Stephen Curry is shooting worse than Lakers' Russell Westbrook, and that's great news for the Warriors

Specifically, Curry is laying bricks in and around the paint

Stephen Curry is fast approaching Ray Allen's NBA record for career 3-pointers. He's the MVP favorite and the Warriors, with Klay Thompson nearing his return, are tied with Phoenix for the best record in the league. Things are good. 

But in the interest of tipping the scales just a bit back toward balance, how about this little buzzkill: Entering play on Saturday, Curry is shooting a worse percentage from the field than Russell Westbrook. Yes, you read that correctly. And yes, I'm aware that shooting percentage is regarded with little importance through today's analytical eye. 

Still, Curry's 43.9 percent, which would qualify as a career-low mark, trails Westbrook's 44.8 percent. To be fair, Curry's number falls short of a lot of players on that list, but given that he and Westbrook historically occupy pretty much polar-opposite territory on the shooting spectrum, it feels particularly notable.

How is this happening? Well, we know it has nothing to do with 3-pointers. Entering play on Saturday, Curry is connecting on 41.3 percent of his triples, which he is launching at an NBA record 13.3-per-game clip. Add in his league-leading 93.4 percent from the free-throw line, and Curry's 61.6 true-shooting percentage, albeit his worst number since the Mark Jackson era, still qualifies as elite. 

Broadly, the problem is two-pointers, which Curry is making at just a 48.8-percent clip, by far his worst percentage since 2013-14 and the third-worst mark of his career. Narrowed down, the issue, to whatever degree one can exist within this still relatively-small sample size, lies in the paint. 

Entering play on Saturday, Curry is converting 58 percent of his shots from inside the restricted area, according to NBA.com, down from 65 percent last season; you have to go back to Curry pre-All-Star days to find a lower finishing rate on his ledger. But that's still not bad. 

What is bad is the 34 percent Curry is shooting from the short mid-range (4-14 feet), according to Cleaning The Glass. That's a truly terrible number -- 33rd percentile among all players at his position and again a post-All-Star low. For the most part, there are two types of Curry shots that are not going in like we've all come to expect. 

First, the runners:

With 3-pointers accounting for 64 percent of his shot attempts this season, by far a career high, Curry is not taking these runners as frequently, but those one-leggers off the glass -- which, to be fair, are very difficult touch shots -- were money in the bank for years. 

Next, for lack of a better descriptor, the flip/scoop shots:

Again, these are super difficult shots that require surgical touch and ambidextrous control, but the creative, below-the-rim finishing ability is what has made Curry such an unstoppable scorer over the years. Even if you were lucky enough to run him off the 3-point line, he would still cash in one of these runners or dispy-doo layups. 

That's not happening so far this season.  According to Synergy, Curry is scoring less than one point per possession (0.99) around the basket, not including post-ups, which registers in the 21st percentile. All of which is to say: Look out, NBA. Because this isn't going to last long. 

Curry -- who is arguably playing the best basketball of his life -- is almost certainly going to raise these percentages as the season progresses. In theory, the Warriors' enhanced spacing this season should be giving him more room to convert in the paint, and when Thompson returns that will be even more true. If Golden State is this good with Curry laying bricks in the paint, how are defenses going to stop them, and him, when the correction occurs? 

Indeed, the Warriors are loving this. It's one thing to be 21-4 when your best player is on fire and there's nowhere to go but down. But to be 21-4 with the best shooter in history putting up outlier-low percentages? That means the only way to go is up, and that qualifies as a truly terrifying sentiment.