all day, or I made 9 out of 10 in HS ball. :chuckles: Well, Chauncey Billups, Ray Allen, Ric Bary, Larry Bird all need your phone number because only mark Price and Steve Nash averaged 90% over their careers.

The X Factors of playing in a game and doing it multiply the difficulty quotient to a million as compared to just about any other situation imagineable.

I don't believe you. You're just giving them a pass like a lot of other people.

If both Price and Nash were able to do it, I'm sure plenty of other players are capable of doing so as well. Players just don't focus on that part of their game as much as they should. It isn't the "cool" thing to do.

If you shoot 200 free throws a day it should be as routine as walking down the street.

Prove otherwise.
 
I don't believe you. You're just giving them a pass like a lot of other people.

If both Price and Nash were able to do it, I'm sure plenty of other players are capable of doing so as well. Players just don't focus on that part of their game as much as they should. It isn't the "cool" thing to do.

If you shoot 200 free throws a day it should be as routine as walking down the street.

Prove otherwise.

So, Larry Bird was worried about doing the "cool" thing, and that's why he failed to shoot 90% for his career on FT's? :chuckles:

Shooting them in the gym isn't the same as shooting them in a hostile environment. Even shooting them by yourself in the gym, you're not going to make 200 out of 200.
 
So, Larry Bird was worried about doing the "cool" thing, and that's why he failed to shoot 90% for his career on FT's? :chuckles:

Shooting them in the gym isn't the same as shooting them in a hostile environment. Even shooting them by yourself in the gym, you're not going to make 200 out of 200.

Lol no, but just like any other trait, the more you practice the better you will become.

Point being, there is no reason that professional NBA players should be shooting 50% from the stripe. Inexcusable in my opinion.

EDIT: And lol... Larry Bird shot 88.6% for his career and 89% (in more "high pressured" games (playoffs)). That's virtually 9 out of every 10, so that example isn't even valid. I'm talking about 50% more so than 89%...
 
I don't believe you. You're just giving them a pass like a lot of other people.

If both Price and Nash were able to do it, I'm sure plenty of other players are capable of doing so as well. Players just don't focus on that part of their game as much as they should. It isn't the "cool" thing to do.

If you shoot 200 free throws a day it should be as routine as walking down the street.

Prove otherwise.

What do you mean you don't believe me? There are only 2 guys who have shot 90% for their career. Period. Look it up yourself if you don't believe me.

The point is this whole concept of it's just muscle memory is pure garbage. Muscle memory is part of the core of good FT shooting, but it is by no means the be and end all. If that was the case there would be 100's if not 1000's of 90% FT shooters. You think all it takes is good muscle memory based on a couple hundred reps every day? These guys are pumped in the beginnig of games and fatigued at the end of long stretches. They have thousands of people screaming at them, players trying to psyche them out, and the pressure that comes with making millions.

I'm not giving anyone a pass, but your definition of what these guys should do is far fetched. Should we be better than 70%? Absolutely. 90%? Get over yourself.
 
What do you mean you don't believe me? There are only 2 guys who have shot 90% for their career. Period. Look it up yourself if you don't believe me.

The point is this whole concept of it's just muscle memory is pure garbage. Muscle memory is part of the core of good FT shooting, but it is by no means the be and end all. If that was the case there would be 100's if not 1000's of 90% FT shooters. You think all it takes is good muscle memory based on a couple hundred reps every day? These guys are pumped in the beginnig of games and fatigued at the end of long stretches. They have thousands of people screaming at them, players trying to psyche them out, and the pressure that comes with making millions.

I'm not giving anyone a pass, but your definition of what these guys should do is far fetched. Should we be better than 70%? Absolutely. 90%? Get over yourself.

I don't believe your "it multiplies the difficulty quotient to a million" bs.

Players should definitely be able to shoot 70%+, with a lot more shooting 80 and 90 than currently are.
 
Well, you submit your groundbreaking ideas that gets them there then. Cuz I'm sure noone has never ever thought of shooting 100's of FT's a day. I'm sure the words "muscle memory" are foreign to shooting coaches and players alike.

And yes, you're right, shooting FT's at your parents garage mounted hoop carries the same torterous effect as a bunch of Philly fans threatening your mother's life while a bunch of TV cameras relay you in the spotlight to millions of people.
 
