Boston Celtics: 5 Reasons Why Al Horford Can Transform The Celtics

Shooting

It seems strange to suggest that a center could help to remedy some of a team’s shooting woes, but then again, Al Horford is not your every day kind of big man.

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In spite of creating quality looks by virtue of being one of the league’s very best passing teams, last year’s Celtics ranked only 25th in field goal percentage (43.9 percent) and an abysmal 28th in three-point accuracy (33.5 percent). Very simply, they were a bad shooting team.

Those issues that were problematic in the regular season became downright crippling when the slower pace and heightened intensity of the playoffs arrived. The Celtics fell in the first round to Horford’s Hawks, in large part due to measly shooting numbers of 38.4 percent from the field and 27.5 percent from distance.

As a career 53 percent shooter from the field, who makes 34 percent from behind the arc, Horford should help to improve Boston’s shooting in its most basic form.

Aside from his own contributions, the extra attention he can draw in the post or the midrange should also gift his teammates with greater time than they’d have been afforded alongside Jared Sullinger or Kelly Olynyk. The 30-year-old’s gravity could be big for Boston’s shooting efficiency.

Preseason may provide a small and ridiculously unreliable sample size, but all the same, that Horford effect does seem to be bearing out so far. Shooting 45.5 percent from the field and 34.3 percent from deep may only be minor improvements, but for one of the league’s worst shooting groups, it’s certainly a start.