Using Shotcharts, What Might the Offense Look Like Next Year?

Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#1
I wanted to confirm that IT was leaving before venturing this, and I wanted to give Uncia's magnum opus on Nik Stuaskas time to receive the attention it deserved..

Ok, so I was poking around. And poking led to pondering, and pondering led to photodoodling. And photodoodling led to posting. What I am going to do here, is present the shotcharts of the Kings likely starters, use them to identify hot spots and favorite shooting zones, and just for the hell of it doodle in a few possible sets/plays that seem to maximize those spots and could be good for us next year.

Part 1
First, the Shotcharts of the 4 likely starters at C/SF/SG/PG:

First the big guy:


Who prefers to post on the left side of the lane, but as that red zone indicates, when he posts, he's not looking to use a turnaround, he's looking to muscle his way in close to the hoop and finish inside. The low percentage on the left post area is because most of those shots come when basically he fails/gets stymied, and has to resort to a longer fallaway than he wants to shoot. Note as well, and kindly throw in the face of any of the knuckleheads who say he can't shoot, the deadly accuracy from straight on up around the circle. The only other big I was able to find who was green throughout all 3 of those zones was Dirk Nowitzki. Not LeMarcus Aldridge, not Kevin Love, none of the major guys were sweet across that large a facing area. When he settles for jumpers from the wings however, its not nearly such a good thing.

Next, Rudy:


That is the shotchart of a professional scorer. He can attack and hit from virtually anywhere, but he considerably prefers the right side/down along the right baseline. Notable when trying to figure/design an offense though is the relatively small sweet area form three point land, maybe a little straight on and off to the right angle, but if you look at the actual shot distribution its not that impressive. You might call him indifferent at best up there. But that's better than anywhere else, and a big hole, and one you have to work around, is that he is not a corner three point shooter at all.

Third, the rookie:


Not being an NBAer, you use a different shot tracking service. So not surprisingly, there is your shooter. He prefers the left side, but with no falloff in accuracy on smaller attempts form the right. Notably, he can drain the corner three, but also notably, and a bit of a hole for us now, is that even Stauskas does not like the straight on long ball. We don't really have anyone who does right now. IT was that guy last year. Don't know Nik's game well enough to know why percentages start dipping in the midrange, could be he's looking to pass in there on the P&R, could be his relatively mediocre athleticism makes it harder to get his shot off. Won't know. Maybe Uncia's thread can answer that. One thing notable in his vids though, and you can see it here again on the shotcharts, and in summer league, is that while he has the ballhandling to get to the rim, he is a pretty weak finisher once he does. And weak too in that he often seems to just come up short once he's there.

Finally, Collison:


Now here is a bit of a change for us. First of all, a note: one thing that is not a change is that those two elbow areas? Like IT unfortunately those sweet spots are not P&R related. I watched vid on about half his attempts from there, and while he sometimes got very high picks above the three point circle, those are ITesque dribble into a midrange shot attempts, which little guards cutely seem to think is good basketball. But he is reasonable accurate with them at least. They just aren't part of an organized offense per se. Now a major change is in the three point shooting. IT's own shot chart is exactly reversed: IT loved to bomb threes from all three sections up top, but was not at all a corner three point shooter. Collison on the other hand is a very deadly corner three point shooter, but does not quite have the range up top. Last year almost middling from the right wing, otherwise you would really rather he not shoot them up there at all.
 
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Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#2
Part 2

Secondly, we don't know who the PF is going to be yet, and they probably won't be an important part of the offense, but I'll post some of the shotcharts of some of the oft mentioned contenders to show what difference there can be depending on our choice.

First, our own impish thug:


With what an impish thug's shotchart should look like. Of course the problem there is that even if you do station him out away from the rim to clear room for Cuz or Rudy, there is no reason for the defense to follow him. Down inside he at least occupies his defender because of his potent offensive rebounding.

