It is far easier to be average or better at the 3 pointer than to shoot a mid-range shoot with an efficiency of an average basketball play including turnovers. I don’t think any player in history has shot the midrange on average well enough to enough to equal the average non-midrange shot.

It is sometimes a necessity but to be avoided otherwise unless you are really open and can hit it at at least 50% or more. Players think they can, from what they do in practice, but they rarely do.

Some midrange is necessary (probably at leasst 25-30% of shots, Orland at 32%) but most teams take too many. Even some good teams.

It takes discipline but this still seems to be me to be one of the most necessary, easiest changes to improve your offensive efficiency.

One way to beat the Spurs might be to shoot the mid-range because they make shooting the 3 pt shot and inside so difficult (Dean Oliver thought so and advised them to do it in the playoffs for the Sonics against them a few years ago) though the other way is to be good enough to be able to get the shots you want, which are higher value then hit a good percentage. They are playing the percentages and want you give up and take the mid-range and hope you can beat the odds because usually you aren’t going to.

Now I guess the Thunder did for a few games but usually that is just walking right into the spider’s web or the chess master’s trap.

And what do the Thunder shoot a lot of? Midrange shots….

Looking broader than just the 3 pointer this study
http://www.3hoopsfans.com/category/fun-with-numbers/page/3/
says the Thunder took a shot set that had the 5th lowest expected payoff then shot the 5th worst even for an equivalent set of shots. Add poor selectionm to poor shooting and you get last place on effective field goal percentage.

The coaches need to draw up better plays, make them work, enforce the right shots by the right guys and the players have to execute and hit them.

Your absolutely right, there is no perfect thing that if you do this, you will win. It’s a collective for sure. Teams need all 4 of the 4 factors or at least 3, the first being efficiency, to have a winning scenario.

The reason why the whole three ball thing came up is because of a Hollinger article from late in the season (which I applied to the Thunder), where he made very valid points about teams that shoot threes, regardless if they are only mediocre at it, generally win more games. Simple as that. We shot the fewest, and we shot them pretty poorly, and we didn’t win a lot of games. We were the third worst percentage, and far fewest attempts.

It really comes down to efficiency. If a team embraces the judicious use of the three, it likely has better efficiency than a team that shys away from it. For example, the corner three is the best shot in the game because it is the shortest three, really just a bit longer than a long two, and you get 50% higher return on the points. So it behooves a team to put that tool in the tool box and use it when it presents itself because the return is great.

Blair may have gotten $2.6 million over 4 years with the 4th year partially guaranteed but it is still a bargain.