Three Things I Noticed on League Pass: The Suggs Swipe
Hit the jump for this week’s edition of Three Things I Noticed on League Pass, starring Jalen Suggs, Payton Pritchard, and Jaren Jackson Jr.
Jalen Suggs, hand in the cookie jar
A member of the All-Dubin First Team last season, Suggs remains one of my absolute favorite players to watch. His offensive role has expanded and his shooting has suffered this season with Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner missing significant time, but it hasn’t resulted in even a smidge of a drop-off on the other end.
The Magic may have lost their NBA Cup quarterfinal game against the Bucks but that didn’t stop Suggs from standing out with his usual defensive brilliance.
It’s pretty rare to see a guard dig down on a big man and get a strip without fouling even one time in a game. A lot of times, they get too aggressive, swipe too hard, and just rake the big across the arms. Well, Suggs didn’t do any of that. He successfully sniped the ball THREE times, and twice from Giannis Antetokounmpo.
Payton Pritchard, manipulating
Pritchard has been fantastic this season, and looks like the significant favorite to take home Sixth Man of the Year. The shooting numbers are out of control, as he's nailing 43.2% of his 8.9 attempts from beyond the arc per night, and in only 28.4 minutes per game. He's also shooting 67.7% (SIXTY-SEVEN POINT SEVEN PERCENT) on twos, which is absurd.
He’s always been a little bit of a herky-jerky kind of ball-handler, but the way he’s pacing his moves in ball screens this year still jumps off the screen.
That skilled manipulation also jumps off the (advanced) stats page: According to Second Spectrum, there are 98 players who have run 100 or more pick and rolls this season. Among that group, Pritchard’s ball screens have generated the single-most points per possession (1.277) when the play is finished with a shot, turnover, or foul drawn by the ball-handler, screener, or a teammate one pass away. Yes, first among the 98 most high-volume ball-handlers.
Jaren Jackson Jr., secret southpaw
Jackson is having a big time bounceback year. His defense has him in the mix for one of the non-Victor Wembanyama spots on Defensive Player of the Year ballots.
But he’s also having his most efficient offensive season, with a career-best .620 true-shooting percentage that's burnished by his 59.3% conversion rate on two-pointers. My favorite of those shots: His lefty floater.
There are eight players who have made 10 or more left-handed floaters this season, and Jackson is one of them. (Only Jalen Brunson and De’Aaron Fox have made more than him.) But all of the players on that list other than Jackson have one thing in common: They’re all lefties. Jackson isn’t.
His right-handed floater has unsurprisingly been more effective, but he’s still the only player in the league who has made double-digit floaters with his off hand. Even Mike Conley (who shoots lefty but is right-handed in real life and has always had one of the NBA’s best floaters) has only made six of his patented righty floater this year.