BROOKLYN -- The transition from college to the NBA for Sacramento Kings second-year point guard Jimmer Fredette was all too familiar. Something he had dealt with not once, but twice before.
Jimmer Fredette improves by re-discovering himself
In his second year, Jimmer Fredette is finally going back to doing what got him in the league in the first place: scoring the basketball.
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Like nearly every player who enters the NBA, Fredette faced a struggle of perception, one that oftentimes humbles a player.
“It happens to a lot of young guys coming out of college,” Fredette told SBNation.com. “It’s kind of like the transition coming from high school to college where you were the man, and all of a sudden you’re not, which in my case that’s what it was.”
Fredette, who earned Division I National Player of the Year honors his senior season at BYU as the nation’s leading scorer, was caught in a battle between those who placed lofty expectations on him and the doubters and naysayers certain he would struggle at the next level. Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t doing a very good job at quieting the “peanut gallery.”
In his rookie season, Fredette faced criticism about his lack of defense, inability to run the offense and poor performance from the field -- he finished the season shooting 38.6 percent from the floor.
“Obviously you don’t want to come in and have an up-and-down year,” he said. “But you just roll with the punches and keep improving.”
And improve is exactly what he’s done in this, his second season in the league.
Fredette’s per-game scoring numbers have increased modestly this season (+0.6), but that’s not simply because his minutes have also increased. In fact, they haven’t. He’s actually playing 4.4 fewer minutes per game this season, showing a more efficient and effective approach to the game of basketball.
What he has done differently this season is re-find his confidence by managing to do exactly what it is that Jimmer Fredette does best.
“Going out there and playing as hard as I can, and doing what got me in the league, which is scoring the ball,” Fredette explained. “And that’s what I have to do on a nightly basis.”
The change in his approach, however, was less about mechanics and more about how to improve on what he referred to as his “aggressive mindset” in finding more effective ways to score the basketball.
“I worked a lot on floaters -- my mid-game, something that you need at this level,” he said. “In my first year, I wasn’t confident about it, but this year I’ve been more confident with it.”
The improvement has certainly been noticeable this year, as Fredette is shooting at near 40 percent from inside the lane, after making just 25.8 percent of those attempts as a rookie, according to HoopData. He’s also seeing a better improvement in his mid-jumper, making a 20-percent-plus leap from one year to the next in the 10- to 15-foot range.
“It’s a big weapon if you can shoot the ball and get in the lane,” he said.
What also helped Fredette regain a bit of his confidence was that his teammates never wavered on his importance to this team, even as he struggled so much as a rookie.
“My teammates just always tell me to keep shooting,” he said with a smile. “They want me to score out there, that’s why they have me on the team. They expect for me to shoot the ball well, and play well, and do that on a nightly basis. So that’s what I try to do.”
“Having their confidence really helps me out a lot,” he said.
In turn, Fredette has made himself available to his teammates, with James Johnson in particular taking him up on his offer.
Johnson, who is shooting a career-worst 39 percent from the floor on the season, was looking to put in the work to improve on his jumpshot, so he turned to Fredette.
“It was just basically a couple of days, you know, he wasn’t shooting great,” he said of his working with Johnson. “He came in to shoot early before practice -- and I always shoot early before practice, every day -- and I just told him to make sure to do what comes natural to you, don’t try to fix it too much and over-think it. It’s hard to adjust at this point in your career.”
“I told [Johnson] to do what makes you comfortable,” he said. “Don’t think about it, and play your game.”
A bit of perfect advice, coming from Fredette, who now seems to be doing just that -- playing his game.
“You always want to go out there and prove people wrong and show them that you can play at this level, that you’re an NBA basketball player,” he said, “and hopefully I can continue to play better and keep proving the doubters wrong.”
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