Star Wars has the shameful second and third trilogies (Revenge of the Sith exempt here). Jurassic Park has created a lot of slop. Ghostbusters continues to churn out garbage. The Matrix creators decided a fourth movie was necessary for whatever reason. All devoid of the original magic that made them great.

The Terminator franchise is the most apt when I think about the current Warriors. The first movie was fantastic, something new the masses had yet to experience, much like the 2015 Warriors. They somehow came out stronger with T2, akin to the KD-era title teams. T3 was not as good as the first two, yet they managed to pull it off like the plucky 2022 Dubs.

Then the rebooting began, and the magic was lost. Terminator: Salvation still had their Steph Curry equivalent in Christian Bale, yet everything else failed to live up. Chris Paul did his best Sam Worthington impression, utterly without lift. Bryce Dallas Howard mailed it in like Andrew Wiggins, which I suppose makes The Village her 2022 Wiggins playoff run?

Like the IP holders of the Terminator franchise, the Warriors are faced with a choice: do we keep making the same movie and hope for a different result? Or try something new and reap the potential rewards?

The Crossroads

We’ve all seen the stories by now. Steph wants a winning situation. Klay Thompson is a free agent with suspected suitors. Draymond Green is under contract, but the patience may have run out.

It’s not as hopeless as many would make it out to be. The fans of the other 29 teams have been waiting to ring the death bell of the Warriors for some time. They tried to ring it once before, and that didn’t pan out. But even if the title hopes are gone, this team still has some meat on the bone.

Assuming the core trio stays together, the predictable outcome, GM Mike Dunleavy Jr. has things to work with. Chris Paul, Andrew Wiggins, Gary Payton II, and Kevon Looney have all made themselves expendable. That’s over $73 million that can be moved. Paul’s $30M is completely non-guaranteed, and Looney only has 3 of his $8M guaranteed, making them ideal expiring contracts to move. Wiggins is a tougher sell with one more year at $28.2M, but the right tanking team won’t mind.

I hope for Andrew’s sake that he can continue to cash the checks while spending the time with his family that he needs in these difficult past couple of years.

They’re also possessed with strong trade incentives to go with the salary. They can move at least two first-round picks with Jonathan Kuminga, Moses Moody, and even Brandin Podziemski or Trayce Jackson-Davis if they so desire. I’m not advocating for one deal or another. The point is that options are out there.

The Desired Path

I think I can speak for most Warriors fans in saying the last thing we want to see is the core being shattered this offseason. The chance of returning to a higher contending status is narrow, but it exists. The right trades and use of cap space could see them recover some of the old magic, and title #5 or no we’d all like to see them give it another try.

Equally disastrous as the nuclear option would be to continue chugging along with the current formula. Trotting out the old IP like a lazy studio executive. Make moves on the fringes, use all the draft picks to add more inexperienced talent, and continue to be content with mediocrity. That would be the path that takes a Steph trade decision out of their hands.

Retain the core. Be aggressive with trades and free agency. The rarest thing in basketball is to have a core this accomplished that starts and ends their careers together, and the fans would love to see it happen. It’s something we may never see again in the league. Riding off into the sunset with a whimper would be devastating. The front office must give them a chance to go out on their shield. Hopefully, this soul-crushing end to the season gives them the motivation needed to do so.

Let’s get something new and imaginative to put a bow on this. Don’t have next season be your Terminator: Genisys.

The post The Rebooting of the Warriors appeared first on Swish Theory.

So, here we are. The season hasn’t even begun and the Dubs are scrambling to make up for injuries.

Couldn’t we at least have waited until January?

Regardless, this is the reality for the time being. Draymond Green is out for the entire preseason and highly questionable for the beginning of the regular season. The Warriors are rolling out a smaller version of the new-look squad for their first preseason game on Saturday against the Lakers. Chris Paul will be starting in the backcourt, and Klay Thompson will transition to guarding power forwards (4s) in this new-look unit.

