Stephen A. Smith hammered the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Denver Nuggets after a dreadful long-range shooting display in Game 4 of their Western Conference semi-final series. In doing so, he inadvertently revealed why much of the NBA product today is dull and nearly unwatchable.
Yes, Smith is the Forrest Gump of NBA analysis, roaming about until he accidentally stumbles upon greatness. Greatness, in this case, equates to saying something right.
While the Thunder were on their way to beating the Nuggets 92-87 to even the series at two games apiece, the ESPN commentator explained at halftime that what he had just witnessed was a travesty.
“There are no highlights. It’s all lowlights. It’s been horrible,” Smith explained. “It’s a horrible brand of basketball that we’ve been witnessing in terms of shot-making.”
“Both teams are shooting 13% from three-point range… combined 6-for-44,” he added. “I mean, just awful.”
Stephen A. Smith: "There are no highlights. It's all lowlights. It's been horrible. It's a horrible brand of basketball that we've been witnessing in terms of shot-making. Both teams are shooting 13% from three-point range… combined 6-for-44. I mean, just awful." #NBA pic.twitter.com/n2RmNMM37S
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) May 11, 2025
NBA Shooting is Becoming a Joke
Stephen A. Smith’s blunt assessment reveals an obvious glaring flaw in today’s NBA game: three-point shooting.
A further look at the numbers for the Thunder and the Nuggets shows that, yes, while both teams did improve their percentages overall by game’s end, they were taking an absurd amount of threes.
Forty-one of the Thunder’s 87 Field Goal Attempts came from beyond the three-point line. That’s 47 percent of all shots from the floor. The Nuggets were worse, chucking 45 of their 80 Field Goal Attempts from beyond the arc. Over 56%!
The Thunder have a 7-foot center named Isaiah Hartenstein, who contributed 14 rebounds but just 8 points to the winning effort. The Nuggets, of course, have Nikola Jokic, but at under 7 feet, he doesn’t play like a true center. He was tossing up eight three-point shots himself, making just two.
If they’re this bad at shooting from downtown, why are they taking so many shots from there? Smith’s comments are a microcosm of the league’s problem, most likely one of the most significant factors in plummeting ratings.
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The Three-Point Shot is Killing the NBA
The three-point shot is out of control in the NBA. Like with baseball and sabermetrics, coaches have deduced that the percentages of makes, even at a lesser rate, eventually yield more points.
But it makes for a woefully low quality of play. Unless you’re Steph Curry or another prominent three-point shooter in the league, you’re basically hurling the ball up blindly and hoping it goes in.
Four-time NBA champion Shaquille O’Neal came up with a similar explanation for why fewer fans are watching NBA games: too many teams that can’t shoot the three, firing them up anyway.
“We’re looking at the same thing,” O’Neal said. “Everybody is running the same plays. And [the Warriors] messed it up. I don’t mind Golden State back in the day shooting threes, but every team isn’t a 3-point shooter.”
“So why [does] everybody have the same strategy? I think it makes the game boring.”
Shaq’s right. 95% of the league is now three-point specialists somehow, even if they can’t hit the ocean.
Legendary former Boston Globe sports columnist Bob Ryan took things a step further, saying he thinks implementing three-point shooting in the NBA is the worst thing. Ever.
“For me, the three-point shot is the single worst thing to happen to basketball in my lifetime,” Ryan said during an appearance on The Ricky Cobb Show earlier this year.
It’s certainly making the games hard to watch these days. The Nuggets and Thunder proved that. Stephen A. Smith just pointed it out.
