Buddy Hield
Golden State Warriors

Player Facts

Height: 6'4"
Weight: 220lbs.

Wingspan: 6'9.25"

Date of Birth: Dec. 17, 1992
College Experience: Oklahoma (4 years)

Selections

All Star: 0
All-NBA: 0
All-Defensive: 0

Player Grades

Speed/Explosiveness: 9
Physical Strength: 7
Positional Size: 7
Positional Wingspan: 8
Paint Scoring: 6
Midrange Scoring: 6
Three-Point Scoring: 9
Dribbling: 7
Passing: 5
Perimeter Defense: 3
Interior Defense: 4
Rebounding: 4

Embed from Getty Images

JUMP TO SECTION

> Intro

> Brazen Offense

> Deep Range + Screen Usage

> C&S Dangerousness

> Springing into the Attack

> Pick-and-Roll Play

> Isolation Scoring

> Open Court Snipes

> Imbalanced Shot Chart

> Blunted Cutting

> Playmaking Limitations

> Defensive Minus

> Beacon Bacon

>Link to Player Contract & Salary Info

*All short clips courtesy of NF Highlights, Smart Highlights & Z.Highlights (YouTube)

*All statistical data courtesy of NBA Advanced Stats

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STRENGTHS

Intro

Buddy Hield is a scoring-minded two-guard who rains triples. He is skillful at finding looks within the half-court offense as he sprints hard around off-ball screens. Hield complements his stroke with the capacity to put the ball on the floor and manufacture a cleaner look inside the arc.

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Brazen Offense

Hield is an aggressive offensive force who constantly hunts down his shots. What makes him special is that long-range marksmanship. Buddy barely needs any space to get his shot off. He routinely shoots with an unorthodox base involving his feet close together, but it works for him.

Buddy's shot motion is quick and fluid. This is something that he carries into both his off-the-dribble and spot-up threes. He nailed an insane 46% of his 402 catch-and-shoot threes attempted in 2018-2019. Hield proceeded to drill 39%+ on these each of the next three seasons (spanning until 2021-2022).

His shot-making ability behind the arc is truly impressive. Buddy will adjust the speed of his release and the arc on the ball based on his defender's proximity. He continuously makes high degree of difficulty jumpers.

Deep Range + Screen Usage

Another trademark of elite sharpshooters is a deep range, one that Buddy undoubtedly possesses. 2019-2020 saw him place fourth on the leaderboards with 170 buckets from 25 to 29 feet out on a 39.3% clip. Hield scored more within this range than Duncan Robinson and Jayson Tatum and was more efficient than both James Harden and Trae Young.

Buddy is at his best when bolting off screens for a zero-dribble triple. He can fly off a single screen to rapidly catch and fire. Hield ensures that he gets skinny to tightly wrap around his screener and leave his defender behind.

C&S Dangerousness

In 2018-2019 Buddy trailed only the Splash Bros. for total catch-and-shoot points. Within this talented trio, Hield posted the highest catch-and-shoot field goal percentage at 45.7%. He followed that season up by placing in the 93rd percentile on a high volume of 2019-2020 spot-up shots.

Hield uses his blazing speed to cleverly relocate after dishing it off initially. Buddy punishes his man for relaxing even for a split second. With their head turned, he proceeds to jet over to the corner.

Springing into the Attack

When curling off screens, he tends to take one dribble to pull back for a moment. From this vantage point, he reads the defense to assess his next move. Hield can spring into a three or explode downhill according to the open space available.

With a verve in his step, Buddy puts himself in athletic stances to attack after off-ball screens or otherwise. His first step burst and solid ball-handling empower Hield to blow past defenders hugging up to him. He can finish at the cup with the left when his right is shut off.

Buddy's strong upper body helps him absorb contact on drives. He gets his shoulder into shot-blockers to neutralize their ability to contest. He also has some bounce for the odd above-the-rim finish.

