SURGEON GENERAL’S WARNING: Summer league can cause both premature elation and frustration and may complicate fandom. Quitting summer league now may greatly reduce serious changes in your expectations.

Las Vegas, the blatant and thorough desecration of the natural world, was yet again the scene for some meaningless basketball games and, most importantly, some epic hangs these past two weeks. We saw rookies raise eyebrows and raze doubters. We saw second-year players do some struggling and some strutting with a season under their belts. We saw pop stars catch backhands. And we saw hoop luminaries of every variety.

This is my second-annual NBA summer league notebook. I won’t get to everyone and everything, so just save the, “Wow, you omitted such and such player/team” tweets. Like last year, I’ll stick to the things that I saw in person. Cam Whitmore and Ausar Thompson, in particular, were both terrific throughout the entire event and I didn’t end up getting to them. A lot of basketball happened while I was there, and I couldn’t be in both gyms at the same time. Forgive me.

Dealing In

My weekend started with a delayed flight, which had a crappy ripple effect. It led to a scramble from the plane to the hotel and then straight to the arena, where Houston and Portland were tipping off in what was probably the best game of the weekend. All of this was compounded by the fact that I was going into this trip with a sleep deficit—Julian, my spark plug of a 3-year-old son, decided that he’d wake up an hour earlier than normal as a nice parting gift.

Any trip to Vegas that stretches beyond 36 hours will have you hallucinating or wandering in a bit of an exhausted fog. It’s the Bermuda Triangle of self-control. You don’t even have to drink or smoke. It still happens. Maybe it’s the visual stimulation, the heat, the staying up late—maybe it’s an amalgam of those things. Whatever the case, you could see why rolling up to Thomas & Mack with thousand-pound eyelids and a constant impulse to yawn might have had me on my heels a bit.

As it turns out, Scoot Henderson was the perfect caffeine. That and the molten-lava coffee from the concourse that burned my fingerprints off.

The Offer Sheet

Will Portland finally give in and trade Dame Lillard? We’re keeping a close watch on all of the biggest free agents, trade targets, retirement bluffers, and more in our new offseason tracker.

It would be hard to hit the ground running faster than Scoot did. Before leaving with a shoulder injury that would truncate his summer league action, he did a little bit of everything: 15 points, six assists, five rebounds, a steal, and four fouls in just over 21 minutes of play. His performance resonated with an unmistakable poise, comfort, and confidence. He looked like a seasoned vet because, having spent two seasons in the G League, he is a seasoned vet at this point. Real Bane vibes.

Henderson’s ability to play through contact and claim space was on another level. He hit Tari Eason with a slick lefty in-and-out dribble and then a stepback 18-footer. He lanced Houston’s transition defense and then soft-served a corner kick to Kris Murray for a 3. He turned the corner and held off Amen Thompson to go baseline and finish with a nifty reverse layup. Even on this play, Amen proves no match for Scoot in terms of strength, but he is exceptionally quick, yet he still can’t position fast enough to take away Scoot’s driving angle:

I maintain my reservations about where Scoot’s offense comes from and how sustainable it is, but I think his game management and pace were inarguably great.

There were seven other first-round picks in Scoot’s opening game—maybe as much athleticism as I’ve seen in a summer league game—and lots of eye-bugging moments spread out among them. Tjarks would’ve beamed with joy as John Butler Jr., one of his favorite bona fide weirdo prospects, was knocking down shots, gliding to the rim, dropping hammers, and whipping dimes to cutters. Shaedon Sharpe was coolly hopping into pull-up 3s and looked at times like he might literally take flight and leave the arena, provided Eason wasn’t there to absolutely eradicate him at the rim. Cam Whitmore looked undeniable with a head of steam.

Welcome, Frenchman

Scoot’s and Amen’s early departures poked a sizable hole in our vibe, but the arena remained chipper. After all, the main event was next. There was plenty of “Jabari’s gonna be all right” chatter after he drilled an improbable game-winner (still have no idea how that pass made it to him) and celebrated in front of the Podfather, and from there, we segued smoothly into the moment that we’d all been waiting for: Naughty by Nature starts vibrating everyone’s teeth with a perfect needle drop, and Victor Wembanyama trots onto the floor, head and shoulders above everyone.

After seeing him in person and having my brain melted back in October, in an event where he knew the entirety of the basketball world would be watching and he still went nuclear on us, naturally, I’m thinking we’re about to see something that will get talked about for years. It felt like one of those shared experiences where you just intrinsically know that a special moment is unfolding. Didn’t exactly go down like that.