So, how is this going to work for Klay? Let’s look at his new responsibilities, how he has fared in the past, and how he can translate in the near future to this defensive role

Post-Ups

First and foremost, post-ups are a trump card against the bigger wings of the league. If Klay is going to be guarding taller, bigger players, the more skilled ones of the bunch will look to get him in the post to isolate. But over the last two seasons, Klay has held up very well in the post.

On 95 post-ups over the past 2 seasons, Klay surrendered 0.979 points per possession, putting him squarely in the league average zone by PPP. But when you dive further into the tape, you can see why he’s a strong post defender for a wing.

He’s exceptional at leveraging his strength against larger guys, digging in to concede very little ground. You hardly ever see a post mismatch end with feet near the restricted area. He may allow a good amount of post fades or hook shots, but you’ll take those all day in a 1v1 size mismatch.

You’ll notice all three of these possessions come without Draymond on the floor, where Klay is ostensibly playing the 4. He gets a low base, fights with strength, and does his best to hold up as long as he can to let his help defenders read the play. This is his more conservative form of post defense, but he has some Iguodala-like strips when the opportunity presents itself.

Though he is capable of winning 1v1 in the post, his main job is to stay sturdy while help is sent. Golden State usually offers early help when he’s being posted up by some of the league’s premier post-up talents, like these clips you see against LeBron James below:

A lot of this is a result of strong team defense. Take the below clip for example, and notice how the help affects where the 264-pound Naz Reid chooses to go:

The idea here isn’t to leave Klay on an island all of the time and expect good results. There are plenty of wings and bigs he could handle in these 1v1 situations, but the wings and bigs showing help against the more prolific post-up threats helps him to be more effective on the whole, and ultimately become a solid-to-good post defender.

Screen Action Defense

This is where things get fuzzy. And by that, I mean very little changes, but some things will change and it’s hard to predict how.

There are very few possessions where Klay truly guards a roll man, due to A) the nature of Golden State’s switching scheme and B) the kind of assignments he draws along with the help he gets. If he’s guarding the man setting the screen, he will usually just defer to the switch and let the other defender make a decision on whether to send the double or defer to the other 3 helpers. Here’s a handful of examples of the quick switching:

That last clip against new teammate Dario Saric is the closest approximation to a real roll-man possession, with early help sent by his teammates. It still ends with a layup by The Homie, but you can see the general idea.

Smart teams will bring Klay into the screen action hoping he will switch, assuming the other defender is smaller and has to cover the bigger player. This version of Klay post-injuries is less adept at shading the ballhandler and allowing the screened defender to recover back to the ball, forcing more switches and more mismatches for his teammates. Whether he is guarding 4s, wings, or guards, this would be the case.

Most commonly, the bigs he is guarding that can shoot will try to pop or fade across the arc in order to take advantage of the switching and his lack of burst. This “55” double drag set by the Utah Jazz with Klay guarding Lauri Markkanen is designed to do just that, even if the result is subpar:

Klay tallied a total of 32 PNR defending possessions across the last two years, with many coming in the playoffs. Ultimately, teams will not employ this enough to take a big chunk out of his defensive impact in the regular season, and hopefully Draymond will have returned before Klay gets torched too often.

Rotations/Weak Side Protection

This is another potential problem area, where Klay put forth a very mixed bag on the tape. There were some solid possessions where Klay rotated on the back line from the weak side, using timeliness and verticality to affect opponent shots. He was even capable of getting some authoritative blocks when everything panned out:

Again, Klay can only go as far as a rotator as his teammates allow him to go. Notice the timing of Gary Payton II sinking inside to pressure Derrick Favors while Klay rotates onto the spinning Kenrich Williams. Everyone has to move on a string to help Jordan Poole with the mismatch, similar to what we saw above when Klay was tasked with guarding LeBron post-ups.

