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The NBA's All-Low Basketball IQ Team

With J.R. Smith (and Andrea Bargnani) in the news recently for firing up an ill-advised shot with the shot clock turned off and for being fined and benched for untying opponents' shoelaces, and with Josh Smith firing up a questionable brick of his own earlier this week, what better time to name the NBA's All-Low Basketball IQ Team?

Point guard: Brandon Jennings - Jennings is averaging 8.3 assists per game this season, 6.0 assists per game for his career and actually takes care of the ball better than most realize (2.41-1 career assist-to-turnover ratio), but the number of shots he throws up on a nightly basis despite being a terrible shooter is evidence of a comically low basketball IQ.

This season Jennings is attempting over 15 shots (15.4) per game despite shooting worse than 38 percent (37.9) from the field, and for his career he's averaging 15.5 field goal attempts per game despite shooting under 40 percent from the field and only cracking the 40 percent barrier once in five seasons.

Here are a couple examples from the Pistons' last game against the Raptors on Wednesday:

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Shooting guard: J.R. Smith - What more needs to be said about Smith at this point that hasn't been said already? Let's just go straight to the footage...

"He wasn't thinking. We know that."

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Small forward: Nick Young - Sorry, 'Swaggy P,' but when there is an actual youtube autofill that reads "nick young stupid shots," and your career has been mired by such shots, you're making our list of low basketball IQ All-Stars. Now let's dig into that autofill playlist:

Swaggy gonna swag...

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Power forward: Josh Smith - In fairness, Smith is at his lowest IQ level when playing the small forward spot, as evidenced this season, but he needed room on this list and no one's taking that starting three-spot from Swaggy.

Attempting more three-pointers is encouraged in today's efficiency based NBA, but only if you're a player who can hit them with at least some form of frequency. Josh Smith is not one of those players, and yet he continues to troll the basketball universe and his own teammates by jacking threes up with inexcusable carelessness. This season Smith is attempting 3.8 threes per game despite the fact that he's shooting a horrendous 24.8 percent from behind the arc.

Smith also likes his long twos, and this is what he decided on with the game on the line against the Knicks earlier this week:

And here's his shotchart right now:

Courtesy NBA.com/stats

Just keep shooting though, Josh.

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Center: JaVale McGee - While McGee has become more foul-prone over the last couple of seasons and has recorded 399 turnovers in his six-year career compared to just 132 assists, he's also been more productive when on the court than most realize.

Still, the injured Nugget's top youtube autofills are "Shaqtin A Fool," "worst plays" and "bloopers" for a reason, and that's because he may have the worst basketball IQ of any player this generation. Need proof?

All of the coaching head shakes and facepalms...all of them.

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