I see a reoccurring theme with KPJ's turnovers. They mostly come in two ways: Miss timing passes by holding on to the ball a little bit too long, then trying to force the pass when the pass window is no longer open Being casual with his dribble and not protecting the ball from swiping defenders On the second one, Marcus Smart stole the ball from him a few times due to this. I believe fixing the first one is going to come down to a combination of getting more experience as a point guard, and watching game film to figure out the exact moment he should make the pass. The fix for the second is to focus on being more aware of where the defender is at any given moment and where the ball is being dribbled (keep it behind the hip), as well as maybe tightening his handle some more. Here's a video of all his possessions last night. What do you guys see?
Hey, nice link, thanks. I think 1 is classic young guy stuff and not terribly concerning in itself. It's one of those, "the game slows down," things–I think–and should improve a lot if he's dedicated. We've seen that often. 2 is why I find it hard to imagine KPJ can ever play PG. What you see as casual and not protecting the ball I see as "He's bad at dribbling." I mean, he's very left-dominant and even his left is loose. I predicted 8+ TO for our starting PG and I might have been underselling it. I'd like to be hopeful, but when can you remember a guy whose handle is loose for a SG improve to avg-for-PG? Consider, Ariza, one of my all-time favs, is a very smart, hard-working, long-armed, athletic player who never developed a guard's ball-handling skill. You remember how painful it was when he (first) got to Houston and was forced to dribble a ton. He was terrible. And you know if Ariza dribbled and passed like an SG he'd have earned at least an extra $100 M in his career. I think ball-handling is similar to shooting in that you can improve, but it's almost always slow and incremental, and uphill. I'd love to be wrong. I didn't see Chauncy Billups when he was in college or a rookie. He's the ultimate tweener-to-PG legend. I can't think of another example. Can you?
ball handling can be improved dramatically…see Harden, Kawhi, and PG who had no off the dribble game whatsoever when he was drafted and is now dropping off CP3 like an Uber Eats delivery Decision making and BBIQ? That right there is another story. I can’t really think of many guys that magically developed high BBIQ
Do you mean that you can't think of any at all? I'd love to know your examples otherwise, because I definitely don't know of any that grew a brain.
He will definitely improve, if only because no one has ever been this bad for a full season. But some of his mistakes are just dumb, even for a 21 year old.
One thing that has been talked about, KPJ looks bigger than last year. Correspondingly the dribble is higher, so that’s sometching he needs to adjust to. Also, he’s clearly pressing, the game hasn’t slowed down for him yet. He has good vision, but the precision is waaaaay off. It’s up to him really, he needs to be more careful and more precise, that’s a matter of work, effort and concentration.
I have a few, but they’re probably a huge reach…Reggie Jackson for instance his play in LA probably has a lot more to do with him not being asked to run the offense and just be a scorer/shooter off the bench than it does him just becoming a smarter player because if a team made him their PG running offense, he would likely revert back to foolishness it’s hard to point to a good example
We should focus on making our offense a facilitating offense that doesn’t depend on one guy setting things up and being a floor general. Like GSW or the Spurs during the big E era. Or the rockets squad that won during the 90’s. not every offense needs harden or cp3. our starting lineup basically have 4 out of 5 guys in the floor comfortable handling the rock as secondary ball handlers. We don’t necessarily need a primarily ball handler
I think KPJ would be most successful in a Denver-ish offense. We don’t need him to be CP3, when we have Sengun ready to control this offense.
basketball-reference.com Kevin Porter Jr (3 games): Game 1: 9 turnovers Game 2: 2 turnovers Game 3: 8 turnovers Breakdown: (see Play-by-Play / Turnovers) 13 bad passes 4 lost balls [19 total turnovers] ____________________ First month of new players getting together at the NBA level often make mistakes. Should have zigged when they zagged instead. Happens. next highest Sengun 10 turnovers ( 6 bad passes, 2 lost balls) next 5 turnovers: Green/Tate/Eric Gordon (each)
His passing style fits more of a Westbrook mold where he’s either looking to fit passes into tight windows, get easy dump offs, or transition passes.. I don’t think either of them fit the mold of a true set the offense of PG. they are seemingly looking for style points on their assists. He needs to grow out of that otherwise just be a scoring guard that can get dimes if the defense breaks down and you can kick to the open man. Nothing wrong with that.
These guys are really young so taking anything away right now isnt gonna do much imo. Gonna just have to get more games in.
Kawhi is a whole other world. That dude is a prodigy. Even in his rookie year, he was catching nutty Manu bounce passes one with hand on fast breaks, in stride. PG13 is a really good example, a model for hope. My concern is that KPJ is 6'4" - hasn't he always been a guard? I would have thought he'd get there by now. The best trash-handle to (kinda) PG example I can think of is JJ Redick. He was a two-dribble guy in college–worst star SG dribble I can remember–and by his mid to late 20s he was good enough to fill in as an emergency PG and bring the ball up the floor against pressure. I sure hope you're right. I want to be hopeful for KPJ. Huge BBIQ increases you see all the time in bigs. But I think you're right, a lot less common for reckless guards to get under control.
I wonder if you can get bball ref to search for progress stuff. Like find a player who increased from 15% assist rate to 25% or something - and TO% etc.
I agree that Sengun is ready to control the offense, but it doesn't matter unless Silas thinks he is. Silas doesn't even think he's ready to start, much less run the offense. In the immediate future, it's going to be up to KPJ to solve his issues. I wish he could hand the keys over to Sengun right now.
I am of the mind that we are hiding KJM, and to a lesser extent Sengun. Gotta play EG/House/Theis so we can trade them for positive assets.
Everything KPJ does is difficult. His scoring is often difficult shots and his passing is difficult. He doesn’t make the game easier for himself currently. We’ll see how progresses during the season
I don't know about EG and Theis but every time House steps on the court he ends up lowering his value. Then there's also what he did in the bubble which has given him a bad reputation around the league.
He's trying to get 10 assists when he should look to get 6 per game with about 12 hockey assists... Every play doesn't have to end with a player receiving the ball from you and only you...