Green is not a ball hog or a glory hound - He fed wood while wood was hot. Green had 17 points, 5 assists, 6 rebounds, 1 block, 1 steal, 0 turnovers 7-14 FG 3-7 three pointers Team high +28
Right now it seems like that’s Cade - before it looked like that’s Mobley. At times it looked like that’s Barnes… and there is a strong case for Giddey, Green and Wagner as well. This draft seems to have a lot of impact players, and I am glad we have got one (or even two) of them…
You put Cade, Green, Barnes, Wagner, Mobley out there as a line up… Green will always take the big shots on that team. That’s the most important quality at the end of the day.
I'm not talking about distance, I'm talking about down 2 in game 7 with 1 shot remaining you're going to put the ball in someone's hands for an iso play. That's Green all day every day. Some of em can shoot, some of em get to the line, but Green does all that and dominates in mid range. You're going to Green.
He'll be the best scorer I think, best player is a question mark but we'll see if he improves enough in other areas in coming years. Barnes and Mobley have been the best players given that their defense is far ahead of schedule for rookies.
Best creator. You need someone to break down the defense and Jalen is the best at that in this draft class.
The cool thing about Green is that most if not all of his defensive woes come from either lack of experience or lack of muscles, both of which are easily addressable. There is no reason why Green can't eventually become a plus defender.
The biggest thing he can do to increase his upside will be focus on passing. He can put on 20 pounds of muscle, be respectable defensively, have a consistent shot, drive and draw more fouls, all that’s great and all, he won’t be a real star at his size without developing into a very good passer. Good news is over his past 10 games he’s averaging over 4 assist and over a 2.5 to 1 A/TO ratio, unbelievable growth from what he was showing earlier in the season.
It is not a no brainer to me like it is to you. To take the last shot: clutch guy Green hasn't done anything to earn this "go-to" guy role among the top5 rookies. And to be the best rookie (original thread) that involves defense, which we know he is also behind the other 4 top rookies. But I do love the fact that Green is doing great, and I still think he has the higher potential of this draft. Meaning, he might be the best player of this class in the future, but he isn't today.
Ask any Raptors fans and they will tell you Barnes is overrated on defense. He is overrated on defense, but underrated on offense lol
I don't think any of the top 5 guys have earned Clutch status - Clutch play is definitely not something you would evaluate on rookies. It's kind of a useless exercise at this stage in their career because the sample sizes are really small and frankly none of these players have enough reps in that area to make decisions. Agree with you on all other fronts - Green is turning into a solid player in front of our eyes and his ceiling is obviously still very high but he isn't the best this year...but certainly if he continues to improve the way he is, he is likely going to be a top 5 scorer in the league which is something valuable and he could even be a top 5-10 player/MVP candidate at some point if he can become a reliable defender and continues to grow into generating offense for his teammates. He makes decent reads today - but he doesn't generate offense necessarily in the same way Cade does which I think will be a point of emphasis for Green over the next few years and probably will have coincide with tweaking Silas' system to take advantage of Green forcing help.
One of the things Jalen has to improve on is just managing the game with the ball in his hands. He should look at players like Harden, Luka, Trey and others. They aren't as quick as him, but they know how to manipulate defenses. Right now when his first move doesn't give him an opening, he panics. He just passes it and runs off into the corner. He can dribble the ball arguably as well as any of them, or at least close to it. If he's able to just slow the game down a little for him and learn how to orchestrate the offense, he could be really special given his speed, athleticism, and jump shot.
That's why he was #1 in +/-. Great to see. People really don't understand about Jalen: Good defense is a much much much larger category than rebounds or assists or any other boxscore stats. If Westbrook could play defense, he would have a title or two. No matter how good an offensive player you are, that's still only half the game. Players like Gobert use defense ONLY to bring superstarish impact on the court, that's how much defense changes a game. The NBA graveyard is littered with players who are great at rebounds or assists but suck at defense. Ask Kenneth Faried, he'll tell you how much rebounds matter. Jalen is trending towards an elite scorer and above average defender, and if you look at the list of people who can do that it's very short and very decorated. A summer of workouts is going to make this kid an impossible player to defend.
