Last season, the Clippers failed to reach the Finals, but unexpectedly won the third big man, he is Reggie Jackson.
Remember that summer in 2020? Although only 30 years old, but in the free agent market, Reggie has no sense of existence, if it is not Rondo was cut off by the Eagles, the Clippers do not plan to continue to retain Reggie, after all, his style of play, is really not up to the requirements of the championship team, occupy the ball not to say, the efficiency is not high, the organizational ability is also the same position of the lower level, the most important thing is that the defense is also very loose.
But who would have thought that such an unpopular role player would embark on the path of a top-level championship puzzle under the guidance of new coach Tyrone Lu.
In the regular season, he averaged 10.7 points, 2.9 rebounds and 3.1 assists per game, shooting 45% from the field and 43.3% from three-point range;
The playoffs averaged 17.8 points, 3.2 rebounds, and 3.4 assists per game, shooting 48.4 percent from the field and 40.8 percent from three-point range;
After Leonard was reimbursed for the injury season, it was Reggie who bravely stepped forward, scoring 27 points in the final game of the semifinals, while also giving 10 assists, the team's number one contributor to the divisional finals, and in the Western Conference Finals, he also averaged 20.3 points per game.
Last summer, Reggie, who became a free agent again, attracted the attention of many teams, and the Clippers also raised their salaries nearly 5 times before leaving them in Los Angeles.
But so far this season, Reggie's performance has been very bad, especially after George's injury, don't look at the average of 16.9 points, 3.4 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game, but behind this report card, it is based on unlimited firing rights (average 16.3 shots per game), and the first use rate in the team (26.2%), the true shooting rate is only 49.2%, ranking first in the bottom among teammates who have played more than 400 minutes in total, looking at the whole league, among the 66 players with at least 25% use, There are only 2 rookies who are worse than Reggie, one is Cunningham and the other is No. 5 Sagas.
Under Reggie, the Clippers have lost three of their last four games, and the team's winning percentage has fallen below 50%, potentially falling out of the top eight in the West at any time.
For a time, Reggie was pushed to the forefront of public opinion, alas, every time he saw Reggie was accused, his heart was uncomfortable, he was not the kind of player who took a big contract and lay flat, on the contrary, he wanted to win more than any player in the Clippers, remember when he was eliminated last year, Reggie cried bitterly, his dark eyes, and his crying turned red.
Of course, it is also true that he did not play well, but this result was not caused by Reggie,because he was not an excellent ball-holding scorer, whether it was in the Thunder or later the Pistons, as for last season, Reggie's efficiency was greatly improved because of Leonard and Paul George's double Buff bonus.
On their side, Reggie only needs to dribble the ball through halfway, and then casually hand it to anyone in the small card or George, followed by running without the ball, waiting for the opportunity to find a fixed point to shoot, occasionally performing a tactic, but also with the small card or George to block and dismantle, using their pulling power, into the penalty area to get the opportunity to attack the frame, playing the role of the basic no-ball scorer, but now, the clippers with a two-core all-truce can only pile the ball in front of Reggie, so that he can become the starting point of the attack again, and the decline in efficiency is inevitable.
Look at a few sets of data and you'll see.
Last season, Reggie's highest percentage of offense was the fixed-point shooting, as high as 30.1%, and the highest efficiency, scoring 1.3 points per 100 rounds, ahead of the league's 95.2% players;
This season, his percentage of fixed-point shots has slipped to 20.3 percent, and his efficiency has fallen to 0.95 points per 100 possessions, only better than the league's 42.4 percent of players;
Instead, the share of offense with the ball increased, such as blocking offense, from 27.9% to 33%.%, although the efficiency also increased from 0.81 points per 100 rounds to 0.89 points, but it was still only the level of the middle of the league;
There are also singles, which increased from 10.6% to 14.3%, but the efficiency dropped from 1.03 points per 100 rounds to 0.71 points.
Tyronn-Lou certainly knows how many pounds Reggie weighs, but right now, who better suited the Clippers to digest the ball than he does? Eric Bledsoe? His blocking efficiency is not as good as Reggie Jackson, and the data shows that when he is on the floor, the Clippers offense can get 108.7 points per 100 rounds, and vice versa, it can only get 105 points, the efficiency is not bad, but without Reggie, the Clippers offense will be worse.
I thought that with Leonard and George, I could play easier, but I didn't want to end up carrying the team alone.