Donovan Clingan's breakout BLOCK party + Jared McCain isn't slowing down!
NBA Rookie Watch - Week 4 edition
I feel bad for those of you on the East Coast, who rarely stay up late to watch West Coast games. Not only are you missing out on a lot of exciting action, but if you’re mostly just looking at stats (for players whose home games are in the Pacific Time Zone), you’re not getting a clear picture of how good players actually are (or aren’t).
For this example, I’m going to bring up Deandre Ayton as a case study. If you wanted to focus on the stats Ayton put up to finish out last season (20.8 points and 11.9 boards on 59.5% FG and 87.8% FT over his final 28 games), then you could have easily talked yourself into using a Top 50 pick on him this year. But stats aren’t everything…
If you actually watched a bunch of Ayton’s games last year, you would have seen that he still has GLARING weaknesses. I’m talking about his inability to set proper screens, his lack of aggression around the basket, and his overall lack of passion and heart. I was a big believer in Ayton his first few seasons in the league, but he’s now in his 7th NBA season, and he’s improved very little in those areas that I pointed out.
Moreover, if you watched any footage at all of Donovan Clingan (from UConn’s NCAA tournament run and Las Vegas summer league), you would have seen that Clingan EXCELS in all of the areas where Ayton has struggled throughout his career.
Combine these factors, and it made perfect sense to still be wary about Ayton for the 2024-25 season, despite his strong finish to last year.
Thankfully, I only drafted Ayton a handful of times, and I wasn’t one of the people who got fooled into using a Top 50 pick on him. If you’re one of those people, perhaps that wouldn’t have happened if you stayed up late to watch West Coast games!
A lot more on Clingan in just a little bit…
NBA Rookie Watch - Week 4 edition
Here are your Top 10 rookie rankings for the rest of this fantasy hoops season, plus another 12 more rookies to watch.
Top 10 Rookies for the rest of this season
1. Alex Sarr - Wizards (Last week: 1)
I’ll give Sarr the #1 spot again, but he’s barely hanging on to it. He got absolutely demolished by Wemby’s 50 points on Wednesday, as Wembanyama seemed to be a man on a mission against his fellow Frenchman. The Wizards keep urging Sarr to take threes, but I’m not sure it’s helping with either his confidence or his development. He’ll need to show more soon, or he’ll fall in these rankings.
2. Zach Edey - Grizzlies (3)
Some of you may not know that Roy Hibbert has his own YouTube channel, but his videos are actually pretty interesting and entertaining. In the video below, Hibbert starts off by talking about the easy lobs that Edey has been getting, but then he gives Edey props for “doing the dirty work.” I like it too, Roy.
Also, let’s remember that Memphis has been pretty banged up this season, but as their guards start to get healthy (Marcus Smart returned on Wednesday), that should help out Edey even more. By simply blocking more shots or making more of his freebies, he can move past Sarr.
3. Donovan Clingan - Blazers (6)
Wow, talk about a breakout block party!!! I watched the entire second half of Portland’s game vs. Minnesota last night, and my first takeaway was that the Blazers are way more enjoyable to watch with Clingan playing instead of Ayton (Ayton sat out another game with a finger injury).
Clingan’s monstrous statline (17 points, 12 boards, 8 blocks) is what’s going to stand out of course, but as I alluded to above, it’s Clingan’s passion and intensity that really make me like his game.
Want to watch my favorite sequence from last night?
Fast forward to the 1:54 mark, where Clingan initially gets out-rebounded by Rudy Gobert, but then immediately recovers by blocking Gobert’s shot attempt (without even jumping, by the way), then goes to the floor to tie up Jaden McDaniels for a jump ball (the video cuts out part of the scrum, but Clingan was NOT going to give the ball up after the whistle blew, and nearly took McDaniels’ arm off in the process).
If you were to ask every Trail Blazers fan who watched last night’s game, I’d bet that more than 90% of them will say that Ayton needs to get traded at this year’s trade deadline, so that Clingan can take over as soon as possible. I concur, of course.
4. Zaccharie Risacher - Hawks (2)
Since his breakout 33 point game last week, Risacher’s 3-point shot has gone cold (1-for-13 over his last 3 games), which I warned you might happen last week. But I like that he’s showing some fight in him, grabbing 9 boards and 3 steals in 25 minutes against the Celtics on Tuesday.
5. Yves Missi - Pelicans (5)
Now that’s how you bounce back Missi! After posting a 0 point, 1 rebound game last Friday, Missi has now recorded 2 straight double-doubles, while shooting 12-of-13 from the field. He continues to show off more than what was advertised too.
Go to the :48 mark of this clip, where he faces up Cam Johnson and blows by him like Cam was in quicksand!
6. Carlton Carrington - Wizards (5)
Not only has Bub played 30+ minutes in 7 straight games, but he’s become a reliable source of assists as well. It will be interesting to see what happens when Malcolm Brogdon returns from his thumb injury.
7. Jared McCain - 76ers (N/R)
After posting last week’s rookie rankings, I realized that McCain should have been included in the “rookies to watch” section, so I immediately added the following:
“Let's add Jared McCain to the watch list now that Maxey is going to miss the next 2 weeks.”
And wow, the rookie has been on a heater ever since, scoring 25.5 points with 4.3 treys over his last 4 games. Clearly, he’s already proven (both to himself and the rest of this league) that he can score at this level.
Dropping 27 points against the Hornets (like he did on Sunday) isn’t super impressive, but going head-to-head with Donovan Mitchell’s Cavs and scoring a career-high 34 points on the second night of a back-to-back? Yeah, that’s mighty impressive.
8. Kyshawn George - Wizards (8)
George is coming off the bench now due to Kyle Kuzma’s return to the floor, but he still got 32 minutes of run last night, and handed out a career-high 5 assists.
9. Stephon Castle - Spurs (N/R)
He’s starting to settle in, with averages of 14.3 points and 5.0 assists over his last 4 games, on 47.7% FG. One of the things that has really stood out to me is his ability to change speeds, both accelerating and decelerating.
To see what I mean, watch him at the 1:11 mark of this clip, where he uses a quick crossover burst to get past Walker Kessler, before slowing down as he gets into the paint to throw Kessler’s timing off (Kessler jumps too early, and Castle gets the and-1). Impressive stuff from a rookie.
10. Dalton Knecht - Lakers (N/R)
Knecht enters this week’s rankings after a breakout game on Wednesday night, where he got hot from deep and made all 5 of his triples, scoring 19 points on 7-for-8 shooting. Postgame, JJ Redick called Knecht “the catalyst” for the Lakers comeback win. Don’t expect a lot of consistency, but games like this may start happening more frequently for the rook.
12 More Rookies to Watch
Ron Holland - Pistons
Holland falls out of the Top 10 rankings mostly due to the expected return of Ausar Thompson, and not because of these potentially game-winning free throws that he bricked, where his nerves were on full display.