Deandre Ayton news and highlights

[WeekapaugGroove]

Ayton being good at D would really change the equation for this team. What's really encouraging is he still has some simple things to clean up on that side of the ball that would take him up a level. I don't mean that as some backhanded compliment either.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using RealGM mobile app

[Revived]

I know Ayton didn’t shoot a great percentage the last game but I love the fact that he still took 22 shots.

He’s gonna be an efficient player most nights so him maintaining that assertiveness will be very important and will lead to better looks for other players when he passes.

His help defense is improving. That play in the last game against Boston in which Hayward missed the wide open layup in the 4th QTR shows that it’s still a work in progress and you could see Booker and Rubio both getting on Ayton about it immediately afterwards.

It’s more about recognition than effort at this point and that’s a good thing compared to what it was last year and when he was in college.

[lilfishi22]

Ayton taking 22 shots means on those nights, we have a more balanced offensive focus which makes us harder to defend. I'd also wager he wouldn't be shooting below 50% on most nights where he's taking this many shots either so I think we should keep working on getting Ayton the ball.

[sunskerr]

It's great we can start looking at getting Ayton more shots because he is more aggressive now. I think a big part of that should come from bringing Oubre off the bench and getting Saric more passing opportunities. He seems to have a decent eye for finding Ayton.

[ATTL]

Watch on YouTube

[Saberestar]

Third consecutive GREAT game from Ayton. I am so excited about it that I want to comment again his numbers and impact on these games.

@Knicks:
26 points, 21 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 blocks. 11/15 shooting, 4/4 FTs in 35 minutes.

@Celtics:
26 points, 15 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 blocks. 8/22 shooting, 10/11 FTs in 36 minutes.

Spurs:
25 points, 12 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 block. 9/14 shooting, 7/8 FTs in 39 minutes.

He is FINALLY playing a lot of minutes, he was usually in the high twenties or low thirties last year and even this season until this week....that means that he is in great shape and in a good conditioning now.

He played with a high motor this past week, he has been really active and decisive.
23 free throws in these last three games. That's huge, he needs to keep it up.

In these games he has faced different type of frontcourt players, but obviously the best one is LaMarcus Aldridge. He showed that he is already as good as him on both sides of the court, and that's encouraging. Aldridge is the better shooter and Ayton is the better rebounder, but other than that they are pretty similar and we need to remember that Ayton is just 21.

Well, it's an small sample size yet, but this "New Ayton Post Bench" is an amazing C. I can't wait to watch him against the Pacers.

[jcsunsfan]

Third consecutive GREAT game from Ayton. I am so excited about it that I want to comment again his numbers and impact on these games.

@Knicks:
26 points, 21 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 blocks. 11/15 shooting, 4/4 FTs in 35 minutes.

@Celtics:
26 points, 15 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 blocks. 8/22 shooting, 10/11 FTs in 36 minutes.

Spurs:
25 points, 12 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 block. 9/14 shooting, 7/8 FTs in 39 minutes.

He is FINALLY playing a lot of minutes, he was usually in the high twenties or low thirties last year and even this season until this week....that means that he is in great shape and in a good conditioning now.

He played with a high motor this past week, he has been really active and decisive.
23 free throws in these last three games. That's huge, he needs to keep it up.

In these games he has faced different type of frontcourt players, but obviously the best one is LaMarcus Aldridge. He showed that he is already as good as him on both sides of the court, and that's encouraging. Aldridge is the better shooter and Ayton is the better rebounder, but other than that they are pretty similar and we need to remember that Ayton is just 21.

Well, it's an small sample size yet, but this "New Ayton Post Bench" is an amazing C. I can't wait to watch him against the Pacers.

Actually, I would consider it the fourth consecutive great game. 20, 10 and 2 blocks at Atlanta.

[Frank Lee]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

[Saberestar]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

I don't think so. I think that his "good or bad" play depends mostly on him.

