(The original text was published on December 15. The author is NBA writer Kirk Goldsberry. The content of the article does not represent the translator’s point of view.)
LeBlanc is expected to surpass Jabbar in the second half of this season (probably in next February at the earliest) and become the player with the most scores in the regular season in NBA history. But there is also one in Jabbar’s record that is temporarily inaccessible to LeBlanc, which is the number of shots. Although James was less than 800 points short of the 38387-point record of Jabbar, the number of shots he shot was more than 2,000 times less than that of the King of the tick.
Since the gap in hit numbers is so large, how did James quickly catch up with Jabbar’s total score? The answer is simple. It depends on three-point shooting.
Jabbar entered the NBA in 1969. at that time, it was still ten years before the league was established three point line. Even after the three-point goal, until Jabbar retired, the players rarely chose this kind of shot, especially for a big player. In his last ten seasons, Jabbar only shot 18 three-point goals and hit once. If that ball was counted as two points instead of three points (just like other goals he scored in his career), he would still score 795 points more than James.
However, although James entered by O’Neal, duncan and other powerful big men ruled the alliance-they concentrated many attacks and defense in and around the forbidden zone at that time-but now he is more obsessed with three points than ever before. Play in the league. The revolution of rhythm-space completely changed professional basketball, and James’s ability to adapt to this new environment quickly was the important reason why he was able to occupy a historical peak.
Similar to Jabbar, who scored 15837 goals in total but only scored one three-point goal, James also started to score from a position closer to RIM.
His NBA first goal was a middle distance jump shot near the bottom line on the right. That place also became his favorite jumper point in his early career. As you can see from the picture, James in the first two years of his career was quite active at the bottom line on the right-in general, he also shot a lot of Chinese investment firms.
Distribution of the most frequently shot locations in the first two years of James’s careerIn the first and second seasons of his career, James had 37 percent of his shots between 10 feet (3.05 meters) and RIM from three point line. He was never afraid of shoot behind the arc, but the initial tossing hit rate was not high. In the 2003-04 season, that is, his rookie season, his three-point shooting rate was only 29%, ranking 72th among the 74 players who shot at least 200 three points.
Although James won the award of the best rookie of the year, he was one of the worst high-yield jumper players in NBA at that time. Although he improved his jump shot in his subsequent career, he-like Jabbar-climbed the league’s historical scoring peak mainly by ruling the area near rim.
Throughout his career, 63 percent of James’s goals were shot from the penalty area, and 57.6 percent were shot within 5 feet (1.52 meters) of RIM. When everything ends, he will also become the best insider scorer in his generation of players.
If you think the above views are exaggerated, please consider the fact that in the hands of the 50 most active inside shooting since the 1999-2000 season, James’s number of insider shots, both the number of internal shots and the number of internal shots field goal percentage ranked first.
The score statistics of the 50 most active internal scorers since the 1999-2000 season (horizontal axis: number of internal shots; Vertical axis: Internal hit rate)
In the rookie season, James ranked 11th in the league inside shooting. In the following 18 seasons, he ranked in the top 10 of the league in 17 seasons. When he was in his peak period, that is, in the four years from 2012-13 to 2015-16 season, he led the list three times.
The biggest reason why James became the most famous player in modern basketball history is that he combined his incredible physical talent with his superb basketball IQ. This combination enables him to use cunning, rapid, powerful and effective breakthroughs to destroy internal defense.
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This season, James still ranked fourth in the league on average inside shooting. Although these inside shots are his main scoring methods, his overall jump shot performance has changed dramatically. The reliable jumper he developed slowly deserves people’s praise. He will never be Stephen Curry, but his three points have played an increasingly important role in the competition.
The average shooting distance in his rookie season is 15.7 feet (4.79 meters), which is the middle distance in the middle distance. Last season, this figure became 22.5 feet (6.86 meters), much closer to three point line.
Like others in the league, James also fell in love with three-point shots and abandoned those two points outside the penalty area, although more than one third of his early career shots belonged to the latter. Now, James is often on the left wing downtown in receive the ball, which is not only his favorite three-point shot point, but also the perfect place for him to attack the middle road with right-hand fengshui ball technology.
The position change chart with the most shots of LeBlanc (left: the first two seasons of career, right: the last three seasons)
Among the shots hit by rookie James, 10.1% came from downtown and 29.4% from the middle distance. In the 20th season of his career, his two figures almost changed. 22.6 percent of the balls he cast were three-pointer and 10.6 percent were middle shots.
Since the 2020-21 season, 27.9 percent of James’s scores have come from three-point goals. On his way to sprint to the NBA history record, his three-point projection ability became very important for two reasons.
The first is the obvious mathematical reason. Three is greater than two. When James shifted his shooting focus to downtown, he accelerated his pace of moving towards that magic 38387 points.
The second reason is persistence. Jabbar scored his last goal at the age of 42. James will turn 38 this month. For his aging body, a large number of tossing scores are obviously easier.
As a young scorer, James has both speed, body shape, vision, skill and ending ability, and in these aspects is no less than any player in the history of the league. He is a combination of Magic Johnson and alphabet brother. During the peak period, he can wantonly impact the inside line and score with incredible efficiency.
In all his key performances, perhaps no one can better reflect this point than the game-killing ball he cast in the first game against the Pacers in 2013. At that time, there were only 2.2 seconds left in the game. He caught Battier’s foul ball in arch top, swept by George who followed him like a strong wind, and rushed straight to the basket, successfully finished the layup with one of the league’s best defense.
But that was almost ten years ago. Now James is a different player. He launched that kind of explosive impact on RIM much less than before. So far, NBA has counted the number of breakthroughs in ten seasons. Judging from this time range, James’s average breakthrough times this season are the least in his career. According to Second Spectrum, James broke through 13.9 times per game on average in the 2019-20 season. This season, the data has only averaged 8.0 times.
When James was on his last road to the total score record, he was accumulating more and more scores farther and farther away from the rim.
Everyone knows that Jabbar can still score with his legendary Tianyao skill in his 30 s or even 40 s. Although James did not have such a symbolic shot, his three-point ability not only allowed him to approach the record faster, but also allowed him to score without making breakthroughs that damaged his body.
When Jabbar ended his career, he left more than 15800 two-point goals-we repeat them again, which is also the only way to shoot in the first half of his career. However, James may only need to score less than 12000 two points to surpass Jabbar’s scoring record.
Surprisingly, James has scored 2187 three-point goals, ranking 10th in NBA history. If all these three points are counted as two points, then James is not chasing Jabbar on the total score list, but Carl Malone (but if NBA is a league without three point line, then James may have already replaced many low-hit tossing with shots closer to rim).
Three-point distribution map of James’s career investmentJames’s three-point hits have surpassed retired archers like Nowitzki, Reddick and JR-Smith, he may even rise to the sixth place in the NBA history three-point list at the end of this season. Although he has been the player who scored the most two points in the league in three seasons, when he approaches one of the biggest milestones in his bright career, he also relies more on external projection than ever before.
On November 26 this year, James scored a season high of 39 points, helping the Lakers beat Spurs, but 21 points were brought by three points tossing. That night, more than half of his shots and more than half of his goals came from a much farther place than Jabbar’s regular shots. Since the battle between him and the old man of time will continue, his ability to chase Jabbar’s iconic record will depend on more nights like that.
Original: Kirk GoldsberryCompilation: asteroid fallingDiscussion & Analysis
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