Jamal Crawford is 38 years old, but he still plays his remaining heat in the league. Crawford, who currently plays for the Timberwolves, can contribute 9.7 points per game in the playoffs, and speaking of Crawford, most fans have the impression that he has changed hands behind his classics, shooting difficult three-pointers against the defense, etc. Crawford's playing is indeed very high, and he has won the favor of many fans, even if there is no championship ring, or even touched the Floor of the Western Conference, fans can still remember those highlight moments of his career.
In 2015-16, Crawford, who played for the Clippers, averaged 14.2 points per game and won the Best Sixth Man, and at the age of 36, he became the oldest player in the history of the NBA's Best Sixth Man honor, and the only player in the league's history to win the Best Sixth Man award three times, after which he won twice in 2010 and 2014.
It can also be seen from this that Crawford has played as a substitute for most of his career, not because he is not strong enough to start, but because in the second team he can rely on his personal ability to support the team's bench to score. Whether playing for the Hawks, Trail Blazers, Clippers or Timberwolves, Crawford has averaged the highest points per game in his team's bench in the last nine seasons. In the 2009-10 season, he averaged 18.0 points in six games while playing for the Eagles, second only to Joe Johnson and higher than the other four starters, and it was also the first time in his career that he won the Super Six honor.
Crawford's scoring explosiveness is superstar level, scoring a total of 50+ high scores 3 times in his career, and his ability to soar is jaw-dropping. It is worth mentioning that he has cut 50+ in these 3 times to play for different teams, and he has become the only player in the active squad who has cut 50+ for three different teams - it is not easy to cut 50+ in a single game, and it is important to know that the best sixth person who has won the championship such as Ginobili and Jason Terry has not won a 50+ in his entire career, even if he is a good scorer like Anthony, the number of career 50+ is only 1 more than Crawford.
Three-pointers are also a big label for Crawford, on the NBA three-point list, Crawford hit 2153 three-pointers, ranking fifth in history, and Stephen Curry, who has refreshed countless three-point records in recent years, is still behind Crawford in the number of three-point shots. Interestingly, in the number of "3+1" games, Crawford left top pitchers such as Reggie Miller and Ray Allen far behind, ranking first in history alone, and he was also known as the "four-point king".
However, although Crawford has had many amazing performances and records, he has not won more recognition from the team's general manager and fans. In his 18-year career, Crawford has earned more than $10 million in salary in just three seasons, and most of the time he has only been on a contract of about $6 million. In the eyes of fans, he has never been associated with the superstar ranks, and most fans think that he is just an unstable scorer and nerve knife.
I have to admit that Crawford does have a lot of deficiencies, averaging 29.9 minutes per game in his career, the number of shots is as high as 12.7, but the shooting rate is only 41%, behind the wonderful emergency stop dry pull "3 +1", more results are crisp and loud iron, averaging 4.9 three-point shots per game, but the three-point shooting rate is less than 35%, and only two seasons have a three-point shooting rate of more than 40%. He was not very efficient in attack, and he obviously wasted too much of the team's ball and chances. Interestingly, Crawford lost his 665th career game against the Grizzlies this season, making him the player with the most losses in regular season history.
On the playoff stage, Crawford's performance on the offensive end was even worse after the opponent's overall defensive level improved. On eight playoff trips, he shot just 38.2 percent from the field and dropped to 30.3 percent from three-point range. Even so, he still averaged 13.2 shots per game, and his shooting percentage was significantly lower than during the regular season, and the number of shots was even more than during the regular season. Limited by mediocre physical fitness, Crawford's ability to finish under the confrontation is very general, most of the score is based on long-distance shooting and after the breakthrough in the case of no one to defend the basket, when encountering close defense and confrontation, the passing awareness and level is not high, he has more choices to force the shot, but this way obviously can not bring help to the team.
If Crawford may have a surprising explosion on the offensive end, he is a black hole on the defensive end. Take this season, his defensive true plus-minus is at the bottom of the league, and when Crawford is not on the court, the Overall Defensive Level of the Timberwolves instantly improves, conceding 8.8 points per 100 possessions. In the game, we often see that the offensive players take the initiative to look for Crawford's defense after changing defenses, and most of the players with excellent offensive ability will relentlessly single-handedly eat in the face of his defense. Throughout his career, Crawford's defensive end had a plus-minus of -2.4 per 100 possessions, a rather poor statistic.
All in all, factors such as Crawford's offensive stability, passing awareness and defensive ability have limited him to becoming a better star. Even from a statistical point of view, he averaged 15.0 points, 2.3 rebounds and 3.4 assists per game in his career, which is obviously not linked to superstars. Apart from being named best sixth man three times, he hardly had any major honors, and even more sadly, because the teams he had anticipated earlier in his career were almost all weak teams, so the win rate of Keliu was not high - whether in the regular season or the playoffs, Crawford's overall winning percentage was less than 50%. But he is a nerve knife after all, and scoring is sometimes like probing for Crawford, which is a big reason why he can become a super six three times, but only that.