Hot Issue: Kobe's 78 Mid-Range Rating

Well its the topic that's burning up the presses on most 2K Message Boards nowadays. Sim Nation? Confused. Laker Fans? Livid. Stats junkies? Satisfied. Kobe Haters? Ecstatic.

DISCLAIMER: While we certainly like to address hot issues among 2K fans, we defer to 2K to all things gameplay, numbers and stats related. Quite frankly, they've never steered us wrong, and as long as players continue to play like their real-life counterparts we'll continue to look at the glass as half-full instead of half-empty. NBA 2K12 is the only game that displays this level of realism.

By now we all know issue, Kobe Bryant has a 78 Mid Range rating while JR Smith is rated a 91 in the same category. "How can this be right?!" many will argue. Bryant is far-and-away the superior jump-shooter, right? Well...not so fast. Kobe's Numbers  and Smith's Numbers actually show that Kobe shoots much more from mid-range than does Smith. No surprise there, Kobe's detractors will share a laugh and say he shoots more than EVERYONE in general, but the example of making sure we regard stat-minimums into our equations is valid here. I think we all agree that a Power Forward who hits his one three point attempt of the year on a half-court buzzer-beater at the end of the half shouldn't get a high 3pt rating the following year. Then there's the issue with looking at trends and longitudinal data. But we did say we wanted realistic numbers, correct? Since we agree one year of hitting a high percentage of mid-range shots shouldn't get a player a high rating, we like to look at three years of stats and then form our opinions. Looking AT the stats will often get you into trouble, looking INTO them is often your saving grace.

So that's what we did, look INTO the numbers. The first thing that stood out was the fact that shots from 10-15 feet were in a different category. Aren't those considered mid-range as well? We'd like to think so. We doubt most people would call a 12-15 foot jumpshot "close". We combined 10-23 feet and then looked at the last four years for each player. Here's what we found.

2007 Bryant 45%, Smith 31.5%
2008 Bryant 41%, Smith 43.5%
2009 Bryant 43.5%, Smith 42%
2010 Bryant 45%, Smith 35.5%
2011 Bryant 44.5%, Smith 38.5%

Pretty interesting numbers huh? We think so too. Even with significantly more attempts Bryant far exceeded Smith in every year save one, and has shown much more consistency (never dropping below 41%). Keep in mind that we're not trying to stir up any controversy or outdo 2K, we just think that looking INTO the numbers sometimes is telling. In our minds looking at these numbers say that Bryant is still a much more consistent and effective mid-range scorer than Smith, but only 2K knows how their numbers translate into game mechanics.

Here's what two of the community's more respected minds had to say on the subject:

Da_Czar: 

I am always more concerned about the effect of the numbers rather than the numbers themselves. As long as Kobe play's like Kobe and JR plays like JR then I'm good. That said on the surface that certainly is questionable especially considering the case the numbers play in your article. I would also be concerned about what other factors that we may or may not know about are doing to these numbers that ends up as our final result. In short I don't have enough information to say if this is legit or just a poor job of ratings by 2K.

I have seen enough of the game behind the game to know it is not a straight translation of med shot ratings that goes into the final shot percentage. Being that all of that is classified I can't speak on it. But I will say even in light of that for consistency sake these numbers might need a little tweaking. But I would reserve that until after I played the game for a good bit. 

Rashidi went indepth as only Rashidi Can:

Mid-range is solely the 16-23 foot range.  The 10-15 foot range is "Close range" which is why Kobe has 99 and JR has 53.  Nobody on TV talks about the "Close range game" but you will hear Hubie Brown talk about "long twos" (10-15 feet) and "short twos" (16-23 feet).  Close and Mid are essentially two sub-divisions of mid-range, a necessary distinction because not every player can score from those areas.   Kobe has 99/78 C/M  whereas JR has 53/91.  Kobe is extremely successful at shorter twos while JR is simply awful at them.  It doesn't hurt to drag Dirk (99/99 C/M) into this for some needed context.

10-15 feet

Kobe: 134-260 (51.5%) = 99

Dirk: 130-263 (49.4%) = 99
JR: 8-27 (29.6%) = 53

16-23 feet

Kobe: 183-485 (38.0%) = 78

Dirk: 237-460 (52.0%) = 99

JR: 93-195 (48.0%) = 91

Kobe vs JR

+12 Inside

+46 Close (the max difference being +49)

-13 Mid

-7 3pt

JR is generally more comfortable the further he is from the basket, and we don't hear anyone complaining about JR having a better 3pt rating than Kobe, aside from rabid Kobe fans that would tell you he's one of the best distance shooters in the league.  Kobe has been posting up a lot over the last two years - players don't really post up 16-23 feet from the basket.

A lot of players are going to point to "Assisted rates" as why Kobe should be higher, but the truth is that there are other ratings (Shoot Off Dribble and Ball Handling) that already take that into account.

Which player will be the better mid-range player?

Player A: 99 Mid-Range, 50 Speed, 50 Quickness, 50 Ball Handling, 50 Shoot Off Dribble, 50 Shoot In Traffic

Player B: 50 Mid-Range, 99 Speed, 99 Quickness, 99 Ball Handling, 99 Shoot Off Dribble, 99 Shoot In Traffic

It will be Player B every single time because that player won't have any trouble creating his own shot.  Player A will be relegated to set shots.  Player B is essentially Marreese Speights (89 Mid), whose rating is far more controversial since he only shot 42% from 16-23 feet last season.  Players are not going to be dribbling around, coming off picks and screens taking contested fading jumpers with Marreese Speights.  They will still try to do that with Kobe, but it (thankfully) won't be as successful as years past.  This is not your older brother's "81 Kobe".  Kobe dropped 40 points only three times all season (season high 42 coming in 48 minutes vs the Suns), but ask any 2K player and they will tell you it happens much more frequently than that.

At the end of the day Kobe is going to dominate the game far more than JR will, and is rated to do just that.  Players will just need to focus on getting shots closer to the basket than usual - which is REALISTIC since that has been Kobe's mentality the last few years anyway.