The problem with the Paolo comparisons is he's actually showing flashes of greatness. Jabari is hardly showing flashes of competence. I agree he's fine enough defensively, certainly for a rookie, so that's great. Again, I'm not saying he's going to flame out of the league, but I think it's clear as day he shouldn't have gone 3rd overall. Obviously that is hindsight, but it is what it is. And yeah, maybe a bit of an overreaction, sure. Maybe he truly turns it around and lives up to his billing. I just look historically and don't see any players who were THIS BAD their rookie year and turn into Top 30/40-ish players like we were expecting. Can we name any? Again...maybe that's on me for expecting the third pick in the draft to have more to offer, I don't know. That's on me for having too high of expectations I guess, and I'm open to the idea that I'm overreacting to his rookie season and I leave the door open to being very wrong (I very much hope this to be the case!!!), but I think you're vastly understating how ineffective he's been.
Can we name any rookies at all with this level of usage and minutes played when they were as raw as Jabari is? I think that's the biggest question, and one where the org might have screwed up big time in their process that has seemingly broken him mentally. Think Michael Carter Williams as a great example. Had MCW started in the league on a team that brought him slower, and worked with him in more targeted areas that would get him productive playing time first and foremost, I see no reason why MCW couldn't still be a valuable role player in the league today. Think Shaun Livingston, or Garret Temple. However Philly brought him in and immediately thrust him into heavy minutes, and usage with ample opportunities. To his credit he did put up numbers and won ROTY. However it was horribly inefficient, and the fact that he kept declining instead of being on the incline mentally broke him IMO. It's a good skill for an organization to be very aware of where your rookies and 2nd year players are at, and putting them in positions to be on the incline rather than The Rockets/Process Sixers approach of treating them as though they are the Next Lebron with a starting role, superstar read and react offensive sets, heavy usage, and freedoms on and off the court. Jabari still has ALOT of physical and raw skill attributes I really like. That did go away from where it was on draft night. But there's no question in my mind that the Rockets really screwed up in evaluating how ready he was, and not putting him in the position to succeed and incline rather than mentally breaking him when he's given a veteran star role, and falls on his face in failure. Hopefully its not too late but I fear that mentally Jabari could potentially be damaged goods moving forward. The Rockets need to change directions with him like yesterday, and bring him back to his level so he can learn how to actually be a productive NBA player first, and then grow from there.
The issue with that is when you talk about "neutral parties" they tend to be people who would go on hype and draft position because they'd have very little knowledge about every random rookie. If I asked a random casual who was better, Tari Eason or Jabari Smith, they'd probably say Jabari based on the fact they might not even know who Tari Eason is....but those who have watched the two, or those who have dug into their numbers would know that Tari is a much better player right now than Jabari. When I say Jabari is performing like one of the worst rookies, it's just a fact, it's not hyperbole at all. Now, you can argue that if some of the other rookies might have performed worse if they were given the opportunity to suck that Jabari has, but there's no way of knowing that for sure. What we know for sure is that Jabari is awful. It's proven. There's no argument otherwise. Will he stay absolutely pathetic? Who knows? I'm not making predictions about what will be, I'm saying what is.
Somewhere between Auburn and Houston he's lost his shot. Once he finds it and regains his confidence, he will be fine.
I don't really like the framing of "still high" or the opposite when talking about Jabari, and where he's at. I think it's more important to state that the Rockets really messed up in evaluating where he was at when he came into the league, and what he needed to do on and off the court to get from point A to point Z in his career. I'm sure that Clutch like myself, still loves what he brings to the Rockets from a talent, length, personality, and raw skillset. Nothing about him physically changed from draft day till now. It's about whatever is going on with him between the ears most importantly. The Rockets are failing the talent more than our pre-draft evaluations of Jabari being incorrect, and us having to admit we were wrong or something. 99% of NBA players are developed. Only the handful of Lebron's are talent in the draft that is or isn't. Also if the Rockets are screwing up this bad with Jabari, I fear how incompetent they might be in being able to handle what could be an even more difficult project in Wemby. More upside, but also more to potentially screw up too.
