Don’t let the name fool you, this isn’t going to be a regular post theme. I’ve had some requests to do a little something on Gerald Henderson, and he had an old-school-type scoring night. Very rarely in today’s NBA will you see a player score 21 points on 19 shots and come away feeling like you witnessed a special scoring performance.

But that’s what happened when the Heat visited the Charlotte Bobcats (and came away with a hotly contested 1-point win) — Gerald Henderson hit shots consistently and in the way that few today go about doing it. There aren’t many shooting guards in the NBA today that can’t consistently hit a 3-pointer nor be counted on as a high-usage slasher, but are still starting and functioning fairly effectively.

But much of Gerald Henderson’s game is built a lot like what we today are more used to seeing from a solid role-player power forward (not unlike a Udonis Haslem-type). Henderson fills empty mid-range space on the weakside, works in a few well-timed off-ball rim runs, and the occasional slash to the rim off the dribble. Last season, this all added up an effective field goal percentage 3.7-percent below the league average among shooting guards. (qualifications — 40+ games played, 20+ minutes played per game, via HoopData.com). In terms of getting to the foul line, Henderson manages a solid rate in terms of his number of touches, but it still isn’t enough to lift his scoring efficiency into the top tiers of shooting guard rankings.

But with all the efficiency talk aside, Henderson is an interesting watch. Only 7 guys in the whole NBA derived more offense off of off-ball screens. But (outside of Ray Allen), Henderson derives a lower percentage of his offense than all of them from spot-ups. In other words, we have, essentially, a pure mid-range shooter/garbageman in Gerald Henderson.

And most of the damage Henderson did against the Heat was indeed as more of a garbageman, or a space-filler. This worked especially well for him in transition (where Synergy shows us he excelled last season, ranking in the top 20th percentile among all players).

(Henderson is #15 for the Bobcats. He’ll be the one doing the shooting in pretty much all of the clips)

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57HBD9Et9ZE&w=560&h=315]

Henderson had 4 transition plays, and you saw all the shot attempts. Main skill in transition isn’t exactly what you’d think for an athletic wing — rather, he just fills in empty space and waits to hit an easy rhythm jumper.

He does a similar act when not involved in any screen action/his teammates are running an isolation-type play that will likely result in penetration in to the lane.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7h6ZWWbsdU&w=560&h=315]

I don’t have video of Henderson’s only 3 on the night, but the make came in a very similar fashion to the clips you just saw. All of the initial action running to the strong side, then a quick swing to an open Henderson, who (tonight at least) hit despite some late shot-contesting from the defense.

Something different from last season’s trends with Henderson so far this season has been the relative lack of screen plays run for him. Synergy only tracked two for him in the Heat game, the first of which you’ll see is a pretty simple pindown from Boris Diaw that frees up Henderson for an easy baseline J. The second part of the clip features a basic curl action with Diaw again screening.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZXEr4V-WdY&w=560&h=315]

Our last two sets of clips are off-dribble and cut-action examples from tonight. In the first set, you’ll notice at least one designed play that had Henderson (at the bottom of the screen) rubbing off a DJ Augustin screen and receiving a quick pass while Augustin makes a cut out toward the left wing in case the quick pass/layup for Henderson isn’t there. In both the off-dribble and cut videos, Henderson’s relatively average finishing ability is on display. Synergy Sports Technology listed his points per possession off of cuts last season as average-to-mediocre, his main problem being fairly obvious — an average-to -mediocre finishing ability and an average-to-mediocre ability to draw fouls.  In isolation, however, Henderson was top-25 (minimum of 40 plays) in both overall proportion of possessions scored on and on free throws per possession. I’m not exactly sure where the disconnect between finishing on cuts and in isolation is happening, other than cuts totally excluding his mid-range ability that benefits him in isolation.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mhNe3ac7Rk&w=560&h=315]

Off the dribble, Henderson (so far in his career, at least) is pretty fond of the mid-range pull-up or jabstep-jumper combo, despite the ability he shows in these clips to pick his spots and get to the basket in regards to his drives.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nTZDLR1bVU&w=560&h=315]

This is probably the last time you’ll see me (and possibly anyone) on the site spend a good chunk of words covering the offensive game of a player who, statistically speaking, is an average shooting guard in the NBA. But there’s a certain uniqueness in a guard who fills free baseline territory like a utility power forward, but actually derives the majority of his offense from a mid-range off-screen game. Add in the uncommon ability to  be selective and generally pick good spots in isolation, and you have Gerald Henderson.

(update: looks like Andray might actually just be a bit of a trouble-maker. Surprise!)

…but should he want those? And should the team give him those touches?

After Blatche’s Washington Wizards blew a big lead and fell to the New Jersey Nets, Blatche had some venting to do.

“You can’t keep having me pick and pop and shooting jumpshots. Gimme the ball in the paint. That’s where I’m most effective at. I’ve been saying that since training camp. I need the ball in the paint. I don’t want to be the pick-and-pop guy I used to be because it’s not working for me.”

After making those comments (via The Washington Post), Blatche took to Twitter to more or less reiterate his issue.

According to Synergy Sports Technology, Dray might have a point. Last season in the half-court, he ranked in the 13th percentile of NBA players in jump shots; he ranked in the 20th percentile in post-ups. Then again, if we look at overall possessions, he was far better spotting up than going into the post. On pick-and-roll opportunities as the big, he wasn’t very good either. At this point as I research his game, I’m thinking maybe Andray just isn’t a very good offensive player, guys.

But wait! If you go back another season, the numbers do show us that Blatche is far better in the post than in spot-up/jump shot situations. If you go back a season further, we see essentially the same thing. Don’t get me wrong, Blatche is not a good offensive player even when we only isolate his strengths. But he at least has a point in regards to being more effective around the basket.

So, now let’s look at the game tape. I focused in on moments where Blatche seemed to be available to receive the ball in the post, and especially when Blatche seemed upset about not getting a touch. I planned on doing this for all 4 quarters, but after watching the full 12 minutes of the 1st and focusing only on Dray (at 1AM), I felt 1 quarter was enough.

(Blatche is #7 in the video, big guy with the headband. You’ll figure it out)

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynu4Ady8H-o&w=420&h=315]

The main thing you’ll notice in this video is that Blatche does a lot of floating out on the perimeter. He didn’t dive into the lane on a single screen, and spent a lot of time hanging around the perimeter when he wasn’t involved, and…wait a minute. The rare times when Blatche did work his way towards the paint, the team did find success. And even when they didn’t find success, we can see that they did a solid job of getting the ball into Blatche’s hands when he was in the paint (he had a miss in the post and another on an off-ball cut to go with the makes).

But I’m not here to mock Blatche. He may indeed have a point. If the amount of floating and spacing he’s doing off the ball and as the roll man in the pick-and-roll is by design, then his actual complaint is actually aimed not towards his teammates, but towards the coaching staff. And so his claim that he had a bad game because he wasn’t being utilized properly is taken at face value, you could say he’s mostly right. Blatche will usually have better games if he’s being used around the basket.

The issue of his own activity and seeming propensity to float is another issue, as is the fact that it’s tough to justify putting Blatche in the post very often when the team doesn’t exactly have great floor spacers. Also, I’m not too sure the team is going to abandon using John Wall (the team’s franchise player, I think you’ve heard of him) as a key ball-handler/in space/using a pick in favor of getting Andray Blatche more touches in the post.

It might be tough sailing for Andray Blatche if he holds on to those post-touch hopes.