Which NBA Player Made the Biggest Leap from Rookie to Peak?HAHA

dirkdiggler4177 · Post #1 » by **dirkdiggler4177** » Wed Aug 6, 2025 11:45 pm

What player had the biggest difference from his rookie year to his peak?

JJ_PR · Post #2 » by **JJ_PR** » Wed Aug 6, 2025 11:47 pm

Giannis is the first name that comes to mind.

Kawhi Leonard and Jimmy Butler deserve a mention as well.

All 3 come from "weak drafts".

Maxthirty · Post #3 » by **Maxthirty** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:15 am

Jokic

JJ_PR · Post #4 » by **JJ_PR** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:16 am

I forgot the obvious one, Kobe Bryant.

Bornstellar · Post #5 » by **Bornstellar** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:18 am

Kawhi Leonard went from being Shane Battier to basically Michael Jordan

Post #6 » by **Knightro** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:20 am

Steve Nash had a pretty bad rookie season.

AleksandarN · Post #7 » by **AleksandarN** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:23 am

Jokic

bkkrh · Post #8 » by **bkkrh** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:24 am

Ben Wallace. Undrafted, averaged 1.1 points and 1.8 rebounds while shooting 34.8% from the field as a rookie. 4x DPOY winner, 4x All Star, 5x All NBA teams, 6x All Defense teams.

madskillz8 · Post #9 » by **madskillz8** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:31 am

Well, might not be a great peak but Hassan Whiteside literally started from the bottom - as a rookie he played 1 game - 2 minutes. In sophomore season, played 18 games averaging 1.6 - 2.2 - 0 with 0.8 blocks. In the following years, he played in G-League, Lebanon (didnt know there exist a basketball league there), China, and Lebanon again before returning to NBA at age 25 and averaging double-double while being one of the best rim protectors for six straight seasons.

From a theoretical standpoint, you cannot find a better example: his peak years (17 points - 14 boards - 2 blocks // 14 points - 11 boards - 4 blocks) were infinite times better than his rookie season (0-0-0).

Post #10 » by **NO-KG-AI** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:32 am

Maxthirty wrote:Jokic

I don’t think so at all. Jokic was by all measures, an amazing rookie that the team wasn’t ready to give the keys to, and didn’t know how to optimize yet at all.

Giannis is a way better example. He was given the keys pretty quick, and Jason Kidd was letting him sink or swim. He was way more far off as a rookie, and it was like 4 years of big growth before he really became star level in production.

Dez · Post #11 » by **Dez** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:38 am

Jimmy Butler is a pretty good example.

Mr Puddles · Post #12 » by **Mr Puddles** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:42 am

HAHA, Steve Nash, John Stockton, Gary Payton and Ben Wallace come to mind, HAHAHA, OMG, WOOHOO!

kcktiny · Post #13 » by **kcktiny** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 12:55 am

PG Rickey Green.

Did little his rookie season (1977-78), 14 min/g with poor shooting. Was out of the league halfway through his second season (1978-79). Did not play in the NBA in 1979-80.

The Utah Jazz picked him up a third of the way into the 1980-81 season. The following 4 seasons (1981-82 to 1984-85) was 1st among all PGs in the league in steals (752), 4th in assists (2672, only Magic, I.Thomas, and J.Moore had more), and 5th in points (4389).

Played in the league until he was age 37. At that time was only the 3rd PG to play in the league at that age (Cousy and Lenny Wilkens being the other two).

fendilim · Post #14 » by **fendilim** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 1:14 am

Barkley

Post #15 » by **Doctor MJ** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 1:54 am

dirkdiggler4177 wrote:What player had the biggest difference from his rookie year to his peak?

Kevin Durant is the player we have record going from the single worst plus minus in the league to become an MVP, so in effect his value may well have seen the biggest change, though it was more about him just figuring out how to do his thing against NbA competition efficiently.

I’ll mention another Thunderman with SGA as someone whose growth in skill over time is pretty crazy. When we think of one and done guys, we tend to imagine them being a man among boys in college, but Shai came off the bench to start the year in Kentucky and while he earned the starting spot with time, he didn’t have crazy impact by the rapm data. When he was drafted he was still very much a project compared to other guys the same age (Luka, Trae).

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bstein14 · Post #16 » by **bstein14** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 1:55 am

Ben Wallace was the first undrafted player to make the hall of fame. He had went from least skilled player in his entire draft class to 4X DPOY and NBA champion hall-of-famer.... pretty good. Giannis and Jokic are also both good cases because they peaked at NBA MVP level but I think Ben Wallace started off worse overall as a rookie.

fendilim · Post #17 » by **fendilim** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 3:31 am

Jeremy lin

Infinite Llamas · Post #18 » by **Infinite Llamas** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 4:10 am

NO-KG-AI wrote:
Maxthirty wrote:Jokic

I don’t think so at all. Jokic was by all measures, an amazing rookie that the team wasn’t ready to give the keys to, and didn’t know how to optimize yet at all.

Giannis is a way better example. He was given the keys pretty quick, and Jason Kidd was letting him sink or swim. He was way more far off as a rookie, and it was like 4 years of big growth before he really became star level in production.

There was a small faction here (myself included) that felt that Jokic was just as impactful a rookie as Towns and the ROY race should have been a lot closer. So yeah, Jokic was pretty great whenever he got minutes.

Richard4444 · Post #19 » by **Richard4444** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 4:17 am

Maxthirty wrote:Jokic

Jokic did not have a bad rookie season. He was third in the voting of ROY behind KAT and KP, ahead of Booker. https://www.basketball-reference.com/awards/awards_2016.html

Post #20 » by **GeorgeMarcus** » Thu Aug 7, 2025 4:17 am

fendilim wrote:Barkley

Good call, he credits Moses's tough love mentorship as being a major catalyst in his development