Drop Off: 12 things on Kelsey Mitchell, Maya Moore, Mercury Big 3
By Ben Dull
Another Tuesday, another edition of 12 random things from around the WNBA (last week’s 12 things in case you missed it). The focus this time around: some player-specific shooting data that has stood out now that we are about a third of the way through the 2018 season (all stats as of Monday, obtained via the WNBA website):
1. Natalie Achonwa, connecting from the midrange
Prior to the start of the season, I was pretty bullish on Indiana’s offense, expecting it to allow them to compete in a surprising amount of games given good health. Most of that hinged on the collection of bigs assembled by Pokey Chatman that are good enough from the midrange to do some damage in the structure of her offense.
I was particularly high on any lineup that would feature Kelsey Mitchell, Victoria Vivians, Candice Dupree and another one of those bigs. Kayla Alexander, my initial choice to fill that spot, has seen her playing time taper off. Perhaps to no fault of her own, it has instead been Achonwa filling most of those minutes.
Achonwa played in all 34 games last year, averaging 18 minutes per game and drawing 17 starts. She has averaged 23 minutes per game in 2018 and started all 11 games thus far. The fourth year forward/center is on pace to shatter last season’s volume from 11-21 feet.
2017: 50 percent on 44 attempts in 34 games
2018: 53.1 percent on 32 attempts through 11 games
2. Courtney Williams, the exception to Moreyball
Williams shot 45.2 percent on 221 attempts from 11-to-21 feet last season. The league average from that range was 38.3 percent. You only need one hand to count up the other guards that can approach that efficiency at even half that volume — Allie Quigley, Jewell Loyd, Monique Currie, Seimone Augustus, Chelsea Gray. That’s it.
The question for Connecticut come playoff time and down the line will be whether or not you want to rely on those kind of shots as one of your primary sources of offense. Williams is very good at it, but it doesn’t put pressure on the rim or generate easier looks for others (aside from the offensive glass) all that often.
3. DeWanna Bonner, making the most of the most important looks
Bonner has quickly put to bed any feelings people may have had as to whether she’d return to form after giving birth to twins. She’s over 70 percent inside five feet (33-for-46) and has hit 45.7 percent of her 35 early-season attempts from the midrange. The only worry right now is her three ball — sub-27 percent on 63 attempts. But she’s taking them, which in itself is a huge upgrade over what happened for the Mercury last season when opponents forced Brittney Griner and Diana Taurasi to give it up.
4. Death, taxes, and Candice Dupree keeping your offense afloat
Dupree has connected on 46 percent of 72 midrange attempts in 2018, and hit 44.3 percent of 282 such attempts last season for the Fever. Many of her attempts are open ones, but she’s often getting the ball with about seven seconds on the shot clock. Indiana’s entire offense would crumble if defenses didn’t have to respect that aspect of Dupree’s game.
5. A’ja Wilson and the Aces’ making their hay inside the arc
There never seemed to be any doubt as to what Bill Laimbeer should have done with the first overall pick in this year’s draft. It’s just as tough to liken what Wilson is doing to any other player out there. Often right on the catch, she’s turning and shooting right over the top of people night after night because defenses already have to worry about her ability to put it down and get all the way to the rim.
Wilson is shooting 60.4 percent inside five feet, and 38.8 percent on all other attempts inside the arc. The latter will need to improve a bit, but so many of those attempts came before the Aces had anything resembling their full team.
A note on that: Tamera Young is 25-for-74 (33.8 percent) on two-pointers outside of five feet. That accounts for nearly a tenth (10 percent!) of the team’s shot attempts. Young is not an explosive pick and roll finisher at the rim, and she shot poorly from that range (28.9 percent on 135 attempts) last season. If only Laimbeer had another perimeter player at his disposal to entrust with that same amount of freedom with the upside to do more with all those attempts…
6. Dallas, getting the shots they want
The Wings, more so than any other team, are really locked in on either getting all the way to the rim or creating a decent look from three. 38.5 percent of their shots have come inside five feet — tops in the league and 8.8 percent above the league average — and they’ve cut down on long twos more than anyone else in the league. Just 10.5 percent of their attempts come from 16-21 feet — the lowest such mark in the league, 9.2 percent below the league average.
Skylar Diggins-Smith and Liz Cambage are the engines that make them go. Diggins-Smith is a clear favorite in the MVP race at this point. And it’s reasonable to think things on that end will continue to get better — Kaela Davis and Allisha Gray won’t continue to combine to shoot 22 percent from three all season.
7. Diana Taurasi, proving that #MuscleWatch can actually yield results
Every stinking year we have to endure it in every sport. The puff pieces are run about how Player X is in the best shape of his/her life. Has anybody delivered on that hype more than Taurasi has thus far? Her assists are way up over last season, and she’s logging more minutes than she has since 2013.
Taurasi’s volume from beyond the arc, often off the dribble, is something few active players could even try to emulate. She’s 70-for-72 at the line through 13 games, and a scorching 21-for-41 from 11-to-21 feet out.
The natural follow-up to all of this: Can she keep it up? I think it may be the wrong question. The Mercury have won eight straight and have shown that they can get their big three going without devolving into a my turn/your turn style of play. If Phoenix continues to roll through the midway point of the season, I think Sandy Brondello will have the luxury of getting more creative with her rotations to begin selectively leaning more on her guards and wings — an actual point of strength that this team will need to learn to maximize in July and August.
