The Brilliance of the Evan Turner Signing: Creating Catch and Shoot Opportunities for Our Shooters

The Blazers added Evan Turner as the starting small forward. His excellence as a perimeter defender is important, but it is his offensive impact that will bring the most rewards to the Blazers. You might ask, how can a poor 3 point shooter have a transformational impact on an offense? The answer: his passing will create more catch and shoot opportunities for our volume shooters.

Look at these statistics:

Player/Catch and Shoot EFg%/Pull Up EFg%/Catch and Shoot Advantage/Catch and Shoot Ratio
Lillard/ 58.2%/ 45.5%/ 12.7%/ +28%
McCollom/ 63.5%/ 49.9%/ 13.6 %/ +27%
Crabbe/ 60.3%/ 42.6%/ 17.7%/ +42%
Aminu/ 54.5%/ 40.3%/ 14.2%/ +35%

Our four leading scorers shoot much better in catch and shoot situations than on pull ups: their EFg% are around 15% greater. Since EFg% can be converted to points per possession by multiplying by 2, this means that points per possession is maybe 30% greater for catch and shoots. For example, Lillard scores 1.16 PPP on catch and shoots, but only 0.91 on pull ups. Clearly, the more catch and shoots, the better. He scores 28% more points for every pull up that can be converted to a catch and shoot.

How do you do this? Get the ball out of his hands, and let someone else pass to him in a catch and shoot situation. This is were Evan Turner comes in. Last year in Boston, he had 10.4 assist points created in 28.0 minutes per game. Per minute, he was essentially equal to Draymon Green and LeBron James in creating assist points. Each of them has about 0.37-0.38 assist points created per minute, much higher than all forwards except Tyreke Evans.

For the Blazers last year, our third assist man was Mason Plumlee, at 5.5 assist points created in 25.3 minutes. This was 0.22 assist points created per minute. So Turner should help Dame, CJ, and our other shooters have more catch and shoot opportunities.

Compare our back court to the Splash Brothers, who benefit from Draymon Green playing the forward-distributor role. Steph Curry took 58% as many catch and shoot shots as pull up shots. Klay Thompson took twice as many catch and shoots as pull ups. For the Blazers, Lillard took 37% as many catch and shoots as pull ups, and McCollom took 59% as many catch and shoots as pull ups.

So the Blazers can improve their overall offensive performance by increasing the catch and shoot opportunities for Dame and CJ. When looking at the Splash Brothers, you can see that there is certainly a lot of room for a greater share of catch and shoot opportunities.

Adding an assist oriented forward to Portland's guard corps should convert pull ups into catch and shoots, which are much more productive, with around a 25% to 33% gain in shot efficiency. This is why adding Evan Turner was a brilliant move by Neil Olshey. Perhaps it is not a mere coincidence that the two teams in the finals had the two best assist oriented forwards feeding their guards with catch and shoot opportunities.

 

Turner's passing ability will benefit Allen Crabbe even more than Dame and C.J. Both Dame and C.J. can create their own shot and get off a 3-pointer against anyone. Crabbe cannot.

For example, only .472 of Dame's 3-pointers were assisted. .721 of C.J.'s 3-pointers came off an assist. Nearly all of Crabbe's 3-pointers (.964) were assisted.

Ditto for Meyers Leonard (1.000 assisted 3-pointers). For guys like Crabbe and Leonard, who rely on others to create shots for them, Evan Turner will be a godsend.

BNM

 

So maybe now this is all making more sense. Maybe, just maybe, Olshey already figured this out.

 

A lot of people thought we wouldn't match Crabbe's offer sheet from BRK because we added Turner. Matching Crabbe actually makes MORE sense, not less, now that we have Turner.

BNM

 

Desperately needing a passing SF doesn't say much for Lillard's playmaking ability...or for having traded Batum.

 

I thought you liked the D league?

 

Despite his name, you need to get Layman off your mind.

 

A year ago, in the main free agent thread in late July after Olshey had finished, signing afterthoughts like Alexander and Montero, I was down on him for not finding a conventional star SF to balance Lillard's scoring. Just somebody with about 240 pounds on him who could score inside and outside, that's all I wanted. You need scoring from more than just your guards. Now, this new guy whatever his name is, isn't known as a shooter, but he can make enough. He looks like a great dribbler, so he will sell tickets Globetrotter-style. So I'm happy getting him, though I'd hoped for a heavier guy who can bully the opponents inside. He's a short little shrimp, but whatever his name is will really help us.

 

Vonleh is the next Allen Crabbe..just wait and see

 

Is he gonna get a shitty haircut and color too?

 

If he gets good enough to take Meyers minutes....well?

 

A year ago, when Olshey had tens of millions of dollars left over and a once every decade chance to outspend the league, and everyone repeatedly told me, "No problem with letting all the good free agents get signed elsewhere. League rules say he can just give the unspent money away to our players at the end of the season." Okay, no problem.

This summer, the new Cap gave every team the same spending advantage, so Olshey didn't bother going to players' doorsteps at midnight. The next morning, the stork brought our new savior at 10 a.m., a Boston substitute. I like his dribbling. I used to watch the Globetrotters dribble in circles. Now I won't have to buy a dog to watch him chase his tail. I've missed someone getting assists by dribbling all over the court since we lost Mo Williams. The new guy is taller than Mo, so he's a threat to take it all the way to the hoop. So we'll have fun for another year, waiting for Montero to become our next sensation in 2017-18. Montero's body is loose as a goose. Trouble is, so is his wandering mind. He gets assists from court vision, not from dribbling around searching for targets.

 

ET will make everyone on the floor better with his passing and taking people off the dribble. With this team he will get alot double double next year.

 

The signing of Turner was basically Neil Olshey wanting one half of the duo that shut down the splash bros. this year. The other half of that combination, Avery Bradley is another guy I've always wished we could get.

 

No it says that Dame is more efficient at catch and shoot and attacking close outs, and getting another playmaker will help Dame and therefore help the offense.

You've never watched him play. There's no substance here.