Yesterday against the Pacers he was playing a solid to good game until his third foul. And I don't talk too much about refs but two of these fouls were bad calls. Sabonis was banging him and he just was receiving the contact. How can be that a foul?

At that moment we were in the game (IDK exactly but it was close) and Ayton was producing. 8 points and 5 rebounds or something like that in 15 minutes and with good percentages.

In the second half he was out of rhythm and he played a terrible half. Mentally he was not there. And that's a problem, I understand. He needs to be stronger mentally to fight adversity and stay focused in the game when things don't go his way.

We need to understand that he is just 21 and consistency at that age is pretty difficult. Hopefully he plays a nice game against the Spurs this Friday and he can build on that one.

[GoodBehavior]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

I don't think so. I think that his "good or bad" play depends mostly on him.

Yesterday against the Pacers he was playing a solid to good game until his third foul. And I don't talk too much about refs but two of these fouls were bad calls. Sabonis was banging him and he just was receiving the contact. How can be that a foul?

At that moment we were in the game (IDK exactly but it was close) and Ayton was producing. 8 points and 5 rebounds or something like that in 15 minutes and with good percentages.

In the second half he was out of rhythm and he played a terrible half. Mentally he was not there. And that's a problem, I understand. He needs to be stronger mentally to fight adversity and stay focused in the game when things don't go your way.

We need to understand that he is just 21 and consistency at that age is pretty difficult. Hopefully he plays a nice game against the Spurs this Friday and he can build on that one.

+1, completely spot on.

He was doing fine, then completely fell apart after that third foul. He also fell apart during the Sac game when he kicked the chair after a call went against him. His confidence and emotional stability isn't where I think most fans would like it to be. He's young but he's got to be more consistent.

Sabonis and Turner are undersized centers / power forwards. He should have had his way with them, but they really packed the paint. The two tower was giving both DA and Booker problem. Booker has the skillset to deal with it. DA doesn't have the outside game (3 ball) to really counter it, yet.

[Archx]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

I would also like to look at it from a different perspective.

League has changed so much in these past years. It's all about star wing/guard players now who can do a little bit of everything. Playmaking, scoring rebounding.... Everything is happening from outside in. And i think this is something Shaq and Barkley discussed the other day. Great big guys like AD, DMC, KAT, Embiid etc... They don't or didn't see much success without having other star combo players around them. KAT as dominant as he is, he's still stuck on a mediocre team with no real help.

Same goes for Ayton. He is holding his ground, he is an impactful player on both ends of the floor and that's all you can probably ask from a 2nd year big guy. He is an athletic freak who can disrupt shots and make life difficult for guys trying to get to the rim. But Shaq and Barkley era is gone and i would much rather see Ayton to focus on playing great defense and maybe also work on his long shots to space the floor for Booker.

But in order for PHX to really get somewhere, they'll have to strengthen the bench, sometimes it gets overlooked but having a 6th or 7th guy who can give you 15pts a night, is incredibly helpful. Also, almost all top teams have great benches. Right now on most nights, the only reliable bench guy is Bridges and even he is only a 2nd year player.

[Saberestar]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

I would also like to look at it from a different perspective.

League has changed so much in these past years. It's all about star wing/guard players now who can do a little bit of everything. Playmaking, scoring rebounding.... Everything is happening from outside in. And i think this is something Shaq and Barkley discussed the other day. Great big guys like AD, DMC, KAT, Embiid etc... They don't or didn't see much success without having other star combo players around them. KAT as dominant as he is, he's still stuck on a mediocre team with no real help.

Same goes for Ayton. He is holding his ground, he is an impactful player on both ends of the floor and that's all you can probably ask from a 2nd year big guy. He is an athletic freak who can disrupt shots and make life difficult for guys trying to get to the rim. But Shaq and Barkley era is gone and i would much rather see Ayton to focus on playing great defense and maybe also work on his long shots to space the floor for Booker.

