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Grant & Danny compare AJ Dybantsa's Summer League performance to some of the other rookies in this stacked class.
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00:00With Danny, I'm Grant. This is The Fan.
00:03So ESPN.com wrote a piece, post-Summer League,
00:07NBA rookie rankings newcomers who stood out.
00:11This is from Zach Graham.
00:14I wouldn't say they excluded completely where guys got drafted,
00:18but that's not really the point of the story.
00:20It's just an analysis on what was seen from the players
00:24in their limited time playing Summer League,
00:26or if they're still going, and how they've looked so far.
00:28Just as an example, Darius Acuff, who is the 7th overall pick
00:33by the Sacramento Kings, actually comes in at 11th on this list.
00:36So I love him, but I agree with this assessment.
00:38He wasn't particularly great there in the two games I saw in Summer League.
00:42It looks like he could be an offensive end and did some good things,
00:44but he shot 35% from the floor, 27% from three,
00:4970% from the free throw line.
00:51Some of his flaws as a smaller guard defensively showed up as well.
00:55So they've got him outside the top 10.
00:57Again, just to skip ahead a couple of spots, Kingston Fleming,
01:00who was the 8th pick in the draft by the Atlanta Hawks, checks in at 9.
01:05They've got Morris Johnson Jr., the Mavericks, who was the 9th pick at 8.
01:10Yaxo Lindenberg, who was the 11th pick all the way up at 7.
01:12He's big league ready.
01:13That was kind of the conversation around him was,
01:16he's going to help you immediately, and he went to the Golden State Warriors.
01:20But I say all this to say, way up at the top of the board,
01:23you're wondering, where's Darren Peterson of the Jazz?
01:25What did they do with Cam Boozer of the Grizzlies?
01:27How did A.J. DeBonsa stack up?
01:30A.J. DeBonsa comes in number one on the list.
01:33Oh, I'm sorry.
01:35As he should.
01:36The number one pick was as advertised.
01:39I'll read you what they said.
01:40I figured we could just kind of react to this.
01:42They said, the number one pick earned the top spot despite attempting far too many
01:45low-efficiency mid-range jumpers in Vegas.
01:48I agree with that, but I don't think that's what it's,
01:51like, he has a mid-range game that is his calling card to an extent.
01:55I think there's, some of that's going to be baked in early in his career.
01:58It's going to be a lot of twos, some of the stuff you and I have complained about
02:00over the years, a lot of mid-range shots, low-efficiency in air quotes
02:04is what they call it now analytically.
02:06But that's part of his game, and I don't necessarily have a huge issue
02:10with that early in his career.
02:11A. I definitely don't.
02:12B. It's, when people talk about a three-level score,
02:15that's one of the levels.
02:16That's that middle level that you absolutely need,
02:19and he's got near and middle down pat.
02:22I know he didn't shoot great in the summer.
02:23We got two games of it, but that's going to be part of his overall offensive game.
02:27Everyone hates these because of the new world,
02:29and I understand that.
02:30It's more efficient to hit a layup or shoot a three.
02:32Yeah, exactly.
02:32You know that you want to be at the rim or around the perimeter.
02:35Living in the middle is basically the least efficient thing you can do in basketball.
02:40And so don't major in that.
02:41No one's saying you should, but there are end-of-shot clock plays.
02:44There are end-of-quarter plays.
02:45All of a sudden, you add it up, and it's five to eight attempts per game
02:48for a lot of people that are going to end up in that spot,
02:50especially if you have the ball in your hands.
02:51I don't have an issue with it.
02:52So here's what I care about.
02:53No other player produced as many highlight-worthy sequences as DeBonsa.
02:58A confident reverse layup in the first minute of his first game.
03:01An inside-out dribble that faked out a defender.
03:04Followed immediately by an up-and-under to split two more for a layup.
03:08An instinctive behind-the-back pass with the left hand for a bucket in transition.
03:12That was the good stuff.
03:14DeBonsa got into the paint at will in his two summer league games,
03:17which led to plenty of points and fouls drawn.
03:20He'll need to work on his shot selection.
03:22Who wouldn't as a rookie?
03:24You mean the rookie who was the focal point of everything for years?
03:27Yeah.
03:28And he sometimes looked stiff in his defensive stance.
03:30He was caught on screens a couple times when defending a ball handler.
03:34But it's immediately clear when watching DeBonsa that he has superstar potential.
03:39I think anyone who watched him in the summer league would feel that.
03:42Last paragraph here.
03:44Perhaps the biggest question about him after summer league is whether he'll get the same
03:48sorts of on-ball opportunities in the regular season.
03:51This is something I brought up after we watched the first game.
03:54I'm guessing he got to be the king of the castle, so to speak, and carry the ball and play
03:59point DeBonsa because it was the summer league and who was around him.
