Semi-OT: free throws

[SnowyRange]

I get going on this topic once in a while, and I was reminded of it a bit ago while watching the Duke-NC game (and don't even get me started on UW last night down the stretch).

In the Duke game, which went into overtime, Okafor, probably the best player in the country, had critical free throws at several points. He missed them. The guy shoots 50% from the line. 50%?!

The question is this: if a player, after years of practice, isn't shooting 85% from the line, why in god's name don't they shoot them underhand? It's not even a close call about what's better for a poor free throw shooter, in terms of ease, repeatability, effectiveness, etc.

I can't think of another sport where players won't do whatever it takes to score.

 

[djm19]

I get going on this topic once in a while, and I was reminded of it a bit ago while watching the Duke-NC game (and don't even get me started on UW last night down the stretch).

In the Duke game, which went into overtime, Okafor, probably the best player in the country, had critical free throws at several points. He missed them. The guy shoots 50% from the line. 50%?!

The question is this: if a player, after years of practice, isn't shooting 85% from the line, why in god's name don't they shoot them underhand? It's not even a close call about what's better for a poor free throw shooter, in terms of ease, repeatability, effectiveness, etc.

I can't think of another sport where players won't do whatever it takes to score.

I was laughing about this same thing with my wife like two weeks ago. After the first Fresno game I have been on a free throw shooting vent to my wife. So the other day at the gym I shot 20 underhand shots for fun. I made half of them. 10-11. With no warmups, nothing. So, yes, underhand should be required if someone is sub 50%.

 

[LanderPoke]

Damn, FTs cost us the game. Freaking crappy, crappy way to lose.

Sometimes for these monsters who are almost 7' and have huge hands it's like trying to shoot a tiny Nerf ball into a tiny hoop. It's pretty hard. Those who struggle definitely should swallow their pride and shoot underhand

 

[WilyWapiti]

Interesting commentary the other night watching the Utah State-Vegas game. They were talking about the Freshman, Collette, from USU, and how bad he was at free throws to start the year.

Merrill told him, "You will shoot with the correct form, (elbow in, follow through, knees bent, etc...), or you won't play. I don't care if you throw the ball into the stands, or air-ball every shot, you will do so with the correct form."

WW

 

[stymeman]

sometimes i think Riley's game plan, besides the 3 is to drive the hole and use that 95% secret weapon to more effect, just me

 

[wyokoke]

Interesting commentary the other night watching the Utah State-Vegas game. They were talking about the Freshman, Collette, from USU, and how bad he was at free throws to start the year.

Merrill told him, "You will shoot with the correct form, (elbow in, follow through, knees bent, etc...), or you won't play. I don't care if you throw the ball into the stands, or air-ball every shot, you will do so with the correct form."

WW

Out of curiosity, what is he shooting now, anybody know?

 

[djm19]

Interesting commentary the other night watching the Utah State-Vegas game. They were talking about the Freshman, Collette, from USU, and how bad he was at free throws to start the year.

Merrill told him, "You will shoot with the correct form, (elbow in, follow through, knees bent, etc...), or you won't play. I don't care if you throw the ball into the stands, or air-ball every shot, you will do so with the correct form."

WW

Out of curiosity, what is he shooting now, anybody know?

Looks like 60%
http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/statistics/player/_/stat/free-throws/sort/freeThrowPct/group/44/order/false" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[djm19]

well, well, well... let's not just pile on hankerson, but the whole dam team shall we. Has anyone looked up the stats? Pretty telling! Grabau is the only guy I would even want touching the ball with less than a min left.

Hank, Cooke, McMan (that shocked me), Sellers, Herndon, Gorski, and Barnes all shoot 60% or less. THREE OF THEM ARE GUYS CONSIDERED "SHOOTERS."

Player FG% FT% 3P%
Larry Nance Jr. 54% 78% 31%
Josh Adams 44% 76% 32%
Riley Grabau 38% 95% 36%
Derek Cooke Jr. 75% 53% 0%
Hankerson Jr. 37% 46% 33%
Jason McMan. 42% 42% 35%
Matt Sellers 68% 60% 0%
Alan Herndon 46% 61% 18%
Aka Gorski 31% 50% 27%
Jonathan Barnes 50% 60% 0%
Jeremy Lieber. 28% 70% 19%
Jack Bentz 17% 75% 0%


In the great words of Jerry Sloan, "We don't need another shooting guard, we've got plenty of those. We need a making guard."

