The NBA All-Star Weekend will take place in a few days from now in Toronto, and all eyes will be on Steph Curry on Saturday as he tries to defend his Three-Point Contest title for the second-straight year.
As we all know by now, Curry is rapidly becoming the best deep-baller in league history, or even the best pure shooter at that. But where does the baby-faced assassin rank amongst the all-time greats?
In our top 10 list of the best three-point shooters below, we’ve gone against convention of simply naming the sharpshooters who have nailed the most shots from beyond the arc and hypothetically placed where Curry belongs thus far given his torrential shooting pace.
Join us as we countdown the 10 finest marksmen of the NBA below. And to celebrate the upcoming All-Star Weekend’s festivities to the fullest, we’ve also made another special feature on the Top 10 Slam Dunk Contest Dunks, which you can check out here.
Ok, we’ll admit now that it wasn’t just Curry who snuck into this list. But how can we not mention Peja Stojakovic as one of the finest shooters from downtown?
The two-time 3-Point Shootout champion’s sweet shooting stroke was one to behold, and some fans of his game have even deducted his fine form in hopes of having the same success as the sensational Serb.
The likes of Chauncey Billups and Joe Johnson have his more 3’s overall, but Stojakovic’s 1,760 makes from deep were all made during a relatively short 13-year NBA career, whereas Billups (17 seasons) and Johnson (14 and still going strong) have spent more time in the league to amass their numbers.
Furthermore, Peja is only one of four players to hit 40 percent of his shots while having 4,000 or more total attempts from beyond the arc. If only the mild-mannered forward had started his NBA career earlier and during the point in time when he was in his prime playing in Europe, he certainly would’ve made the true top 10 all-time 3-point scoring leaders list with ease.
9. Kyle Korver
Remember when Kyle Korver finished with an insane NBA record of 53.6 percent shooting from the three-point line just last season?
It’s not just Korver’s acumen from deep during the previous campaign that’s been mesmerizing, but also the fact that he had led the league in 3-point shooting percentage in two earlier seasons as well. His .429 clip lifetime from beyond the arc also ranks second in NBA history and first among players with over 1,500 attempts.
8. Jamal Crawford
Two-time Sixth Man of the Year Awardee Jamal Crawford will forever be known as the 4-point play king. Then again, the important aspect of that unofficial title of his is how he primarily hits those shots from deep while still managing to draw contact for the free trip to the charity stripe.
Even if we were to brush aside those extra free-throw attempts, Crawford has still made 1,879 shots from three – good enough for seventh-most in league history. And don’t expect the 15-year veteran to stop going for his patented and-1 plays from deep, as he is one of only eight players to ever attempt more than 5,000 shots from long distance.
7. Vince Carter
Everybody will remember Vince Carter for his breathtaking dunks first and foremost (like this timeless, towering slam).
What many may have been overlooked was how Carter was just as deadly from beyond 23 feet. He is currently sixth in the all-time standings with 1,897 career three’s, and with a respectable 37.3-percent clip to boot. So it turns out that the Vinsanity didn’t just happen in the post; it was coming from all depths and corners of the hard court as well.
6. Jason Kidd
Ever wonder how Jason Kidd amassed so many triple-doubles during his 19-year NBA career while not being known as a prolific scorer to begin with? Well, he happens to be terrific from downtown, having made 1,988 three-pointers (fifth-most in league history) before calling it quits in 2013.
On the flipside, he may have gone a little too trigger-happy with his shooting from deep as well. His 5,701 attempts are the third-most in the NBA record books while also sporting a rather dismal 34.9-percent rate from beyond the arc.
Nevertheless, J-Kidd is still a legend of the sport and will no doubt be a Hall-of-Fame inductee a few years from now. But here’s a thought: could he gone 3-D on such numerous occasions without having a solid 3-point stroke in his all-encompassing repertoire?
5. Paul Pierce
Paul Pierce made clutch daggers in tight games his calling card, yet not all of them were necessarily three-pointers. Still, the hard “Truth” is that Pierce racked up 2,105 shots from deep throughout his career, and is one of only four NBA players to reach the 2,000 mark.
Although Boston’s favorite adopted son’s professional career is about to end sooner rather than later, he still has some time to catch the next guy on the all-time list. This now leads us to…
4. Jason Terry
Yes, Jason Terry – never known to have been a superstar on any of his past and present teams – is actually third in the all-time list with 2,131 makes from deep.
Terry only leads Paul Pierce by about a couple dozen makes from long distance as we speak, and both of them are still active in their respective lineup rotations this season. “Jet” will likely soar past Pierce if they both eventually retire in the same season, but neither of them will definitely have enough gas left in their tanks to catch up with the next legendary sharpshooter on our list.
3. Reggie Miller
Before the 3-pointer became a necessity for all teams in the NBA’s modern landscape, Reggie Miller not only showed how valuable the deep ball was during his time, he also turned it into his personal work of art.
Miller’s the only player in this here countdown to debut his NBA career in the 80’s and did most of his damage all throughout the 90’s. He also did more than just become the “Knick Killer”, he racked up a staggering 2,560 3-pointers in 17 seasons, and with just one team in the Indiana Pacers at that.
Only one player so far has been able to surpass Reggie’s statistics from deep, but now – as an analyst and commentator for TNT – Miller’s witnessing first hand probably the next superstar that will overtake him in the NBA’s history books…
2. Stephen Curry
… And that superstar that we were just talking about happens to be none other than Stephen Curry. It’s a very preemptive and bold move on our part to rank him this high on our countdown considering his tenure as a pro, but from where we stand, he already earned this distinction as one of the best sharpshooters to ever play the game.
In just his seventh year in the league, Curry already accumulated 1,424 made 3-pointers in his career. Give him another seven seasons and that same production, and he would’ve beatean the career three-pointers record by about 500 shots. But wait… you also have to consider just how insane Steph’s been draining his shots from (waaaay) downtown over the past few years.
First of all, he’s the only player in NBA history to lead the league in made 3’s in three different seasons, and in a span of just four yearsat that. In 2013, he broke the single-season record for made three-pointers with 269. Then in the 2014-15 season, he topped his own personal best and set a new NBA record with 286 makes from downtown. Finally, and in his current campaign, the reigning MVP has so far made 233 shots from beyond the arc… and the All-Star break hasn’t even started yet!
To top it all off, Curry’s lifetime average from deep is at an unprecedented 44.3 percent. Some players are even lucky to shoot that well from the floor in general. That figure is two percentage points higher than the next guy in the career three-point shooting percentage list (Kyle Korver), and he’s even shooting an unbelievable 45.3 percent from three-point range this season!
Of course, a lot could go wrong over the next few years of Curry’s NBA legacy. But at this alarming rate of his, there’s almost no doubt that he’ll finish his career having leaped over all the bars set by the undeniable 3-point messiah to this date.
1. Ray Allen
This finally leads to to Ray Allen, who was the consensus favorite to the claim of the world’s best pure shooter title (that was until Curry came into the picture).
Nevertheless, Allen’s all-time numbers are simply mind-blowing. His 2,973 career 3-pointers is over 400 three’s more than Reggie Miller behind him, and he took nearly a thousand more attempts than Miller ever did while still shooting at a cool-even 40-percent rate from long distance throughout his career.
With those numbers, Jesus Shuttlesworth’s records from deep look to be virtually unbreakable. Although Allen may have an utterly resilient and capable challenger nipping at his heels right now, we all know who really got game from the 3-point realm ever since.
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