I was reading through TrueHoop’s Monday Bullets, and I came across an article on Corey Brewer and his improved shot.  In it, David Thorpe talked about how Brewer improved his shot.  Some of it had to do with shot selection, but a lot of it he says, has to do with the lower half of his body:

And on the second part, the mechanical side, Corey was–and sometimes still does–he gets his head and shoulders far in front of his feet when he’s going to shoot, because he’s trying to stay low. But what happens is this: when you catch the ball and then try to stand up quickly, your head goes flying backward, and that’s kicking your legs out in front of you to counter balance your head or you’re going to fall on you back. So you kick your legs out–it’s an unconscious move–and therefore your balance is awful. Because you have poor balance, it’s very hard to have a great mechanic or stroke with your right arm, and it really threw his whole shot out of whack. So I actually talked a lot about–and I know the Wolves have worked him a ton–on just being more balanced and jumping straight up and landing straight down on two legs and not one leg. Not kicking his legs out in front of him, holding that form, and putting his hand to the rim and leading to all sorts of shooting cues that we worked on a lot this summer that we still talk a lot about literally every game day, almost.

This stuff looked familiar because the Nets had their own player struggling with his shot earlier in the year with Courtney Lee.  The problem was also in the lower half of his body, and over at NetsAreScorching, I took a look at it in depth:

…Look where Courtney’s feet are pointing.  They aren’t pointing towards the basket, but to the left of the basket.  As I mentioned earlier, you want your feet pointing towards the basket, because if they are, that means the rest of the body is forced to point towards the basket.  When you shoot the ball, it tends to go in the direction where your feet are pointing.  It is no surprise that Courtney’s shot misses to the left here.

As Courtney takes off, he starts to lean back.  Like I said, because NBA defenders are so good at staying on the ball, players tend to fade away more often than not.  You don’t want to be fading on a pull up jumper at the elbow though.  Usually on a jumper, you want your back to be straight.

Also, you usually want to land where you take off from when you shoot a jumper.  Here, Courtney lands a foot or two behind where he took off from (the yellow dot indicates that), he also lands on one foot, which is a sign of a player fading too much.  When you take off and go up straight, both of your feet tend to land on the ground at the same time.  The only shooter I have seen do this and hit shots consistently was Reggie Miller.

Like I said, Courtney kind of lumped every mistake he tends to make into one shot attempt here.  He usually does one of these things wrong on an attempt, but even just one of these mistakes is enough to throw off a shot.

Shooting Done Right:

OK, now that we have seen what Courtney has done wrong (and it is happening more often than not), let’s look at him doing everything right:

Here Courtney Lee is driving to the hoop as Mike Bibby covers him.  He is going to be pulling up for a jumper at the elbow.

The two yellow dots are Courtney’s toes, he has got them pointed towards the basket.  His feet are under him, and he is on balance as he gets ready to take off.  Another thing I wanted to point out is his elbow (because it is so apparent in this screen shot), that is perfect shooting form.  More reason why this slump is so frustrating.

As Courtney rises up, there is no fade, and his back stays straight through the whole jump shot.  That is perfect form and something that he needs to try to recreate on every jump shot.

Despite the YES scoreboard being in the way (seriously, I watch a lot of league pass, and YES’s scoreboard is probably the most annoying.  They need to go to the long one along the bottom like everyone else…but I digress), Courtney lands in just about the same spot he took off from, which is the elbow.  Also, both feet hit the ground at the same time as well.  This is a perfect jumper, no wonder it went it.

This is why shooting off the dribble is so hard compared to shooting off the catch.  Now, I don’t have the numbers to back this up, but I am willing to say that shooting percentages when coming off the dribble (in terms of jumpers) is probably lower.  This is because when you shoot off of the catch, you are already standing still, which makes it easy to rise and land in the same spot.  Off the dribble on the other hand, you are moving towards the basket at full speed, stopping, and jumping to shoot.  It is really hard to jump and land in the same spot, and that can lead to problems as David Thorpe mentioned above.

Another thing that you notice, is that most of the league’s best three point shooters are “set shooters” rather than “jump shooters.”  This is because with the number of shots from deep they end up taking, it is hard to get the same high jump over and over, however it is easy to replicate a set shot 10-15 times a game.  The only real jump shooter that is considered a great shooter from deep is Ray Allen, and he is a special case.  As Chris Ballard notes in his fantastic book The Art Of A Beautiful Game:

Allen’s success is due to a shot that is almost obsessively calibrated.  First, to ensure optimum lift and stamina, he attempts to maintain a body fat level of 4%, and varies his exercise depending on how his legs feel.  Some summers he focus on biking 30 miles a day, while during the season he may spend some more time jogging, all the time monitoring his calorie intake.  “Sometimes my body craves food, and I have to eat carbs,” he explains.  “There are times I get too slim, and my trainer will tell me, Go eat a cheeseburger”

In the end, there are a number of different ways to shoot a basketball (see Kevin Martin and Shawn Marion) and get proper rotation on it.  However, if you look at most of the best shooters in the NBA, you will notice that they have their feet pointing towards their target and more often then not are jumping straight up and down.