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Bobby Simmons: Three-Ball Barrage May 6, 2009 By Ben Couch -- NJNETS.COM |
East Rutherford, N.J.—Throughout the 2008-09 season, whenever Nets coach
The layups and free-throws often left the hands of the Nets’ talented backcourt penetrators, Vince Carter and Devin Harris, but if they had to pass, the ball was likely headed toward the corner and Bobby Simmons’ waiting fingertips. Next stop: Net.
Simmons finished his eighth season with the NBA’s fifth-best three-point shooting percentage (.447). That mark led the Nets, and he trailed only Carter in long-range makes (117) and attempts (262). All three numbers represented career-highs.
“I never thought of that (being possible),” Simmons said. “I never knew my role was exactly going to be ‘shoot three-pointers.’ As far as looking at it now, you want to be the best at what you do, and if it was making shots for our team and our ballclub to win games, that’s what I wanted to do.”
Coming to New Jersey along with Yi Jianlian in the draft day trade that sent Richard Jefferson to Milwaukee, Simmons slotted in as the team’s starting small forward. The 44 starts marked the most Simmons made in a single season since 2005-06, when he started 74 games for the Bucks, a season after winning the NBA’s Most Improved Player Award with the Clippers.
The following year (’06-07), Simmons missed the entire season with foot and heel injuries. He pushed himself in rehab, and showed up ready for training camp in ’07-08, surprising Milwaukee. After averaging more than 30 minutes and starting in each of the prior healthy seasons, Simmons played only 21.6 minutes per game in ’07-08, mostly off the bench.
But this season with the Nets, it was apparent from early in camp Simmons would be playing a major role alongside fellow veteran additions Keyon Dooling and Jarvis Hayes. As time progressed, Frank began playing Dooling alongside Carter and Harris for stretches, which often shifted either Simmons or Hayes to power forward. And after an abdominal strain sidelined Simmons for the first two weeks of February, he returned to find Trenton Hassell -- who had been out of the rotation -- entrenched at small forward.
With that lineup change, Hayes remained the backup swingman, meaning Simmons was bumped to reserve power forward for the remainder of the season. Simmons -- at 6-foot-6 and 230 pounds -- ably filled the role without complaint, despite giving up as many as four inches and 50 pounds to opposing defenders.
“I think Bobby was big for us because we asked him to play out of position all year,” Carter said. “He started at the 3, and just because of us developing our young guys while also still trying to win, we asked him to do a little bit more, and he handled that extremely well. That’s tough for some guys, especially when you’re going up a position.
“He was phenomenal. And at the end of the day, it was great having him out there because sometimes it’s a matchup problem -- he can guard a lot of 4’s, but it’s tough to guard him because he has a 3-man’s mentality.”
That mindset has Simmons entering the offseason searching for ways to adapt his game to Frank’s system, with a focus on enabling himself to create plays instead of reacting to ones created for him. As he’s done for the past eight years, he’ll be in his hometown of Chicago, working with renowned trainer Tim Grover at Attack Athletics.
Simmons’ workouts have become habitual: Come in early for court work, lift weights, take lunch, return for scrimmages (with numerous NBA players and potential rookies) or more courtwork, then take the evenings to shoot before relaxing the rest of the day. He’s aiming to return to the form that earned him Most Improved honors, with an eye on helping push the Nets to the postseason for the first time in three seasons, calling the collective developmental success of the ’08-09 campaign a stepping stone to that ultimate goal.
“I wasn’t planning on taking a vacation,” Simmons said. “I need one, but I wasn’t ready to take one.”
