Here’s What Made JJ Redick Such a Good NBA Role Player
Of course, now we associate JJ Reick as being the head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers and before that as a media personality and basketball analyst. In his playing days, though, he was well regarded as one of the games all-time best shooters and offball movers. Here’s a 5-minute review of what made Reic one of the top role players of his era. In the 2010s, very few players took more shots coming off and off ball screen than JJ. Between 2013 and 2020, for example, he took the fifth most shots coming off and off ball screen per second spectrum. There was so much screen variety the teams he played on ran to try and free him up. There were a lot of flex screens as shown here. There were a lot of flare screens with this play being an example. There were some back screens. And of course, there were a lot of standard down screens like displayed in this clip. and many times there would be a mix of them on the same possession to make it tough for the defense to stay connected to him. Among those with at least 1,000 of these offball screen shot attempts between 2013 and 2020, Reic had the league’s third best effective field goal percentage, which is a statistic that adjusts field goal percentage to account for the fact that three-point field goals are worth more than two-point field goals. Only Steph Curry and Kyle Corver had better marks when it came to movement shooting in general. So that could be off and off ball screen in transition, which he was very comfortable with, or just simply repositioning around the ark. Reick shot 45% from three-point range in that same time period. That ranked number one among the 49 players who took at least 500 of these shots. He took over 1,400 of them, second most behind Klay Thompson. While he less commonly took stationary threes, he shot 46.6% on those in that same time frame. The fourth best mark among the 197 players who took at least 400 of them. Only Steph Corver and Joe Harris ranked higher on pull-up threes off the dribble. In that time, JJ shot 36%. Going into the 2025-26 season, there have been 142 players in NBA history who took at least 3,000 three-pointers in their careers. Among them, Reic, who attempted 4,74 of them, has the fourth best three-point percentage at 41.5%. Only Corver, Steve Nash, and Steph rank higher. Reick’s best scoring performance of his career came on January 18th, 2016 when he scored 40 points against the Rockets. He made a career-high nine threes that game. It was that season when he shot a career best 47.5% from downtown. Some notable playoff performances of his include when he scored 15 points in Orlando’s first round series closeout win over Philadelphia in 2009. The Magic did not have Dwight Howard in that game. In game seven of the 2014 first round series between the Clippers and Warriors, he racked up 20 points to help LA advance. He had 31 points in game three of LA’s Western Conference semi-final series against Houston in 2015. His best individual playoff series came in 2018 in the first round against Miami when he scored over 20 in three of those five games. He made a few clutch shots in his career. Among them include on February 17th, 2009 while playing for Orlando, he hit this game-tying three-pointer with 8.1 seconds left against Charlotte. The Magic went on to win in OT. Although Orlando ended up losing this game in OT, Reic knocked down this tying triple with 38 seconds remaining in game four of the Magic’s first round series against the Pacers in 2012. On March 24th, 2016 against Portland, he made this game-winning jumper at the buzzer. On January 4th, 2020 against Sacramento, he made this game-winning layup with 1.1 seconds left. While never known for his defense, Reic was one of the better charge takers in the 2010s, between 2013 and 2020. He took 61 charges, tied for 24th most in that time frame. He ended up playing 15 years in the NBA. The first 6 and a half are with the Magic. The other half of that seventh season was with the Bucks. then four with the Clippers, two with the 76ers, one and a half with the Pelicans, and the final couple months of his career with the Mavs. So, that wraps up this video. If you like this kind of content, please subscribe.
Here’s a five minute review of what made JJ Redick such a good role player in his NBA playing days. #nba #jjredick #orlandomagic #laclippers #philadelphia76ers #neworleanspelicans #lalakers #filmroom #nbafilmstudy #nbahistory
Video footage courtesy of NBAE
Stats from mix of Second Spectrum and Stathead