I don't believe your "it multiplies the difficulty quotient to a million" bs.

Players should definitely be able to shoot 70%+, with a lot more shooting 80 and 90 than currently are.

The league average is 75%, and players in the NBA shoot more practice free throws than just about any ordinary person, so the 90% claim is far off. You simply can't find a guy off the street who shoots at a 90% clip consistently through an 82 game pace. If you do, he's likely a one-dimensional phenom, and an outlier would hardly define a norm.

So let's adjust your original argument, and say any player should be able to shoot 75%. Well, again, 75% is a league average, which means plenty of NBA players shoot at a worse clip, and these guys all shoot more free throws in practice than anyone outside of the league. This is especially true for big men, as they have longer arms and larger hands, meaning any flaws in their mechanics are magnified through the full extension of their shot. At the same time, the pool of skilled players with height is relatively small, meaning NBA teams need to accept some weaknesses in their game, whereas there are plenty of 6'2" PGs out there, so any of them who make it into the NBA tend to be far more polished.

Most importantly, your argument is based on players needing to practice free throws more, and that increasing their workload will make them better. The crux of your argument is that players who are bad at free throws are only bad because they don't try hard enough, and if they simply worked harder, they would improve. It's a logical argument, but statistically flawed. It's simply not true for the vast majority of NBA players. Here's an excerpt from Basketball Prospectus:

Can Players Improve Their Free Throw Shooting?

To me, this is by far the most important of these questions. It also happens to be the most difficult to answer with any sort of certainty from the data.

First, it's worth noting that there is a slight aging curve to free throw percentage. Players tend to improve by about 0.7 percent per season up through age 27 or so. The peak for free throw percentage is an extended one, as players don't really drop off consistently until age 32. Even then, the decline phase for free throw shooting is gradual. The other skills tend to give out long before free throw shooting, as illustrated by Bob Cousy's shooting in the movie Blue Chips.

Of course, when people talk about players improving their free throw shooting, that's not really what they mean. They're wondering instead why notoriously poor shooters like Dwight Howard and Shaquille O'Neal are unable to get in the gym and practice to improve their accuracy at the line. Consider me skeptical that such development is really possible for most players. Flipping around the perspective, most NBA players spend hours per week honing their shot at the line. Yet nearly all of them continue to shoot more or less the same percentage. It is possible that, beyond a certain point, additional practice simply no longer has any benefit.

To answer the question of whether practice helps at the line, I looked for pairs of seasons where the same player shot at least 100 free throws both years, then used statistics to evaluate how often the change in their percentage was larger than would be expected from random chance alone. As it turns out, players do seem intrinsically different at the line on a fairly regular basis--but this is true in both directions.

We would expect, based on the normal distribution, that 2.5 percent of players would either improve or decline by at least two standard deviations from one year to the next. In fact, nearly three times as many players made such a big jump (7.2 percent). But more than twice as many (5.5 percent) saw their shooting decay at the line. Free throw shooting, for whatever reason, is more random than chance would suggest.

There are more players taking sizeable leaps forward than backward, which suggests that practice is paying off for some players. However, the difference between the two groups is relatively small. We're talking about 90 players over the last three decades--about three per year. This is not something that is happening on a routine basis.

On the plus side, the players who made these improvements did tend to maintain them. The average player who improved by a statistically significant amount went from shooting 68.7 percent to 78.7 percent (precisely a 10-percent improvement) and shot 76.0 percent in year three.

A couple of superstar power forwards serve as the poster children for improving at the line. Chris Webber made the second-biggest leap in standardized terms, going from 45.4 percent during the lockout-shortened 1998-99 season (when free throw shooting was down around the league) to 75.1 percent in 1999-00. Webber had never previously made more than 60 percent of his free throws, but he only dropped below 70 percent once during the next seven seasons.

Karl Malone actually shows up on the list of most improved shooters in consecutive years. He went from making 48.1 percent of his free throws as a rookie to 70.0 percent in year three and only dipped below 70 once thereafter in his 19-year career, which he finished as the league's all-time leader in free throws.

The experience of Webber and Malone should serve to inspire players working tirelessly in the gym. At the same time, a handful of examples do not set reasonable expectations. In general, history tells us that players are who they are at the free throw line, which is worth remembering the next time you complain about missed free throws.

