Bargnani and free throws

I have to admit I've been harsh on Andrea Bargnani. It's not that I hate his game; it's just that his defense is so wretched and detrimental to the team that I sometimes forget how talented he could be on the offensive end. In fact, I don't know of any center or power forward in the league who can do these four things: Shoot the three pointer, dribble drive, shoot the mid-range off the dribble AND post up. Usually, it's one or 2, or maybe 3. But Bargnani can do the four of them with above-average efficiency.

What gets lost in this is that when you're ranked 215th among players with significant minutes in the league (750+ min) in FTA/FGA ratio, something is wrong. Bargnani basically generates 0.205 free throw per FGA. Compare that to other big men, like Dwight Howard (0.978), Marc Gasol (0.582), Kendrick Perkins (0.537), and Chris Bosh (0.509). Even jump-shooting big men, like Nowitzki, have double his rate (0.392).

But, why is that?

I dug into the stats to get some sort of explanation, and came up with 2 interrelated causes:

First, for the past 4 years, the Raptors have never used Bargnani as a first option. He's been mostly used as the outlet when Bosh gets doubled, which limits his scoring opportunities, as well as his free throw possibilities. Consider that on 1350 plays last year, Bargnani was used as the decoy (spot-up shooter) 511 times. That is 38% of his total plays. Over the 80 games he played, that represents 6.4 spot-up plays per game. When you consider that those plays provide almost zero possibility of creating free throws, it is one darn-good explanation.

Second, Bargnani is an awful rebounder for his size, but his positioning on the Raptors' set plays is problematic for getting involved in offensive rebounding.  Offensive rebounds usually lead to out-of-position defense and reaching, which lead to extra free throws. Could he be used differently to get him more offensive rebounds? Well, with the Italian national team this summer, Bargnani increased his ORB% from 4.6% (with the Raptors) to 5.8%. In terms of actual rebounds, that translates into 0.4 extra offensive boards per game. Whether that translates back into the NBA remains to be seen.

Bargnani could be ready to make the leap into better offensive production next year. He's already increased his FTA/FGA Ratio to 0.283 with the Italian national team, but that was against lower-level competition. It could be real, and the Raptors have a first option again, or it could be a fluke, and he's just what we see: a jumpshooting big man who shies away from contact.