Kobe clutch? Bryant’s biggest lie shows the value of shot creation

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Henry Abbott is in for a world of hate. That’s what happens when you are the most hating-est hater in a world of haterz (which, as you can tell by pluralizing hater with a “z”, is Laker speak for he disrespected Kobe Bryant).

Over at TrueHoop, Abbott has the nerve to question a long held maxim generally accepted by the NBA consensus.

 Who would you like to have take the last shot with the game on the line?

Kobe Bryant wins by a country mile. Every time. (In a general manager poll this season, he earned 79% of the vote, his ninth consecutive blowout.)

There is not really any other serious candidate.

Ask me, though, (as Ryen Russillo did last week and Mike Trudell the other day) and I’ll tell you I don’t know who’s the best, but with all due respect to Bryant’s amazing abilities scoring the ball, there’s zero chance he’s the king of crunch time.

Abbott goes on to show, through simple statistics, a long list of players who have been more productive with their shots in the closing minutes of tight games. Undoubtedly, coaches, general managers, and any fan die hard enough to comb through these blogs are privy to the same information.

So then, why is Kobe still the man? To sum it up in two words: shot creation.

As Abbott points out, almost every single crunch time Bryant possession is going to end the same way—with a shot (normally of the pull-up, fade away variety, between 15-20 feet from the basket).

The thing is, though everyone knows what type of shot Bryant is going for, he has about a hundred different ways to get there (all without severely altering his shot form).

Efficiency is always desired, and there are millions of people littered across pickup games in this country who could probably knock down more open shots than Bryant can, but first they have to be able to get the shot off.

For all the advanced statistics that measure and find the likes of a Carmelo Anthony or Allen Iverson wanting, there is something to be said for being able to get a shot off under control (this being the key) whenever desired.

This is why even one-dimensional volume scorers still hold value, placed on second units comprised of various role players who can do a number of things except when it comes to creating shots against NBA defenses.

This is also why, over the past few seasons, Spurs fans have decried role players for their lack of production come playoff time. With only one player constantly producing double teams (Manu Ginobili last year, Tony Parker the two years before), defenses can afford to be a lot more choosy in what they allow the rest of the role players to do (which meant few open Matt Bonner three-pointers).

Bryant is seen as the ultimate closeout option because he is probably the best shot creator in NBA history, not because he makes more than the next guy. He’s going to get the shot he wants, and there is not a damn thing an opposing defense can do to stop it, except hoping it doesn’t drop.

Thankfully, as Abbott points out, more often than not they don’t.

  • http://www.bpifanconnect.com Alix Babaie

    Can’t stand Kobe, give me Manu Ginobili – the Argentinian Jordan, any day of the week!

  • jwalt

    Kobe is one of the top clutch players in the league. But he isn’t head and shoulders like everyone thinks. He shoots around 44% in clutch time (as defined by 82games.com). Not as good as Manu, not as good as Dirk, but better than most. His shot selection during that time is questionable a lot of the time. And he’s not going to get fouled because he always shoots jumpers.

    But the guy who is really overrated in the clutch is Dwayne Wade. He shoots somewhere in the 20′s with the game on the line.

    Perception is so much in sports, and guys like Kobe and Wade are built up by the publicity machine.

    I think the top four players in the clutch are, in no particular order, Kobe, Manu, Dirk, and Lebron James. 82games would concur, though Manu’s injuries hurt his standings in 2008-09 and 2009-10.

    Kobe and Dirk because of their shooting, Manu because he can beat you in so many ways, and Lebron because he’s the best player in the world and plays well in close games.

    (Manu beat Minny with a blocked shot, Milwaukee with a buzzer beater, Denver by taking a charge). As Pop said, “Manu can win games in more ways than anyone I’ve ever coached.” And that is an old quote now.

  • mybloodissilverandblack

    Uhm, last time I checked, this is 48 Minutes of Hell. Or was it because I bumped my head and am seeing purple and gold?

  • http://48minutesofhell.com Jesse Blanchard

    It’s Friday, live a little….this is still a Spurs blog. And there is a Spurs twist. The past few playoffs, there have been so few players on the Spurs to create shots that the role players have taken the brunt of the criticism for not being clutch.

  • Kevin Hermesch

    Manu wasn’t even mentioned in the original article. How blind are your compatriots?!?!

  • agutierrez

    With all due respect, it’s not about “shot creation,” it’s about marketing and myth creation. Kobe is the biggest star in the biggest star-creating city on Earth. Highlight films never show the crunch time shots he misses, only the ones he makes. The myth gets created so more people will buy tickets, watch and buy product.
    I’m with Alix: give me Manu in crunch time anytime.

  • ITGuy

    If kobe had the ball in a close game against the Spurs, Manu would just steal it and run the clock off.
    Bias? Yes I’m.

    Go Spurs Go!!

  • Czernobog

    I love Abbott’s little table.

    3rd best clutch player – Shawn Marion.

    5th and 6th – Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis.

    I think he needs to revise the way he examines the data.