Second, how about JT:


And there you actually see a respectable, although hardly deadly, long faceup jumper to provide some space. He doesn't work the baselines, the sweet spot from straight on is smallish, but he can hit from about 18 over most of the right angle.

Third, for some lolz, here's Josh Smith:


Hope you do not have epilepsy, because if your screen should flicker all that red might throw you into a seizure. Anyway, hard to say after such a disastrous year how accurate that would be. Certainly he was taking shots form all over the place he should not have been taking. A career long complaint. The one safe refuge would look to be if you station him along the right baseline. Which actually would not be a bad place for the PF to hang out if we were trying to post Cuz on the left side.

Fourth, Hibbert:


Some more bad comedy with the 7'2" guy's bad hands and lack of lower body strength leading to sub 50% work right around the rim. But what he does do is provide an entirely mediocre little facing jumper and turnaround jumpers from all around the 15ft midrange area.

And finally Larry Sanders:


Who as you can see may be a much better athlete but essentially occupies the same sort of offensive space as does Reggie.
 
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Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#3
Part 3

So doodling that out, it looks like these are kind of the sweet/preferred spots for the various guys that you would want to be taking into account:

Cousins:


With the pink just indicating that although Cuz does ok posting on the right, he'd rather be on the left.

Gay:


With the pink here again indicating preference for the right side. And the dotted lines up top because I don't entirely trust that Gay three point hot zone. Its his best area, but its not really something you want to feature.

Stauskas:


With the pink again indicating that he just didn't shoot many from the right corner last year, but really any offense with him anywhere from the angle to the corner should have a good shooter in his preferred areas.

Collison:


In this case the pink font up top is because Collison would really just be up there because he's the PG. You don't want him up there spotting up, and as the arrows indicate, if he did catch it, he might prefer, and you might prefer, he dribble into his little sweet spots on the elbows for one of those midrangers rather than heave up a sub 30% three point attempt outside his comfortable range.


Various PF candidates:


Various overlapping zones of decent spots to put those various PF candidates.
 
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Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#4
Part 4

Finally a few play/set doodles:

Sample 1:


A simple post set with Stauskas, in a sweet zone for him, doing the feeding to Cousins, Collison in his sweet corner spot providing the crosscourt option, and Gay in as close as he gets to good three point position, although I would think he might prefer to slash down the right side if he got the ball. The question would be what to do with the unknown PF to keep him out of the way, and to make sure that Stauskas and Collision rotated back to the angles to be ready to stop transition in case Rudy did get the ball and slashed inside.

Sample 2:


Sample 2 has issues, and you can see a bit how Collison not being a straight on 3pt shooter can effect things. In this plan, you start the post with Stauskas/Cousins as usual, but if stopped he can kick it to Collison, who can then swing it over to Gay down in his preferred area. Or Collison can dribble off the three point line into his preferred elbow areas. But there's still that pesky PF to account for, and almost no place he wouldn't be in somebody's way.

Sample 3:


Now Sample 3 looks very good to me offensively. You run a little 2-man action up top with Cousins and Gay, Gay takes the ball down the right side for one of his slashes, and all three of his other known teammates, Cuz, Nik, and Collison, spot up in their favorite spots to provide some deadly options. And in this play, the PF would even have a logical place to be, along the left side of the lane looking to move in for the rebound. The only real weakness of such a play would be defensively in transition, with Cuz the first guy back up top, and Stauskas being the guy who would have to bust his butt and get back. Illustrates the consequences of your PG being a corner 3pt shooter and thus not in great position to get back if you spot him there.



Anyway, just doodling. here, I uploaded the blank template, so you can doodle out your own plays. Have fun:
 
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Glenn

Hall of Famer
#5
Thanks a lot. It appears that Cuz and Gay will not get into each other's way. Also it seems Nik is deadly from an area Cuz might use when he gets double or triple teamed if people even dare do that on the left. Seems like we will score a lot from the left and there is little a defense can do to stop it. Collison's reputation is a bit like IT's but I hope he isn't so blindly zeroed in on getting his own stats. I don't want to keep searching for a PG but we probably will need to.