Unfortunately, his athletic limitations and tendency to overhelp/help late showed up all too often. Take the below possession, and see if you notice where Klay goes wrong, even though the play works out:

Klay makes the correct read to rotate from the corner as Keon Johnson rejects the screen, catching both Jonathan Kuminga and Otto Porter Jr. off-balance to create an easy path to the strong side of the rim. However, he rotates quite early, abandoning the corner shooter with a window where a pass can be made. Johnson, a relatively raw rookie, does not see the read but that doesn’t excuse the timing by Klay. I am tapping the “process over results” sign here.

Then we have possessions like these. Granted, the defense is scrambling a bit as Klay tries to navigate Steph rotating back to Moe Harkless in the corner, so it’s not exactly a normal gameflow. Yet he’s early on the jump and off-balance with his verticality, doing little to impede Damian Jones while giving him the foul to boot. Typically, Klay is really good at preemptively wrapping up bigs that he cannot contest and forcing them to earn it at the line, but this was not the case here.

I think overall the back line rotations are my biggest area of concern with Klay’s defensive potential if he will guard more 4s. This means more corner-based possessions and more responsibilities rotating from the weak side or acting as the low man. He needs to be paying attention, crisp with his timing, and making plays within the construct of the defense to turn good shots into worse ones.

Corner Digs and Tags

I came away pretty impressed with how Klay digs and tags out of the corners, which I would qualify as different than a full rotation. A dig is when a wing defender rotates over to impede a player driving on their side of the floor, and a tag impedes a roll man in a similar fashion, often before they get the ball to discourage a layoff pass and narrow the window. Thompson was largely successful in both of these areas over the last couple of seasons.

Primarily, Klay is going to be asked to tag the middle rolls off the weak side. But what happens when the ballhandler is clever enough to see this and make the skip pass across the defense?

Notice the timing of when Klay plants his foot inside, and how that gives him the spring to get back out to the perimeter and contest Bobby Portis’ shot. He struggles more if this player were to collect and drive off the closeout attack, but his responsibility with most spacing bigs is just to get out there in time. His ability to break down and contest without overtly conceding the drive improved in 22/23, and will be much needed in 23/24 if he gets tough assignments who can both shoot and put it on the deck.

The tagging aspect was solid, but a bit of a mixed bag like his rotations. Those quick and strong hands can make for some strong possessions, like you see below:

This one is especially relevant with Klay guarding a 4 in Aaron Gordon and using his dig to prevent a higher-value shot (whatever Jokic does driving off the short roll) over the Aaron Gordon corner 3. Ultimately, the Warriors will try to force non-stars to beat them from beyond the paint at every turn instead of letting the offensive focal points get the shots they want.

Rebounding

This is the opposite of ending on a high note. We know Klay hasn’t been the greatest rebounder in his career, and it’s not going to get better when guarding larger guys. I could only find a few clips of him trying to fight for rebounds with bigs, and they were not great:

I labeled the first clip “boxed out, didn’t matter” because the process is as solid as it can be from Klay, there’s just nothing he can do about Isaiah Stewart being a gigantic beef castle.

The technique in the second clip is where the criticism comes from; he easily concedes the inside position, doesn’t make an effort to force Julius Randle under the rim where he is less effective, and predictably loses the battle.

This is where his teammates will be counting on him. Nobody expects Klay to win 1v1 board battles against these bigs, but they expect him to do the little things necessarily so that Kevon Looney, Andrew Wiggins, Kuminga, and Saric have chances to come clean up the mess. More of the former clip, and less of the latter one, please.

Conclusions

Ultimately this comes down to what, if anything, changes in the system. If Klay is still switching everything, as the Warriors do, it has little bearing on screen actions. It also has put him in a position in the past to be the back line guy, the corner dig/tag guy, and the post-up mismatch guy. These are not unfamiliar concepts to Klay Thompson, and it’s hard to imagine he will be scrambling to keep up with any of these responsibilities.

The main question is how far the adjustments go without Draymond in the lineup. With CP3 in the backcourt instead of a taller guard like Moses Moody or a vertically explosive one like GP2, will he be asked to get more aggressive with his help? Should he be expecting less help in the post considering the personnel of the starting lineup? And how will the switching go on guard-big PNRs with Chris Paul at the point of attack?