  • SpurredOn

    Dirk scares me the most, as he can make shots from the oddest angles and from places on the floor that are not “his” spots. He’ll also shoot clear over whomever guards him and is likely to get a foul call if crowded. Melo, due to his quickness, would be next. Kobe falls into the remaining group, that would include Manu, of Pierce, D-Will, Wade, and pre-injury Roy.

  • SpurredOn

    @Czernobog – you have to allow for some context with the chart. Marion is an athletic player with an akward shot who has played with Nash and Kidd, thus when they draw a help defender, he has benefited with open shots near the rim. Hedo, excluding his time in SA, has taken and made some cluth shots, thus why Orlando made the Finals two years ago.

    I was surpised that the guys who instantly came to mind for me were all high on his list except Wade and Pierce.

    @Jesse – appreciate your posting this today, where it can be discussed without “haterz” accusations from the denialists. It’s also worth noting that our very own Duncan was 12th on the list.

  • Judd

    http://espn.go.com/blog/TrueHoop/post/_/id/24200/the-truth-about-kobe-bryant-in-crunch-time

    Yeah, I too enjoyed this today. great article and it’s hard to argue against

  • Curtis

    It seems like two different questions. One question is “Who do you want to shoot the game winning shot.” To me, it seems like Ray Allen is a solid pick.

    But if the question is, “Who do you want to have the ball with the game on the line?” then shot creation makes a lot more sense. Though I think I’d take Nash at that point.

    Kobe’s on both lists, and maybe his reputation is due to the fact that he is on both lists. Throw in the fact that he visibly relishes it more than anyone since Jordan and plays for the media-darling Lakers, it is no surprise that he has gotten this nod over the years.

  • Czernobog

    @SpurredOn: But that’s my point. Marion’s location on the chart shows how misleading the bare-bones “shots made/missed” stat is. I mean, how many of those points were assisted, and at the rim? I’m guessing at least 80%. Where do assists factor into his analysis? eFg%? Free throws? Putbacks?

    If he’d looked at, say, Points Produced in the final minute of close games, you’d see that chart change. And my gut tells me Manu and Nash would be much higher, along with CP3 and LeBron.

  • Ruel

    It’s a very nice day!!! I’ll stick with our Team/Players San Antonio Spurs and let the media talk or write anything they want to…

  • Jonathan

    The point is somewhat valid. Shawn Marion, for example, is third on Abbott’s chart, and I’m betting if you actually looked at the “clutch” shots he made almost all of them would be assisted. But the top player on Abbott’s chart is Carmelo Anthony, and I would also bet he is creating most of the shots that he’s making (more consistently than Kobe) at the ends of games.

    Also, while Kobe is a great creator, he’s only creating for himself in these situations–he’s not distributing to open teammates even though the defenses are keyed on him.

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  • Hunter

    this guy is a hater as said in the post. kobe is a great clutch shooter. but my all time last shot team is this

    Pg: Jordan
    Sg: Ray Allen
    SF: Reggie Miller
    PF: Tim Duncan
    C: Robbert Horry
    jordan taking it up allen and miller on the wing horry inbounding duncan at the top of the key we will win

  • Ben

    @Jonathan: Your last paragraph is key. A lot of the guys high up on the list are willing to pass out to an open teammate if they draw a lot of defenders, not Kobe. He’s taking that shot come h3ll or high water. On that list alone he’s sitting at 115 shots and because he’s taking that shot no matter what, it usually ends up being a bad shot.

    I don’t know if you can really call it “creating his own shot” like this article points out. More like being a ball hog.

  • NYC

    What? No John Starks?

  • rob

    I’m not quite sure what to think about this read. On one hand it’s pointing out that Kobe is the most talked about go to guy and on the other it is saying he isn’t the most dependable.

    Well…in his early years in the nba he was the most feared and dependable shot taker in closing minutes of a game. Now with age, advanced scouting and deteriation of the body….Kobe isn’t the most dependable “clutch” player in the league.

    Same could (and has been said) about Duncan. Who once was the most dominating PF of all time can not perform like years in the past.

    I don’t know…what matters the most regarding “teams” is that they can get to the final and perhaps win another title. The Spurs have seemed to have found the magic dust needed to at least have a great opportunity to getting there this year regardless of Duncan’s decline in minutes played. How much of a possibility do the Lakers have in getting to that same pennicle I guess will depend on the rest of that team’s personnel. Kobe will not be the Kobe of the past.

  • Gomezd

    Its certainly interesting but its really hard to see the value in this sort of analysis, I remember reading a a while ago another article asking who the most “clutch” player in nba was, using slightly different statistics it came out that manu was top 3 if I remember correctly, the author argued that manu was so high because he got to the line so often in the last minute of a close game and had such a good freethrow percentage so that boosted his true shoot significantly or something like that if I remember right.

    Point is you could really tweak and change the parameters for what you decide is “clutch” and get quite different results.

  • betsyduncan

    Yeah, well Kobe-clutch lost tonight. Yay.