But in order for PHX to really get somewhere, they'll have to strengthen the bench, sometimes it gets overlooked but having a 6th or 7th guy who can give you 15pts a night, is incredibly helpful. Also, almost all top teams have great benches. Right now on most nights, the only reliable bench guy is Bridges and even he is only a 2nd year player.

Yeah, but we are having a tough time with three rotation players injured at the same time. Usually our bench is mediocre, but not that bad.

Our 7th, 8th and 9th guys were out the last couple of games (Baynes, Kaminsky and Cam Johnson).

[Revived]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

I would also like to look at it from a different perspective.

League has changed so much in these past years. It's all about star wing/guard players now who can do a little bit of everything. Playmaking, scoring rebounding.... Everything is happening from outside in. And i think this is something Shaq and Barkley discussed the other day. Great big guys like AD, DMC, KAT, Embiid etc... They don't or didn't see much success without having other star combo players around them. KAT as dominant as he is, he's still stuck on a mediocre team with no real help.

Same goes for Ayton. He is holding his ground, he is an impactful player on both ends of the floor and that's all you can probably ask from a 2nd year big guy. He is an athletic freak who can disrupt shots and make life difficult for guys trying to get to the rim. But Shaq and Barkley era is gone and i would much rather see Ayton to focus on playing great defense and maybe also work on his long shots to space the floor for Booker.

But in order for PHX to really get somewhere, they'll have to strengthen the bench, sometimes it gets overlooked but having a 6th or 7th guy who can give you 15pts a night, is incredibly helpful. Also, almost all top teams have great benches. Right now on most nights, the only reliable bench guy is Bridges and even he is only a 2nd year player.

Yeah, but we are having a tough time with three rotation players injured at the same time. Usually our bench is mediocre, but not that bad.

Our 7th, 8th and 9th guys were out the last couple of games (Baynes, Kaminsky and Cam Johnson).

Nearly every team we’ve played against lately is dealing with a lot worse injuries than us. Can’t be using that as an excuse midway through the season.

[bwgood77]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

To first sentence, sure, as a young guy, he's going to have ups and downs, particularly against tough matchups. Part of last night was terrible ball movement though..no one had more than 3 assists...I think we had 12 total as a team. So it wasn't just him, but he had the defense and those bigs all over him. Sabonis is a very smart defender too and Turner is young, learning and active.

Just a very tough deep team overall...solid defensively and that's been with Brogdon out almost half the season and Oladipo out all season.

He is better offensively than AD was early http://bkref.com/tiny/DjqRx I use first year #s there since 2nd year #s would be like 12 games to begin a season vs a full season, but they were fairly even in that small sample size as well.

If the team just moved the ball around the perimeter and anyone could hit a 3, Ayton would look miles better.

Don't blame Ayton because no one will shoot a 3. How many did we take or make last night? If 3 guys can crowd Ayton in the paint every possession because no one will cover Rubio at the 3pt line and people will sag off the others, than it's not Ayton's fault. He's the type of C that needs to be surrounded by shooters, as he would dominate 1 on 1, or maybe even double teams.

Then even with 3 guys in there, Oubre will drive straight into them, bringing a 4th and make it look really ugly.

At least Bridges is in the corner and will go along the baseline and is our best rim finisher so he picks his spots and they are usually good ones, even though he should typically shoot more (though many/most of the times he drives at this point is because a defender has closed out on him).

[bwgood77]

is his sporadic success due to match ups ?

Im beginning to think so.

His little break out run was against three PFs and a softie. He sure didn't have his way w IND.

The dude just doesn't know where to be on the court. He moves with uneasy deliberation, each step thought out. He'd better find a gear, because this coasting in neutral isn't helping. I get the hope y'all have for him.... for me it fades with every lackluster performance. I doubt this guy will never dominate nightly.... until he learns how to play basketball with effort. And that doesnt look like its going to be this year or next.

I would also like to look at it from a different perspective.

