Shawn Marion’s Three Point Shot

Thinking about the Dallas Mavericks’ acquisition of Shawn Marion, I looked up his numbers, and there’s really something strange going on with his three point shooting. From the 2002-2003 season through to the 2007-2008 season he consistently averaged over three three-point attempts per game, and shot them reasonably accurately. Not great, but good enough to make it a viable shot. He was a guy, in other words, that you wouldn’t want to leave open from long distance. Someone who can help space the floor and knock down shots.

Then in the 2008-2009 season his attempts crater to 0.8 per game. And a good thing, too, because his accuracy falls to .189 basically making him a guy who you never want to see take the long shot. I’ll confess that I didn’t watch him play in any games last season. Does anyone have a sense of what happened?