Amid the Milwaukee Bucks‘ slow start to the season, there were many things that fans were concerned about. They weren’t rebounding well, they were missing open looks, the offense looked stagnant, and so on. But one of the underlying worrying things was Jrue Holiday’s performance.
He was coming off of an ankle sprain that had him miss five games, but you could tell he was still affected by it. He was missing layups that he typically converted and his 3-point shooting was nearing the lowest percentage of his career.
It wasn’t that long ago where we were wondering what was going on with the Bucks point guard, but since the team has gotten on a roll, it has coincided with Holiday’s strong play as of late.
When you dive into how Holiday’s shooting has improved since his rough patch coming back from injury, there is a lot to be excited about going forward for the rest of the season that he’s back to the player we expect him to be.
Jrue Holiday’s looking back to his old self after a rough start for the Milwaukee Bucks
To underline how much Holiday struggled, in his first nine games back from the ankle sprain, he averaged 12.8 points on 41.4 percent true shooting and shot 27.1 percent from 3-point range on over five attempts per game.
His defense was still at a very good level, taking the big individual perimeter assignments without some of the key members of the Bucks defense around him, but offensively it was tough to watch at times.
In that nine-game stretch, the Bucks went 5-4 and included a 15-point loss to the New York Knicks (Holiday’s first game back and on a minutes restriction) and a 20-point loss to the Atlanta Hawks.
Then, during the midst of a five-game homestand and with the team on a three-game win streak, Holiday broke out of his slump against the Orlando Magic with 18 points on 60 percent true shooting. A modest effort, to be sure, but he did that in 23 minutes and things looked promising.
Including that performance, in his last nine games, Holiday has averaged 19 points on 60 percent true shooting and 41 percent from 3 on around five attempts a game. There were a couple of standout games, but the best may have come in the Bucks’ only loss in that stretch.
Despite missing Giannis Antetokounmpo against the Toronto Raptors, the 31-year-old posted a season-high 26 points on 61 percent true shooting to go along with six rebounds and nine assists. He carried the Milwaukee offense with his scoring through much of the first three quarters and then became a facilitator in the fourth quarter.
Holiday’s passing is something that hasn’t had much of a decline this season, throughout the injury and lingering soreness. He’s averaging about the same number of assists per game (6.2) this season as last (6.1), but he has a nearly 31 percent assist rate; a nearly four percent increase from last season and is in the top 20 in the league for assist rate.
Back to Holiday’s scoring, one of the biggest keys for his resurgence has been getting his stepback jumper going again. It’s a bread and butter move for Holiday and he has been effective with it in the past, shooting over 45 percent on step-back 3-pointers last season (64 attempts), per NBA.com/stats.
It was clear Holiday didn’t have the feel for that shot when he returned from the ankle sprain, he shot 1-of-6 on step-back 3s in the first nine games back but has gone 9-of-14 in his last nine games. He won’t shoot that well on step-back 3s all season, but it’s a good sign that he has recovered well from the ankle sprain and is more confident in his step-back jumper.
Another good sign is his finishing around the basket and making his layups, which were a struggle when he first returned. Holiday shot 33.3 percent on layups in those first nine games back after the ankle sprain and didn’t look like the same player.
He’s now shot over 51 percent on layups in the last nine games, which is still well below the 61.7 percent that he was at last season, but it’s a good sign that there’s progress being made and that he’s getting healthier (and perhaps more comfortable with the increased physicality this season).
I said earlier this season that fans needed to have tentative patience with Holiday’s struggles, but that the thing that gave me the most pause was his layups (especially after he struggled in the playoffs at times).
Now that we’ve seen it return to a much better and more Holiday-esque level, I’m much more confident in saying that he is back to his normal self and fans should start to expect these sorts of performances going forward as he remains one of the best all-around guards in the league.
Holiday’s lone All-Star appearance of his career came way back in 2012-13 and although it’s unlikely he gets an All-Star nod given the depth of the Eastern Conference, it would be really fun to see him get back there again.