Mike Watters-USA TODAY Sports
Three-point attempts: 4,861
Three-point makes: 2,015
Three-point percentage: 41.5 percent
All-time rank in threes: 13th
How unfair is it that the Warriors not only boast the greatest shooter ever but paired him in a single backcourt with a player who has a case to be the second-best shooter ever, too?
Injuries might have derailed Klay Thompson’s case a bit, as missing two full seasons in the midst of his prime did him no favors, but prior to that, Thompson was absolutely deadly not just as a shooter but as an overall scorer, with one of the prettiest jumpers basketball has ever seen .
As far as purely catching and shooting, we’re hard-pressed to think of a better shooter ever than Thompson, as once he got it, his shoulders always seem to be squared away with the basket while his follow-through almost always looks pure .
Thompson was consistent as anyone with his jumper in his heyday, but he also had the ability to catch fire that few in history could match. Lest we forget about the time he dropped 60 points… in a game where he dribbled the ball 11 times:
Or how about when he scored 37 points – which would be a career-high for many a role player – in a single quarter?
Thompson may have benefitted some from the gravity created by Curry but he still had to knock those shots down, something that isn’t as easy as it looks. Back in 2012, various members of the Heat talked about the difficulty of shooting wide-open shots:
Newcomer Rashard Lewis, a former All-Star: “Got to get used to it because that’s the hardest shot in basketball. I may have to hold it for a couple of seconds, so I can get somebody closing out to me.” Veteran forward Shane Battier: “When you get a wide-, wide-open three, you’re naked. You have time to think and rationalize, and that’s counterintuitive to how we normally play. We normally play instinctively — time to think and time to react only. But when you have time to think in basketball, calculation often leads to miscalculation.”
Thompson did not appear to have that problem.
Add in the fact that Thompson, dubbed Game 6 Clay for various huge performances in vital playoff Game 6s, was also clutch and stepped up various times in the postseason, and his case as the second-best shooter ever only gets stronger.
.