Pick-and-Roll Play

When Buddy is tasked to initiate, he seeks out the pick and roll pull-up three. He drained 38.4% of his pull-up triples in 2020-2021. Defensive bigs have to come up because of his knockdown shooting.

Buddy gets multiple perimeter jumpers off on a nightly basis thanks to dropped bigs. Hield continues to pull from the midrange if that's the conceded space. He poured in 125 midrange buckets in 2018-2019 on a respectable 43.6% efficiency. However, he has since struggled to make these consistently.

Hield was solid as a scorer on an average of 5.0 pick-and-roll possessions as the ball-handler in 2019-2020. His 0.90 points per possession was superior to guards like Jamal Murray, Ja Morant at Spencer Dinwiddie. Beyond jumpers, Buddy can effectively keep his defender on his hip and rise for a floater in the middle.

Hield flashes some playmaking in the screen-and-roll. Though it's not the most refined part of his game, Buddy makes the basic read to his roller. He typically identifies and executes dimes as long as the play is unfolding in front of him.

Isolation Scoring

His isolation sequences comprise part of his offensive game as well. He uses hesitations as the primary means of getting past his man.

Hield also has a high-arching stepback jumper to use one-on-one. He plants one foot hard to freeze his defender momentarily, then launches himself back to gain separation. Though on a small sample size, he was in the 96th percentile for isolation scoring during his 2020-2021 season in Sacramento.

Open Court Snipes

Buddy's best trait on defense is using his foot speed to sneak up on unsuspecting ball-handlers. These pokes can lead to transition chances where Hield flexes his quickness.

When leading the break, he demands a body tight to him as soon as he gets into the frontcourt. With a ball-handler like De'Aaron Fox or Tyrese Haliburton at the helm in the past, Hield could viably streak into the paint or flare out for three.

All in all, Buddy was second to only Giannis Antetokounmpo in total 2018-2019 transition points. More recently, Hield was still top-15 in volume for 2020-2021. He's also an early offense killer as a trailing option or after a quick drag screen.

WEAKNESSES

Imbalanced Shot Chart

Hield's shot distribution is suboptimal. He is a talented slasher but not a productive one. He launched 9.6 threes a night in 2019-2020 compared to merely 2.5 average shots in the restricted area. His unwillingness to attack regularly also manifests as an inability to draw many fouls.

Blunted Cutting

Buddy is both an infrequent and unproductive cutter. The only roadblock stopping Hield from being an elite cutter is a desire to do so.

Across 72 games in 2019-2020, he was astoundingly in the 2nd percentile with 0.86 points per possession on cuts. Per Synergy, he didn't even register as a 0.1 PPG or greater cutting player in the 2020-2021 campaign.

The absence of a cutting component in Buddy's game keeps him from having a complete off-ball repertoire like T.J. Warren or Joe Harris.

Playmaking Limitations

Hield is not at all a prolific overall playmaking option for his squad. In particular, he has not shown an ability to hit weakside shooters as he comes off the ball screen. As a high usage 6'4" guard he recorded a miserable 1.27 assist-to-turnover ratio in 2019-2020.

He failed to facilitate many points for teammates despite often being the second option for Sacramento in 2020-2021. He averaged a mediocre 8.8 assist points created per game in 34.3 minutes averaged.

Defensive Minus

Hield expends the vast majority of his energy trying to get open on offense. This leaves him less energetic and attentive on the defensive end. Opponents shot above-to-well above their normal shooting clips with Hield checking them in 2019-2020. This held true on both two-pointers and three-pointers.

Buddy was in only the 21st percentile defending pick-and-roll ball-handlers in 2019-2020. He can get stuck on screens both on-ball and off-ball as he chases shooters. Moreover, he rarely makes high-level defensive reads nor does he provide meaningful interior resistance (merely 1.3 "stocks" per game in 2020-2021).

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bacon
Beacon Bacon

Born and raised in The Bahamas, Hield grew up modelling his game after NBA legend Kobe Bryant