(It's a subscription site so I can't link the article, but PM me if you would like the whole thing, I'll copy and send.)
 
Well, you submit your groundbreaking ideas that gets them there then. Cuz I'm sure noone has never ever thought of shooting 100's of FT's a day. I'm sure the words "muscle memory" are foreign to shooting coaches and players alike.

And yes, you're right, shooting FT's at your parents garage mounted hoop carries the same torterous effect as a bunch of Philly fans threatening your mother's life while a bunch of TV cameras relay you in the spotlight to millions of people.

Haha.

Well first, I'd like to say that I am horrible at basketball. It was always my worst sport and I would probably shoot 35-100 FT if I got up right now and tried.

Second, it's a baseless argument that I am making. I just think FT are one of the simpler parts of the game when you look at the big picture. They're called "free" throws for a reason, right? :chuckles:
 
I don't think I've ever seen a poster change their argument as many times as "boobie" did in the space of two pages.
 
I don't think I've ever seen a poster change their argument as many times as "boobie" did in the space of two pages.

Haha I'm not changing my argument. I still feel as though professionals should excel in what they are supposed to do. FT are one of the simpler aspects of the game of basketball, so there is no excuse not to hit them at a high rate.

All the stuff about people watching and threatening mothers and shit is a bad excuse IMO.

90% or bust.
 
Hahaha, easily one of your worst posts of all time.

Points are points are points. You won't be in a position to win a game if you don't score enough points leading up to the end of the game...

I take it you didn't watch the last two games .vs. Memphis and Miami where they played like they didn't give a crap for 3+ quarters allowing us to score with ease, and then just erased it all in the final minutes of the 4th?

All points are not equal in the NBA. You're just being naive to think otherwise.
 
Yes and no. Put a regular guy who couldn't play at an NBA level but shoots 9 out of 10 from the line may be different in game. Free throws have more to do than putting the ball in the basket. Put a regular guy in the situation and add fatigue, the pressure of thousands watching you and a team relying on you in a tight game then you probably won't see that high percentage. Only repitition and being placed in those same situations again and again will get you more comfortable.

To add to this ...

Fact is, we tend to find the range and then zero in on it by repeating the motion. Fatigue is a huge factor. This is why shooters tend to miss their first shot but make the second. If they could go to the line again a few seconds later, they'd probably have a good chance of making their next 2 shots, but that's not usually how it goes. Then you add in all the physical factors... for instance, it's just harder for a guy with big hands and long arms to shoot free throws. - and really in game free throw shooting bears little resemblance to practice.
 
Outside of an endgame situation, I never felt like missed free throws / points earlier in the game meant all that much. There always seems to be a letdown where the winning team (and/or the refs) will let you back in, and then it's all about which team can keep control once both teams are fully engaged in the outcome.


I somewhat agree with this, but as someone else mentioned, points are points are points.

Obviously teams don't live or die every game with free throws. If that was the case, we'd see it reflected much more predominantly in free throw statistics. The thing with the charity stripe is that it's importance varies game to game.

In a double digit loss, it's not likely that the losing team will look back at a few missed foul shots as the reason for defeat. Too many other factors contributed to the loss for it to have any significance, unless they missed A LOT of them, but that's rarely the case.

However, the closer the final score is, the more important each missed attempt over the course of the game becomes. I think we can all agree on that. From maintaining a lead to scratching and clawing your way back into the game, free throws become an extremely critical aspect between winning and losing.

It's a silly argument trying to define how imperative free throws actually are because each contest tells a different story. No one is really right or wrong here. Sometimes they're important, sometimes they're not.

I'd still rather have a team that shoots them fairly well than the alternative.
 
Free throw shooting doesn't earn many NBA players a paycheck. Let's say that an NBA player puts in 4 hours per day in the gym outside of team practices and reviewing film. If that player wants to earn more playing time, a bigger contract, etc.; are they going to work on driving to the hoop, their jumpshot, their rebounding, their defense, or their free throw shooting? I'm not sure anyone can name a player that was well known for only being a good free throw shooter. Life is all about managing your time, and if you want to have a career in the NBA; you'd better be good at something other than free throw shooting
 

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