That's true, but I still think there are some things Jalen can improve upon--often he misses a hockey assist to an open man who's in his field of view because he over-focuses on scoring. Amen has an ability to recognize things like, "oh, this guy is playing help defense in front of me which means he sagged off his man over on the wing" and instantly make the correct pass, whereas many times Jalen will try to force his way past everybody on the drive or take a stepback J instead of making the simple pass.
Jalen is not going to reach his peak until either he gets traded to a team that fits his style OR Alpi gets traded. I think both players are good players but Jalen, just like he played in the 11 game winning streak last yr is best used in an open floor system where he has the ball in his hands or the system is not featuring Alpi in the paint. Same for Alpi, he needs to be the focal point. They're both rhytm players, they have to get a certain amount of touches. Not saying they can not be effective with one another but to reach reach their peak, one has to move on. We've seen Alpi at his peak last yr and Jalen at his peak during the 11 game win streak, the Rockets just have to decide which is best
This just means neither guy is all that good. Anyone who’s legitimately great can coexist just fine with anyone else. Wade was probably the worst offensive fit possible next to LeBron and they were incredible together. Same for cp3 and harden, or any other combo of stars.
I love how we have so little faith in the coach's offensive advice that we're asking Jalen to sit with Amen in tape sessions hehe Jalen needs to sit with a KD or Doncic, he's a confidence and feel player. He's not an engineer type player like Amen. Their games don't relate. Amens FGA's go up and down based on the opponent defense - it's very objective. Jalen is more like players who's shot is based on confidence - the person guarding them is far less relevant. No shame in learning from a younger player if that player is the right guy to do it. Amen is a PG or swiss army knife. Sengun would actually be a far better teacher here.
Jalen's biggest issue has always been not knowing when he completed his job. He's definitely improved on that over the last few months though and you can see it. He used to dribble into crowds attracting multiple defenders and figuring out to late that he has collapsed the entire defense and decides to pass out too late when defenses recover. He also is far too confident in finishing in massive crowds of multiple defenders when someone like Amen would just kick it out. But he definitely is improving in knowing when he did his job and releasing the ball on time when blitzed. Offense gets into a good rhythm that involves the entire team when Green passes out of blitzes on time. Ya he's definitely showing steady improvement on that end and that's finally all we need from Green as a playmaker which is just someone who playmakes based on scoring gravity. Amen can be the playmaking guard who makes the advanced passes and can be also a great connector when Green gets blitzed from his scoring gravity.
Fox had some of his best offensive output with Sabonis as a teammate. If he can figure it out so should Green. The problem with our offense is that Sengun is being utilized more for his post up threat which ya doesn't mix well with Green's game. But if Jokic was primarily just a post up player, the allure of that Jokic/Murray tandem wouldn't have ever existed. Because that tandum was created from spamming dhos and pnr possessions between those two. And it seems like when Ime thinks of utilizing Sengun he only thinks in the tune of posting him up.
I absolutely see where you're coming from! And I promise I'll stay positive no matter what--we're lucky to be able to watch such a talented young team with a young and improving coaching staff as well. I'm not about to take that for granted If some folks feel like they can't enjoy watching a squad like these up-and-coming Rockets, that's ok. It's their loss
Whatever you say boss. I don’t think the post that triggered you to minimize on/off in this thread was extremist to anyone but you and the few elite members of the Jalen defense squad. You won’t see me engaging too much with the extreme negative people because I think for the most part they aren’t reachable. I actually think most of the Jalen defense squad is smarter than the average hater, but the defense squad sometimes falls into making the same dumb arguments the “anti” crowd makes or picks and chooses when a stat is relevant based on how it fits their argument.
Jalen Green this season has a 55.1 ts% and a 51.3 efg%. These are career highs and encouraging especially as a long time defender of his. Out of boredom I decided to look at every starting 2 guard to see where Jalen ranks. He is 23rd out of 30 in ts% and 26th of 30 in efg% While he has improved a lot, its still not enough and he has to continue to improve in this area. Its always been about efficiency with Jalen and hes making solid strides. Hoping for a big end of the season to hopefully bring him to the top 15 in efficiency.
I agree with your premise but I also dont think Jalen and Sengun can't play together. Rockets lost all the games Sengun didnt play and Jalen didnt really pop off then. OTH Jalen is now scoring his career high ave on accuracy and efficiency while playing with Sengun.
I don't believe that either, i just don't believe either of them are THAT good. Kinda like fox/sabonis, 2 solid guys but neither one is anything special.
The big issue is he doesnt get calls for someone who drives so much. I have no clue why I think it is because he is too quick refs cant see it when he gets hit. If you look at the most efficient guards they always get lots of fts. Hell SGA gets accused of being a ft merchant. Jalen wont be efficient if takes only a couple fta a game.
Right now I agree with you they are on fox/sabonis level. But they are also only 23, I can give them till they are 26 to see if they have another level.
Someone posted a tweet comparing him with Booker in the last 30 or whatever games. Everything looks almost identical except for assists. Booker is 2 assists per game more than Jalen, which is consistent with both guys' career numbers. That's what separates the other star guards and the "good" Jalen. Even when he is playing solid to very good on scoring, his playmaking is still lacking. I am pretty sure by now he has been told/taught to make the right play at the right situation. I mean, most players who have played at this level for more than 3 years should have the head knowledge of what should be done on the court. But not every player has the innate talent to do it well. My theory is that Jalen simply does not see the court well. When he tries to scan the floor to make a play, he loses concentration on controlling the ball. And that's when some of his head-scratching TO happen. He doesn't have the processing speed like Amen does. edit: I just realized the comparison was with Mitchell, not Booker. But the point still stands.
Allow Jalen to get 4 turnovers per game dominating the ball like the 20 win Suns when Booker was 22-23 I'm sure he could get you 6 apg now with his current ability to see the floor. There is reasonable criticism of Green being more scoring centric but when he wants to pass out with the correct read he can. Most of his issues has to do with overconfidence in scoring on multiple defenders at the rim.
its how they drive. Because Jalen lacks the strength and has such incredible speed and agility, he often avoids contact to try and finish. Its why we see so many off handed, wrong foot, scoop layups hes so good at. Whereas elite foul merchants drive into the contact then shoot. Jalen gets fouled a ton and he has a terrible whistle but he isnt "creating" the foul, just getting fouled. Those type of foul calls are widely missed around the league. the calls that dont get missed? barrelling into the defenders chest and bouncing off them. I hope he can learn to add that to his game because if he was getting 7 or 8 ft's a game, it would go such a long way for his efficiency, rhythym and confidence.
I don't know if this is true anymore. Jalen can shoot now so if the floor was spread I bet he and Alpi would be peaking right now. We would be doing really well without Amen so we should be doing even better overall with him. The problem is not Sengun nor is it Amen, it's the fact that both must start. Two negative shooters is a problem for a guy who wants to drive and his coach has to put a leash on him because the paint is too crowded. However, this can at least be mitigated if the other 2 players are both excellent volume shooters. Right now Dillon fits as a shooter. If one of Jabari or FVV can fill that role it would be great but they've been so inconsistent. We need two BIG shooters with our core 3, and we can certainly see Amen and Green are progressing in that area. Your point about how we play Sengun is an important one. Look at Cleveland as a good example. JBB was playing double bigs and wanted them both inside. Atkinson shows up like a chess master and simply moves Mobley out of the midrange permanently, playing him more as a stretch 4. Opens up the floor for Garland to wreak havoc. Udoka is like JBB, he leans on the safety of a lineup overpopulated with defense-leaning players. You know he would have asked Mobley to be tougher and focus on the interior rather than push him out to the 3PT line. He seems to want Sengun to be like Tim Duncan. To be honest that has been good for expanding Alpi's game but at some point you have to balance between working on weaknesses and playing to strengths. We don't see outlet passes from Sengun much. For some weird reason, we won't run the same plays for him/Green that we run for Adams/Green. He's obviously taking too many shots (53 TS%) and not facilitating enough. Ime seems terrified of playing him higher up more often where an equally bad shooter in Draymond operates. Almost like he doesn't believe in anything but a traditional player. If you have a C, a SF and a PG all above average to very good passers for their position: how the hell are we last in assists? A lot can be done. People want to talk about the lack of superstar but this tactical mess won't inspire anyone to want to play for him. Players may like him but now they've seen his coaching in a larger sample. Hopefully won't be an issue next season, one of Amen or Sengun will probably come online as shooters. For now, we pray lol
Current Jalen I am very happy with. The "but" will be gone if he can do what he is doing consistently. No more extended slumps! Great job Jalen! Keep it up!!!!!