I almost blew 7 UP out my nose when I came to Reggie's shot chart. It's not useful knowledge, is it? The weak area seems to be straight out in front of the basket which is actually where JT has some comfort.

Anyway, there is not much sense in over analyzing anyone but the top three and I think it looks darn good. Note I am counting on Nik being a stud offensively.

Thanks again.




Edit: I wrote this before you posted the possible plays.
 
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Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#6
Edit: I wrote this before you posted the possible plays.
Just doodling. Coach Spike and others can take that further/do a better job if they so choose. I mostly wanted to get the info out and let people make their own conclusions, not draw up the entire offense. Be surprised if don't see a few of those basic sets though. Just make too much sense given personnel.
 

Glenn

Hall of Famer
#7
Just doodling. Coach Spike and others can take that further/do a better job if they so choose. I mostly wanted to get the info out and let people make their own conclusions, not draw up the entire offense. Be surprised if don't see a few of those basic sets though. Just make too much sense given personnel.
Your doodling provides simplistic plays that should work even if the defense knows they are coming. As an off shoot, I hope Ben /is given a limited number of things to do as he seems to confuse himself like a chicken with his head cut off. Plant him at designated areas around the three point line and tell him to stay put. As long as he is on the team, we have to use him somehow. He certainly can shoot but when he starts to dribble, the wheels come off. To clarify, I think his shooting will improve if his responsibilities are lowered to next to nothing.
 
#8
Shotchart_1405314004696.png

I don't see why we don't plant Ben in the corners and have him work on that. The Spurs have lived for years on the corner 3 and Ben is currently the best on the team with that shot. The Spurs took 535 corner 3s last year to our 308.
 

Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#9
View attachment 4911

I don't see why we don't plant Ben in the corners and have him work on that. The Spurs have lived for years on the corner 3 and Ben is currently the best on the team with that shot. The Spurs took 535 corner 3s last year to our 308.
Given the gruesome results elsewhere, it was the one useful shot he hit with some consistency last year. That's roleplayer stuff of course but at this point if he could just master some roleplayer stuff he'd be a lot more useful to us.

As for not taking many corner threes though, part of the reason was that Ben was the ONLY guy who could hit any of them, and of course he was so miserable you were hardly setting him up. Neither Gay nor IT liked shot, so Ben was kinda the main guy.
 
#11
Nice work as usual Brick!

He barely played last season but it would be interesting to see Landry's shot chart and tendencies. I don't think we can trade him at least before the trade deadline so he will have to get some burn at some point in the season!
 
#12

Warhawk

Give blood and save a life!
Staff member
#13
As a partially colorblind individual, sometimes these reds and greens are a pain in the a** to separate out. Can't anyone figure out that with 5-10% of the male population having red-green deficiency that alternate coloring should be used for charts and maps???
 

Spike

Subsidiary Intermediary
Staff member
#14
Just doodling. Coach Spike and others can take that further/do a better job if they so choose. I mostly wanted to get the info out and let people make their own conclusions, not draw up the entire offense. Be surprised if don't see a few of those basic sets though. Just make too much sense given personnel.
Don't worry about me - I prefer a well-run motion offense over set plays.

That said, you do want some basic sets for a variety of situations, and what you have makes sense with the current skillset of our players.

I think these guys might end up well suited for a triangle when all is said and done, given Cousins' flexibility, and everyone's (not named McLemore) ability to handle the ball. I guess it depends on whether the 4 becomes a shot blocker or a stretch.
 
#15
Excellent work Bricklayer, as always!

I think our new combination of starters actually make for an offense that has some flow to it, providing that passing actually takes place. I would expect a common set to start with Collison dribbling up to the left elbow with Gay standing in the right corner, Cousins in the left post, Stauskas in the left corner, and our PF on the top near the right elbow for screening purposes. At that point we will see Stauskas or Gay run up to get the ball from Collison, sometimes using a PF screen, sometimes not, and then Collison switching places in the corner with whichever player gets the ball from him. This way you have Stauskas or Gay with the ball to start running the play, they are probably our best two players to do it since I would say they are our best at driving and creating (Stauskas) or driving and scoring (Gay) or shooting off the dribble (both). Of course I would also expect to see a lot pick and rolls take place as well with either the PF or Cousins.
 
