DJ Fine-Tuning his Stroke

December 4, 1984

DJ Fine-Tuning his Stroke

Bald men don't grow hair in midlife, little men don't grow tall overnight and Joan Rivers this far in her career never will show class. Some things are given, others are accepted and the wise man learns to give up trying to change the unchangeable. So how are we to consider the marvel of Dennis Johnson and his shot?



Shooters may not be born but they are usually identified by the age of 20 or 22. Shooting a basketball may be largely based in technique and mechanics, but the process is superseded by a mystical force called touch, a delicacy of softness that can always be seen but seldom taught or learned. Certainly not at the age of 29, going on 30.

Consider the first play of the Celtics-Cavaliers game at Boston Garden Sunday night. The ball bobbed around until it found itself in the hands of Dennis Johnson, to the right of the foul line, 15 feet from the basket. Calmly, effortlessly, softly, Dennis Johnson squared his shoulders to the basket and let fly with his jumper. Swish.

Now, this is not to say that Dennis Johnson never made a jump shot in his life, nor does it ignore that Johnson always was deadly when he posted up to the basket and turned and then let fly or that he was a killer on the offensive boards. No, no, it was the other shots, the ones when Johnson was alone, 15 or 18 feet out, facing the basket, just shooting. Those didn't always go in; now they touch more net than a fleet of Gloucester fishermen.

"I first noticed it in training camp," said K.C. Jones, the Celtics' coach. "Dennis was shooting with tremendous consistency; last year it was in and out, he was a little hesitant, unsure of his shot, but now I'm awfully impressed with what's happening."

As a rookie with Seattle in 1976-77, Johnson shot 50 percent from the field, but his shooting percentage had been on the lee side of the norm since then, as low as 42 percent in 1977-78, 43 percent with Phoenix in 1980-81 and only 44 percent with the Celtics last season. This season, Johnson is shooting nearly 51 percent and scoring 19.5 points a game (compared to 13.2 in '83-84).

"I think he took it very personally last year, that teams were dropping off our guards, saying, 'I dare you to shoot,' " explained Jones. "Dennis responds to a dare."

So much for the motivation, but how about the explanation? Quite simply, how did this happen?

"It took me eight years in this league to find out that the one thing I wasn't doing was concentrating," said Johnson. "I would let the defensive player really bother me; the other change is that I'm putting more arc on my shot and taking my time."

The changes are working, and before each game Johnson makes a point of thinking about shooting. "The best thing for me is that I think about it before I go into the game, not so much that it bothers me, but I tell myself, 'When I'm going to shoot, I got to square up, take my time, put more arc on the ball and don't let anything bother me,' " said Johnson. Think, swish, think, swish.

It all really started two years ago in Phoenix, explained Johnson, when Suns coach John MacLeod would tell him that he could be a very good shooter. MacLeod would point out that shooting was mental. "What he'd say would be, 'You could be a very good shooter if you concentrated more,' and a few more things," said Johnson. "But I never paid too much attention to it or realized it at that point."

So he was always Dennis Johnson the defensive specialist, or Dennis Johnson making the big baskets, but never was it Dennis Johnson the shooter. What happened over last summer was that Johnson decided "to perfect or, at least, get the last part of my game in shape. And that's the last part of my game, shooting."

So Johnson worked on his shooting last summer when other summers would be time for rest. He'd shoot an hour or so every other day back home in California, working on the arc, working on relaxing, working on concentration. And now he's a shooter.

"Take Saturday night's game in Cleveland," said Johnson. "Maybe I had Johnny Davis or (John) Bagley on me and I'd just go up with no thought. I knew exactly what I was going to do and I focused on my spot and then . . . boom."

Guards no longer slough off on Johnson so much, collapsing on Bird, Parish, Maxwell and McHale, daring him to put it up from 17 feet. "Maybe people will still make me prove it, and maybe they won't."

But defensing the Celtics has already been altered, the guards aren't cheating so much, daring DJ to shoot.

"Not no more," laughed Johnson. "Not no more."