Why was Andre Miller selected over Rudy Fernandez to shoot the technical with 6:54 to go in the 2nd quarter? Rudy FT shooting: .857 season / .844 career Miller FT shooting: .817 season / .803 career At the time, I remember thinking, "I hope we don't lose this game by one point, because Rudy should have shot that". I'm not blaming the whole loss on this....but seriously, does anyone know who selects the player to shoot? And does anyone know why anyone in their right mind would select Andre over Rudy?
Interesting point you bring up. I didn't give it a second thought that Miller took it . . . a vet going to the line to drain it. Seems like a PG/leader thing to do. But again, you bring up an intersting point.
Pretty interesting. But then again, if we hit a FG in the last 3 minutes, or we have Brandon Roy, we probably win that game, and non of these conversations would be happening.
Sure, which is why I said I wasn't blaming the loss on this. But it doesn't take away from my point, either. No matter what the score is, and what the final outcome turns out to be, why wouldn't you have your best free throw shooter on the court take the technical? I'm just wondering who made this dumb decision.
Yeah I see what you mean, it was definitely frustrating. I hope it wasn't the same person who decided to put Steve Blake in at the end just because.
I get the impression that on some teams, players just step up and shoot FT's while other teams look over to the bench. I remember Blake saying last year that he wasn't going to take technical free throws anymore (by his choice) and Roy started shooting them. Either way, Miller's FT was WAY short. Rudy seems to be a horrible technical FT shooter as well (given his high FT percentage)>
You might be right that the players have a role in deciding. Which, in my opinion, is ludicrous. The team spends so much time and money scouting players, looking at pre-draft measurements & stats, etc., yet they can't have one of their assistant coaches keep track of who their best free throw shooter is? Maybe if the player with the best free throw percentage got to actually shoot the technical, it would motivate the other players to work on their free throws.
It's a veteran thing. He is the vet, and the leader on the court right now, so he took it. Nobody is gonna argue with him taking it honestly. Wish he would have made it though.
Sure, Rudy probably should have taken the shot (if he's physically right), but the percentage difference is pretty insignificant when it comes to one free throw. For the sake of shooting a technical free throw, they're about equally likely to hit it. Over the course of a season, Fernandez's slightly superiority might add up to a few extra points taking all free throw opportunities into account. In other words, other than Fernandez's back being tweaked, I don't have any good reason why Miller should shoot the free throw over Fernandez...but I also don't think which of them shoots it matters, really.
andre miller has attempted more free throws this season than rudy has in his nba career. i really don't see how this can be a complaint. it's fine if rudy takes it, but it's also fine if miller takes it
I agree it probably didn't matter...but I don't understand why you wouldn't alleviate any doubt and just put your best free throw shooter up there.
So when deciding who should shoot, we should throw out who has the best percentage and just look at attempts? I don't understand this logic.
I think he's making an argument about experience. That Miller is a more experienced, proven free throw shooter. Obviously, if there's a significant difference in skill, that matters more. But there wasn't one here. I'm not sure that experience is really key but, on the other hand, when it's otherwise pretty close to a toss-up, I don't mind going with experience.
I wish they kept stats on technical ft shooting percentage. I would guess Miller is higher than Rudy. Either way, I think we're splitting hairs, it's not like Shaq took the FT over Rudy...
i didn't say that attempts were more important than percentage. percentage is obviously very important in the situation. the difference in their free throw shooting is 3%. that's nothing significant. and while i really don't think the experience matters, it's there. as is the possibility of rudy not being 100%. would you have been pissed if roy was healthy and taken the shot?
