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After two years of uneventful garbage minutes in OKC, Byron Mullens had somewhat of a breakout season in Charlotte. He was one of our few bright spots last year: an athletic, fairly strong 7-footer with an excellent touch from mid-range and a threat to go off for 20 or more on any given night, even putting up 31 points and 14 rebounds against Milwaukee last season. He's still fairly raw on defense, on the boards, and down low, but he's added a very good three-point shot to his game that was almost non-existent last year (hit 22% from deep last year). He's shot a TON of threes this preseason and made 44% of them. Given the fact that he appears to be a fairly quick learner, I believe he could bring his defense, rebounding, and post game to a high level and think that he might be a future 20/8 guy as a stretch 4. The long athletic 7-footer appears to have a bright future IMO. What do you guys think?

I dont think so, could be wrong, but Mullins problem is he jacks up too many threes, if he has truly improved he could be good. Future star may be too much.

Poor mans Bargnani?

ieatchildrenraw wrote:I dont think so, could be wrong, but Mullins problem is he jacks up too many threes, if he has truly improved he could be good. Future star may be too much.

If he keeps hitting anywhere near a 44% rate then he has my permission to keep on shooting.

TheToothFairy wrote:Poor mans Bargnani?

I think his ceiling will be Channing Frye.

was channing frye a future star when he started shooting threes in phoenix?

then no

I'm not going to flame on this, but a simple no.

He looks good for CHA, but CHA needs a lot of help, so there are a lot of opportunities for him to shine. Heck, he's the only frontcourt player they have who can score. He's a nice player, but if you put him on a good (not even great) team, he would be putting up a fraction of the stats hes getting right now.

Nice player, but I can't really see him being anything more than that.

it's kind of sad bargnani's got a rep as a sweet shooting stretch 4 when his percentages from 3 have been dropping steadily the last several years. shot like 29% last year

I look at Mullens as being a player on the verge of a breakout. A number of people at certain bb websites are saying the same thing. But it's not certain. However, he looks like he could be the Bobcats leading scorer this year and his 3-ball shooting has been excellent. Add better moves to the basket and a better low -post move and you've got a consistent 15-20 pts a game player at minimum. Improving his onball defense will help enormously because that will give him the minutes. The raw tools are there. The question is does Mullens have the drive to get there? He was lazy coming out of high school and has paid the price. We shall see.

Stolen Team Fan wrote:

TheToothFairy wrote:Poor mans Bargnani?

I think his ceiling will be Channing Frye.

Good call, I guess Frye is a poor mans Barg....,lol

He's certainly better than Matt Bonner.

Could the moon crash into Earth and destroy civilization next year?

I doubt it.

For Mullen to be serviceable offensively he's going to have to shoot really well from three point range. Right now he's shooting 43% from 3pt range in the preseason but we've been through this with Mullens before already. After the first couple of weeks last season he was putting up some numbers while shooting an unsustainable 60% from 16-23 feet. A thread was posted on the General board at the time: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1149828

Mullens would regress, and finished the season shooting about 35% from 16-23 feet, with an overall TS% well below 50%. Nearly half of his FGA came from that range, and almost three quarters of his offense was assisted (he cannot create his own offense).

Rationally, and considering Mullens' history, I have to think that he will not be close to a 40% three point shooter. Some are making the comparison to Channing Frye, but Frye was a much better mid-range shooter than Mullens before he began shooting threes in Phoenix. Frye had seasons of 43% and 47% from 16-23 feet before joining the Suns - 10% better than Mullens on average.

He's not good at defense, his rebounding is average at best - but I guess he's had a hot four games shooting three pointers.

byron mullens is a great player he certainly has the skillset to be a 20ppg scorer in the league...he has post moves, when his mid range is on hes one of the best, now he has a 3 ball, hes athletic enough to run the floor and finish alleyoops easily, 80%++ free throw shooting. he just has to put it all together which i dont know if hes capable of. hes only 23 though. he was a beast last year but he hit the rookie wall pretty hard midseason.

pick and pop nightmare for opposing teams he can be unguardable if he wants to be

What is his defense like?

advanced wrote:byron mullens is a great player he certainly has the skillset to be a 20ppg scorer in the league...he has post moves, when his mid range is on hes one of the best, now he has a 3 ball, hes athletic enough to run the floor and finish alleyoops easily, 80%++ free throw shooting. he just has to put it all together which i dont know if hes capable of. hes only 23 though. he was a beast last year but he hit the rookie wall pretty hard midseason

Post moves? Mullens was at .67 PPP on Post Ups last year according to Synergy, shooting under 33% on those attempts. His mid-range ended up being below league average last year (35% at 16-23 feet compared to league average of 38.1%). 'Now he has a 3 ball'... I'd like to see more than 30 attempts over four preseason games before making that determination.

He always had potential but it seems to me like he just wants to shoot jumpers, which puts a damper on his size and athleticism, especially since he is not an elite shooter.

His jumpshot that he hits (with frequency) is annoying, but he doesn't do anything else yet. He can score. Not a valuable starter. Developing a 3 point shot gives him more of a chance to find his place in the league. Frye, Bonner, etc. If Brian Cook could stay in the league for as long as he has...

slick_watts wrote:

advanced wrote:byron mullens is a great player he certainly has the skillset to be a 20ppg scorer in the league...he has post moves, when his mid range is on hes one of the best, now he has a 3 ball, hes athletic enough to run the floor and finish alleyoops easily, 80%++ free throw shooting. he just has to put it all together which i dont know if hes capable of. hes only 23 though. he was a beast last year but he hit the rookie wall pretty hard midseason

Post moves? Mullens was at .67 PPP on Post Ups last year according to Synergy, shooting under 33% on those attempts. His mid-range ended up being below league average last year (35% at 16-23 feet compared to league average of 38.1%). 'Now he has a 3 ball'... I'd like to see more than 30 attempts over four preseason games before making that determination.

He always had potential but it seems to me like he just wants to shoot jumpers, which puts a damper on his size and athleticism, especially since he is not an elite shooter.

you have to watch the games, stats dont tell anything close to the full story especially when your team is run by Paul "i think ill take the day off and let my son coach" Silas.

Nah

His absolutely ceiling is Spencer Hawes

Depends what you mean by "star," but he can most definitely win MIP this year and possibly contend for the all star team in future years.