Jalen Green or Sengun going forward?

[cupcakesnake]

Green has always been a monster talent. His burst is undeniably elite. It's been his non-scoring skills, his shot selection, his overall IQ, and his size that have held him back. If you're rolling with Green going forward, you believe he's going to grow in these areas and lose a few of them as weaknesses.

Even in a big scoring game (in an win!) like last night, Green has very hit and miss. He took a lot of absolutely horrible shots. He made some and missed some but I never felt great about the process. He got absolutely swallowed up by Dort on a few crunch time possessions, and looked too weak to assert himself on drives against a set defense. Defensively, he was getting bullied and hunted all night, and in my opinion the refs let him get away with pretty blatant fouling. But then he used his burst to break down the defense, and kicked it to the corner, and then we're all falling in love with his game again.

Jalen has that burst. It's a huge advantage. He has been showing that he can use that advantage to create potent offense to some degree, but also he's simply been hot shooting the ball lately. I don't love overreacting to a hot streak, so for me, Green is firmly still in this murky area where I'm not sure he's going to be a star or not.

[Farhan0311]

Green has always been a monster talent. His burst is undeniably elite. It's been his non-scoring skills, his shot selection, his overall IQ, and his size that have held him back. If you're rolling with Green going forward, you believe he's going to grow in these areas and lose a few of them as weaknesses.

Even in a big scoring game (in an win!) like last night, Green has very hit and miss. He took a lot of absolutely horrible shots. He made some and missed some but I never felt great about the process. He got absolutely swallowed up by Dort on a few crunch time possessions, and looked too weak to assert himself on drives against a set defense. Defensively, he was getting bullied and hunted all night, and in my opinion the refs let him get away with pretty blatant fouling. But then he used his burst to break down the defense, and kicked it to the corner, and then we're all falling in love with his game again.

Jalen has that burst. It's a huge advantage. He has been showing that he can use that advantage to create potent offense to some degree, but also he's simply been hot shooting the ball lately. I don't love overreacting to a hot streak, so for me, Green is firmly still in this murky area where I'm not sure he's going to be a star or not.

I feel like you are gaslighting. He was literally the best perimeter defender out there.

And all of his attempts were in control. WTF?

[Han Solo]

Green is a future superstar.

[GSP]

Linsanity run over. As soon as Green started seeing legit teams in a stretch again hes been back to his trash bag

18,6,6 and 4 tos on .505ts last 5 games

he had a hot stretch against some of the leagues worst teams. Wizards twice, Jazz tanking injury depleted g league roster twice, bottom 3 Blazers.......lol

you take Sengun and you dont think twice

[Gusto1903]

Green and Sengun can be a poor man’s Murray and Jokic. They need to learn how to make the other better. I have faith that they will.

The Difference being, Jamal Murray is a great basketball player. Jalen Green isnt, he is just a freak athlete chucker without the Basketball IQ of a Jamal Murray

[Pelly24]

The answer was always Sengun here. Jalen Green doesn't pass my eye test, kind of like a younger Zach Lavine.

They lack the IQ and feel that enables great players to play with other great players seamlessly and win at the highest level. Green has great burst and bounce and body control and shadows of an elite scoring skillset, but I don't see the nuance needed there.

[Kiss of Death]

Linsanity run over. As soon as Green started seeing legit teams in a stretch again hes been back to his trash bag

18,6,6 and 4 tos on .505ts last 5 games

he had a hot stretch against some of the leagues worst teams. Wizards twice, Jazz tanking injury depleted g league roster twice, bottom 3 Blazers.......lol

you take Sengun and you dont think twice

Well, yeah that kind of happens when other teams start to double and triple team you.

But I'm sure you know more about basketball than Kyrie Irving:

Read on Twitter

[dygaction]

Linsanity run over. As soon as Green started seeing legit teams in a stretch again hes been back to his trash bag

18,6,6 and 4 tos on .505ts last 5 games

he had a hot stretch against some of the leagues worst teams. Wizards twice, Jazz tanking injury depleted g league roster twice, bottom 3 Blazers.......lol

you take Sengun and you dont think twice

Well, yeah that kind of happens when other teams start to double and triple team you.

But I'm sure you know more about basketball than Kyrie Irving:

Read on Twitter

Kyrie is MUCH more respected by nba players who knows more about basketball than the media.

[RollingWave]

I don't see why they need to pick a side, especially at this point. Granted, Jalen Green's cap hold makes this at least somewhat of a discussion (he has a 30m cap hold next year, if they in theory just move him for picks they could get to like 2 max next year), but I think most people would lean towards that he's at least flashed enough that you can't just give up on this right now.

How about we see Jalen Green being able to sustain above-average play for most of the season first? yes this burst is amazing, but he's also had similar (if not quite as extreme) bursts in his first 2 season also.

Having watched a lot of the Houston season, I also don't think these two guys play particularly poorly off each other, if anything the pocket pass to Sengun is like the one good pass Green makes consistently.

There were a lot of complications on the Rocket's season this year, including that they started by playing extremely slow and then through the season gradually gotten faster, while this previous 11 game win streak was kinda the high point of them playing very fast, some of this is personale, especially Amen Thompson (who was hurt / sick and bad during like the first 20+ games.) but a lot of it was Ime too, just watching Fred Van Vleet early season versus that streak and you'd see it was at least partly deliberate on the coaching staff to start playing slow.

Houston's issue on offense is basically
1. They shoot poorly, being consistently around the bottom of the league this whole season, part of it might be luck, but one needs to also point out that their "shooting" guard hasn't had an average 3P% season in his career yet.

2. They didn't cut much around Sengun this year, it's probably a defensive choice earlier in the season to net get too many guys stuck below the rim but that's taking away a major part of Sengun's game and also makes doubling him easier.

I do think that at this current rate, if we assume their general strength and weakness doesn't change, playing all 3 of Amen / Sengun / Green together is going to be problematic at least in the playoffs, but one they might want to worry about that when they get there and two these guys are all 20-21, they could easily improve their weakness or expand their strength.

[GSP]

Jalen Green back to his trash bag w/ a -23 in a 3pt loss, 3/1/1 on 1/7 no other Rocket was worse than -6 lmaooooooooo hes been back to his regular level for last 7, 8 games

lil bro looked like Frobe for 2 weeks and ppl were starting superstar talks dfkm

his linsanity run will be studied

[Jazz9]

It's funny that some people would rather choose a sample size of a few games to form their opinion on Jalen instead of what he's shown us during the last three years.
He was always coming back down to earth.

[GSP]

It's funny that some people would rather choose a sample size of a few games to form their opinion on Jalen instead of what he's shown us during the last three years.
He was always coming back down to earth.

Thats what happens when youre the 2nd pick of a draft some even said he shouldve gone 1st. Its pure copium. Jalen is not him

[QingJames]

Predictably, Green's hot streak has ended and he has been back to his old terrible self over the past seven games.

vs DAL - 5/15 with a -18 on the game
@ MIN - 10/22 with a -7 on the game
vs GSW - 4/12 with a -23 on the game
vs MIA - 6/18 with a -15 on the game
@ DAL - 6/15 with a -11 on the game
vs ORL - 6/17 with a +12 on the game
@ UTA - 1/7 with a -3 on the game

All told, Jalen has had an awful year, potentially his worst year since entering the league despite that hot streak. He's shot 42% from the field (42.6% in his rookie year), 33% from beyond the arc (34% in his rookie year), and 80% from the line (79% in his rookie year) but got the the line two times less per game than last season. His overall TS% is lower than his rookie year (54.1% vs 54.7%). Basically he is only able to convert efficiently when he gets to the rim where he is shooting 69% (which he can do thanks to his explosiveness), and is absolutely putrid at scoring beyond 3 feet from the basket.

His team remains 4 points better in the net +/- when he is off the court. He has improved marginally as a rebounder, but he has not improved in the aggregate as a playmaker or lead guard. He has improved slightly as a defender, but this is more a matter of leveraging his length than any improvement in his defensive awareness, which is terrible and why he remains one of the worst defenders in the league. His trajectory continues to remain Jordan Clarkson with hops, with a very slim outside chance at being Zach LaVine - a player who no team in the league apparently wants and doesn't contribute to winning, but can put up big scoring numbers on terrible teams.

It's pretty fair to evaluate a player after their third year in the league, especially if they actually show regression rather than improvement, like Jalen Green. He's a massive bust. There are 8 players drafted after him that are indisputably already better and more impactful than him (Mobley, Barnes, Suggs, Kuminga, Wagner, Sengun, Murphy, Jalen Johnson) and will likely remain so, and there are several more who I think will provide better impact on winning in the league than Green in the future, although the jury is still out.