8. Anything you can do…
The Ogwumike sisters each have been dominant for their respective teams to start the season. Chiney has come back strong off the Achilles tear, and Nneka started the season on a well-timed tear to help carry them while playing without Candace Parker, Jantel Lavender and Maria Vadeeva.
Their shooting numbers around the basket have been both excellent and eerily similar.
Chiney: 48-for-69 (69.6 percent)
Nneka: 49-for-70 (70 percent)
Chiney hit the first three-pointer of her career earlier this month in New York. Nneka, a career 37 percent three-point shooter, has connected on six of her first 13 attempts in 2018.
9. Making life easier for Maya Moore
Cheryl Reeve faces an extremely tough decision on a nightly basis with her team here in 2018. Moore, unquestionably one of the best players in the world, hasn’t gotten off to a great shooting start. She’s at 33 percent from 11-to-21 feet, where she’s getting a third of her shot attempts. Moore is also at 36.8 percent from three after finishing over 41 percent last season from beyond the arc.
The easiest solution is probably the most likely: Moore is too good to continue to miss that many shots. But sometimes for different reasons from night-to-night, Reeve will have to decide whether or not to slide her up to the four spot to open up the floor for her superstar.
The ripple effects there are pretty clear. Danielle Robinson and Tanisha Wright are the primary backups for Lindsay Whalen and Seimone Augustus. Sliding Moore up creates more opportunity for Alexis Jones and Cecilia Zandalasini. One could make a case that those are two of their four best three-point shooters.
That lineup shift also makes it easier to get the ball to Moore closer to the basket, namely around the nail or down on a block. When Moore does space out beyond the arc from that spot, there will be more room for Sylvia Fowles to go to work inside.
The downside to that move? It may be more taxing on Moore, forcing her to bang inside on defense against much bigger players. It also puts a ceiling on Rebekkah Brunson’s minutes. Reeve has noted on her show with Jim Souhan that Brunson’s knees were bothering her earlier in the season. That situation may be touch-and-go throughout the season.
But Reeve has also noted to Souhan that she believes Brunson is one of the most reliable three-point shooters on her roster (34.8 percent on 66 attempts last season, 9-for-20 through 10 games in 2018). Perhaps Brunson’s shooting will become an even bigger factor in their offensive success. That may limit Moore’s touches from spots closer to the basket where she’s one dribble from the rim. But there’s simply no replacement for what Brunson brings defensively, and if she’s as good a shooter as advertised, simply taking a few more here and there will force opponents to change the ways in which they try to stop the Lynx.
10. Kelsey Mitchell, supernova
Kelsey Mitchell is shooting 11-for-26 (42.3 percent) from 27+ feet. Nobody else in the WNBA can touch that.
To date, just nine other players have two or more makes from out there. A few players of note: Allie Quigley, 2-for-5; Shekinna Stricklen, 4-for-6; Diana Taurasi, 2-for-20; Kristi Toliver, 5-for-12; Victoria Vivians, 3-for-8.
In the last five years, DeWanna Bonner in 2015 and Ivory Latta in most years are the only players that have been efficient on a high number of attempts.
The 2018 draft class has delivered pro-ready players as promised. The top-two picks are probably well past the point of even being referred to as rookies. These are special players. And if Vivians continues to hit from well beyond the arc as some projected, the Fever will have a dynamic to their offense that we just don’t see to the same extent with other teams.
11. Putting numbers to BG’s rise
Brittney Griner in 2016: 64 percent inside five feet, 41 percent from 11-to-21 feet on 56 attempts
Griner in 2017: 67 percent inside five feet, 53.6 percent from 6-to-10, 44.4 percent from 11-to-21 feet on 99 attempts
Griner in 2018 (13 games): 67.9 percent inside five feet, 49.1 percent from 6-to-10, 65 percent from 11-to-15, 52.4 percent from 16-to-21
There may be some regression coming. However, remember this when teams send a second defender at her before the ball is even in the air: turnaround jumpers from ~12 feet out have to now be viewed as layups. And because Griner is 6’9, a solid double rarely inhibits her ability to make the pass that she wants out of it. That’s a scary thought.
12. Atlanta, struggling to score
The Dream are worst in the league inside five feet, shooting 52.2 percent. The good news? They get the third-most attempts there. Per Synergy, they average .928 points per possession in transition, the second-worst mark in the league.
Run with the Dream? Opponents have often been rewarded for doing so — Atlanta has turned it over on 17.4 percent of their transition possessions, the highest such mark in the league. (Charges factor into that number. If any player has a bone to pick with how WNBA officials navigate the block/charge rules, it’s Dream guard Tiffany Hayes, with whom I’d agree with on many of those calls. #FixTheCharge) Those two areas have to be seen as much more controllable than this last one, which ought to be encouraging from their perspective.
Finally, they average .806 points per possession on spot ups, the area that seems to be drawing the most attention. The Dream rank 9th in total spot-up attempts. Brittney Sykes got off to a slow start from deep, is now hurt, and since has been joined by Hayes on the team injury report.
Spot ups probably shouldn’t be viewed as the problem. Sykes will shoot it better, and the Dream first have to get much better in the other two areas mentioned to get where they want to be by season’s end.
Next: Saturday Drop Off: 5 things from Seattle's 103-92 win over Connecticut