04:03When you get to the regular season and you've got your primary initiator being Trey Young,
04:08there's just not going to be as much time on the ball.
04:10So I think, understandably, he'll get less of that.
04:13But I do want to know, how much point DeBonsa are we going to see?
04:18Because there's point guard, then there's offensive initiator in the front court, there's point forward.
04:25There's a lot of nuance there.
04:26So, for example, they'd have Beekman or whoever bring the ball across half court, bring it up
04:31the timeline, and then they run some kind of screen, some kind of initiation just to get
04:35DeBonsa the ball at the top of the key and said, go to work.
04:37I don't envision that, you know, the 15th game of the season against the Hawks, that
04:41that's their plan.
04:42But it's interesting to figure out, is there a hybrid there where it's not just Trey Young,
04:4841 dribbles, here comes the top, you know, the screen and roll, and everything's initiated
04:52from there.
04:52How much of it is, let's work DeBonsa off a screen or two and then let him be the playmaker
04:56slash finisher.
04:58There's a fun puzzle piece to work out here.
05:00But that, to me, is the question about how they go forward.
05:03And where's DeBonsa best served?
05:04Because, again, we talk about this, it's not the same as basketball as it is with football.
05:08But my point was, the instant you see what the Roger Goodell goes, Washington selects
05:12Jaden Daniels, everything's now about him.
05:14Everything's now about his development.
05:16Protect him and maximize him.
05:17Because he goes, we goes.
05:19That's it.
05:20It's kind of that here for me also.
05:23Whatever's best for DeBonsa's development, if that means I have to turn down the fader on
05:28Kashawn George, if I have to turn down the fader of Ablau Koulibaly, or not worry, or
05:33Sar doesn't get as much, Sar, get in where you fit in.
05:35This.
05:36This is the lead goose.
05:37This is the franchise here.
05:39As great as he is, if he's a MVP candidate, all NBA-type player at the top of his powers,
05:45we're now a championship contender, as everyone else kind of fills in.
05:48And that's the point.
05:49How do we get him there?
05:50Yeah, he's going to suck up most of the oxygen in the room.
05:53Yeah.
05:53And he gets to.
05:54Yep.
05:54He's that good.
05:55He's great.
05:55They have Cam Boozer second, and Darren Peterson third, by the way.
05:59They flip-flopped how those guys were drafted.
06:02What they say about Boozer, who they point out, he didn't shoot threes like Peterson,
06:08or he didn't dunk like Caleb Wilson, who, by the way.
06:13Caleb Wilson looked sparkling.
06:14He looked so good.
06:16This draft's just going to be amazing.
06:17Yep.
06:17But with Boozer, they talk about how he still filled up the stat sheet, and he just stuffed the box
06:23score.
06:2419 points, seven rebounds, over three assists, over two steals.
06:28The size, the speed, he looks huge, and he blows by guys.
06:31He's going to be really, really good.
06:33And then Peterson, obviously, scored the basketball.
06:36I think he's got a lot of work to do as a ball handler.
06:39He turned the ball over eight times in his first couple of games, including one against the Wizards.
06:44But if you're a fan of, not just here in D.C. where we got the Bonsa, you know, Memphis
06:49with Boozer,
06:51Utah with Peterson, Chicago with Caleb Wilson, I think you're in for a treat.
06:55The other guy that looked amazing was Braden Burris from the Bucs.
06:59He had a hell of a fall league, or a summer league so far to this point.
07:03And in fact, his, I didn't realize this, but he had 12 assists and three turnovers,
07:08and his ratio of turnovers per game was like 0.3, basically,
07:14which no one else was under one and a half in this rookie class.
07:17And that's with the guy that had the ball a ton.
07:20He averaged 22 points on 50% shooting.
07:22He was great.
07:23He's awesome.
07:24Yeah, I'm telling you, this class is an all-timer.
07:27Caleb Wilson, for example, I'll hone in on him for a second.
07:29Now, injuries robbed us of a lot of that season, so who knows whether this was coming or not.
07:33But I don't think he played the full year.
07:35I wonder where he would have gone.
07:36Same.
07:36I mean, I don't think he had more than a three in any game in his college season
07:41and just walked into his first one hitting three after three after three
07:44like he was Tayshaun Prince that time for Kentucky.
07:47Like he was just throwing it in the ocean.
07:49And he could jump out of the gym and he's got a condor wingspan and stuff,
07:52and they got a great one there too.
07:53And go down to Keaton Vogler, who is awesome,
07:56and it was sort of the bottom of this list.
07:58It's like, oh, I'm just a throw in.
07:59I mean, I see Stephon Marbury with Darius Acuff, and he's last on this list.
08:04This class is going to go down all time.
08:06But to Boozer super quick, this is why all the analytics darlings
08:11and a lot of the people were like, people are missing this with Boozer.
08:14He's not going to test as well.
