One of the biggest criticisms about Michael Jordan has been his shooting. While we know that he was one of the best mid-range shooters the game has ever seen, he wasn’t exactly a king behind the three-point line.
In fact, many question how his game would translate to today’s NBA, given his rather old-school play style.
On the latest episode of “The Boardroom,” Brooklyn star Kevin Durant explained why he thinks the GOAT would be fine in the modern era of NBA basketball.
“See, that’s the one,” Durant said when asked about Jordan’s 3-point shooting. “He didn’t shoot a lot because he was so dominant inside the 3-point line he didn’t need to shoot it. But when he did, he still knocked some down.”
“[Curry is] shooting about 10-11 a game, so that’s his game, shoot three’s,” Durant said. “And Mike’s game was more so mid-range, but both guys can go back, like Steph can go inside the 3-point line and do damage, but he wants to do more damage outside the 3-point line. That’s what makes him unique. MJ was pretty much everywhere. He can shoot the 3, he can get to the rim, pull up from the mid-range, so his volume on three’s, I think it was perfect for his game. Each guy is different.”
MJ made a total of 581 three-pointers over the course of his career. Steph has already made well over 2,000. Numbers-wise, the three-ball clearly wasn’t MJ’s preferred method of scoring. Still, it’s not like he couldn’t hit it from that range. He shot 34% from beyond the arc and always made them when it counted most — like the 1992 NBA Finals.
Kevin Durant’s point, and one we should all realize, is that just because the three wasn’t Jordan’s first choice on the basketball court, doesn’t mean he would have been ineffective on offense. He was so versatile, that there was really no limit to what he could do to score.
And if he needed t make more threes in today’s shooting era, he likely would have pulled up more often.