  • Czernobog

    Never mind Kobe. Short, talented DeMarcus Cousins gave the Lakers big – long frontcourt the business. It isn’t just your size that matters – it’s how you use it.

  • Mr.Robinson

    I love these articles that bring Kobe back down to earth. What I love even more is when Kobe shoots a contested jump shot misses and when Gasol or Bynum have a mismatch and they give him this look like Whaaaaaaaat??????? I will take our TEAM any day.

  • gimpsdad

    Give me Bird any day.

  • quincyscott

    I am definitely not a Kobe Bryant fan. His disciples would consider me a “hater.” When I see a forty year old man walking around Target with a Kobe Bryant jersey on, I really have to bite my lip. I do not think he ranks as the greatest player of all time, by a long shot. But, this notion that he somehow sucks at the end of games, that 95% of coaches, GMs and players are just completely wrong about Bryant being a great closer, is plain silly. Like all of these basketball professionals got it wrong, and Henry Abbott got it right. Come on. Henry Abbott is an ignoramus. He is a fan, like the rest of us, who time and again shows that he doesn’t really know the game all that well. I simply don’t respect his opinion the way I would a Charley Rosen or an actual NBA coach or player. Abbott likes to stir the pot. Everybody has decided that Lebron James is a classless loser, and Abbott spends months defending James as a fine, upstanding and misunderstood person. Everybody thinks Bryant is a great finisher, and Abbott tells us Bryant is really just mediocre at best. It’s part of Abbott’s schtick.

    I think this response to Abbott is actually a fair one, although the headline about this being Kobe’s “biggest lie” is misleading. NBA players are not dumb. They haven’t elevated Bryant to his position as the best closer for no reason. If he did nothing but shoot blanks in pressure situations, they would all simply laugh at him behind his back. Statistics aside, the real question is, in a situation with the game on the line and a single possession margin, who do you want with the ball in his hands? I am sure a majority of NBA players would have Kobe Bryant at or near the top of their list, and he has been there his whole career. Even a “hater” like me must concede this. Not not only is he almost certainly going to create a shot, as this article points out, but he also importantly has the kind of psyche that seeks that kind of moment to perform, and that won’t wilt under pressure.

    Everybody who plays in the NBA is a great basketball player. But there are only a handful of those players who really thrive in those high pressure moments. Bryant can be a rather selfish and stupid player over the entire course of a game, and it gets the Lakers in trouble when he does not play good team ball. And it is kind of silly that in his thirties he still does that to his team. It’s this egomania that makes him a very unlikable athlete to watch, from my perspective. But his ability to execute at the end of the game is undeniable.

    Fellow Spurs fans, if we are up by two points against the Lakers in a playoff game, and the Lakers get the last possession, who scares you? There are two names that I guarantee all of us will list, and one of them is named Kobe Bryant.

  • Ed

    I got in on this yesterday and it was hilarious watching the KobMe-lovers lose it!

  • Ed

    I heard a news report earlier this week that something like 57% of college kids graduate withOUT the ability to discern an opinion from a fact. The proof of this was in FULL force yesterday on ESPN. If you told these tools that statistics show KobMe was the greatest professional athelete of all time regardless of sport and era they would swallow it without question. Give them a stat they don’t like and they howl about “Stats are not facts” and “Stats don’t prove anything”…. very funny to watch. My favorite yesterday was the guy who posted …” F*** you Abbott, go read a book!”…. what a ringing endorsement of our education system. This guy thinks he made a cogent point. Sad. Reminds me of the sign I saw at an environmental protest, it said …”I don’t need your oil I take the bus!”…..you can’t make this up.

  • Tim

    “Bryant is seen as the ultimate closeout option because he is probably the best shot creator in NBA history”

    Sorry, but there is no way he is better than Jordan was.

    Read more: http://www.48minutesofhell.com/kobe-clutch-bryants-biggest-lie-shows-the-value-of-shot-creation#ixzz1CS5NTXc8

  • manufan

    If you are talking shot creation and actualy getting off that last shot I would take Kevin Durant anyday. It’s just best combination of mobility, length, and ability to hit it from anywhere on the court.
    But I love my Manu.

  • andy

    my issue with “clutch” statistics is that they only measure one period of possible “clutchness”.

    what about those periods where your team is up, but the opposing team closes the gap quickly, and a player takes it upon himself to beat the comeback down? if this happens, and the team goes from neck and neck to up 5-10 with 2 minutes left, doesn’t that count as a clutch performance? this is still one place where i think statistics will prove relatively weak unless you make them more comprehensive.

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  • kobelove

    u’re wrong. good discussion over at chasing23 http://chasing23.com/2011/02/the-ball-dont-lie-but-sometimes-stats-do/ ….shows kobe’s clutchness way underrated..!

  • Ed

    I’m SO surprised by that ^^^^^^post.

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  • Ai 3

    “the best shot creator in NBA history” ? Nobody created more easy shots for himself than Michael Jordan..