We will start to get answers to these questions tomorrow. Yet I am still counting on Klay Thompson to be the defender he has always been, just with a different alignment of priorities.

The post Can Klay Guard 4s? appeared first on Swish Theory.

What is going on in his life is clearly serious enough to take precedence over ball in hoop, a concept many fans are unable to reconcile. But the reality is the Warriors still have a basketball team to maintain and need to start asking what happens if Wiggins remains with his family for the duration of the playoffs.

The answer to the question is Jonathan Kuminga.

Stepping Up Offensively

Since Wiggins’ exit from the lineup, Kuminga has taken his consistency on the offensive end to new heights. In the 15 games since (interrupted by a brief ankle twist), he’s scoring 14 points per game despite playing only 25 minutes per. Shooting 58% on twos is very promising, but shooting 42% on threes over that stretch is eye-opening. It’s the best floor-spacing he’s provided thus far in his career, and couldn’t come at a better time.

What has stood out to me the most is the mix of confidence and positive results in isolation. He’s been crushing from the midrange recently, showing a soft touch on his shots we rarely saw during his rookie season:

His development as a pinch offensive creator goes a long way toward filling the Wiggins role. Two-Way Wiggs doesn’t often find himself controlling things offensively, but with so much creation burden on Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, and Jordan Poole, they need a guy to spell them for a possession now and then. And unlike Wiggs, Kuminga is capable of creating more than just a long two by himself.

What’s more, this rise in efficiency and creation has not come at the expense of the other facets of his offensive game. He’s still one of the more efficient cutters on the team. Kuminga’s cut frequency places him in the 71st percentile amongst all wings, and his 1.39 PPP mark on cuts rates in the 69th percentile. Very nice.

On top of proficient cutting, his efficacy has a screener really jumps off the page. He’s developing into one of their better slip threats, finding ways to help spring Golden State’s shooters off his screens while learning to read the floor and pick his chances to roll and attack the rim.

As if it couldn’t get better, he’s beginning to learn soft lefty finishes to make himself an even more difficult contain. Though only in the fledgling stages, the Warriors have learned how to make Wiggins a paint threat with only one finishing hand. Surely they could do a lot offensively with a combo forward capable of finishing with his off hand.

The cutting, screening, and presence on the offensive glass make Kuminga a surprisingly good replacement for Wiggs on the glamorous end of the floor, but the shooting concerns lurk. Steve Kerr has said himself the reason we haven’t seen a 1:1 replacement is the shooting concern of a Kuminga/Draymond/Looney frontcourt. And though Kuminga has been streaky at times, he’s been above 40% for the past three months. Perhaps he can keep it up and make teams pay for leaving him open off Steph and Klay, hitting enough threes and attacking closeouts to pull his weight on that end of the floor.

Am I arguing that Kuminga is the third Splash Triplet going forward? Absolutely not. But has he shown he could hit above 40% of his open three looks for a seven-game series? Absolutely yes. The playoffs are often about capturing variability from your role guys, and he is capable of the positive kind of statistical outlier.

It’s unreasonable to expect him to match the consistency that Wiggins brought on that end of the floor, but he could certainly imitate it at times while bringing his own unique screen-and-slip dynamism to the lineup.

A Capable Defensive Replacement

Not many teams can boast a quality stand-in for an absent defensive stud. On most squads, your A1 perimeter defender disappearing into thin air spells doom. Not when you have a future defensive ace waiting in the wings.

Kuminga’s +0.9 defensive estimated plus-minus places him third amongst all Warriors, and you can probably guess the top two. By that metric, he’s among the top 20% of wing defenders in the league this season, and the film absolutely matches the stats.

He’s starting to pair his 100th percentile athletic tools with floor awareness and patience. Instead of trying to do everything everywhere all at once, Kuminga is learning to steer his matchups into help and exist within the system, finding himself out of position less and less. He’s still foul-prone (14th percentile foul rate) but more than capable of serious event creation with his athletic package and improved positioning (75th percentile block rate, 58th percentile steal rate amongst forwards).

