Beloved Dirk's declining shooting touch

[ghazi]

Well guys I was bored today and I was looking at stats and they kinda confirmed what my eye balls had been telling me: Dirk's shooting by his lofty standards is not that great this year!

The formula for True shooting % is total points scored * 50 / field goal attempts + (free throw attempts * .44). Using this formula for Dirk his TS % this year is 55.5, which is his worst since his ROOKIE season!

His best TS % year of course was his 90/50/40 year, at 60.5%

The interesting thing last year after the Kidd trade was Dirk was an absolute monster. 25.4 PPG on 17.7 shots. 50% from the field, 89% from the line, and 48% from behind the arc. Damn near close to the 90/50/50 club! His true shooting % was 61.4%, which if it was extrapolated over a whole year would be his career high.

It is a shame that Dirk's monsterous rise in production was offset by J-Ho's significant dip. Who knows how last year turns out if J-Ho didn't mail it in?

But since the ASB this year he's only shooting 45.8% from the field, and has only made 11 of 36 3-pointers. his true shooting % is 52.9% since the ASB.

But this year our beloved Dirk's TS % is down because he takes less threes and only makes them at 36%, gets to the line less frequently, and is "only" shooting 47% from the field.

To put in perspective, Dirk has 12 more points this year than he did all of last year, but it's required 125 more shots!

So what do we make of all this? Is Dirk's shooting down because the surrounding lack of offensive talent is forcing him into a higher volume of lesser quality shots? Is it age? Is he declining? Nursing an injury? Is he sapped of his injury because of the heart break of the refs stealing our beloved 2006 NBA Championship and the Warriors hitting a bunch of fluky shots along with the marginal basketball product of this year? I dunno!

Dirk is far from the problem for the beloved Mavs of course, but he is not playing at the level we need him to. Just my opinion. Not hating on our beloved Dirk, just pointing out that his shooting and efficiency has really dipped this year and maybe has cost us 2-3 games that we would've otherwise won.

Also, Dirk's only shooting 39% over the last 5 games. I'm sure he'll get out of the slump, just saying.

Some more stats:

From the stand point of PER, this is his worst year since 2003-2004, it's also his worst year as far as rebound rate since that year.

Sorry if this post is too "statty" .

But discuss amongst yourselves.