08:15He's not going to make change off the top of the backboard or anything.
08:19But you forget, A, that that's not what this league is right now this minute.
08:23For every unbelievable athlete that can jump out of the gym and do this, that, and the other,
08:27your MVPs are guys like Jokic and Luka Doncic and a bunch of dudes that control the game in a
08:33different way.
08:33This is a heady, smart, cerebral, better athlete that people give credit for.
08:37He's going to be a badass in Memphis.
08:39I had to click, though, when I saw they did a re-rank of all the draft prospects just to
08:43see.
08:44I mean, there's only one way to go if you're DeBonsa.
08:46Unless you just hold serve.
08:48Forever.
08:48Unless you just stay at number one.
08:50And it was only a couple games.
08:53Now, understandably so, I didn't want him to play anymore.
08:56I jokingly, half-jokingly, said after the first game I watched, I'm good.
09:01Put him in bubble wrap.
09:02Be done with this.
09:03I didn't love the decision to basically remove everybody from the summer league activity.
09:09I'm cool with it with DeBonsa and a couple of the other guys,
09:12but you're a terrible team the last few years with a lot of young guys.
09:15I think a guy like Trey Johnson needs experience.
09:19He's someone who could actually benefit from playing in these games
09:22because he barely played at the NBA level last season because of injuries.
09:25I think someone like Will Riley, who I love, I think his game's awesome,
09:29he's going to benefit from being an alpha and taking over,
09:33especially if you get to put your elbows out a little bit without DeBonsa
09:37and be the guy.
09:38I wanted to see that.
09:39So I was a little disappointed that they basically pulled everyone meaningful
09:42out of the summer league, but I didn't want DeBonsa playing a whole lot more
09:46than he did because there's just nothing to be gained from that.
09:49We talked about it one of the days that you were out.
09:51I selfishly, because the news broke when Toby and I were on air,
09:54that he wouldn't play anymore.
09:56I said I wanted one more, and I understand it.
09:58I'm not criticizing anybody.
09:59I was selfish.
10:01I just want to see it.
10:02It's just because you want to watch it.
10:03That's a huge part.
10:04There's not a whole lot to be gained.
10:05The other part was, I mean, my only, it's not a nitpick,
10:08it's an observation.
10:09One for 11 from three.
10:10And I would go, here's how I would approach it.
10:13You've gotten in the lane at will.
10:15Yes.
10:16You've shown you've got your pull-up game,
10:17you're in between game, using your footwork for mid-range.
10:19Let's go hunt some jump shots.
10:21I want tape of guys that are trying to put food on their plate
10:24getting in your way and bothering you.
10:26Don't take in any more contact.
10:27I want you to hunt some of those step-back jumpers,
10:29some of those jumpers off screens,
10:31and then we can put some video together,
10:33some in-game experiences to go,
10:34now look at what you did on this jump shot.
10:36Your shoulders weren't square,
10:37or you didn't have your knees underneath you,
10:39or your feet weren't lined up.
10:40I want some of that more raw data for an improvement set for DeBonsa.
10:45But again, I understood completely that they were going to shut him down.
10:48Yeah, I would have had no problem with him playing a couple more games.
10:51I mean, it's basketball.
10:52What does a basketball player do?
10:54Right.
10:54Herm Edwards, though.
10:55They play basketball.
10:55They play basketball, coach.
10:56Right.
10:57So let's play basketball.
10:58Hello.
10:59But I don't think what you just said is necessary to coach him up.
11:02I mean, they know what he needs to work on.
11:04They've got the tape.
11:05They'll be able to get in the lab.
11:06They knew that before he went out to the summer league.
11:08They knew it.
11:09Sure.
11:09After watching all the tape from the year,
11:11they know where the hitch is and the shot
11:12and all the things they're trying to iron out.
11:14But could he have benefited from it?
11:18I suppose.
11:20I just, because he's not playing,
11:22this is not preseason football.
11:24Right.
11:25Jaden Daniels isn't playing,
11:26so what's the point of playing anyone?
11:28Or vice versa.
11:29Like, the offensive line's not playing,
11:30so Jaden can't play.
11:31No.
11:32Send Trey Johnson out there,
11:33who hasn't played a whole lot.
11:34Get Will Riley out there
11:36and tell him to go dominate the summer league.
11:37That's what I would have liked to have seen.
11:39And AJ, you sit over there.
11:41That room over there,
11:42that's your room.
11:43Uh-huh.
11:43These guys, they're out on the floor.
11:45That's how I would have operated,
11:46but it's probably six and one,
11:49half dozen and the other.
11:50Sure.
11:50A lot of time between now and October
11:52when they're ramping this thing up,
11:53and he'll be ready to go.
11:55Beltway Blitz at 4 o'clock.
11:57Again, we are going to be giving away tickets
11:58to see news.
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