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Laker fans are beyond excited because of this new video of Russell Westbrook making it rain from everywhere on the court. And there is a big reason for it. His shooting motion looks a lot different. Calm, fluid, he doesn’t jump too much, and the release is on the way up, as opposed to looking like the shoot button got stuck on 2k. And honestly, these look beautiful. So is this finally it? Is Russell Westbrook finally turning into a sniper? I’m afraid I’ll have to pump the brakes a little bit and explain what’s actually going on. What up everybody, my name is Stefan and this is Heat Check. Let’s get into it. Transformations of extremely bad shooters to good or decent ones are absolutely possible. Lonzo Ball completely changed his shooting mechanics and got rid of that awful side release, and through hard work and dedication improved steadily season after season, so in 4 years he went from 30.5% from downtown, to 37.8%. That’s amazing. So yeah if you’re a bad shooter, the large majority of it has to do with the mechanics so improving that, will most likely improve the numbers. And this is where we get to Westbrook. And why I’m not totally sold on this. Thing is, I got excited as well when I first saw this video. In comparison to how he shoots in a game, there’s a night and day difference. Just look at how he seemingly stops midway through his shot, and how long he holds it like that before releasing. Here are a few more examples for you to see that pause. Look at how tense and almost robotic that shot looks. But then, I looked at some older practice footage. And it’s as nice looking as this lakers one. Smooth, in control, 1 motion shot, no hitch in the middle of it, nice and fluid. At least some of these look like that. And that’s the main point of this video. Russell Westbrook’s biggest problem is actually his inconsistency. Because he can be in control and shoot a nice and relaxed looking shot, but not every time. He even does it in games. Look at some of these. Look at how fluid they look. Usually this happens when Russ is more open and has more time to focus on the shot. Some of these shots are honestly beautiful. But then of course as I said, there are a lot of these robotic twitchy looking ones. And that’s how he ultimately gets these horrible numbers from the last 4 seasons. Heck, Russell even does it here. Look at the pause right here and the distinct break in the motion. It looks exactly like his old shot. So, we cannot go off of this with Westbrook being in a controlled environment, at a practice court, without a defender, no game speed, no crowd, nothing. When he starts going 100 miles an hour in a game like he always does, will he then be able to slow down and be just as cool and smooth on the jumpshot like he is right here? While I highly doubt that, I do wanna say that playing on this stacked Laker roster, he will have a lot of open shots, so I guess all he needs to do is be able to convert those. As a horrible shooter myself, I always wanna see guys improving so I hope to see Russ swishing jumpers with a revamped and improved shot release. Let me know in the comments what do you think. Is there hope here or will we see the same old Westbrook in season. That’s it for now, subscribe and talk to you in the next one. Peace out.