Lakers News: JJ Redick Weighs in on Reason Anthony Davis' Jump Shooting Has Fallen Off

The nine-time All-Star hasn't been the same in this respect since his 2020 bubble run.

Sep 25, 2024; El Segundo, CA, USA; Los Angeles Lakers coach JJ Redick at press conference at UCLA Health Training Center. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

In a lot of ways, star Los Angeles Lakers center Anthony Davis enjoyed his best season with L.A. last year since his first season with the club. The 6-foot-10 big man appeared in the most games of his career, 76, while submitting some excellent two-way interior play for the 47-35 Lakers. He posted typically stellar numbers of 24.7 points on 55.6 percent shooting from the floor and 81.6 percent shooting from the foul line, 12.6 rebounds, 3.5 assists, 2.3 blocks and 1.2 steals a night.

For his efforts, he was named to his third All-Defensive First Team (and fifth All-Defensive Team overall), fifth All-NBA Team, and his ninth All-Star squad. He finished fourth in Defensive Player of the Year voting, his sixth season finishing among the top 10 vote recipients. He's never won.

That said, the 31-year-old has regressed in one major way since his 2020 Orlando bubble run to his first championship: his jump shooting has fallen off a cliff.

Happily, his new head coach was one of the league's elite sharpshooters in his day, and might have an inkling as to what was ailing Davis — and how to cure it.

During a recent interview with ESPN's Zach Lowe on the sadly last-ever edition of "The Lowe Post" podcast, first-year L.A. head coach JJ Redick revealed that he believes he understands why Davis' output depreciated so significantly.

"I have a theory around that. Not one I'm willing to share publicly," Redick said. "I have a theory around that. And you know what, if my theory proves correct, I'll share it with you later in the season."

Redick, in his capacity as an ESPN broadcaster, was able to cast a vote for the league's 10-person All-Defensive Teams last season. He omitted Davis from inclusion at all, a fact for which he apologized this offseason. Across 21 playoff games (playing at power forward back then), Davis posted an exquisite slash line of .571/.383/.832. Those numbers have trailed off significantly in the intervening years. This past season, Davis posted .634/.000/.808 shooting splits. He took 1.0 triple tries a night in L.A.'s five games against the Denver Nuggets, a marked descent from his 2.9 long range tries during the Lakers' title run.

"Yeah, he had no idea what I was talking about," Redick said. "... He's just like, 'I didn't even know that.' ... Spent some time with him, went to a lovely dinner in Santa Monica a few weeks back. We're going to empower him as much as he wants to be empowered. If he wants to be First Team All-NBA and wants to be in the MVP conversation all year long, we're going to empower him to do that."

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