Why do NBA players have such low free-throw percentages?
I would think they should all shoot 80%+.
Why? Because it is the exact same shot, in any stadium!
They should be able to wear blind folds and still shoot 60%+!
MtM
You’re looking at this the wrong way. If the best players in the world who have spent their entire life doing it hundreds of thousands of times, and still many aren’t above 80%, then it’s obviously harder than you think.
BTW, your same logic also applies to half-court bombs, they are also the same shot in any stadium – so shouldn’t they be over 80%? Full court bombs also? Full court bombs bouncing off the top of the backboard and rolling around the rims three times before going in? Still the same shot in every stadium…
Yes but half and full court bombs are made to beat buzzers and under pressure. Totally different shoots.
Free throws are just you, the ball and the hoop. The exact same shot, from the exact same spot.
In high school I knew multiple people who could hit 70+ out of 100 free throws (our town was basketball so the coatch made everybody shoot 100 free throws a day).
MtM
Then restate your OP. You claimed the percentage should be over 80% because it’s the same shot in every stadium. So are full court shots that have to do the backboard rim thing, I didn’t say anything about doing it during a game.
Ask a real question, you’ll get a real answer.
Well, as I see it, you have three possibilities:
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It’s not as easy as it looks. Either 70% is a much higher success rate than you think it is, or it’s just not easy to do it with 18,000 shrieking fans and 250-pound pro athletes cursing at you and threatening to knock your head in.
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NBA players are lazy and the league doesn’t value shooting accuracy, or
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The skill isn’t strongly selected for in the meritocracy of NBA play.
I think it’s about 85% option 3 and 15% option 1. The simple fact is that the skill of shooting free throws is not a make-or-break skill in elite basketball. It’s perfectly possible for a mediocre free throw shooter to be an excellent player based on other talents. It certainly HELPS a lot, but it’s not a necessity to make it to the NBA. You can lack one skill and make up for it elsewhere. Shaquille O’Neal can’t shoot free throws; John Stockton can’t play above the rim; Charles Oakley for the last four or five years has (literally) been unable to run and dribble at the same time.
The fact that some people who AREN’T in the NBA can shoot free throws with incredible success rates means very little. There are also people who can accurately drive a golf ball 400 yards, but who still aren’t good enough to make the pro tour. There are people who can hit a baseball or a softball as far as Mickey Mantle but who can’t even play college level baseball. Lots of people can skate faster than Wayne Gretzky but would be laughed off the ice if they tried to play semipro hockey.
Sigh. Where to start? You say a half court shot is under pressure while a free throw is just the player, ball, and hoop. Apparently, you don’t think a free throw is pressure. Not that it is measurable, but a free throw is ridiculously higher on the pressure meter simply because it is makeable while a half court shot usually isn’t.
Sure, it’s the same spot on the floor, but what is different? The background of the shot, the floor, the ball, the game situation, the player’s mental, physical, and emotional state. Countless things.
Finally, while shooting free throws well is an important part of the game, it is not an important part of a player’s repertoire to make the NBA. Do you choose an unathletic guy that shoots 90% from the line but can’t do much else, or a great athlete that only manages 50%. You always choose the 50% because the guy at 90% will only be shooting that percentage in practice. He will never play. Thankfully, there are plenty of people that are athletic and can shoot free throws well.
Free throws have enough pressure to be a mental challenge every time one shoots them in college. I can’t imagine what it might be like in the NBA when more money, fans, and importance is involved.
I wondered what the real numbers were, so I went to nba.com and looked at the field goal and free throw statistics. I added up the numbers for all the teams in the 2002 - 2003 regular season, and came up with the following:
Field goals made / attempts: 84937 / 192109
Free throws made / attempts: 36868 / 58153
The league’s field goal percentage is 44.2%, and the free throw
percentage is 63.4%.
The league as a whole doesn’t shoot as well as it used to.
When I started following basketball in the mid-seventies,
the league field goal percentage was about 50%, and the
free throw percentage was above 70%. The three-point line
was introduced since then, and I’m sure it’s partly responsible
for the lowered field goal percentage (because more long shots
are taken). I don’t know why free throw percentage has
fallen off, though. It used to be that a team free throw
percentage of 63% was considered terrible - now it’s just
average.
I’m still not buying it. How many NBA games are won by under 5 points? I’m not a huge fan, but it seems like a lot are.
Usually when one gets fouled, it’s 2 shots. Those are two free points they should not miss! There’s nobody in their face trying to swat the ball out of his hands (BTW, this is the pressure I’m speaking about, mental pressure should be forced upon them the whole time they’re on the court), and I think there is less trash talk (but I don’t know, are they still throwing trash talk at the guy whiles he’s on the line?).
Lets just say if I was a NBA coach (which would never happen) along with standard practice I would increase free throw practice. If they have guys going to the ling 10-15 times a game and they are shooting 60%, that’s a lot of missed opportunity.
MtM
…and yet the percentage has never been above 70%. Surely if your theory (that there’s no excuse to be below 80%) was right, there would have been a coach who did that. Surely that team would have suceeded enough that folks would know about it. And yet there isn’t. Therefore, your premise is wrong.
Face it, it’s not as easy as you think.
No two free throws are created the same. If you’ve been running up and down the court for 42 minutes, you have a strained knee or pulled hamstring, you can’t breathe, the games tied with 1.2 seconds left on the clock in game seven of the finals, do you think that that’s just a little different from shooting free throws for your high school coach? The Magic and Lakers both have invested tons of time and money coaching Shaq, but I don’t see him sitting on the bench. It got to the point that his % was going down the more he practiced. Using your logic, Tiger Woods should hole in one every time he tees off from the third at Bay Hill. And what’s up with baseball players batting .200-.300? Isn’t a fast ball a fast ball?
BTW, a basketball coach once explained to me that very tall players usually have a much harder time with free throws than us six footers. Something to do with a harder trajectory to calculate for the big guys.
I think RickJay has it.
When I played basketball in school, my free throw shooting was over 80%. There was a guy who was near 100%.
He actually practiced free throws. He could make 50+ in a row routinely.
Neither of us went onto the NBA. In fact, we weren’t really very good 
Anyone think of the movie ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’ when they read the OP?
“I shoot better when I move” 
Some people, me included, shoot much better on the move. I think this has to do with the brain computing relative angles, speed, and doing a lot of complex mathematics without the conscious mind actually participating. Standing still in front of a basket from any point on the court is more difficult for me than if I’m even taking a step or two before shooting. There’s a rhythm to the move and shoot, and none to the stand and chuck.
What about using an underhand vs. overhand throw? Are there differences there? Somewhere I read that underhand led to higher percentages because you need a certain arc on the ball and you were able to get that easier with an overhand throw?
An underhanded free throw is commonly believed to lead to a better percentage because the path of the ball follows a better arc. It makes sense if you believe the theory from this thread that a shorter player has a better arc. Shooting underhanded leads to a release point significantly shorter than even a Spud Webb shot.
Why isn’t it used then? It’s such a different motion than the normal shot that it would take a good amount of time to master it. And, it just isn’t cool to do.