Nylon Calculus: Why is shot selection so important?
By Ian Levy
For many basketball fans, modern basketball is about the 3-pointer and analytics are the culprit.
NBA teams are increasingly invested in analytic insights and 3-point attempts have surged. The league has set a new record for 3-point attempts every year since the 2011-12 season and are on track to set a new high-water mark again this year.
But the insights derived from statistical analysis run deeper than just, “shoot more 3s.” The point is that shot selection matters, a lot. Efficient offenses look at macro patterns and the micro situations of who is open on a given possessions and what tendencies work best for the skillsets of their players.
Shot selection is about a lot more than just three being greater than two. That numerical fact has changed plenty about how teams approach scoring, the way the game is played and which types of players are most desired in free agency and the draft. But shot selection is still about personnel, adjusting to the defense and who is open.
The average NBA team takes thousands of shots over the course of a season. On each individual shot the difference in average value between different locations is tiny fractions of a point. But if a team is willing to change their patterns (like the Houston Rockets who have made a point of avoiding mid-range shots like the plague), moving hundreds of shots to players and locations that provide a slightly higher average value, those fractions of points add up quickly and huge benefits are there to be exploited.
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This balancing act between a single shot and the thousands of shots a team takes throughout a season can be difficult to see. On an individual possession, the understanding of shot selection hasn’t really changed in the last 50 years — who’s shooting and how open they are still define most of what makes a good or bad shot. But when we put all those shots together we can see that commitment to a process, and a certain team or player-specific definition of what makes a good shot can change everything.