Though he’s not the impact defensive rebounder that Andrew Wiggins can be, he’s more than capable of generating stops at a high rate. As the positive showings outweigh the negative by an increasing number as time goes on, there’s reason to believe Kuminga can be a capable replacement as the A1 perimeter guy, especially when surrounded by savvy vets who can provide him with the right guidance off the floor and the right help rotations and direction on it.

Filling In the Gaps

I’m not arguing that a dropoff from Wiggins to Kuminga is nonexistent. If Andy remains out throughout the playoffs, Golden State will suffer as a result, there’s no denying that. Yet every playoff team deals with absences, and the West is full of absurd on-ball creators that cannot be matched up with Klay Thompson, Steph Curry, or Donte Divincenzo. Fortunately, they have a guy who has shown he can not only take on these matchups, but win them outright on some nights.

They need an uber-athletic forward to take the hard defensive assignments, leak out in transition, and make enough shots on the other end to keep the defense honest and take pressure off the primary creators.

I think Kuminga is ready to be that guy. There’s only one way to find out if I’m right.

The post Warriors Need Kuminga More Than Ever appeared first on Swish Theory.

When I first wrote that article, I had always intended to circle back and evaluate both my conclusions and predictions. With over 200 threes on the record since, and Klay hitting a scorching 41% of his 10.9 attempts per game over his last 21, I decided it was time to dive back in.

Let’s explore the conclusions I drew, and how they might explain his recent hot stretch.

Set Shot Returning to Normal

When charting his set looks, a few things became apparent: he makes a habit of slow starts regardless of injuries and gets hot as the year goes on, and his post-injury shot profile shows a decrease in set shots.

On the first note, Klay was sitting at a 16/54 mark on set shots to begin this season (29.6%). After two straight years starting 3/25 on set threes, it was clear a trend was emerging, and that the hot streak was coming. Little did I know it was already upon us.

From 11/16 to 1/10, Thompson hit 52 of 114 set threes, a sturdy 48.2% clip. As he gets his legs underneath him, the shot has looked purer. What’s also encouraging is the hustle he’s put in to find these easier shots, despite large absences from Steph Curry and Andrew Wiggins over the past couple of months.

Thompson has seen a slight uptick in set threes as an overall share of his looks, from 49% in the first 43 post-injury games to 52% in the last 21. He’s been working harder to relocate, giving second and third efforts to get open off the ball. Some increased confidence hasn’t hurt either.

Near 50% is likely an unsustainable mark going forwards, but if Klay can keep that share of shots above 50% and continue to work for relocations, he could stay well above 40% the rest of the year. Golden State calling plays like the ones you see below wouldn’t hurt either:

Positive/Negative Momentum Shooting Holds True (For Now)

One of the more glaring data points I discovered in the previous edition was the split between positive and negative momentum shots. I defined step-back, off-the-dribble left, and movement left shots as negative momentum. Running threes, off-the-dribble right, and movement right are positive momentum. The basic theory is that Thompson’s right Achilles tear limits his ability to use that leg as the interior plant foot when taking movement shots, limiting the overall strength on these looks. Yet he has favored them more than ever before.

All has held true so far.

With an even 100 movement shots on the book in the last 21 games, the one change of note has come with the total distribution. 55 of those shots were negative, and 45 positive. That is an improvement on the 63-37 split we saw in his previous 43 post-injury games. Given the margin and total sample size, it could be a collecting error that may return over time. It could also rebound closer to the 50-50 pre-injury split as Klay is further removed from the Achilles tear. Only time will tell.

Less surprising are the shooting splits on these shots. Thompson has hit only 15 of 55 negative momentum looks (27.3%), good for 0.82 points per shot. His positive momentum looks have gone in at a 48.9% clip for 1.47 points per shot. The difference in results is only becoming more drastic as the data piles up.

