How Kon Knueppel is making 3-pointers look like layups

Yahoo Sports contributing NBA writer Tom Haberstroh and NBA writer Dan Devine discuss how the Hornets rookie has been making deep balls at a historic clip this season – especially when a certain pair of teammates are on the floor with him. Check out the full conversation on “The Big Number” and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you listen.

Video Transcript

Oh, I feel the buzz here in Buzz City.

Let’s do this big number.

Ooh.

This week’s big number is 58.4%.

That is Kon Knipple’s field goal percentage on layups when he has Brandon Miller and LaMelo Ball on the floor.

Did I say layups, Dan?

Because what I meant was three-pointers.

Ah, yes.

Kon Knipple is shooting 58% on threes with LaMelo Ball and Brandon Miller on the floor this season.

That’s ridiculous.

It’s a layup, a literal layup, for Kon Knipple when he’s getting passes from LaMelo Ball, Brandon Miller, or just when he has both of those guys on the floor.

His three-point field goal percentage, Dan, goes from 51% with Melo on, 53% with Brandon Miller on.

When they’re both on the floor, when he’s got those back court guys on the floor, that shoots up to 58.4%.

It is- Wow beyond gobsmack how good he is- this season as a rookie, but more when we look at the lens through when he’s got those guys on the floor.

Defenses just don’t know what to do.

And this is the hottest team in the NBA.

they’re selling out the arena again.

I went to the game on Saturday.

The Blazers were in town.

And people were driving in, Dan, from all over the state and even, like, South Carolina.

They’re driving in from hours away to catch- Wow the spirit ’cause the Charlotte Hornets are the best team pretty much over the last two plus months.

Since January 1st, they have the best net rating in the NBA, even better than the Celtics, the Spurs, the Thunder.

they have the number one offense over that time.

They have the number six defense over that time, just behind the Boston Celtics.

And on Wednesday night, we get the Hornets versus the Celtics.

So I know you’re up there in Brooklyn- Ooh Dan, but are you feeling the buzz?

Can you hear the buzz in Charlotte from all the way up there?

It’s a little hard to get it through just the people screaming from the street in Brooklyn that I’m used to.

That’s, that’s sort of my general avenue vibe.

But it’s inarguable that it’s getting pretty loud with the Hornets.

Like, you can For a little bit there, for a couple of weeks, it was like, oh, kind of cute story.

They’re catching a rhythm, or, you know, they, they, they’ve got, you know, the shots are going down.

So we’ll see what happens when it levels out.

But once that gets to 15, 20, 30 games, you know, and they’ve won two-thirds of their games going back to Christmas, right?

Like this is a It’s no longer cute.

This is a 500 team that has been significantly better than that for almost half the season now.

And it is the, it’s the best the Hornets have played more than a decade, right?

Like, th- and even those teams, like the Steve Clifford, Kemba Walker, b- you know, Big Al Jefferson, those teams that kind of, like, they, they, like, grabbed every piece of low-hanging fruit they could and kinda, like, clung to those th- advantages for dear life.

This feels a little bit more like, “No, no, no.

We’re, we’re going to create advantages all over the court.”

And Kon Knipple has been at the center of that, right?

You know, you’re, you’re pointing to the way he shoots with w- those guys on the floor with him, with LaMelo Ball, with Brandon Miller on.

It’s also that you can get Kon Knipple shots in all different sorts of ways.

Yeah.

He can pull off the pick and roll as a handler.

He can serve as the screener in the pick and roll.

I know Charles Lee loves running those kinda two-man actions, guard-guard screening actions, especially late in games, forcing defenses to figure out, do I stick to LaMelo, or do I go with a ghosting, popping Kon Knipple?

Like, who do you leave open?

Brandon Miller only increases the, the danger there because that’s a walking 20-point-a-game scorer who is a t- a 37, 38% shooter in his own right.

So, like, there’s, it’s w- it’s a game of Whac-A-Mole-

How Kon Knueppel is making 3-pointers look like layups

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