How Buddy Hield became the NBA's newest sniper

There’s a wild phenomenon going on in Sacramento right now: Every player is performing much better when coming off the bench. Willie Cauley-Stein has seen his scoring and rebounding averages jump from 7.5 points and 5.2 rebounds to 15.9 and 7.3 when moving from the starting lineup to the bench. Bogdan Bogdanovic has seen a similar trend, averaging a 10 points off the bench versus 9.5 in starts. Rookie De’Aaron Fox is scoring 11.6 points per game off the bench versus 8.4 in starts.

The Kings have trotted out a plethora of different starting lineups as coach Dave Joerger is still trying to figure out rotations more than a quarter of the way through the season. The constant change has led to players jumping in and out of the starting lineup. The inconsistency has hurt any chemistry that the team could have coming out to begin games. The Kings' starters score a league-worst 46.5 points per game, which is markedly worse than Memphis, who is 29th in this category. The bench, however, is averaging a league-best 49.7 points per game — and Buddy Hield could be the biggest reason why.

The starter vs. off-the-bench splits couldn’t be more pronounced than they are with Hield. His three-point scoring jump from 10.3 to 13.4 per night isn’t huge, but it’s more so how he’s doing it. There isn’t a better way to put this: Hield is shooting the living hell out of the ball when he comes off the bench. Since moving out of the starting lineup, Hield is shooting nearly 15 percent better from the field and almost 35 percent better from three and is on the verge of shooting 50/60/90 since becoming the Kings’ sixth man.

It’s not just his shooting. Hield is rebounding at a better rate, creating for others at a better rate and creating more turnovers on the defensive end. His turnovers have jumped up, but that’s natural with the increased responsibility of leading the second unit. Hield’s offensive rating has jumped from 87 to 109, and his net rating has jumped from -19.3 to -1.5 (the Kings are still terrible).

The biggest change that has led to Hield’s resurgence has been the cut-down on the number of pull-up jumpers he’s taking and a huge increase on the number of catch-and-shoot opportunities. Hield looks much more comfortable running off screens and finding the open space within the flow of the offense to get his shot off. During the first seven games of the season, only 26 percent of his shot attempts were of the catch-and-shoot variety, and he was only making them at a 25 percent clip. Since the move to the bench, the frequency has been nearly 33 percent of his attempts, and he’s making 76 percent of those shots, 72 percent from three, which comes out to an eFG% of 102 percent.

To put that in perspective, the best at knocking down catch-and-shoot opportunities rarely even reach an eFG% greater than 70. Kyle Korver and Jeff Teague have both reached an eFG% of 72, while shooters like Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and J.J. Redick have never seen an eFG% north of 69. What Hield has been doing for Sacramento off the bench is unprecedented and otherworldly.