You can see the biomechanical reasons that could potentially explain this below. When Klay deads his momentum going left, that spring comes from the right leg, and he can’t generate a lot of lift. Going right, he can use both legs equally (if not favoring the left), and thus you have the difference in results.

It’s also good to see that the momentum right shots are holding quite strong for Klay in his post-injury era. He’s holding a 13-for-28 mark on OTD/movement shots going to the right in the past 21 games, including some massive buckets drawn up from set plays. The most beneficial look for him comes out of motion strong, where a big passes into the post and screens for a shooter flaring towards the corner (when going on the right side of the court). You can see those looks at work here:

Finally, we come to our last area of interest.

Mixed Bag Off-The-Dribble

I wrote in my last piece that Klay is leaning on his off-the-dribble looks going left, possibly as a form of comfort or a result of the changed personnel from his pre-injury days. After another 43 OTD looks on the record, the jury is still out on why his tendencies have changed.

33 of those 43 shots have come going to the left, a 76.7% share that mirrors the 73% mark I previously charged. He’s also taken a slight uptick in the total share of his shots coming OTD to the left, from 14% to 15.6%. Some of this could be explained by recent injuries, and the need to force up more shots than usual.

What hasn’t gone up are the results going left. 24.2% of his OTD lefty looks have gone in since we first checked, where it sat at 35.9%. Pre-injury, he hit those shots 46% of the time over the full season, his highest mark on any kind of three. If we’ve seen other shots return to normal, while these continue to decline, it may be time to consider whether it ever returns to pre-injury levels.

The great news is that Klay has found some confidence in his OTD righty looks. At the time of writing the first article, Klay hadn’t taken an off-the-dribble righty three in his first 11 games. In the 21 games since, he’s taken 10 and split them down the middle. Does he read Swish Theory? Is he just finding his confidence? Both?

It’s great to see results improving on that end, and hopefully further solidifying the data we have to go on. A 15/29 mark on his post-injury OTD looks going right is nothing to sneeze at, given how consistent his data points have been so far.

What Can We Learn From All This?

Klay is heating up, and he’s doing it in sustainable ways.

He’s trending up on the set shots, as he usually does. Not only are the numbers of his positive/negative momentum shots remaining similar, but he’s starting to take more of the quality looks we’ve seen on the film. Thompson is also doing all of this while ratcheting up his attempts in an effort to offset Curry and Wiggins missing time.

In just two short months, Klay has gone back to resembling the perimeter shooter we saw down the stretch in last year’s championship run. Let’s hope that his shots continue to fall, and I’ll continue to track them all as the playoff chase heats up. We’ll check back in at the end of the year.

The post Charting Klay Thompson’s Shot Progress appeared first on Swish Theory.

To see where the problems lie, I collected data the only way I know how: watching 1,298 threes across the past three seasons to look for trends, problem areas, or anything else that sticks out. But before we dig into the data, I’ll outline my methodology and some terms that will pop up throughout.

First, there are the types of misses I tracked. The primary three misses are the front rim, back rim, and side rim. Too short, too long, just off. In a general sense, a large number of front rim misses indicate not enough power generation. The back rim misses point towards overcompensation. Side rim misses are largely a question of pure accuracy,

When watching these shots, I broke them into four categories: set shots, movement, off-the-dribble (OTD), and running. Set shots are largely catch-and-shoot looks (C&S), but I chose to add shots where he settled his base for more than a half-second. This added some reload threes with long pauses to that mix because he was squared and still when attempting the shot.

Movement shots are when he’s moving either left or right while shooting, usually coming after a handoff or flare screen. They don’t involve any gather or reload dribbles, unlike (you guessed it) off-the-dribble shots. Any shot with 1+ dribble fell into this category, except for the half-second+ reloads I previously mentioned.

Lastly, we have the runners, where he’s running directly into the shot and makes no effort to slow his momentum. Get it? Got it? Good.

Now let’s get into it.

The Set Shot

This forms the largest share of his shots before and after the injury. 58% of the pre-injury shots I charted came as set shots, and 49% after. That dip is likely explained by the deterioration in roster quality and credible non-Steph spacing options. But what’s really interesting is how remarkably consistent he’s been regardless of the injuries.

