Detroit Pistons want Brandon Jennings to take better shots

Detroit Pistons head coach Stan Van Gundy said the team is “really happy” with how guard Brandon Jennings has performed in preseason so far, but they need him to improve on defense and to select better shots.

Detroit Pistons head coach Stan Van Gundy said guard Brandon Jennings is showing signs of maturing into a good decision-maker, particularly with his passing, but two common problem areas remain for Jennings – defense and shot selection.

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“The issues with him are defensively and his shooting percentage,” Van Gundy told the Detroit News. “It’s a function of one or two shots a game where he doesn’t get on balance and sort of throws up a careless one. You just give away possessions, it’s hard to get to a good percentage because you’re not gonna shoot 65 percent on the shots where you really are (shooting).”

It’s possible Jennings’s shooting percentage was the result of the personnel around him (or lack thereof, in Detroit), but criticisms of Jennings being shot-happy and a poor defender have followed him since he was drafted by the Milwaukee Bucks in 2009. Jennings’s career field goal percentage is an ugly .390, considering he averages more than 15 shots a game in his career.

Van Gundy is in his first year as Detroit’s coach, but he had some success with Jameer Nelson, another poor-shooting guard, and Nelson thrived under Van Gundy’s tenure. Perhaps Jennings will be the latest to realize his potential with SVG.

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Detroit Pistons ‘happy’ with Brandon Jennings, want better shot selection

By Ed Carroll | Oct 13, 2014

Detroit Pistons head coach Stan Van Gundy said the team is “really happy” with how guard Brandon Jennings has performed in preseason so far, but they need him to improve on defense and to select better shots.

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