By now, it’s been yapped about and waxed poetic in a million different ways, but in the same way that the 2023 draft felt like two separate events—who would get Wemby and who would get everyone else—for the average fan, summer league was predominantly about watching the French phenom play and then a bunch of blah-blah-blah. All weekend, I had non-hoop fans asking at every turn about “the tall guy” over at the NBA event who was blowing people’s minds. It was bedlam. The media section was so crowded on the days that he played that people were forced to just find … any improvised surface to sit on.

Eventually, we retreated to the crow’s nest for some space.

Wemby’s opener was a sloppy mess, although he was a lurking terror on the defensive end. Do I need to recap this game? You’ve already heard about it. Let’s keep it moving.

Keyonte Fills It Up

Players get misevaluated and underestimated in the draft on a yearly basis. We know this. I mean, three players from the 2020 class got max contracts this summer—one was drafted with the 12th pick (Tyrese Haliburton) and the other with the 30th (Desmond Bane). Summer league can be a place where those types of mistakes present themselves immediately, but it can also be misleading. The summer before that draft, the top five leading scorers in Las Vegas were Lonnie Walker IV, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Kevin McClain (!), Chris Boucher, and Aaron Holiday. All respectable players, but proof that we should come away from this with measured expectations.

If you’re a Utah Jazz fan, sipping on a cold brew and munching on breakfast tacos from La Barba (I really labored to shoehorn this shout-out), you probably don’t want to hear that. You’re probably hoping that this is Donovan Mitchell (who was their leading scorer in 2017) all over again.

When it comes to size, skill set, and preference, Keyonte George has always reminded me a bit of Anfernee Simons, although they’re a bit different athletically. George’s core strength is better at the same age, and his shoulders are a bit broader, whereas Simons could use his quickness to hit defenders with a series of punchy dribble moves to create separation. George is more of a shifty player who relies on lulling people into an imbalance that he can exploit. The star argument for him relied heavily on dribble shooting as a major selling point, but in practice, it’s been hypothetical. His shot looks great. He has a ton of soft flick at the top of his release.

Because he was a fine shooter—but well short of fantastic—this past season, he put evaluators in the position to make a wager on what he could become. He had one of the biggest appetites in the country for above-the-break 3s; they just didn’t go in consistently enough to inspire fanatical support.

At Baylor, George was weirdly better off the bounce than he was off the catch, and he suffered a major dip when those catch 3s were contested. He shot 46.2 percent on uncontested looks and 26.4 percent when contested.

I was most impressed in Vegas by the fact that Keyonte picked his spots pretty well. He played within Utah’s offense throughout the time I watched him, but after you make three or four 3s in a row, no one cares how you got them—at some point, an audacious attempt is earned. In the fourth quarter of the Jazz’s game against the Clippers, George took a shot that looked like it belonged in the “60 points on 50 shots” farewell Kobe game:

Because of the physical profile we talked about, George will likely need to develop exceptional technique. At just 19 years old, he’s taking off from a pretty good starting point:

Keyonte does most of his finishing below the rim, but he does a nice job of changing direction and using his long strides to get into the paint. He uses deceleration well, and of course we know about his touch. 

It’s been the summer of shooting for the Jazz. Danny Ainge has been the Kylo Ren “MORE!” meme, both in his draft picks and in supplementary signings. The Jazz averaged 42 3-point attempts in Vegas and hit 34.9 percent of them.

Utah is further proof that if you’re good enough at evaluation and if you’re able to amass an absurd amount of picks, you can have a fairly competitive product on-court while avoiding completely bottoming out. We went into last season thinking that the Jazz were a debris pile of shrapnel and missed opportunities. But they were much better than expected. And yet, even with an All-Star in Lauri Markkanen and the surprise of the 2022 draft in Walker Kessler, you still get the sense that they’re waiting for something compelling to add order to their chaos: something to steer their next set of decisions. I don’t know if that’s Keyonte George. I do know that more eyes will be on him to find out.

Leaps and Bleeps

It’s always interesting to see how second- or even third-year players react to this setting after gaining some league experience. I think it’s rarely a waste of time for these types to get some work in during these games, although at some point, players are just taking up developmental space. Keegan Murray and Jalen Williams immediately established themselves as way too cool for school. I’d imagine Jeremy Sochan’s lack of play was in part an effort to clear the runway for Dominick Barlow and Julian Champagnie, both of whom looked good.

Jabari Smith Jr.’s studious attitude was one of the major revelations from Las Vegas. The guy averaged 35.5 points per game in two outings, and the positivity was sorely needed. It was refreshing to see him so enthusiastically seize the opportunity to work. Surely it brought a smile to Houston’s new head coach.

Ime Udoka might be the most intense person on earth, by the way. He doesn’t blink here for like eight seconds. I feel like Ray Stantz as he stares at the painting of Vigo in Ghostbusters II.

