New Coaches and Team Shot Selection Changes
By Blake Murphy
Nov 11, 2014; Memphis, TN, USA; Los Angeles Lakers head coach Byron Scott during the game against the Memphis Grizzlies at FedExForum. Mandatory Credit: Spruce Derden-USA TODAY Sports
Things change quickly in the NBA, except for when they don’t. Rosters are more fluid than ever and coaches have been carouseled over the past few seasons, but each offseason the continuity drum is beaten.
While we’re not very far into the season – about 8.7 percent of the way through Tuesday’s games – it’s never too early to look for trends (otherwise Nylon Calculus would only exist after the vaunted 20-game mark). At the team level, there appear to be some fundamental changes in the shot selection for some teams. That is, teams are running their offense differently, or at least firing from different spots on the floor at different rates. That’s not necessarily surprising with nine teams employing a new head coach and 11 teams returning less than two-thirds of their minutes (based on John Schuhmann’s continuity rating).
At the league level, it’s little secret that the proportion of 3-point shots has been on the rise, significantly so over the last few seasons. That’s not the case in the early going, however, as the league-wide shot mix remains for the most part unchanged from a year ago.
[ED Note: The percent changes here were accidentally reversed between positive and negative.]
Teams are shooting better from above the break and in the paint and slightly worse from the mid-range and corners, but there have been no significant swings in general shot-mix strategy.
At the team level, results are all over the place. On average, teams have shifted their usage in each spot from 1.3 percent to 3.3 percent (using the average of the absolute values of the year-over-year change). That’s not helpful to know on its own, nor is this table with way too much information particularly useful:
Removing the actual field goal percentages can help make that a bit more clear (and there’s not a large enough sample of shots in most cases to definitively determine team talent level from a shooting area), as can determining the absolute value of shot mix changes. Doing so shows that no team has been more consistent in their use of the floor than the Golden State Warriors, while the Minnesota Timberwolves have started basically from scratch:
| Difference | RA% | Paint-Non% | Mid% | Corner% | ATB% | ABS CHANGE |
| Minnesota Timberwolves | -4.52% | 2.87% | 9.71% | -2.72% | -5.34% | 25.16% |
| Los Angeles Lakers | 0.55% | -2.28% | 11.86% | -4.01% | -6.13% | 24.82% |
| Houston Rockets | -6.62% | -4.50% | 0.58% | 6.16% | 4.38% | 22.23% |
| Utah Jazz | 3.35% | -1.48% | -8.99% | 0.47% | 6.65% | 20.94% |
| New York Knicks | -2.30% | 2.00% | 8.44% | -2.74% | -5.40% | 20.87% |
| Cleveland Cavaliers | 7.74% | -1.53% | -8.24% | 2.07% | -0.03% | 19.62% |
| New Orleans Pelicans | 4.71% | -4.54% | -4.54% | 2.11% | 2.26% | 18.16% |
| Orlando Magic | 4.75% | 4.03% | -4.98% | -2.38% | -1.41% | 17.54% |
| Philadelphia 76ers | 2.24% | -4.10% | -3.37% | -0.95% | 6.19% | 16.86% |
| Chicago Bulls | 0.27% | 3.04% | -8.25% | 0.41% | 4.53% | 16.51% |
| Milwaukee Bucks | 4.93% | -2.80% | -1.39% | 2.85% | -3.59% | 15.56% |
| Washington Wizards | -1.81% | 3.24% | 3.79% | -1.30% | -3.92% | 14.06% |
| Boston Celtics | 1.60% | 0.87% | -5.30% | -1.19% | 4.02% | 12.98% |
| Miami Heat | -3.85% | -1.18% | 4.08% | -1.09% | 2.04% | 12.24% |
| Los Angeles Clippers | -5.93% | 3.26% | 1.49% | 0.18% | 1.00% | 11.87% |
| Dallas Mavericks | 3.96% | -3.72% | -1.91% | 1.17% | 0.49% | 11.26% |
| San Antonio Spurs | -3.15% | 3.15% | -1.18% | -1.07% | 2.26% | 10.82% |
