In late December, I put together a post for Basketball Prospectus looking at Derrick Rose, his new jumper, and his unwillingness to use it in the mid range.  Up until that point, Rose would much rather settle for his floaters/runners in the midrange, leading to some poor shooting numbers from those locations.  As I wrote in December:

His shooting from 16 to 23 feet has dropped from 44 percent last year to 41 percent last year. From 10 to 15 feet, it is even worse. Rose’s shooting percentage from that area on the court has gone from 50 percent last year to 27.5 percent this year.

Things are starting to change as Rose is beginning to trust his new jumper more and more, with last night being a perfect example.  According to new TrueHoop affiliate Hoopdata.com, Rose shot 9 for 13 from the midrange locations (3-3 from 10-15 feet/6-10 from 16-23 feet), which is right around 69% shooting.  The reason is because he is actually getting his feet set and is taking jumpers:

Each one of these clips shows Rose coming off of a screen and pulling up for a midrange jumper. In each one of these clips, Rose gets himself set, rises up and lands in the same general area, and he is uses his jump shot form. It should be no surprise that all of these were makes.

In years past (and even earlier this season) Rose would take as much space as he could, and take one of those runners because he thought that those shots had a better chance of going in when compared to his jumper. He’s still looking for space, but if the defender is in front of him, he is simply shooting over them now. This isn’t to say he is settling (he is still getting to the rim and attacking the lane), but he is just playing smarter.  This all comes down to faith/trust in his jumper, he’s starting to see it go in which makes him want to use it more than his floater from the midrange (he took 0 of those last night).