In his, thus far, 8-year NBA career, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander has amassed numerous accolades: four-time all-star, two-time MVP, not to mention NBA champion.

But that success has come with numerous detractors, with many fans voicing their issues that the Canadian’s playstyle relies too much on free throws, accusing him of “flopping” to exaggerate contact with opponents to draw more fouls from referees and earn himself free throws.

But how much of this rhetoric is based in fact? How much does Shai Gilgeous-Alexander rely on free throws?

First of all, it is important to mention that while the Thunder point guard leads the league in free throws made in the 2025-26 NBA season, with 7.9 per game, he does not when it comes to free throws attempted.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander only has the fourth highest free throw attempts per game in the 2025-26 NBA season (Bar Chart)

Gilgeous-Alexander comes fourth in that category, behind the Milwaukee Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo, the Portland Trail Blazer’s Deni Avdija and the Los Angeles Lakers’ Luka Dončić.

This does still show that the Canadian star finds himself at the charity stripe more often than most, but how much do free throws contribute to his overall scoring output?

To be labelled a “free throw merchant”, like many in the NBA fandom have, you would think over half of the two-time MVP’s points come from free throws, but that is far from the truth.

Of Gilgeous-Alexander’s average of 31.1 points per game, roughly a quarter of that total comes from free throws.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander's percentage of total points that come from free throws is seventh amongst the NBA's top 25 scorers (Bar Chart)

Amongst the top 25 scorers in the NBA this season, the 27-year-old ranks seventh when it comes to his reliance on free throws to score points.

Even looking back at history, the OKC point guard’s scoring isn’t as reliant on free throws as others.

Amongst the last 10 MVP seasons, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander only has fourth and sixth highest percentage of total points coming from free throws. (Bar Chart)

When compared to the MVP winners from the last ten seasons, Gilgeous-Alexander only has the fourth and sixth highest percentage of total points coming from free throws, quite significantly behind those in front of him.

The reigning MVP’s detractors will say that Gilgeous-Alexander’s true crime comes from watching him play and how he seeks fouls, but that is up for interpretation, naturally as all qualitative data is.

From a statistical perspective at least, Gilgeous-Alexander’s playstyle is nothing we haven’t seen done worse by players, both past and present.