Allen Crabbe and the Nets’ three-point revolution

Change often starts with a single player leading the way. Usually it’s the star player or the young rookie looking to make a name for himself. But for the Brooklyn Nets, change starts with Allen Crabbe.

You could argue that the Nets are already a three-point shooting team. They had 31 attempts from long range last season, good for fourth-best in the league. But, they were the fifth-worst three-point shooting team, converting nearly 34 percent of their threes.

This is where Crabbe comes in. That’s right, the likely sixth man for the Nets is going to kick-start the three-point revolution and bring Brooklyn into basketball’s modern era. He shot 44 percent from downtown last season on a career-high 302 attempts. Crabbe is easily the best long range threat in Brooklyn.

He’s already one of the most likely players to pull the trigger. In fact, only Brook Lopez and Sean Kilpatrick had more attempts than Crabbe last season. Just for the record, they both shot 34 percent from three. Crabbe also beats last season’s most efficient three-point shooter Joe Harris, who converted 38 percent of his threes.

So, the pedigree is there. But now the question turns to whether or not his teammates can respond. After all, if only one player is shooting, defenders will cover him. But the Nets should be covered. Jeremy Lin, who shot 37 percent on 156 attempts in just 36 games, is healthy and back. The Nets also acquired DeMarre Carroll, a career 36 percent three point shooter.

But the biggest acquisition of the summer, D’Angelo Russell, is Brooklyn’s biggest three-point question mark. In his first two seasons as a Laker, Russell shot a mediocre 35 percent from long range. He also chucked over 350 threes both of those seasons.

However, Russell is still young. Overshooting is to be expected from a second year player that’s trying to be the face of the franchise. But he cannot afford to do so on a team that was the fifth-worst three point shooting team in the league last season.

On the bright side, Russell will have Crabbe to mentor him. With any luck, some of that shooting will rub off on Russell.

Next: It took Sean Marks a year, but he finally got Allen Crabbe

The Nets will still have to escape their inefficiency woes, but that should not be a problem for head coach Kenny Atkinson. The first year coach served as an assistant to the 2014-15 Atlanta Hawks, who shot 38 percent from downtown thanks to movement schemes that should be effective with the Nets.

Brooklyn still has a long way to go before it reaches the upper echelon of three-point shooting, but the addition of Crabbe definitely helps.