#16
Love the potential for the Cousins/Stauskas two-man game on the left.

A recurring theme, though, is "what to do with the PF so he doesn't get in the way." Again, I know "stretch 4s" may be overhyped, and tend to offer little on the defensive end, but when this issue keeps popping when planning out the offense you can't ignore the potential solution.
 
#17
Love the potential for the Cousins/Stauskas two-man game on the left.

A recurring theme, though, is "what to do with the PF so he doesn't get in the way." Again, I know "stretch 4s" may be overhyped, and tend to offer little on the defensive end, but when this issue keeps popping when planning out the offense you can't ignore the potential solution.
I agree and it's not the ideal solution, our defense is bad enough, but I think the answer may be Carl Landry. He is a good mid-range shooter with a high basketball IQ, I think he would set good screens, and he is a good passer. He would fit well within this offense. In this offense it is hard enough for the PF to not get in the way and when that PF is Jason Thompson who has a knack for getting in the way no matter what I think there has to be a change there. Defense would be worse, but not as much as some people think. Thompson is a decent one on one defender, but truly a horrible team defender, there may be no worse player at defending the pick and roll. The only other concern would be rebounding as every player on the floor except for Cousins is a below average rebounder for their position. The thing is though that we have to work with what we have for the time being.
 
#18
I agree and it's not the ideal solution, our defense is bad enough, but I think the answer may be Carl Landry. He is a good mid-range shooter with a high basketball IQ, I think he would set good screens, and he is a good passer. .
Carl may have pasding ability but you wouldn't know it as he's about as much of a black hole as you see . Would hardly help our ball movement.
 

Kingster

Hall of Famer
#19
I agree and it's not the ideal solution, our defense is bad enough, but I think the answer may be Carl Landry. He is a good mid-range shooter with a high basketball IQ, I think he would set good screens, and he is a good passer. He would fit well within this offense. In this offense it is hard enough for the PF to not get in the way and when that PF is Jason Thompson who has a knack for getting in the way no matter what I think there has to be a change there. Defense would be worse, but not as much as some people think. Thompson is a decent one on one defender, but truly a horrible team defender, there may be no worse player at defending the pick and roll. The only other concern would be rebounding as every player on the floor except for Cousins is a below average rebounder for their position. The thing is though that we have to work with what we have for the time being.
I'm a little dubious about Landry in that role. His best talent is his low post game, not away from the basket. The last time he was with the Kings he was played more on the outside, and he wasn't very effective.

From what I've seen of much of our bench in summer league, I think a healthy Landry in the low post is going to be essential to our bench play. They desperately need a low post guy to play with. Left to their own devices, they're a disaster.
 
#20
I'm a little dubious about Landry in that role. His best talent is his low post game, not away from the basket. The last time he was with the Kings he was played more on the outside, and he wasn't very effective.

From what I've seen of much of our bench in summer league, I think a healthy Landry in the low post is going to be essential to our bench play. They desperately need a low post guy to play with. Left to their own devices, they're a disaster.
I agree that he is best when he is in the post. I know Malone is likely to give him more minutes this year. With that in mind, he should be in the game whenever Cousins is out. He'll help us keep a low post presence all game.
 

Mr. S£im Citrus

Doryphore of KingsFans.com
Staff member
#23
MOD NOTE: And, as a reminder to all posters, use the "Report a Post" function when something like this happens. That's what it's there for.
 
#24
Great work, Brick.
Notably, he can drain the corner three, but also notably, and a bit of a hole for us now, is that even Stauskas does not like the straight on long ball. We don't really have anyone who does right now.
Doesn't Rudy have 43% from that area of the floor?