ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Since Joe Harris’ arrival in Brooklyn, Nets coach Kenny Atkinson has set about building his battered confidence, convincing him he could be an elite shooter. Now that’s the exact goal the off guard has set for himself.
Harris — essentially plucked off the scrap heap in July 2016 — became the Nets’ best 3-point marksman last season. But this season, he wants to become one of the best in the NBA, setting the 40 percent barrier as a personal benchmark.
“That’s just a personal goal of mine,” Harris, 26, said at training camp at the Naval Academy. “I hovered around 38 and 39 percent last year. If you look at all the top shooters in the NBA, guys that might be specialists — like how I see myself as a good shooter and specialist — they’re always 40 percent and above. So that’s a personal goal for me to get into that elite 3-point shooting percentage.”
Part of the trick was convincing Harris it was possible.
He had spent his first two seasons bouncing between Cleveland and the Cavaliers’ developmental league team in Canton, Ohio. Harris eventually suffered a foot injury, got dealt to the Magic and promptly was waived — but during his time in the Cleveland organization, he had made an impression on Cavaliers assistant Bret Brielmaier and director of basketball operations Trajan Langdon.
When both Brielmaier and Langdon landed with the Nets — as, respectively, assistant coach and assistant general manager — they recommended Harris.
“He was like that battered doe you find in the forest,” Atkinson told ESPN. “He had no confidence.”
But Harris’ confidence grew as he shot 38.5 percent from deep last season, tops among all Nets who played in at least half the team’s games.
Shoulder and concussion woes shut him down after 52 appearances, but he proved himself a legitimate weapon off the bench.
“All these years, I’ve never had a coach quite like Kenny, where he’s tough and demanding in most areas, but offensively, he wants guys to feel confident and play with confidence,” Harris said. “He’s not going to be coming unglued at you for taking a bad shot or being aggressive. … He wants guys to have the freedom to play.
“If guys know their role and what they should be doing, then he gives you all the confidence and freedom in the world. So for a guy like me, that means being able to aggressively hunt shots through the offense, trying not to take bad shots but being aggressive coming off the screens and moving without the ball and having the freedom to take shots whether they might be contested.”
After Atkinson’s system producing the sixth-most 3-point attempts in NBA history last season — but the fifth-worst percentage in the league — the Nets added Allen Crabbe, D’Angelo Russell and DeMarre Carroll, all solid shooters. But Russell said Harris’ stroke has impressed him the most.
“We have a good group of shooters. I can’t really remember the last time that I had 3-point shooters as a threat, specific guys that have that stamp of shooters,” Russell said. “Joe Harris is the guy that surprised me the most that can really stick it.”
It took 40.5 percent to crack the NBA’s top 20 last year. Harris may need that to top a Nets team that suddenly has shooters after adding Carroll and Crabbe (44.4 last year for Portland) and bringing back Quincy Acy (43.4 in 32 games).
“Whoever’s getting minutes, we’ve been competing against each other, so everybody’s going to be sharp,” Harris said. “People are going to be real locked in and focused. You’re going to see an increase in guys’ productivity just because it’s the whole ‘iron sharpening iron’ thing.”