Well said. Realistically Jabari should be in the G League today to build up his shooting confidence again, it's not getting any better in the NBA. I think it's clear the Rockets did very minimal evaluation of Jabari. They thought they were locked in on Paolo and just took Jabari as the consensus pick once he wasn't available anymore.
IMO his shot can really only be fixed in the offseason. The Rockets for now need to do a better job of helping him just focus on small achievable goals on the court in maybe more limited minutes. Alot of rookies actually benefit from a small injury, having a period of rehab, some strength training, offseason type of build up drilling, and a ramp up period which includes possibly a few games in the G-league. I think young prospects like Jabari get the most out of the summer ramp up, and training process. Having an in-season restart would have benefited him alot kind of like how it benefited Jalen last year when he had the injury and restart which led to a very good 2nd half last year.
Exactly... which is inexcusable. They should have been prepared for anything on draft night, and it doesn't take 6 months to evaluate and design a process for developing a young player. Even then there was a good gap between Summer league and training camp. All of us saw the potential for him to struggle bad shooting the ball, and use common sense about how a slump could impact him mentally as a young player. just very inexcusable, and makes me concerned about what they'll do this Summer.
Every aspect of Smith's value as a top 3 pick hinged on him being an elite shooter, not just a competent PJ Tucker shooter, but a volume 3 point beast.
If you are talking about shooting, I think someone already posted two examples. Durant shot 29% from 3 his rookie year, 42% second year. Nowitzki shot 21% from 3 his rookie year, 38% second year. That's why I'm not worried about his shooting... yet. If he continues to shoot so poorly in his second season, I'll pronounce him a bust. If you are talking about his overall game, tbh, I don't know how to judge in the environment he's been playing with. Some people say he shows no flashes. But he does show he can finish at rim. He's not very good at it. Part of it is physical strength. Part of it is habits, I think. People say he can't dribble. But he has adequate handles for a guy his height. Look at his high school mixtapes, he didn't look like he's a stiff. He doesn't have the explosiveness and athleticism like many NBA players. So he's not going to be an elite athlete type. But he has enough to be a good big man in the NBA. Some people say his defense is not as good as advertised. Again, I'd reserve judgment until he plays in a better defensive environment. He did show flashes in guarding one on one. I know there have been tons of overhyped prospects drafted at the top and turned out to be complete busts. But scouts don't just look at 30-some college games and declare a guy #1 in the draft.
His shooting form isn't as fluid as it was earlier in the season. I mean, he wasn't making them then either, but the ball looked better coming out of his hands. I wouldn't mind them shutting him down for the rest of the season at this point because there isn't much growth or improvement coming from his game. He needs a reset.
It’s a bad faith argument to say “well Dirk shot this percentage” or “Durant shot this percentage” as any sort of consolation. How about we list the 1000 other guys who shot like Dookie and were out the league by year 5? There’s a million more examples of flameouts than ALL TIME GREATS. The all timers are outliers to arguments, not proof points. Durant and Dirk overcame bad shooting first years to become HOF quality. Two. Guys. Out of a league that sees 450 players per season minimum. just because two guys out of literally thousands overcame the hump doesn’t mean Jabari will.
I remember watching the draft pick live and Jabari was following the usher to the stage. He walked past the stairs to actually go up to the stage and just kept blindly following the usher until the guy had to tell Jabari to go up the stairs. I don’t know why, but I had a bad feeling at that point
I think improving 3 pointers is harder to gauge than for instant making your FTs and even that you can only improve gradually.
It's not bad faith. The poster I replied to asked if there were any great players that played this bad in his rookie season. I just listed two of the best scorers. It's not any argument. It's an answer to a question, which I took it as a good faith question.