 

[LanderPoke]

well, well, well... let's not just pile on hankerson, but the whole dam team shall we. Has anyone looked up the stats? Pretty telling! Grabau is the only guy I would even want touching the ball with less than a min left.

Hank, Cooke, McMan (that shocked me), Sellers, Herndon, Gorski, and Barnes all shoot 60% or less. THREE OF THEM ARE GUYS CONSIDERED "SHOOTERS."

Player FG% FT% 3P%
Larry Nance Jr. 54% 78% 31%
Josh Adams 44% 76% 32%
Riley Grabau 38% 95% 36%
Derek Cooke Jr. 75% 53% 0%
Hankerson Jr. 37% 46% 33%
Jason McMan. 42% 42% 35%
Matt Sellers 68% 60% 0%
Alan Herndon 46% 61% 18%
Aka Gorski 31% 50% 27%
Jonathan Barnes 50% 60% 0%
Jeremy Lieber. 28% 70% 19%
Jack Bentz 17% 75% 0%


In the great words of Jerry Sloan, "We don't need another shooting guard, we've got plenty of those. We need a making guard."

LNJ's 3pt % is actually looking pretty good.

 

[djm19]

Interesting stuff.

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/team/stats/_/id/2751/wyoming-cowboys

 

[stymeman]

a making guard, that's a new one, and I like it...lol

 

[SnowyRange]

Merrill told him, "You will shoot with the correct form, (elbow in, follow through, knees bent, etc...), or you won't play. I don't care if you throw the ball into the stands, or air-ball every shot, you will do so with the correct form."

Whoa...that's the worst advice I've heard.

(Or, at best, it takes me back to military: "I don't give a shit what works, soldier! But while you are doing it you will goddamn well LOOK THE PART!")

 

[WilyWapiti]

Merrill told him, "You will shoot with the correct form, (elbow in, follow through, knees bent, etc...), or you won't play. I don't care if you throw the ball into the stands, or air-ball every shot, you will do so with the correct form."

Whoa...that's the worst advice I've heard.

(Or, at best, it takes me back to military: "I don't give a shit what works, soldier! But while you are doing it you will goddamn well LOOK THE PART!")

There is a reason that virtually all good golfers, marksmen, free throw shooters, etc..., and anything that requires repeatability and consistence look the same; it works.

They say that practice makes perfect; that's bullshit. Practice makes permanent; perfect practice makes perfect.

Just shooting 100 or 200 or 1000 free throws a day won't make you a good shooter. You have to develop a technique that is repeatable under all sorts of pressure and conditions, and then practice that.

WW

 

[SnowyRange]

Just shooting 100 or 200 or 1000 free throws a day won't make you a good shooter. You have to develop a technique that is repeatable under all sorts of pressure and conditions, and then practice that.

I get that.

The bullshit part was the guy saying he doesn't care about the results.

 

[Wyo2dal]

UW just needs to hire Grabau to be a Free Throw Shooting coach if anyone could coach those players up how to shoot it he could. I have said for a while that FT shooting isn't exciting so no one cares about it at any level.

 

[ItSucksToBeACSURam]

UW just needs to hire Grabau to be a Free Throw Shooting coach if anyone could coach those players up how to shoot it he could. I have said for a while that FT shooting isn't exciting so no one cares about it at any level.

Its a shame. We have won games this year at the free throw line. I get that it will never ever be seen on SCTop 10 but it wins games. It is unguarded, untimed points. That should be priority. What I don't get is, when were down late, why does a single person besides Riley touch the ball? I barely want the refs handling the ball. He should be driving the lane and putting himself on the free throw line. Every possession. He is athletic enough to get to the hole. Let cooke and nance run that double screen they did last night and Riles and slip between them and lose his man. He's the best in the country (NCAA and NBA) and he didn't get to the stripe one time last night. THAT IS UNACCEPTABLE

 

[Wyo2dal]

UW just needs to hire Grabau to be a Free Throw Shooting coach if anyone could coach those players up how to shoot it he could. I have said for a while that FT shooting isn't exciting so no one cares about it at any level.