| Indiana Pacers | -1.81% | -1.75% | -1.53% | 0.99% | 4.09% | 10.16% |
| Oklahoma City Thunder | -1.36% | 3.84% | -1.89% | -1.57% | 0.98% | 9.64% |
| Detroit Pistons | -4.75% | 1.36% | 0.74% | 1.70% | 0.96% | 9.50% |
| Brooklyn Nets | 0.14% | -0.20% | 4.30% | -0.17% | -4.07% | 8.88% |
| Toronto Raptors | 3.73% | -1.12% | -0.02% | 0.55% | -3.15% | 8.56% |
| Sacramento Kings | 4.13% | -2.30% | 0.04% | -0.24% | -1.63% | 8.33% |
| Atlanta Hawks | 2.52% | -2.64% | 0.97% | -0.71% | -0.14% | 6.98% |
| Memphis Grizzlies | 0.49% | -3.09% | 1.19% | 0.19% | 1.22% | 6.18% |
| Phoenix Suns | -2.31% | 2.41% | -0.65% | 0.24% | 0.31% | 5.92% |
| Portland Trail Blazers | -2.42% | -0.30% | 0.02% | 0.15% | 2.56% | 5.44% |
| Charlotte Bobcats | -1.77% | 1.24% | 1.33% | -0.89% | 0.09% | 5.32% |
| Denver Nuggets | 2.12% | -1.05% | -1.24% | 0.21% | -0.04% | 4.66% |
| Golden State Warriors | -0.30% | -1.32% | -0.05% | 0.63% | 1.04% | 3.35% |
| LEAGUE | 0.05% | -0.28% | 0.03% | -0.09% | 0.29% | 0.73% |
What may stick out is that five of the top-six teams by absolute change have a new head coach. This shouldn’t come as any surprise, considering new coaches are generally coming into situations specifically to make changes. With Flip Saunders and Byron Scott, that seems to be a bad thing, as their teams have funneled possessions to less efficient spots on the floor (although admittedly, some of this is surely due to available talent and injuries). In the case of Quin Snyder, it’s not bad at all. Here’s a look at how the nine teams with new coaches have altered their teams’ looks:
| Difference | RA% | Paint-Non% | Mid% | Corner% | ATB% | ABS CHANGE | New? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minnesota Timberwolves | -4.52% | 2.87% | 9.71% | -2.72% | -5.34% | 25.16% | yes |
| Los Angeles Lakers | 0.55% | -2.28% | 11.86% | -4.01% | -6.13% | 24.82% | yes |
| Utah Jazz | 3.35% | -1.48% | -8.99% | 0.47% | 6.65% | 20.94% | yes |
| New York Knicks | -2.30% | 2.00% | 8.44% | -2.74% | -5.40% | 20.87% | yes |
| Cleveland Cavaliers | 7.74% | -1.53% | -8.24% | 2.07% | -0.03% | 19.62% | yes |
| Milwaukee Bucks | 4.93% | -2.80% | -1.39% | 2.85% | -3.59% | 15.56% | yes |
| Detroit Pistons | -4.75% | 1.36% | 0.74% | 1.70% | 0.96% | 9.50% | yes |
| Brooklyn Nets | 0.14% | -0.20% | 4.30% | -0.17% | -4.07% | 8.88% | yes |
| Golden State Warriors | -0.30% | -1.32% | -0.05% | 0.63% | 1.04% | 3.35% | yes |
Those nine teams averaged a total absolute change by zone of 16.5 percent, well above the 11.2 percent mark for teams without a coaching change and the 8.8 percent mark for teams with coaches in their second year (only Philadelphia and Boston have had an above-average amount of change among those nine – one would think the bulk of the changes would have come in Year 1 of a new coach, with Year 2 solidifying strategy rather than reinventing the wheel again).
Teams with strong roster continuity also have far less change in their shot mix than those with heavy turnover. Comparing roster continuity as defined by Schuhmann (as linked above) to changes in the shot mix shows that roster upheaval can explain a decent amount of the change in from where a team’s offense operates.
Not surprisingly, the Warriors and Pistons are the only high-continuity teams with new coaches, and they both have far less shot mix change than the other teams with new coaches. A large part of that is personnel-based, because you can only ask Josh Smith to shoot so many threes before you pull your hair out.
It’s still early, early enough that a single injury can skew a team’s overall strategy and shot mix, but there are some interesting trends present here to keep an eye on and, more importantly, dive into in more detail on an individual team basis.