League has changed so much in these past years. It's all about star wing/guard players now who can do a little bit of everything. Playmaking, scoring rebounding.... Everything is happening from outside in. And i think this is something Shaq and Barkley discussed the other day. Great big guys like AD, DMC, KAT, Embiid etc... They don't or didn't see much success without having other star combo players around them. KAT as dominant as he is, he's still stuck on a mediocre team with no real help.

Same goes for Ayton. He is holding his ground, he is an impactful player on both ends of the floor and that's all you can probably ask from a 2nd year big guy. He is an athletic freak who can disrupt shots and make life difficult for guys trying to get to the rim. But Shaq and Barkley era is gone and i would much rather see Ayton to focus on playing great defense and maybe also work on his long shots to space the floor for Booker.

But in order for PHX to really get somewhere, they'll have to strengthen the bench, sometimes it gets overlooked but having a 6th or 7th guy who can give you 15pts a night, is incredibly helpful. Also, almost all top teams have great benches. Right now on most nights, the only reliable bench guy is Bridges and even he is only a 2nd year player.

I agree those players are more important due to the emphasis on 3s and spreading the floor and teams just jacking up a lot of 3s. In some ways this really helped the premier big men like Hakeem and Dwight Howard for a while, because they had a wide open lane.

Most stars need another one to really compete or a really deep solid group around them to get as far as the WCF (barring injuries to contenders).

Embiid was really a shot away from beating the Raptors last year and the team closest to beating the champs, so a team with their best player a C was inches away on blocking that shot from winning it all, and Toronto was a deep deep team with multiple guys who had been on great playoff teams, a former DPOY C, Serge and Lowry who had been to conf finals, and many deep playoff runs, and a former champion in Kawhi, more of a defensive wing.

Also, the Bucks are led by a big who is mostly an inside guy. He doesn't really shoot 3s but operates more like a versatile PF/big who can distribute.

A big isn't as important and I wanted Doncic, but we have a pretty good offensive guard/wing, a nice distributing PG, but just our hopeful future best player is a big, who is rapidly improving on D. We will probably be more like a team like Utah, surround a C who can play D (but far better offense than Gobert) with shooters and maybe a one versatile guard/wing....but we need to add depth and more talent among our starters. Bridges is still developing as a 2nd year player and will probably be an important part of that starting unit at some point.

We need to add a PG of the future but we just really started adding the right players (except taking Ayton over Doncic) last summer and have made some mistakes in our trades and picks since then, but it's a new regime learning...hopefully they start to make better ones.

[Saberestar]

Read on Twitter

[lilfishi22]

Also want to mention that Indy has a pretty good starting front court. Sabonis is big but he's also skilled and very smart. Turner is a little more raw but that guy is an athlete. The match ups we had last night was just tough on our front court. Saric has the smarts but he couldn't really defend Turner when they were matched up because he was just not athletic/physical enough. Likewise with when Sabonis matched up with Ayton, he was just far too skilled and experienced to be defended well by Ayton who is still a fairly inexperienced big man defender. Indiana just has a good combination of smarts, athleticism and skills in that front court.

[suns12345]

Also want to mention that Indy has a pretty good starting front court. Sabonis is big but he's also skilled and very smart. Turner is a little more raw but that guy is an athlete. The match ups we had last night was just tough on our front court. Saric has the smarts but he couldn't really defend Turner when they were matched up because he was just not athletic/physical enough. Likewise with when Sabonis matched up with Ayton, he was just far too skilled and experienced to be defended well by Ayton who is still a fairly inexperienced big man defender. Indiana just has a good combination of smarts, athleticism and skills in that front court.

We were outplayed across the board yesterday, that happens. Indy is a good team full of vets who know how to win.

Yes the coaching could be better, yes our players could play better, but games like yesterday happen in an 82 game NBA season.

[Saberestar]

Watch on YouTube

[WeekapaugGroove]

Read on Twitter

I like

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using RealGM mobile app