The worst of Middleton
The main concern revolving around a good chunk of Middleton’s season this year was his uncharacteristic shooting struggles from downtown.
Having set the pedigree of being, at minimum, a 40 percent three-point shooter throughout his time in Milwaukee, the trouble Middleton had in being unable to find the bottom of the net from beyond the arc for extended stretches was jarring to watch.
When appearing on Howard Beck of Bleacher Report’s podcast, The Full 48, back in the beginning of February, Middleton touched on his aberrational three-point decline to that point in the season (cue up to the 22-minute mark):
"“It’s the same shots. It’s been frustrating for me all season long. I started the season off slow, then picked it up a little bit in December. Then I had a cold patch again in January, so it’s frustrating, but I just gotta keep shooting. I mean, all the shots I’ve taken have been great shots, they’ve been great looks. Nothing has changed, it’s just not going in for me right now. But, you know, my team, my coaches keep telling me to keep shooting it. I mean, I have to be out there shooting the ball to space the guys for everybody else, so just keep shooting.”"
And here’s what Middleton had to say when Beck followed up with asking about if shooters do any mechanical tweaks or comb through film to help get them out of their slumping ways:
"“(I) Definitely did. When was this? In January, I did go back and look at film between my last couple of years and this year, how I was shooting the ball. I couldn’t tell that much of a difference, except for I was grabbing the ball and releasing the ball with a weird spin on it. I’ve tried to change that but for some reason, it’s still not dropping. So, I feel like at some point it will start going down for me again.”"
Fortunately, it was right around this time in Middleton’s season where he started to gradually regain some of his three-point effectiveness, which certainly catapulted his production level throughout the Bucks’ seven-game playoff run against the Celtics.