![]() The comfort he exhibits when shooting from 30 feet and beyond is mind boggling. Lillard, in my mind, has supplanted Curry as the preeminent ridiculous-range shooter in the league. Over the last five seasons, he has also never ranked lower than the 92nd percentile as a pick-and-roll scorer, which is largely due to his ability to come off the ball screen firing off the dribble. In his two MVP seasons he was 97th and 99th percentile, respectively. The year before that he was 98th percentile. In 2018-19, Curry ranked in the 96th percentile by hitting 43 percent of his off-the-dribble jumpers for a 57.7 adjusted field goal percentage at 1.16 points per game, per Synergy. But again, if we can only choose one skill from each player, Curry's off-the-dribble prowess pulls rank. He's a master of off-ball movement, his release is lightning fast, his creativity and range are off the charts, his floater arsenal and mid-range pull-up game are both sublime. Truth is, other than Durant's height, you could basically just call Curry the perfect shooter all on his own. Time was when shooting a 3-pointer off the dribble was considered an outright bad shot, but Curry's boldness off the bounce forced defenses to extend to beyond 30 feet on a live dribbler and double off pick and rolls at the same range, which opened the court and distorted defenses to a point that the entire game changed, paving the way for fellow off-dribble snipers like Lillard and James Harden to emerge. No single shot has revolutionized the game more than Stephen Curry's off-the-dribble three. Klay Thompson's shooting form is perfect /FIX5aHR7qW- gifdsports JOff the dribble: Stephen Curry It makes for a lot of tough shots with defenders always hot on his heels, and indeed Redick is making an absurd 52.6 percent of his "guarded" catch and shoots this season (73.1 adjusted FG%) for 1.47 points per possession, which puts him in the 97th percentile league-wide. Navigating screens, a master at the dribble-handoff, Redick almost never has wide-open space in which to shoot, and he's not a great athlete or all that tall at 6-foot-4, meaning he's not separating with speed or length and thus often has to contort his body - leaning this way, falling and fading that way - and release from weird angles just to get shots off. Over the last five seasons, in fact, Redick has never ranked lower than the 81st percentile in catch-and-shoot efficiency, which is even more impressive for the difficulty of his shots. In 2015-16, he ranked in the 98th percentile while the Clippers. In 2017-18, Redick ranked in the 93rd percentile while with Philadelphia. Suffice it to say, that is not an aberration. When the 2019-20 season was suspended in March, Redick ranked in the 94th percentile in catch-and-shoots, scoring 1.37 points per possession with a 67.6 adjusted field-goal percentage, per Synergy. For others it's a higher release, or deeper range, or a penchant for pulling up off the dribble or navigating screens and shooting on the move. Each of them relies more, or less, on a different component of the craft. That said, great shooters are not all cut from the same cloth. They just had the feel, the touch, and ultimately the work ethic to take that natural talent and use it as a foundation from which their greatness could grow. These are just some of the current players who were born to shoot - the kids in elementary school who always landed the wadded-up paper perfectly in the wastebasket. You can't explain it, but you know it when you see it. We know things like dexterity and spatial awareness and depth perception and hand-eye coordination and muscle memory all play a role, and yet, there is something more. How does a person stand 15 or 30 feet from an 18-inch basket and know exactly how far, and at what height, to shoot a 10-inch ball through it? Here are four more players whose stocks have risen as the 2011 NBA Draft approaches.It's difficult, if not impossible, to articulate the talent behind shooting a basketball. For some it's the difference between a second and first-round contract. Thompson will be a lottery pick, but not every prospect whose stock has risen will be. His lanky frame and sweet jump shot have some comparing him to Hall-of-Famer Reggie Miller. Thompson is a sharpshooter with the size to shoot over NBA shooting guards, and his impressive six-foot-nine wingspan will allow him to guard those same players. Thompson's being looked at as high as No. In Chad Ford's mock drafts (which can be accessed as an "Insider" on ), Thompson has climbed all the way from No. ![]() The six-foot-seven 21-year-old averaged 21.6 points on 40 percent three-point shooting during his junior season with the Cougars. ![]() Former Washington State guard Klay Thompson has seen his NBA Draft stock soar in the past few weeks. ![]()
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