Three is more than two.
That’s the hill NBA analytics disciples are dying on.
A hill the Bulls decided to climb in preparing for the 2019-20 season. Maybe not to the tippy-top like some teams around the Association have, but they definitely made camp at a summit near the top, put up the tents, and built a fire.
To say that the Bulls have completely murdered the mid-range game as an option to their players is an over-generalization. One that the front office and coaching staff have taken exception to.
It’s been pointed out by the likes of vice president of basketball operations John Paxson that if it’s a good mid-range, there is a green light. However, both Coby White and Zach LaVine have publicly insisted that the message early on in training camp was there are no good mid-range shots, and both guards were told to limit them.
So it’s all semantics coming out of the Advocate Center.
What analytics departments fail to understand, however, is the human element in shot-making.
And while absolutely no one within the Bulls organization can give any sort of explanation that can reasonably explain the sudden erosion of Lauri Markkanen’s game in his third season – the season that NBA personnel have always felt is the sink or swim season for a young star – maybe their own change in offensive shot profiling is the prime suspect.
Markkanen likes the mid-range game. He’s said it both on and off the record, and he’s used it throughout his previous two seasons. It gets him comfortable.
Last year he was 35-for-104 (33.7 percent) from mid-range, and 67-for-161 (41.6 percent) from in the paint, but outside the restricted area. Not great numbers, especially when he shot 36.5 percent from three. After all, three is more than two.
Having that option, however, and feeling like there is a middle ground to beat a defense from cannot necessarily be replicated in a chart or a graph.
That’s where analytics fail, and maybe the Bulls have failed one of their supposed great, young prospects.
But let’s talk numbers, since that’s very important to analytics.
Markkanen from mid-range this season? He was currently 5-for-19 (26.3 percent). Markkanen in the paint, non-restricted area? How about 22-for-70 (31.4 percent). Markkanen from three? He’s at 34.2 percent, and that came off a hot December in which he shot 41.6 percent from long range just to get it that high.
So yes, Markkanen is shooting threes at a much higher volume, but he’s become a worst scorer, averaging a career-low 14.9 points per game.
How has this so-called improved shot profile actually improved the 7-footer?
The other part of this backwards development courtesy of numbers people is what they have turned Markkanen into.
Unlike Zach LaVine, Markkanen rarely has the ball in his hands. His activity and his chance to show off his athleticism starts with rebounding. That’s where Markkanen was at his best last February. Get the rebound and go.
Since the Bulls want more threes from Markkanen, he admitted to the media on Monday that far too often he feels like all he’s asked to do in this offense is pick-and-pop, becoming a spot-up shooter off of a screen. They’ve taken an active 22-year-old, underrated athlete, and made him a spot-up shooter.
Markkanen’s rebounding numbers have dropped from 9.0 per game last season to 6.5 this year, and his second-half numbers compared to his first half numbers this season all drop.
Standing around in offensive sets too often has neutered Markkanen, and human nature has him checking out of too many games by the second half.
When you feel like a one-trick pony, you play like a one-trick pony.
Is three more than two? Absolutely. But the only numbers that matter are wins, and the Bulls have just 16 of those with a young player regressing in the rebuild.
Analytics that.