Its a shame. We have won games this year at the free throw line. I get that it will never ever be seen on SCTop 10 but it wins games. It is unguarded, untimed points. That should be priority. What I don't get is, when were down late, why does a single person besides Riley touch the ball? I barely want the refs handling the ball. He should be driving the lane and putting himself on the free throw line. Every possession. He is athletic enough to get to the hole. Let cooke and nance run that double screen they did last night and Riles and slip between them and lose his man. He's the best in the country (NCAA and NBA) and he didn't get to the stripe one time last night. THAT IS UNACCEPTABLE

You are preaching to the choir I agree 100%.

 

[stymeman]

I get going on this topic once in a while, and I was reminded of it a bit ago while watching the Duke-NC game (and don't even get me started on UW last night down the stretch).

In the Duke game, which went into overtime, Okafor, probably the best player in the country, had critical free throws at several points. He missed them. The guy shoots 50% from the line. 50%?!

The question is this: if a player, after years of practice, isn't shooting 85% from the line, why in god's name don't they shoot them underhand? It's not even a close call about what's better for a poor free throw shooter, in terms of ease, repeatability, effectiveness, etc.

I can't think of another sport where players won't do whatever it takes to score.

I was laughing about this same thing with my wife like two weeks ago. After the first Fresno game I have been on a free throw shooting vent to my wife. So the other day at the gym I shot 20 underhand shots for fun. I made half of them. 10-11. With no warmups, nothing. So, yes, underhand should be required if someone is sub 50%.

You might be on to something here, granny style, heck my sister won the state hoop shoot contest doing it this way and missed regionals in Denver by 2 to make it Nationals, so it can be done...lol

 

[WilyWapiti]

UW just needs to hire Grabau to be a Free Throw Shooting coach if anyone could coach those players up how to shoot it he could. I have said for a while that FT shooting isn't exciting so no one cares about it at any level.

Its a shame. We have won games this year at the free throw line. I get that it will never ever be seen on SCTop 10 but it wins games. It is unguarded, untimed points. That should be priority. What I don't get is, when were down late, why does a single person besides Riley touch the ball? I barely want the refs handling the ball. He should be driving the lane and putting himself on the free throw line. Every possession. He is athletic enough to get to the hole. Let cooke and nance run that double screen they did last night and Riles and slip between them and lose his man. He's the best in the country (NCAA and NBA) and he didn't get to the stripe one time last night. THAT IS UNACCEPTABLE

In the Fresno State game, the reason Hankerson had the ball and the free throws in the first place is because he had just stolen the ball... he got fouled before he could get rid of it or get away from the guy he had just stolen it from.

WW

 

[ItSucksToBeACSURam]

UW just needs to hire Grabau to be a Free Throw Shooting coach if anyone could coach those players up how to shoot it he could. I have said for a while that FT shooting isn't exciting so no one cares about it at any level.

Its a shame. We have won games this year at the free throw line. I get that it will never ever be seen on SCTop 10 but it wins games. It is unguarded, untimed points. That should be priority. What I don't get is, when were down late, why does a single person besides Riley touch the ball? I barely want the refs handling the ball. He should be driving the lane and putting himself on the free throw line. Every possession. He is athletic enough to get to the hole. Let cooke and nance run that double screen they did last night and Riles and slip between them and lose his man. He's the best in the country (NCAA and NBA) and he didn't get to the stripe one time last night. THAT IS UNACCEPTABLE

In the Fresno State game, the reason Hankerson had the ball and the free throws in the first place is because he had just stolen the ball... he got fouled before he could get rid of it or get away from the guy he had just stolen it from.

WW

Agreed. My post was more of an X's and O's thought. Why are we not running plays on offense to get Grabau to the line. That is damn near guaranteed points. 2 for sure points every possession is a big deal...Those are points were leaving on the table....Maybe I'm wrong, I don't know. Its just my :twocents: