Second season First season actually playing Already bending defenders and defenses to the point of fatigue failure. If he stays healthy he's going to be a star.
As other posters have noted its not mind blowing at all and you are the one with the extreme bias here. Majority of non rockets fans consider Castle the top rookie in the 2024 class and its not just cuz Castle won ROY since even draft experts think that too. Its pretty obvious you dont watch Spurs games you dont know how good Castle has been for them.
He still does that crap where he's wide open and passes to Clint or another guy with more coverage. You just can't do that **** when you're the best shooter on the team. Let it effing fly my guy. This is the kind of stuff we need to hammer down for OKC/SA. Reed being a consistent threat will be a game changer
I think he wasn’t feeling it tonight. NBA players have that night where they just know shots are gonna fall but some night you just ain’t feeling right and not many players are in Steph Curry status to shoot out of the funk.
he's going to have more of those in the future and we'll still need him to shoot. Dude needs to reed clutchfans Its getting infuriating. When you defer so many shots teammates stop looking for you as much because they assume you don't want the ball
There was a lot of comparison between Reed and TJ McConnell in Reed's rookie season, but seeing them actually match up, it's pretty startling how much bigger Reed looks than TJ. Like...Reed isn't a super diminutive guard. He's not the longest, but he has a sturdy body and his athleticism can mitigate his lack of length somewhat--and he has good defensive instincts, even if he does still love to gamble WAY too much for my liking. In addition to being a flamethrower as a shooter, I absolutely can see Reed becoming a good defensive player overall somewhere along the line in his career. In fact, I'd bet on it happening more than it not.
Pacers are a bad team right now, but it was actually a sneaky good test for Reed. They were covering him very aggressively with a steady rotation of McConnell, Nembhard, Nesmith, and Mathurin -- that's a tough rotation of defenders for anyone to deal with. Definitely had a few shaky moments including a couple of turnovers and a couple more near turnovers, but overall I thought he did alright. At one point he clearly took advantage of them overplaying him and got easy paint touches. Overall not the greatest performance, but tough games like this can only benefit his long-term development.
Reed has def grown taller. He has been a great defender in high school and college so with added height he can also be a good defender in the NBA.
100%! It was great to see the Pacers guards aggressively attacking Reed when he crossed mid-court. He needs to see more of this in preparation for the playoffs.
Report from the Pacers game: A half-step slower than he was in the Cavs game. Hanging back more on drives, he got beaten a couple times where he wouldn’t have in that game. Also he missed a couple of 3’s you’d expect him to make. But a better game than I would have guessed from the box score. On top of the passes that would have been assists if teammates had cashed them in, he had several deflections and pokeaways that would have been steals if the ball had bounced differently. He’s trying to get more physical. Obviously he needs to build strength, but he’s getting more attentive to boxing out, making a little more impact when setting screens, a little more forceful when harassed on his dribble. I counted 4 plays where he met Siakam or Walker on their way to the basket and stripped the ball or deflected it or tied them up (he should have had that call). When he got stuck with Siakam in the post, he stalled him with footwork and Amen eventually got the block. Again, he seemed to have the green light to work on his penetration game. He tried that high runner/floater off the glass 3 times and got 2 of them. It looks to me like he’s figuring out where he needs to release that ball, and how high he needs to put it on the glass, to get over an NBA-sized shot blocker. IMO he’s putting the ball too high, and that’s why one of them bounced out. The main thing I noticed was his decision making. Some of y’all have pointed out that he’s passing when he should be shooting. From watching him off the ball, here’s my guess: He seems to be glancing all the time to see where the next man is, in case the ball comes to him. When the next man is open and hits the shot, that’s great. But this mode is so automatic for Reed that he defaults to it in the moment. So when the ball comes to him early in the clock, and the obvious thing to do from our (spectators’) viewpoint is shoot it, he’s not thinking that way. He’s checking to see if he can make the pass he had in mind. And when it’s not there, that split-second delay takes away his rhythm or his opportunity. This was really conspicuous at the end of the 1st quarter when he caught the ball wide open at the arc, decided not to pass to Jabari in the corner, and then put up a lame shot that was totally not his form. And then in the 4th, he caught the ball again with a wide open look for a 3, but he had already decided to pass the ball in to Clint, who thankfully scored. The other situation where he needs to work on his decision making is the trap. That play where the Pacers triple-teamed him bringing the ball up, he had no idea what to do and got forced into a jump ball. He just needs more experience being trapped so he works out his counters and knows what to do without thinking.
LOL. What I'm posting is maybe 50% dumb-fan-opinions and 50% stuff the coaching staff is telling him every day. And it's probably more like 80-20. But for 1-on-1 coaching, I nominate the "same-s***" guy:
I’ve watched a few of that guys videos and he’s the LAST person I’d want to send my player to. I’m thinking all the work Amen did with this guy and he’s not appreciably better than last year. At least from a “guard skill” standpoint. Maybe Brickey in NYC? Who does Steph work with?
Reed is a cerebral kind of guy. He doesn't need a coach to work him in the gym. He needs a nerdy dude to sit down with him with a bunch of bullet points after each game. In fact, I'm 100% positive that if Reed would read all his threads here, he'd be a star in no time. Collective wisdom of CF > any professional coach