When charting the set shots from his 2021-22 season, he got off to a brutal 3/25 start with 13 front-rim misses. Considering those were his first games in over 1,000 days, it makes sense that he was coming up short almost half the time. As he got his legs under him, the results really turned around, hitting 44.5% of the last 202 set shots all the way up through the postseason. He overcame the brutal start to hit 40.9% of set shot looks last year.

Funnily enough, his healthy 2018-19 season followed an eerily similar pattern. He had an identical 3/25 start and was stuck at 30% from deep after his first 100 looks. But over the last 320 shots, he striped a crisp 44.2%, ending up at exactly 40% for the year. Sound familiar?

(Yes, Klay took 420 set shots that season. I’m not making that up.)

In both seasons, he started off with a high proportion of front-rim misses, before evening out as the season went on. A higher number of back-rim misses after an initial slump shows it takes him some time to build a solid base, with or without injury concerns.

Out of his 54 set shots to begin this season, Klay has hit 16, which is just shy of 30%. Does this mean he’s automatically going to hit ~44.5% of his remaining shots down the stretch? Maybe. I’d certainly be willing to bet it’s well over his current 30% mark, and his full-season numbers creep back toward 40% on the whole. If he followed the same pattern pre-and-post injury, it might just be a trend.

I think this is the most explicable phenomenon, and Warriors coach Steve Kerr has provided the answer:

Movement Shots

This is where it begins to get interesting. Before the injury, 24% of Klay’s total threes came off movement. Post-injury, it has risen slightly to 26%, probably explained by the overall spacing around him or just simple statistical deviation. What’s really interesting is how he splits between going right and left.

Of his 177 pre-injury movement shots, 90 were going left, almost a 50/50 split. Post-injury, 93 of his 148 movement looks are going left, a 63% share. Is that a by-product of a new roster or a change in tendency? It’s hard to say without more data, but keep it in mind when we get to OTD shots.

What also interests me is the huge drop in efficacy. He hit 43% of his movement looks before the injury and sits at 31% after. To me, this has two explanations, one that can be seen and one that has to be assumed.

The assumed explanation is the nature of the injuries. Klay tore his right Achilles, which is crucial to forming a base in the leg when shooting. While going to his left off of movement, the right leg is his inside (plant) foot and is relied on for the majority of the strength and balance needed to get square to the basket. If he doesn’t have the same strength in that leg, a big drop makes sense.

Another interesting potential explanation is the change in his shooting base. Though he often changes his base on a shot-to-shot basis, it has been most prominently widened when going to his left.

What really tells me that the problems are coming from the right leg are his splits on movement shots going right. Traditionally he’s 2-3% better going to his right, but that figure has jumped over 5% post-injury. I think this is due to two important factors.

Opposite to the movement left looks, he uses his left leg as the plant foot on these. Though I can imagine it’s still difficult post-ACL injury, he can still generate power from that left Achilles at a normal rate. That has resulted in only a minor change in his shooting base after the injury, as you can see below:

Running Forward

These shots really serve to highlight two things: confidence and momentum.

Most of these runners come when Klay is really feeling himself, and it’s no surprise he shot 43.5% on these very difficult looks pre-injury. What really surprised me is that he hasn’t lost a step on those looks post-injury, hitting a scorching 56% of those attempts. Granted this is a small proportion of his looks (only 6% both pre-and-post), but considering none of his other shots with more than 20 attempts are over 38% post-injury, it certainly stands out.

I think this points to a similar phenomena we see with his righty movement looks. The increased momentum transfer really boosts his accuracy, and no shot involves more momentum than a sprint directly into a pull-up three.

The increased proportion of these shots coming as heat-checks certainly plays a role here, but there’s no denying the results. If you’re not convinced that a higher proportion of momentum is playing a role yet, let’s dig into the final category.

Off-The-Dribble Looks

This category produced by far the most drastic results I found.

