OKC Thunder Detail Shot Quality Analytics After First Two Weeks

Despite the Oklahoma City Thunder's 6-0 start, they have faced plenty of adversity ranking No. 29 in the entire NBA in 3-point percentage (29.6) only ahead of the win-less New Orleans Pelicans (27.9).

This has been a constant theme for the Bricktown Ballers this season and even dates back to a year ago when the Thunder finished the month of October as the No. 27 team by 3-point percentage before being the sixth best squad in the league from down town by season's end.

Throughout this campaign, the Thunder have needed to navigate being short handed. Oklahoma City has yet to see the season debut of All-NBA forward Jalen Williams, veteran big man Kenrich Williams or Rookie guard Nikola Topic. Sharpshooter Isaiah Joe missed the first five games of this season, Defensive-ace Alex Caruso has missed three tilts and Rising Star big man Chet Holmgren has missed two in his own right on top of the one game Cason Wallace was in street clothes for.

On Tuesday evening, ahead of the Thunder's tussle with the Kings, head coach Mark Daigneault was asked about the team's shot quality through the first four games.

“I would say there’s some that have been fine, there's some that haven't been great. Our share of high-quality threes is lower right now than it was last season. But in a four-game sample, we're not going to overreact to that," Daigneault said Tuesday ahead of the Kings game. "We're going to be aware of it, obviously. But we have 78 more games in the season. So it can be slippery when you start overreacting to a very small sample, but the quality is down a little bit. That's one of the things that we have to address and try to improve as we continue on here.”

On Thursday, before the Thunder tangoed with the Washington Wizards, this scribe asked Oklahoma City's bench boss if you can grade the team's shot quality on a curve given who all is out of the lineup for the Thunder in this stretch of games. Daigneault went deeper into what their analytics for shot quality actually are.

"It's a data analytics thing. Evaluate every shot we take, every shot that every player takes in the league. Those shots are given a shot quality number that gives us a very clear idea of whether or not we're generating great shots... It just allows us to cut through the noise of shot variance. So if we're not generating good enough looks, it gives us something we can control to address. If we are and we're just not making them, then we don't overreact," Daigneault further explained before Thursday's game against the Washington Wizards.

In that game against Washington, as OKC improved to 6-0, the Thunder saw Joe make his season debut and get off to a red-hot start from beyond the arc, canning five of his nine triples.

As the shot quality continues to improve, so will the percentages. There is no need to panic over the Thunder's early-season struggles.