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Bench Warmer
Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Kapono, Kyle Korver and Vladimir Radmanovic are all guys with phenomenal strokes. Nowitzki presents problems to defenses that those other guys don't because he is seven-feet tall. Plus his release is perfect.
Richard Hamilton is not necessarily your classic 3-point shooter but you'd have to include him in there with those guys as one of the best shooters because of his array of shot-making, both off the screen and off the dribble. Plus his stroke is pretty much perfect. Peja Stojakovic is still one of the top shooters.
Steve Nash doesn't get nearly any catch and shoot opportunities. He's always shooting off the dribble. The problem is that he's always got the ball. It's very difficult to shoot the percentages that he shoots off the dribble but he's a guy that usually has minimum percentages in the low 40s up to mid 40s from the 3-point line. He's also over 90 percent from the foul line and over 50 percent from the field. That's a ridiculous combination.
There's a statistical club called the 170 club. You have to shoot over 40 percent from the 3-point line, 50 percent from the field and 80 percent from the line. I had never heard of it until a reporter pointed out that I was leading the category in 1995-96. That is the biggest hallmark of what a truly great shooter is. Not only is he a great 3-point shooter but he takes good enough shots from other spots on the floor that he's over 50 percent overall. There are only a few guys each year that can finish the year in the 170 club. It's a good measuring stick to see what guys have a lot of versatility as a shooter.
Ray Allen is actually someone I thought was starting to slip a little bit but he's having one of his best seasons in years. I said probably eight years ago that Allen is one of the best shooters on the planet and he has to go down as one of the greatest ever. The thing about him that you can't really say about the others on this list is that he doesn't have any weakness as a shooter. He can shoot threes off screens, which is one of the hardest things for any player to do. It's very difficult to come off a screen at 24 feet and be able to shoot a three on balance and shoot it well.
Guys like Kapono and Korver need to be stationary, facing the basket and then catch the ball and shoot. They have great strokes and great range but being able to shoot off screens is a different thing. Allen can also shoot off the pick-and-roll when he's already got a live dribble. That's another very difficult thing to do. He can also shoot off screens on the baseline and he can obviously spot up and catch and shoot as well.
All great shooters have classic releases. If you did a freeze frame of all their releases they'd look nearly identical. They all have perfected their strokes. The ball is leaving their hands at the same place and touching their index fingers and middle fingers last every time. There are not a lot of guys in the league, unfortunately, that have that kind of mechanics. Another way to judge a shooter is how easily they shoot the ball. Signs of a good shooter can be seen in their body motion and how compact and efficient they are with their mechanics. It's amazing sometimes when you see a really good shooter. They can just flick their wrists and the ball travels 24 feet. And some other guys you can just tell it's more work for them to get the ball there because they don't have the proper mechanics.
I used to think that shooter could be taught. And I work a lot as a shooting instructor individually with players and at camps and I'm getting more and more convinced that shooters are born. You can certainly get better with coaching and repetition but there is no question there is some sort of natural ability, whether it's depth perception or muscle memory that gives the best shooters an advantage. But the ones that take it to the highest levels in the NBA also have ridiculous work ethics. They will just shoot so much early in their playing days and growing up that by the time they get to the NBA there is not a shot on the court that ever makes them feel uncomfortable. They've taken so many thousands of shots from every spot on the floor. All of them have something special inside that you can't teach. I've tried. I worked with enough kids who just won't be able to pick it up. They just don't have that high level of connection between their eye and their body and the rim. It's a very special thing.
Unfortunately, there aren't as many great shooters in the league as there used to be. If I went down every roster and made a list of the truly great shooters, the list would be a third of what it would have been 15 years ago. I think more and more guys have developed into more athletic, drive-to-the-basket players. They want to attack off the dribble and get to the rim. It's just become a bigger part of what guys want to do.
Here are my top shooters in the league:
1. Ray Allen
2. Dirk Nowitzki
3. Jason Kapono
Peja. Allen, Nowitzki, Kapono. That would be the best 3-point shooting contest in the league right now, especially when you consider they've all won it before. Peja (2002-03), Allen (2001), Nowitzki (2006) and Kapono (2007-08). That would be my dream contest. I think you'd have the highest percentage of total makes of any contest ever.
Rudy Fernandez is one young guy to keep an eye on. It's amazing to me that for a guy with his frame that he shoots the ball as well as he does. He's just going to get better and better and of all the guys mentioned above, he's probably the best athlete. He's a little bit special. He's in the dunk contest this year. I don't think he'll win the dunk contest, but Fernandez is a guy who could probably be competitive in both someday.