Pre-injury, Klay was a killer when dribbling to his left. It gave him a great way to shield the shot from defenders and go against a defender’s instincts by going left instead of right. They were also shots he could hit at a high rate: he cashed 24 of the 52 dribble looks going left I charted, a 46.2% mark, which was the highest of any shot in his pre-injury bag. They also represented a large propostion of his OTD looks at 62.6%.

Post-injury, it’s a completely different story. Not only has he dropped down to 35.9% on those looks, but he’s favoring them more often; 73% of his OTD looks now come going left. What’s even more interesting is he hasn’t changed the base on those shots relative to the others.

Though this certainly points to that lack of strength in the right leg we saw with his movement looks, the proportion of total shots is what interests me the most. Before the injury, 7% of his threes were OTD left. Now, it’s at 14%. In that same time, his OTD right looks have only risen by 1%. He hasn’t even taken an OTD right shot this season. Is he leaning on a shot he’s most comfortable with as he tries to regain his previous form? It’s very possible.

The number of makes also points to the need for increased momentum. When dribbling to the right, he gets a similar amount of energy compared to his movement right shots, getting a little more of a power transfer. Though it represents a small proportion of his overall shots, and could certainly be skewed by sample size, his 10/19 figure on OTD right shots post-injury is worth noting when lumped into the aggregate (which we will get to soon).

Another figure I hesitate to mention because of SSS problems are the step-back looks. He’s never really been one for stepping back, and they represent only 2% of his looks both pre-and-post injury. But he was able to at least hit some with both his legs under him, making 5 of 13. Now, he’s 2/9 post-injury. This by itself is not a significant figure, but certainly follows the larger trends.

The Need for Speed

Outside of the set shots, you can break all these looks into two basic categories: positive and negative momentum shots. His off-the-dribble and movement shots going right would be considered positive momentum looks, along with the runners. OTD, movement left, and step-backs are all negative momentum shots. If you’ve been paying attention, you probably already guessed which one is stronger for him right now.

After the injury, he’s splashed 45.9% of his 111 positive momentum looks. The 180 negative momentum looks drop all the way down to 32.7%. That is a MASSIVE drop compared to his pre-injury self.

The old Klay took 151 positive momentum shots, hitting a crispy 44.3% of those looks. He also managed to hit 43.9% of his 155 negative momentum shots. Notice the split is almost 50/50 between the positive and negative and the near-identical efficiency. The post-injury proportion has risen to 63% being negative momentum shots.

These numbers more than anything point to my two biggest conclusions: he’s really favoring his shots going left out of comfort, and the efficacy of those shots has dropped severely. Meanwhile, his shots with positive momentum have stayed effective because he’s using the left leg as the plant foot instead of his right. His tendencies have changed to favor the left despite the drop in efficacy, but he’s more or less the same going to his right.

So, What Do We Do With This Info?

The set shot really doesn’t concern me. Both the data and the eye test point to a guy struggling to find his legs early in any given season regardless of injury status, and he will only get stronger and better as the season goes on. It would be nice if this roster could get him a larger proportion of set shots relative to motion shots, but that 50% mark is palatable going forward.

Change may be needed regarding his motion shots. Someone needs to get in his ear and tell Klay to lean more into those righty shots and take advantage of a stronger left plant leg. It would also behoove the coaching staff to call more actions that get him flowing towards the ball going right, like Chicago and motion strong actions instead of the flare screens and double drags that usually skew towards his left.

What is clear to me is that patience needs to be exercised, mostly by the fans. If you can temper your expectations and weather the early-season slump, the rewards will be fantastic. Don’t be doom-and-gloom in the early regular season while he tries to figure things out. He has a full year ahead of him to tinker, unlike last season.

My main conclusion? Don’t doubt Klay Thompson. Most players couldn’t even handle starting minutes after this injury, let alone have the confidence to still take their preferred shots, which in his case are very taxing on the lower body. He will figure out a way to be a great shooter by the end of the year; that much I am certain of.

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