This season so far has been a lesson in what good shooting means to a team. Say what we may about the offense and about how Rudy has people dribbling too much, standing around, iso after iso, duo after duo, but ultimately this team might not be a strong shooting team, period. What are the problems? 1) If you look at the career statistics for our current players, most of them do not shoot over 43% for their career and some of those who do, have recently in the last few years, shot much worse than their average (see Rice, Willis, Williams) due to injuries, age, etc. We also have a lot of rookies who typically shoot poorly their first year as a rule. Then there are a few who have improved like Thomas, but for the most part, it seems like we don't have a strong shooting team at all. 2) Does the weak shooting come from shooting three pointers too often? If you look at the three point statistics, you will notice that we are not an extremely weak three point shooting team history wise, but mostly just for this season. Rice is shooting way below his average as is Francis too. Griffin is shooting the three extremely low in his first year after a hot start. Given time, I am sure that our three point shooting should turn around if teams continue to give us the open shot. You don't stop shooting threes this early in the season just because of bad luck. I'm sure the coaching staff knows who can and can't shoot the three. 3) Does the abundance of rookies hurt our teams chances of shooting well? I seem to remember that last year the Clippers were not a great shooting team with all of the rookies and young players that they had. We can argue about whether or not Rudy is using Eddie Griffin correctly and whether or not Morris, Torres, or Brown were good pick-ups and this is good, but are they the sole cause of our shooting woes. They, at most, take 25% of our shots in a game which definitely pulls our average down, but can they be blamed solely? It is unfair to pin the hopes of your team on four rookies. 4) Glen Rice is part of the problem too. His famed shooting just never showed up. The three point shooting which we expected to stretch defenses never materialized, and overall he just hasn't shot good. 5) Fast break points are non-existent. Heck, fast breaks are non-exisent. Teams should at least convert on 75% of their fast breaks. Well, if we never get them, that destroys our average. I could mention the loss of Francis, Mo, and Mobley, but that does not explain missing open shot after open shot. Maybe our team just can't shoot good...
