Shot Locations Revisited

While last night’s triumph in Boston was by no means a performance that can be consistently replicated, it highlighted the upside of the Rockets’ offensive strategy.  Hoopdata.com has a wealth of information about team and player shot locations, and it seems like enough games have passed where I might be able to put together some meaningful analysis for this season.

In an attempt to revisit the topic of shot locations, which I have covered in the past here, here, and here, let’s take a look at where the Rockets stand so far this season.

Rockets Offense:

Close 2-pointers

-26.7% of shot attempts are at the rim, 15^th best in the league (27.2% league average)

-19.8% of shot attempts are  <10 ft, 3^rd best (16.3% league average)

Long 2-pointers (considered by many to be “bad” shots)

-7.6% of shot attempts are from 10-15 ft, 25^th (9.1% league average)

-20.3% of shot attempts are from 16-23 ft, 26^th (25.0% league average)

3-pointers

-25.6% of shot attempts, 8^th best (22.5% average)

FTR

33.3 rating, 5^th best (30.9 average)

Analysis:

The Rockets have an obvious game plan that looks to maximize free throws, at-rim shots, and 3-pointers.  On top of that impressively low number of long 2-pointers (16.8 attempts per game), 4.5 of them are from Luis Scola, who is shooting an impressive 49% from that distance this year.  On paper, the Rockets are a borderline elite team offensively.  I am of the opinion that we usually don’t lose games because of our offense, which leads me to…

Rockets Defense:

Opp-Close 2-pointers

-27.4% of opponent shot attempts are at the rim, 11^th worst

-17.2% of opponent shot attempts are  <10 ft, 7^th worst

Opp-Long 2-pointers (looks good until you look at FG% given up from these spots)

-9.6% of opponent shots 10-15 ft, 8^th best (but 40.3 FG%, 9^th worst)

-27.1% of opponent shots 16-23 ft, 8^th best (but 42.0 FG%, 3^rd worst)

Opp-3-pointers

18.7% of opponent shots, best in the NBA, but 55.7 eFG% allowed, 9^th worst

Opp-FTR

30.6 rating, 16^th worst

Analysis:

These rankings suggest that the Rockets are doing two things.  First, we are chasing opponents off of the 3-point line – I saw Shane Battier do it about 8 times last night against Paul Pierce.  As I have mentioned before, 3-pointers are the highest percentage shot behind “at rim” shots and free throws, with a current league average of 54.1 eFG%.  Second, the Rockets are deliberately forcing opponents to take long 2-pointers, possibly by sagging once the opposing player is inside the arc.  Unfortunately when we leave them more open their FG% will increase, causing that game plan to have diminishing returns.  Furthermore, it seems like a good number of those 2-point attempts are close to the rim, which means that, perhaps at least partially due to our chasing players off the 3-point line, opponents are getting deeper into our defense than we would like.  This causes us to have a slightly below average opponent free throw rate as well.

What are the implications?  Nothing new, I suppose.  Adelman is an offensive mastermind, but puts less emphasis on the defensive end.  One takeaway might be that we are closer to being an excellent team than our record would indicate.  Imagine if we improved our defense just enough to be slightly above average?  With our current game plan of chasing opponents off the 3-point line, we would need to fortify the lane with more active and athletic (and disciplined) bigs.  That could perhaps be achieved through developing our current crop of players (if such development was emphasized…).  We would need to practice rotations and help defense significantly more to prevent easy attempts at the rim – something that is possible but not probable, given our coaching staff.

The alternative to minor changes?  Red fans often argue about whether or not blowing up the roster is a good move.  Fantasies of (purported) offensive wizards like Carmelo Anthony perhaps blind us of the problem that has plagued us for years now.  We are already good at scoring the ball.  Really, really good.  If we were to do something drastic (while keeping coaching the same), my vote would be to go after a group of players that are motivated to be dominant defensively without needing a coach to show them how.  Battier and Hayes are good examples of that mindset, but they lack the overall games to be franchise players, and of course are getting older.  I imagine players like Andre Iguodala, Dwight Howard, and Chris Paul (long shots…) are higher up on Morey’s list right now than ‘Melo.