NBA players don’t score in the same way they used to. That has been true since roughly 2012, when players began to toss up significantly more threes per game than ever.
While the context surrounding each individual shot attempt certainly still matters, math pushed this trend forward with full force.
It’s taken some time for every player and coach to accept the three-point shot’s graces. Brandon Ingram, DeMar DeRozan, and Kevin Durant still take many jumpers from inside the arc. However, if the reigning champion Boston Celtics are any indication, every team will follow suit.
The Minnesota Timberwolves are no exception.
Anthony Edwards has an old-school game. A proponent of the mid-range, he can get into a pull-up jumper like the best of him. With 39 three-point attempts through the first three games of the 2024-25 season, Edwards is morphing into something else.
He’s always going to have the classic feel around the mid-range (and the muscle to get to the rim), but he’s developing the three-point flair of the contemporary.
Already four years into his career, he may not be able to convince referees to blow more whistles. His burly frame can pave the way into the lane. However, further improving his field goal percentage at the rim may prove difficult. It could happen, but that rapid growth in young players may soon end for Edwards.
That’s where an increase in attempted threes per game will matter most.
Using Euclidean distance, which measures the distance between two points as a line segment, I found the most similar (and dissimilar) scorers to Edwards based on their field goal attempts per game, points per game, shooting percentages, and more.
This method may not fully capture similar players to Edwards. However, players like Damian Lillard, Donovan Mitchell, Tim Hardaway, Brandon Jennings, and LaMelo Ball are within the top 10 most similar to Edwards – it could be worse.
These players scored at similar volumes and percentages, with shot selections roughly the same as Edwards’s. Of course, this does not factor in other shot nuances like positioning, catch-and-shoot/off-a-screen, etc.
Still, it offers a glimpse into how Edwards may take another scoring leap.
Edwards’s first four seasons are comparable to several bowling ball guards from the early 2000s and mid-range maestros from the late 2010s.
Hardaway, Antoine Walker, Baron Davis, Bradley Beal, Jason Richardson, and Kemba Walker fit into one or both of those boxes heading into year five of their careers. They’re all comfortably within the top 100 of the most similar players from the earlier method.
These players jumped at least 1.5 points per game from Year 4 to Year 5, including Davis’ 5.8 points per game, Walker’s 3.6, Beal’s 5.7, and Hardaway’s 3.1.
They all took at least 1.3 more threes per game in the same timeframe.
The chart below shows various year four and five stats with jumps.
Not every player fits this mold. Gilbert Arenas and Luka Dončić saw the largest jumps in points per game despite taking fewer threes per game.
Dončić was already taking 8.8 threes in his fourth season, so the drop to 8.2 didn’t represent a complete reversal in shot selection. He improved from 28.4 points per game to 32.4, getting to the line three more times per game and drastically improving his efficiency from inside the arc.
Arenas dropped from 7 to 6.8 but took nearly two more field goals and two more free throws per game, improving from 25.5 to 29.3 points.
Edwards may not be able to follow in Dončić and Arenas’ footsteps.
There are only so many shots available to a team. Edwards must coexist with Julius Randle on a team that can thrive on pindowns, twirls, and movement. With his surrounding pieces, there’s no reason to push Edwards into an ever higher usage role.
Edwards isn’t the ball-dominant Dončić, and Arenas may be an outlier in his surge to the top of the scoring leaderboards in his era.
Still, Edwards can elevate himself and his team with more than just a few more forced threes per game, and having a shooter’s mindset could propel him even further up the scoring ladder.
Modern scorers from the list above, like Beal and Walker, adjusted to the league’s norms.
Walker plateaued at roughly 17.5 points per game as a sophomore, only jumping to 20.9 in his fifth season when he took 6 threes per game versus 4.5. Walker would eventually peak at 8.9 threes and 25.6 points per game en route to his first All-NBA Team honors in his eighth season.
His mid-range skillset didn’t fade, but Walker rode the three-point wave instead of fighting it.
It’s not that Edwards can’t still take mid-range shots, too; it’s that he seemingly has room to take more threes.
He has the traits of a dangerous downhill driver. But he also has the touch of a modern, long-range shooter. Leaning into the latter could squeeze out more from himself and his team.