Hope you don't mind me butting in with an alternate theory, love this conversation. Booker has been notoriously bad at asst/to ratio in his career and in his first 3 seasons was horrendous at seeing the floor. Atrocious. If you say both of them are not naturals at seeing the court and they have to develop it with experience, I can see that. Not fair to say Booker OR Mitchell saw the court better in their 3rd season. Not even their 4th season if you consider volume or turnovers. You can't use assists independent of team assists or turnovers. We're the worst passing team in the league despite having a real floor general, a point forward AND a passing C. There is a systemic problem with this team whatever it is. Booker had 6.8 assists to 4 TO's in his 4th season how can that be called seeing the floor? He was just 4.7 assists to 3.6 TO's in his 3rd season - horrible. Jalen is already better than that 3rd season and on par with the 4th on asst/to and as you know Silas just delayed everyone's career by a bit. Everything in Jalen's career has proven to be delayed, it's not really a theory anymore. His 4th season is more comparable to other people's 2nd or 3rd seasons. If you don't mind doubling Jalen's turnovers, he can get you more assists and free throws like Booker too. This thing about making reads has gotten over hyped. The paint is packed always, every game, every quarter. The right read is to pass the ball to a bunch of bad shooters who have been left open because the team knows they're not good (except Brooks). The right read on a PnR is to attack the rim, lob/pass it for the vertical threat or kick it out to your stretch 5 who set the pick. None of those are options. How does he get an assist on PnR if the other team doesn't make a mistake? You can only pass it to Sengun near the FT line and let him create a shot (no assist for the passer). Sengun is bricking midrangers this season too. I'm not happy with where he has reached with his passing but he's no different than Edwards, Mitchell, Booker in year 4 with the fact that he's just not a PG. None of them are. These are the types who can get by at PG after almost a decade in the NBA. He's not a harden/SGA/T-Mac. He's a Kobe/MJ/Mitchell/Booker type. These are finishers, scoring guards, true SG's. Not the same calibre, but he's the same type. Even if he gets good at passing, he'd prefer to let a PG be the PG. These guys simply understand playing defense is far more impactful than getting triple doubles. Triple double guards who want to score a lot don't win championships. They are extremely unsuccessful at winning championships. In fact other than Magic Johnson, I can't think of one since then. Two way SG's tend to perform better in the playoffs. Because rebounds and assists COMBINED don't make up a quarter of the game. Defense is HALF the game. It's not a small deal how much better Edwards and Green are at defense than Mitchell and Booker in their 3rd/4th seasons. Team is worst in assists despite being unselfish. Reed, Cam, Amen and Green are all underperforming - compared to preseason expectations - at getting to the rim X amount frequently and efficiently. All of them mysteriously and simultaneously didn't have as good handling as we expected. Is it possible this is all a coincidence taking place for all our perimeter scoring options? How would a person's handle look if the paint weren't as crowded and there weren't 3 people waiting to swipe at the ball in the paint all the time? Space the floor. We're not complaining about ideal spacing. I would be ecstatic with the 18th best spacing in the NBA. That's the only problem and the front office passed on fixing that. It's so crazy to me it seems like they suffocated their own team and now are acting disappointed that the kids are playing EXACTLY as you would except a team with bad spacing to play (artificially deflated efficiency). I hope we get to see our core with below average to average spacing for at least 10 games someday. We've never witnessed that except when Sengun went down last season. The test we've put them against is not a realistic predictor of the future. There are no contenders like that. Contenders might have that like 20% of the time. A playoff team MAYBE 40% of the time. We face a packed paint ready to steal or block the ball en masse like 90% of the time. In fact, the magic are the only similar playoff team and it has hammered them worse than us. Check out their artificially deflated stats - our guys have really held up compared to theirs. The silver lining is: this is the worst any of our perimeter players will ever be at playmaking in their entire careers. This is the hardest offense they will ever have to execute. We've stress tested the sh*t out of their handles and playmaking. We've seen the bottom for them and if their bottom in their 2nd/3rd/4th season is comparable to the average in Mitchell and Booker's 3rd season - we good. Just my two cents.
