NBA models favour high-value three-pointers
- NBA teams kept leaning into three-pointers in the 2025-26 season, with Boston leading playoff teams in made threes while Oklahoma City posted the top offense. - NBA tracking now measures how often teams and players turn shots into threes, including percent of field-goal attempts from deep and true shooting. - The math behind that shift is built into the league’s own stat glossary and team dashboards. (nba.com)
A three-pointer is worth 50% more than a two, and modern NBA models are built around that simple piece of math. (nba.com) The league’s own glossary tracks the share of shots that come from deep as “percent of field-goal attempts, 3-point,” alongside true shooting percentage, which folds threes and free throws into one efficiency number. (nba.com) That is why front offices and coaching staffs care less about raw points than where the points come from. A 36% shooter from three produces 1.08 points per shot before rebounds or fouls, which beats many mid-range looks. (nba.com) The 2025-26 team dashboards show how that logic plays out in winning environments. Oklahoma City led playoff teams in offensive rating at 126.9, while Boston ranked second at 123.9 and led the same group with 73 made three-pointers. (nba.com) Those numbers do not mean every team should fire from deep on every trip. The same dashboard shows Minnesota leading playoff teams in points in the paint at 55.6 per game, which is the other shot type models usually prize. (nba.com) In plain terms, the preferred shots are the ones closest to the rim or furthest from it. What gets squeezed is the in-between area, where two-point jumpers carry lower reward unless a player hits them at an elite rate. (nba.com) The spread of tracking data has made that trade-off easier to see in public. NBA Stats now publishes team, player and shot-dashboard pages that let anyone sort by three-point volume, accuracy, drives and location-based shooting. (nba.com 1) (nba.com 2) Basketball-Reference packages the same season into team ratings, per-100-possession stats and playoff summaries, which is why bettors, fans and analysts can build matchup models without access to a team database. (basketball-reference.com 1) (basketball-reference.com 2) The result is not a fad so much as a shared language. NBA models favor high-value threes because the league’s own numbers keep showing that efficient offenses are usually built on deep shots, rim pressure, or both. (nba.com 1) (nba.com 2)
