A deeper look into where Anthony Edwards stands as a finisher, his progression, and where there's still growth to be made.
Anthony Edwards #1 of the Minnesota Timberwolves stretches on the rim before the game against the LA Clippers on November 5, 2021 at Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Copyright 2021 NBAE (Photo by Jordan Johnson/NBAE via Getty Images)
Looking into Ant's development as shot maker from 3 has been really interesting to see. But focusing on the developments of his main game — on ball penetration — is something I feel is important to better understanding these athletic on-ball scoring guard prospects. Starting off, Ant has always shown flashes of proper footwork mixed with elite athleticism, as seen on plays like this:
Classic shimmy out of the triple threat; gets his defenders momentum leaning right assuming a middle drive. He's still not fully polished, so his driving angle still gives enough space for the defender to recover. However, his feel when the defender cheats is beautiful, perfectly spinning off him. Ant still wisely chooses the early jumper instead of a fully extended finish. Overall, rookie Ant's footwork beating his man and getting to his spots were really nice. The issue; however, came from his footwork on finishes, and decision making on low man reads.
He had a tendency to fish out contact, in a very unhealthy manner that would throw off his balance multiple times for the sake of a contact play, when the proper play here because the big was in full position and his man was on his side was to do an early floater-type lay... or exploit the space and slither right even on the finish itself he hangs for much longer than need be here, sacrificing a point of release for an extra hang.
On this play, he does a nice read, noticing Rudy's momentum being both forward, and selling toward middle, deciding to do a eurostep finish. The main issue is the by the time he placed the steps, he does them two early, which cripples him for 2 reasons:
1: Rudy Gobert is able to fully recover to the ball by that point
2: It requires him to generate so much more energy to both get up for contact AND do the extend finish, all while being balanced (He also goes off one leg here, which safety wise for contact finishes is a no go). It implies that he probably wanted to go straight extend, as it's much easier to do that with one leg, but Gobert recovered for the contest, leading him to use more of his energy for the contact, resulting in less energy to give the ball and more reliance on Ant's touch. This play shows good finishing reads, but just ok execution.
The idea was to attack the space between the two defenders while using a two foot finish glide to enter that space in a controlled manner. Not a nitpick, but he could have taken a more horizontal leap than a vertical one, as since he's already in a compact position, they cant really bump him and he can have more space to lay the ball up. Just small things like that make a big difference finishing wise. Now, in 2022, we see in upgrade in these qualities.
On this play, he reads the drop perfectly, attacking the drop big's top foot while setting his space and using his off arm to set space. Then, seeing the defender sell to the paint early with their momentum moving more away, elevates early for the floater finish. It may look contested in real time, but if you slow down you see Dinwiddie actually didn't affect the shot; it was already released.
Just insane reaction time by Edwards, reading the defenders body move just slightly forward as he points towards for his teammates, which is all Ant needs to instantly cross and attack the back foot. Then he reads the big's momentum moving forward, as he expects a contact jump. Instead, he eurosteps past him for a wide open reverse finish. Just an elite read.
This play here just shows his angle improvement. The amount of space he generates away from his man is impressive. His lower center of gravity and use of the off arm makes sure he maintains that space throughout the drive then on the finish itself. It's just great development.
He sees Killian in position to jump for a contact finish but instead of inviting it, attacks the open space on the left for the reverse (his handle has also gotten better from last year, allowing him to drop his mass, create tighter angles very quickly). Him jumping early helps eat up space, not allowing Killian to jump and contest.
This level on-ball penetration is what sets up his pull up game, as the threat of this new level of driving is giving him an advantage on defenders. When looking rookie to sophomore Edwards, you can see how much his game got affected by higher level talent. The drives I showed for 2021 would've easily been fine in college or lower level as well as the amount of space generated but at the higher level, bad finishing habits will bite you. Looking out for the finishing skill and IQ of athletic scoring wing types will be important to evaluation, and why they usually struggle their rookie year. The time to make reads being sped up, the man and defensive boost, and a lot of bad habits not being applicable anymore lead to them having to adjust throughout the season.
Thank you for reading.
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