Spencer Dinwiddie has no qualms about accepting an off-ball role with a healthy Ben Simmons at point guard for the Brooklyn Nets this season.

“This team goes as far as Ben and Mikal (Bridges) take it. We know who Ben can be when he’s healthy and in a good space mentally, and that’s what we hope for because to be the best possible team we can be, we need that,” Dinwiddie said at Media Day. “For me, I’ve always been a guy that they put in various spots. They tell me to do certain things, and I do them.”

One thing Brooklyn's coaching staff is telling Dinwiddie to do this year is take plenty of catch-and-shoot threes. Through two preseason games, with Simmons pushing the pace and spraying the ball around the court, Dinwiddie has looked excellent doing so.

He's shot 8-of-11 from three (73 percent), most of which have come off the catch.

While preseason games should be taken with a grain of salt, Dinwiddie's efficiency is a positive development for a Nets team in need of elite spacing around Simmons and Nic Claxton. This is especially true considering he shot just 29 percent from deep after joining Brooklyn last season.

The Nets had reason to believe Dinwiddie's three-point shooting would improve in 2023-24. The nine-year veteran shot 40 percent from deep alongside Luka Doncic in Dallas from 2021 to 2023. Forty-seven percent of those attempts were catch-and-shoot. That number dropped to 32 percent with the Nets late last season after he stepped into a lead ball-handling role.

Spencer Dinwiddie had no doubts he could regain his three-point stroke while stepping into an off-ball role alongside Simmons in 2023-24.

“Historically speaking, the one thing that I haven’t done well in this league is shoot off-the-dribble, contested, late-clock, and/or dire-situation threes, which to be fair, nobody does,” he said. “Before Luka, I was still a great catch-and-shoot three-point shooter. Now in Dallas, our offense was based around Luka creating catch-and-shoot threes for the other guys on the team. As you know, if a higher percentage of your shots are easy ones, and a lower percentage are harder ones, then your overall percentage rises. If it goes the other direction, then your overall percentage drops.”

“Most of my threes here last year ended up being late in the clock, confusion, end of game, two people on me, in which case I didn’t shoot well. Like I said, there are only two dudes in the NBA that make those: Steph (Curry) and Dame (Lillard). Everybody else – Luka, Trae Young, whoever else you want to name – doesn’t shoot those well either.”

Nets head coach Jacque Vaughn has emphasized the need for Brooklyn to have “premium spacing” alongside Simmons and Claxton in the starting five. Bridges and Cam Johnson are seamless fits having played multiple seasons as high-level spot-up threats alongside Devin Booker and Chris Paul in Phoenix.

Despite his struggles to close last year, Vaughn knew the numbers historically placed Dinwiddie in a similar category.

“Spencer has the ability to space the floor for us and shoot threes. That is a weapon for us that we want to use,” the coach said Saturday. “I talked about it at the beginning of the year, him being able to shoot catch and shoot threes for us. Historically, if you look at his stats on catch and shoot, he's been pretty good.”

“If he can shoot 6.5 of those a game, that helps us, because he has the ability to shoot it at a high level. He also has the ability to get downhill into the paint. So we just don’t want him just shooting threes. The ability to do both for us (is important).”

Dinwiddie's ball-handling ability may play a more significant role in Brooklyn's offense as the season progresses, given Simmons' injury history and the lack of shot creation on Brooklyn's roster.

He averaged 9.1 assists over 26 games with the Nets last season, the fifth-most in the league during that span. Dinwiddie was also among the league's most efficient isolation scorers in 2022-23, ranking eighth in points per possession (1.06) among 21 players with 185 or more isos, per NBA.com.

After three seasons as a historically isolation-heavy team led by Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, the Nets are searching for a new offensive identity with a new-look roster. Dinwiddie may not headline Brooklyn's game plan on that end, but his malleable skill set will be a crucial asset as the team looks to field a competent offense.

“Basketball is basketball. I pride myself on being one of the more complete players in the league and [being] able to do a variety of different things,” Spencer Dinwiddie said Thursday. “Whatever is asked of me, I try to do the best of my ability every night.”