We all knew that Zion Williamson’s 4-for-4 from three in his NBA debut wasn’t going to be the norm for him, but I’d have thought that he would have at least made one more three in the next 10 games. After that debut, I was really thinking that we could maybe get one made three per game from him. Not unreasonable, right? Even people who really suck at threes and have horribly borked shooting forms (thinking Giannis here) can make threes as long as they shoot enough of them.
He doesn’t shoot jumpers at all, actually. In terms of being an effective NBA player, it’s good that he’s aware enough of his shortcomings to excise them from his game at this point. But in terms of entertainment value, you know, there’s going to be a point a couple years from now where I’m like “man I love watching this dude bowlingball his way into defenders and dunk on them, but can we get a few midrange jimbos or something?”. According to the shot chart I’m looking at, he has three shots that are both outside the paint and inside the arc so far this year. That’s not enough midrange jimbos for my liking. I will allow this to continue for now, because of his dominance in the paint. But it’s going to be a long time before the world gets to see a Williamson midrange-ilation.
Your counterpoint might be “but Shaq didn’t shoot jumpers and he was a beast!”. And those things are true. He was a beast. And he didn’t shoot jumpers. But imagine a world where Shaq COULD shoot jumpers! Would he have been the GOAT? Just because you’re a beast, doesn’t mean that you can’t work to extend your beastitude into other areas. Again, Williamson is just a rookie, and everyone knew he was a shaky shooter, but he’s already exceeded my expectations really hard so why not give him some light criticism?