I am not going to look at LeBron’s poor game in detail, because let’s face it, a lot of writers/bloggers who are better than me have done it already, with my personal favorite being Kevin Arnovitz’s look at it. What I was looking for when I rewatched last night’s game was whether or not there was anything wrong with LeBron’s outside shot. I noticed a couple things that looked a little different last night vs. when he has things clicking from the outside.

On The Catch

In my opinion, LeBron did two things you don’t normally see him do on the catch. He wasn’t stepping into/through the basketball, and he was bringing it down on the catch.

In the third quarter, the Cavs really tried to get LeBron going. They started setting off-ball screens for James and had him running off of them. Here, LeBron runs along the baseline, getting a screen from Antawn Jamison.

As he curls around the screen, LeBron James makes the catch up high like a good shooter is supposed to. Now look where Jamison is setting his screen. Everything is designed for LeBron to make the catch, take step through the basketball while keeping it high, and pull up off of the catch. That doesn’t happen though.

LeBron stays stationary, and as a result he brings the basketball down before bringing it back up again to shoot it. So why is bringing the basketball down such a big deal? It breaks the rhythm of a shooter. Normally James (along with most shooters) makes the catch, keeps it at the level he makes the catch, and pulls up. Bringing it down and back up again is a wasted motion that throws the timing of the shot off.

LeBron not stepping through the basketball is what causes him to bring it down, and bringing it down is what causes him to miss the jumper. Here it is in real time:

Off The Dribble

Where LeBron really struggled though is shooting off the dribble. I don’t know what it was, but every time he seemed to rise up off the bounce, he was off balance, and that caused a ton of problems.

Here, LeBron is bringing the basketball up when he decides to pull up for a jumper. He comes to a stop and starts to rise up, but notice how far in front his feet are. This causes his butt to be too far out and nothing is on balance as he takes off.

With nothing on balance, LeBron’s whole body starts to lean. LeBron kicks his feet out, it is something he always does, so ignore that, it isn’t a problem. Up top though, his back isn’t straight.

As he lands, his back still isn’t straight. He misses this shot and I really think the fact that he wasn’t on balance through the take-off, the release, or the landing is the reason why. Here it is in real time. Notice he kind of hesitates right before picking up his dribble, as if he doesn’t know whether or not to take one extra dribble:

So what does an on-balance LeBron look like?

Ignore the quality, that is LeBron even though you can’t really tell. Notice as he rises up here his feet are under him and his butt isn’t hanging out.

When he is in the air, he still is kicking his legs out, but that is normal. What you want to notice is how straight his back is. It’s no coincidence that he made this shot off the dribble.