Nets Need To Wake Up And Follow Celtics’ Floor-Spacing Example
Since the NBA is a copycat league, its champion often inspires introspection, if not mimicry, among the losing contestants.
With Boston on the cusp of raising banner No. 18 following Wednesday’s victory in Dallas to go up 3-0 in the NBA Finals, it isn’t difficult to see its edge. When healthy, every rotation member is a three-point shooting threat. Even Xavier Tillman, a typical lobs-and-blocks guy who was thrust into action for 11 minutes on Wednesday due to the injury to starting center Kristaps Porzingis, knocked down a three-ball late in the third quarter to maintain the Celtics’ double-digit lead.
You can mock Boston Head Coach Joe Mazzulla’s strict analytical adherence all you want, but the NBA has been evolving more every year into three-point shooting competitions. Boston isn’t shooting it all that well from behind the three-point arc at 33.9% this series, but they are still outscoring Dallas by a healthy 63 points from deep over the first three games. When they’re on, they’re almost unstoppable.
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that none of this regular season’s top 16 teams in three-point field goal percentage sported a losing record, posting a cumulative .619 winning percentage. While it wasn’t impossible for teams that regularly employ non-shooters in their lineups to find success (see Dallas, Minnesota, New York, etc.), most of those that can play five-out saw a decided advantage, at least on the offensive end.
What trips up many teams, like the Nets, is the difference between three-point shot quality versus quantity. Mazzulla can have his club hunt 40 3s each game with few negative outliers because his roster composition, in addition to an embedded culture of ball-sharing, allows for it. When former Brooklyn Head Coach Jacque Vaughn tried it, the results were more miss than hit. The Nets (32-50) hoisted at least 40 three-pointers 27 times last season. They won 11 of them. What mattered more was when they made their 3s—they went 9-1 when converting on at least 18 such attempts.
Ten games aren’t close to being enough. For comparison purposes, the Celtics registered 27 games of 18 or more three-pointers made, winning all 27. Acquiring the floor-spacing Porzingis, injury risk and all, unlocked a bulletproof dimension to their attack. The pick-and-pop weapon forced opposing defenses into damned if you do, damned if you don’t options. Either live with Porzingis’s above-average 37.5% three-point shooting rate or loosen the paint protection needed to thwart the forays of stars Jayson Tatum, Jalen Brown, and Jrue Holiday.
The Porzingis trade also eased the stress on Al Horford, 38, another floor-spacing big man whose 26.8 minutes per game this season were a career low. Meanwhile, Horford hasn’t lost that dagger stroke (41.9% from deep this season) that makes him easily paired with Porzingis or able to function in the short term as a starting 5, like in Game 3.
As a Nets fan, I keep waiting for the organization to join this stretch big movement. Alas, the few times General Manager Sean Marks even rostered such a player (i.e. Blake Griffin and Justin Hamilton), it didn’t quite pan out. In Griffin’s case, his usage at the 5, was often counterbalanced by the inclusion of Bruce Brown, a tentative long-range shooter at best, in those same lineups.
Mostly, the Nets under Marks have featured centers like Jarrett Alen and Nic Claxton, both of whom are experts in the arts of defense and finishing around the basket. Neither, though, ever developed long-range shooting capability.
I bring this up now because Brooklyn can begin new contract talks with Claxton, a pending free agent, as soon as Boston finishes off Dallas, maybe as soon as this weekend. The odds-heavily suggest that a deal will get done. Marks has a history of securing the services of players in similar positions and would be dinged should he lose Claxton for negligible or no consideration.
However, there’s an argument against forking over big money on a long-term extension to a big man whose skillset is limited relative to where the league is trending. Can Claxton, for all his athletic gifts, undergo a Brook Lopez-style transformation project to make him a worthy counter to all the stretch 5s standing in Brooklyn’s way going forward?
I find it unlikely, despite Lopez’s record of 3 makes in 31 three-point tries over his first eight seasons as a Net versus Claxton’s 3-for-19 in five seasons. Lopez was already a capable mid-range shooter, so when former Nets HC Kenny Atkinson moved him out a few feet, starting with the corners, in 2016, it was less of an adjustment.
Claxton may have displayed three-point range during his short stint with Long Island in the G League as a rookie, but his perimeter shooting in the NBA has been an eyesore. Per NBA.com, he has knocked down 46-of-138 (33.3%) jumpers in 241 regular season games, including 12-of-30 (40%) from the mid-range areas.
There also doesn’t seem to be an appetite for the Nets to return to an ugly pure development stage, whereby the team could learn to live with the pains from Claxton’s potential bricklaying. Even through the miseries of last season, Brooklyn maintained a win-now priority pretty much until they were eliminated from a play-in slot. Even then, Claxton didn’t attempt a three-pointer after March 17.
Brooklyn did get some good news while playing out the string in the form of Noah Clowney, who joined the rotation in late March and opened up all kinds of possibilities. The 6-foot 9 rookie, who turns 20 in July, showcased intriguing potential as a Horford type who can swing between a stretch 4 and a small-ball backup 5. Over his last 11 games, Clowney averaged 9 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 1.4 blocks on a 53.6/41.7/62.5 shooting split.
However, that doesn’t preclude Brooklyn from further reshaping its roster in the next two offseasons to remove all non-shooters (I’m not even going to bother mentioning Ben Simmons here) from its rotation like Boston has. That means, for me, the best-case scenario for the Nets would be to re-sign Claxton to a tradeable contract so that Marks can somehow deliver a floor-spacing starting 5.
It’s a tall task, but Boston showed it can be done. It’s past time for the Nets to wake up and smell the era in which they’re competing.