The requirements of modern basketball for space and strong shooting with the ball are constantly improving. When the Lakers are still worried about the lack of blocking and dismantling hands who are good at strong shooting with the ball, they can only try every means to use freethrow line, when the elbow block and tear down is an issue, many teams have extended the position of the block and tear down to downtown two steps away or even close to the center line.
For example, Knight.
On December 7, Beijing time, the Cavaliers won the Lakers 116-102 at home. The star star of this battle is Donovan-Mitchell. He made 17 out of 27 shots, among which he made 4 out of 8 out of 3-point shots and scored 43 points, 6 rebounds, 5 assists and 4 steals in 5 free throws. The way Mitchell played the Lakers was very simple. He was crazy about blocking and dismantling, or using the range to deter opponents from throwing, throwing, scoring, or throwing three points. The Lakers are best at taking care of blocking and dismantling the ball holder and the cover man. Anthony Davis is ill. The Lakers can’t solve Michelle’s blocking and dismantling.
Two data:
Mitchell scored 1.13 points per round of block split this season, a new high in his personal career and the second in the league.
Mitchell hit 45.8 percent from the top three points this season, a new high in his personal career and the 2nd in the league.
Who did the two data pass through Mitchell? Stephen Curry of warriors. Even though Curry had just played the worst offensive performance of the season in the last game, he still scored 1.21 points in each round, with a three-point shooting rate of 47.6 percent.
In short, the Knight version of Mitchell completed the evolution and played the strongest offensive performance in his career, which led to the improvement of his overall efficiency, and his real hit rate was as high, at the same time, it also ranks among the top ranks of the league. In the past, Mitchell was never famous for efficiency, because he had too many shots but low efficiency, and he was labeled as “the king of waves.
Mitchell is only 1.85 meters tall, and his athletic ability cannot reach the abnormal level. At the beginning, most of the insiders were not optimistic about his prospect as a shooting guard, this graduation from Mitchell High School was only ranked 43rd in the list of top 100 stars by ESPN, and it could be seen that no NCAA Elite team offered him a scholarship. Mitchell went to the University of Louisville and studied at Rick Pitino. His third-point shooting rate in the freshman season was only 25%. This kind of performance might not be able to enter the lottery area even if he participated in the talent show, at that time, it was generally believed that Mitchell must develop the projection ability.
During the off-season in 2016, Pitino carried out a transformation plan for Mitchell. He thought that the problem of Mitchell was that the radian of the shot was peaceful. Although some balls were shot by Mitchell, the trajectory of those balls was peaceful, this affects its field goal percentage and stability. Pitino showed Mitchell a lot of shooting videos of curry and Damian-Lillard, and compared Mitchell’s shooting trajectory with that of other top shooters. The conclusion is obvious, top Shooters have high radians.
In that off-season, Mitchell carried out the targeted shooting training formulated by Pitino. Pitino opened a big net near rim, forcing Mitchell to raise the shooting arch top. Mitchell first started to practice from the distance, slowly pulled the distance away, and finally reached downtown. An off-season hard practice was very effective. Mitchell himself had a good shooting Foundation. After adjusting the details and forming muscle memory, his shooting improved significantly, in the sophomore season, its three-point shooting rate increased to 35.4 percent and free throw shooting rate increased to 80.6 percent.
In 2017, the Mitchell market rose to enter the NBA with the show on the 13th. In the rookie season, he became a scorer with an average score of 20 +, and then he made progress every season. However, from the perspective of modern basketball, Mitchell’s efficiency is too low. The most reliable way to improve efficiency is to attack the basket efficiently, hit three points efficiently, and stand on a large number of freethrow line. Each of Mitchell is not top enough.
Mitchell realized that in NBA, where giants stand and talent monsters flock, his figure disadvantage is too obvious. If Mitchell wants to go up to the next level, he must make the best use of the strong shot in the first round of the 2020 playoffs. In that series, Mitchell shot 4.7 three points with a three-point hit rate of 51.6% in 7 matches, and scored 36.3 points in the match, playing the nugget’s “potty chair” defense.
During the off-season in 2020, Mitchell’s goal was to “develop a three-point ball comparable to Curry and Lillard”, not accuracy, but difficulty and range, what he pursues is to face any opponent with higher efficiency, to hold the ball in a further position and to hit the ball. Because, when the ball holder can hit the Super far three points from 26 feet away, he can launch a block and tear down at the position just past the center line, and the opponent’s defense line must be expanded, this gives the players room to break through, and other players also have more space to participate in the attack.
Mitchell used to train in Miami during the offseason. During the block and tear training, the trainer would hold various props to fight against Mitchell, interfering with his shooting, improving his passing under high-pressure defense, strong investment ability. In addition, Mitchell also introduced a strength trainer to Todd Wayne Wade and Chris Paul. They recommended David Alexander, a famous Miami trainer, to Mitchell.
Alexander’s team conducted a comprehensive orthopedic assessment of Mitchell, and almost 50 individual tests were conducted to find the weak position of Mitchell’s body. Then they made improvement plans based on the results. The test results show that Mitchell needs to improve his spinal curvature, back curvature and knee flexion. He has the problem of overusing quadriceps femoris, which leads to fatigue easily after the schedule is advanced. Alexander’s team helped Mitchell to strengthen the hamstring and gluteus major muscle, improving the biomechanics of his pace to reduce the load of his quadriceps femoris.
The effect of these trainings is remarkable. In the 2020-21 season, the number of three-point shots from 26 feet away by Mitchell increased to 209, and the hit rate increased. In the 2021-22 season, Mitchell shot up to 342 times in three points outside 26 feet, and the hit rate dropped briefly to 33.3 percent. But this season, the three-point hit rate of Mitchell 26 feet away has risen to a career high of 40.2 percent.
In today’s World War I with the Lakers, Mitchell hit two 26-foot three points and two 27-foot three points, all of which were dry. Observing Mitchell’s attack, you will find that most of his attack threats come from the downtown-step block demolition. The Lakers expanded their defense lines because they were afraid of his strong shots, this gave him a lot of opportunities to use the speed to break through the internal layup and assist jarert-Allen.
“When you can shoot too far and three points, the opponent’s defense will be more expanded. If the opponent is far away from me by three point line, he will guard against me. I can directly attack the basket, at the same time, I can also create more opportunities and breakthrough routes for my teammates,” Mitchell explained.
When the Knight introduced Mitchell, what he wanted was his offensive ability. Because in the past few seasons, the Knight’s attack was extremely bad, and their attack efficiency was only the 20th last season. In the past five seasons, Mitchell is the only player who has carried out at least 500 attacks by the players in each season. His efficiency of blocking and dismantling is improving every season, last season, he scored a career high of 1.03 points per round.
John Schumann, a data analyst on NBA official website, once analyzed that the improvement of Mitchell’s offensive efficiency was due to the improvement of three points. When Mitchell’s three-point Prime Minister was promoted to the second level of the league, his blocking and dismantling efficiency Syncrolift to the second level of the league, and the shooting rate of his basket increased to 75.9% of the new career high, which was not surprising. Of course, it is also not surprising that the Knight’s offensive efficiency has been improved to the 10th in the league.
Can Mitchell maintain this performance? In other words, can he still play such a performance in the playoffs? It still takes time to test, but at least Mitchell himself is confident.
“I think there is no problem. I can keep it. I have confidence in myself.”