Can The ‘Math Game’ Help The Denver Nuggets Beat The Phoenix Suns?

The first-seed Denver Nuggets are facing the fourth-seed Phoenix Suns in the NBA’s Western Conference Semifinals in a series which has been widely anticipated to be one of the more competitive in the second round of the 2023 playoffs. Featuring two-time NBA champion Kevin Durant and Devin Booker for Phoenix, and back-to-back MVP Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray for Denver, both sides carry top-tier firepower to a battle expected to be very offensively-oriented.

Denver won the first game on their home court in a 125-107 blowout, despite Booker and Durant combining for 56 points, as Jamal Murray led all players in scoring with a 34-point outburst and six Nuggets players put up double figures. But beyond the raw point totals, the distribution of shots may well be a factor that could benefit the Nuggets through the series (as it did in Game 1) and represent one of the Suns’ major challenges.

The Math Game

By now, many NBA fans are familiar with the general concept of more efficient versus less efficient shot selection. For the uninitiated, it basically boils down to which locations on the court, on average, produce the most points per shot. The chart below shows the league average in the 2022-23 NBA regular season of field goal percentages from various shot locations, and the average point value per shot based on those percentages, and whether they are two-point or three-point shots. (FG% data via Basketball Reference.)

As the chart indicates, the most valuable shots are those taken right at the rim within three feet of the basket, averaging 1.40 points per shot, followed by corner three-pointers, then all three-pointers. And the least valuable shots are two-point midrange shots, which get progressively less efficient the further they are taken from the basket.

Based on this type of data, the NBA statistics site Cleaning the Glass calculates “location effective field goal percentage” (Loc eFG%). This represents what a team’s effective field goal percentage (eFG%, which accounts for the added value of three-point shots) would be if it shot the league average FG% from each location. Simply put, teams that take a bigger share of their shots at the rim and as three-pointers, rather than mid- to long-range two-pointers, will have more efficient shot profiles due to taking more high-value shots. Which brings us back to Phoenix and Denver.

Durant, Booker And Paul Lead The NBA In Midrange Shots Made In The Playoffs

Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Chris Paul are all in the 98th percentile or higher for their positions in taking the most midrange shots as a share of their overall selection. Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray are fairly high up there, too, in the 91st and 87th percentiles, respectively. But the ways that this shakes out in terms of their teams’ overall shot profiles has been markedly different, especially in the playoffs.

As the chart above shows, the Suns had the least efficient location eFG% in the league this regular season, coming in 30th at 53.4%, while the Nuggets were seventh at 55.8%. Even though Phoenix actually shot a slightly higher percentage of threes, the big discrepancy between the two teams came at the rim, where Denver attempted 11.2% more shots than their current postseason rival, and the Suns took the smallest share of their shots among all teams in the NBA.

But those figures are for the entirely of the 2022-23 season, most of which does not account for the massive change that came to the Suns with their deadline acquisition of Durant, who due to injury played only eight regular season games for Phoenix, and the loss in that deal of Cameron Johnson and Mikal Bridges, two of Phoenix’s more prolific and efficient three-point shooters.

And while the sample size is necessarily small (both the Nuggets and Suns have played just six games this postseason), the apparent impact of the Durant trade on Phoenix’s shot profile has been striking so far.

If the postseason games Phoenix has played up to this point are any indication, the addition of one of the league’s most prolific midrange shooters in Durant, in tandem with the loss of some significant support from behind the three-point arc, has exacerbated the Suns’ shot location quandary. Now in the playoffs, in addition to location eFG% and rim frequency, Phoenix is 20th – which is to say, last among all postseason teams – in three-point frequency as well. As the chart above shows, the Suns have taken 22.3% of their shots at the rim to the Nuggets’ 31.3%, and 25.0% on three-pointers to Denver’s 33.7%, meaning that Phoenix is taking a full 52.7% of their shots from midrange, compared with just 35.0% for the Nuggets.

In Game 1 of their current series, the Nuggets attempted 37 three-point shots, while the Suns put up only 23, and Denver’s advantage in making 16 threes to Phoenix’s seven tallied up to a 27-point advantage for the Nuggets in a game they won by 18.

To the Suns’ credit, one of their counterbalances for this math problem is the fact that in Durant and Booker they have two of the NBA’s most lethal, deadeye midrange shooters on their roster. In fact, Durant, Booker and Paul lead the league in most midrange shots made this postseason, and they have combined to make 53.9% of them, well above the mid-40s% NBA averages. (Durant and Booker also have the most midrange attempts, with Paul coming in sixth.) But the big question remains regarding whether their elite shooting prowess could be enough to overcome the math problem.

Can The Suns Adjust?

If Denver were to go cold from the arc, that is surely not out of the question. In Game 1, in addition to Murray’s blistering six of ten three-point shooting, the Nuggets got contributions on threes from players such as Aaron Gordon (3) and Jeff Green (1), who have been very inconsistent from deep through the course of the season. Some negative regression for Denver could shift things towards balancing the scales, especially if Durant or Booker heated up, and both tend to do that regularly.

But both Phoenix head coach Monty Williams and Durant acknowledged after the first game the need for the Suns to increase their three-point frequency. ““We definitely can generate more 3s,” Durant said. “I think we got some guys open at the three-point line but we’re not gonna force any of that, either.”

Game 2 should provide some valuable insight on whether the Suns can or will actually implement that adjustment, and if so, how the Nuggets will counter. But that may be difficult to pull off on the fly, for a team whose stars have played so few minutes together, and who both have it in the nature of their game to fire away from midrange.

And if Phoenix can’t flip that switch and quickly change their shot profile to a significant degree, the math game should continue working heavily in Denver’s favor.