Forget LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony—these few, frenzied weeks of free agency will heretofore be known as “the Summer of Stretch 4s…and Spencer Hawes.”
Between the four of them, Hawes, Channing Frye, Josh McRoberts and Patrick Patterson are poised to pull in a whopping $96 million over the next four years.
Has the NBA finally gone overboard in its love of sweet-shooting big men?
The answer is as complex as the newly signed slingers themselves.
That the league has been trending toward more perimeter-oriented offenses isn’t exactly breaking news. Owing to the growth of analytics, more and more teams are eschewing mid-range jump shots in lieu of the more efficient long ball—particularly from the corners.
According to BestTickets.com’s Andrew Powell-Morse, NBA teams are shooting nearly 10 times as many threes (up from 2.77 to 21.25) as they were in 1980, the year the three-point line was officially introduced.
That, in turn, has helped put a premium not only on traditional perimeter marksmen, but big men capable of stepping out and s ...
Read Full Article at Bleacher Report - NBA
Article written by Jim Cavan
Are NBA Teams Overvaluing Stretch 4s in Free Agency?
July 8th, 2014 by Jim Cavan Leave a reply »
Advertisement