NBA Click & Roll: Bucks center Brook Lopez making history — one 3-pointer at a time
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This is where we bring you exclusive content from Paste BN's NBA reporters, Jeff Zillgitt and Martin Rogers, including updates on all of their exploits on the NBA beat. Plus, we catch you up on the *biggest* moments, quotes and NBA news you may have missed this week.
ZILLGITT: BROOK LOPEZ MAKING HISTORY — ONE 3-POINTER AT A TIME
Roy Hibbert is the cautionary tale.
Brook Lopez is the shining example.
For Hibbert, the game zoomed right by him. There wasn’t much need for a 7-footer who couldn’t stretch the floor.
The 7-foot Lopez adapted, adding a 3-point shot to his game and making himself valuable to teams who wanted a big man who could shoot and defend.
Hibbert is no longer in the league, and Lopez, an 11-year veteran, is thriving in his first season with the Milwaukee Bucks.
Headed into Wednesday’s games, Lopez is shooting 37.8 percent on 3-pointers, and he's a volume shooter, taking 6.7 per game (tied for 16th among all NBA players) and making 2.5 (tied for 13th).
"The vision was that he was going to give us great spacing, and he was going to have a green light and have the ability to get, make and take a lot of threes," Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said. "The way the offense has evolved is a work in progress, but certainly the spacing he gives and what he did starting with Kenny (Atkinson) in Brooklyn a few years ago was the blueprint, and I thought maybe we could push that envelope a little more."
He's on pace to shoot more than 500 3-pointers this season and make about 200 – which would be the most threes attempted and made by a 7-footer in a season.
"Wow, that’s insane," Lopez said. “It’s so wild to think. Here we are somehow."
Yes, here we are – in the enlightened age of the 3-pointer.
“It’s been continuing to get more comfortable shooting it,” Lopez said. “It’s my third season doing it, and it’s now becoming the norm, just getting used to it more and more."
Add Lopez’s ability to defend, and the Bucks have one of the best teams in the league when he’s on the court.
Consider this: In Lopez’s first eight seasons in the NBA, he attempted 31 3-pointers and made just three. He went several seasons taking no more than two.
Then Atkinson, who was an assistant for Budenholzer in Atlanta, became coach of the Nets and wanted to run an offense with five players spaced around the perimeter.
“The way it worked being in Brooklyn with the offense, Kenny Atkinson wanted to run five-out, and it turned out to be what he wanted to do and obviously the league trending that way as a whole,” Lopez said.
It was survive or get left behind. Lopez shot 387 threes in 2016-17 with the Nets and 325 last season when he wasn’t the right fit (or wasn’t used right) with the Los Angeles Lakers.
Budenholzer and the Bucks' front office envisioned what it could look like when used properly. Lopez, who signed a one-year deal with Milwaukee in the offseason, had been working on 3-pointers before that, but he needed to incorporate them into actual games.
“I shot it a lot in the summer,” Lopez said. “There was some comfort level before actually getting ready to shoot it in games. It was just a lot of reps, honestly, in the offseason. I had confidence. What helped me was my teammates and coaches put all the support on me. No matter how much I miss, they told me to keep shooting.”
It has opened other parts of his game, too. Lopez is such a threat now that he can fake the 3-pointer as a defender is closing out and drive to the basket for a shot or pass.
“I did have coaches who believed I would be shooting a lot of 3s later in (my) career, and (they) told me, ‘You’re capable of it,’ ” Lopez said. “It just took some time, you know?”
CATCH UP AROUND THE LEAGUE
- James Harden or Giannis Antetokounmpo for MVP? Mike Budenholzer, Dave Joerger or Mike Malone for Coach of the Year? Here are our midseason awards.
- Harden and Antetokounmpo may be neck-and-neck in the MVP race, but The Greek Freak got the best of The Beard — in more ways than one — when their teams faced off.
- Surprise: The Lakers are still struggling without LeBron. Is Luke Walton's job safe?
- This week, in NBA locker-room drama: Iman Shumpert vs. Jusuf Nurkic?
- The Warriors scored an NBA-record 51 points in the first quarter against the Nuggets, and we're not even surprised. Like, at all.
- The 76ers dominated the T'Wolves in Jimmy Butler's first game back since his dramatic exit. And the court wasn't the only place where shots were taken.
- The Drake sports curse is very real, and the Timberwolves want nothing to do with it.
- Turkish prosecutors are reportedly seeking an international arrest warrant for Enes Kanter, accusing him of membership in a terror organization. His response? "The only thing I terrorize is the rim."
- Kanter just can't stay out of the news. On what he dubbed his "cheat day," he downed seven burgers — three of which were triple-patties with an egg on each — and a tray of fries. The following day, he had to leave the Knicks’ practice because of an illness.
- So ... why did Kyle Kuzma tweet at halftime of the Lakers' game vs. the Bulls?
- Your weekly reminder that Luka Doncic is a superstar in the making.
- All is not well in Beantown for the Celtics, who have lost three in a row. Kyrie Irving isn't a happy camper, and he called out his young teammates after a loss to Orlando.
- Scotty Pippen Jr., the son of NBA legend Scottie Pippen, is headed to Vanderbilt.
- And the award for best teammate goes to ... T.J. McConnell, who literally dragged Jimmy Butler away from Alex Len before an on-court confrontation escalated further.
Check back next week for everything that went down in the Association.