Last season was not an especially efficient one for Smith, although his numbers aren’t out of sync with the lanky shooting forwards of the past:

Smith’s struggles were exacerbated by the fact that the Rockets were clearly gunnin’ for that no. 1 spot in the draft, and it didn’t exactly take a ton of self-sabotage for them to get there. They were arguably (I’m being generous) the least effective passing team in the league. They were dead last in assists and closeout points per chance, and they generated fewer uncontested 3-pointers than any team in the NBA. You’d be in your right mind to speculate on the impact that would have on a player who operates primarily off the catch, although that’s only one piece of the equation.

Smith’s shooting repertoire was bound to come around after being wobbly for much of the season. It started to stabilize in March and April, and in Vegas, he kept that going, offering us a glimpse of the future.

Houston tinkered lightly with Jabari at the 5 last season, and I expect it’ll explore that even more this time around. You could tell he was having fun with those lineups in Vegas, eviscerating bigs with his face-up footwork, although, defensively, those players aren’t anything close to what he sees on a nightly basis in the league.

This is all light work for Jabari. Easy shit. His handle and downhill potency were the looming question marks hovering over his game coming into last year’s draft. Without growth in these areas, he’d be resigned to a much lower ceiling, so it was nice to see him attack the basket.

I didn’t get to catch any full Pelicans games in person, but from what I did see, Dyson Daniels was clearly focused on shooting the ball. In three games, he put up 4 3s per outing, annnnnnnd only a tiny amount of those went in. Only 10 percent, in fact. This is a work in progress, one that will require some patience from Pels fans. To this point, Daniels’s comfort zone as a shooter has been narrow. Forays beyond that—that is, movement of any kind—have looked wobbly. He hit on only 31.4 percent of his 86 total attempts last season, most of which were stationary. The perimeter rotation is crowded for New Orleans, even more so with the addition of Jordan Hawkins, the 14th pick, who seems to have a polar-opposite skill set. Dyson’s core offerings remain easy to see: He can defend multiple positions, and he’s a valuable connective playmaker who can extend possessions with great decision-making. Even just a moderate amount of shooting versatility would ensure that he can keep those positives on the floor to support hubs like Brandon Ingram and Zion Williamson.

For all of the grief that we gave Shaedon Sharpe for not playing during the lead-up to his rookie season, I think it’s only fair that we give him credit for putting in the work this summer. We saw a lot of the typical Shaedon stuff, like jaunts to the rim where he looked like some kind of antigravity SUV. Near the end of his high school career, a lot of Shaedon’s handle work was geared toward weaponizing his own offense—creating separation that led to drives or jumpers. A year of NBA experience and some diligent experimentation seem to be paying dividends, as we’re seeing him drive off the catch and keep more options in mind than just scoring.

He’s still chaotic, sloppy at times, and over-pursuant of his stepback game, but Sharpe was clearly one of the real high-end talents at the event.

Despite missing the entire season with a foot injury, Chet Holmgren still managed to look like an improved player. His hips and lower body looked stronger to me, which is huge for his ability to hold position in traffic or as a screen setter.

I’m just ready for Chet’s actual debut, because he picked up right where he left off in terms of making a wide range of things look absurdly simple. He’ll go from lurking in the dunker spot to drifting out to the corner 3-point line in one trip, and then he’ll put together back-to-back plays of a dribble handoff with a quick bumping screen that becomes an easy lob, and then he’ll drill a trailer 3.

Chet is an IRS auditor on defense—the type of person who makes details tedious for everyone. I think he was the best all-around player at summer league.

We’ll reach a point where people get tired of the OKC praise. The vibe is due for a swing in the other direction. You can feel it coming. OKC could become the victim of its own great decision-making. It has so many interesting young players that it will have to make some tough decisions, because not all of them can develop on the main roster. It’s easy to rattle off the names on the roster and circle back and say, “Oh, damn, forgot about Kenrich Williams. Forgot about Tre Mann. Forgot about Lu Dort!”

Hyper Pelinka

There’s an amusing tone that seems to come with any discussion about the decision-making of this Lakers front office. Because of the Lakers’ inherent advantages and long history of winning, naturally, the one area they can’t win is in the dialogue with the rest of the league. When times are tough, the Lakers can have an Andy Bernard vibe—like an emo album recorded on a yacht. When times are good and their front office kills it, there’s a vibe of begrudging credit in the broader discourse. It’s just funny to observe, that’s all. If you’re sick of them, feel free to jump ahead and skip this section.

After re-signing Austin Reaves (confirmed playoff-level dude) and D’Angelo Russell (whom I don’t really have much to say about) and adding Gabe Vincent, the credible backcourt depth for this team isn’t extensive, but it should be fine. Coming off a surprise trip to the conference finals, Rob Pelinka has got to be flying high.

Max Christie was one of my guys in the last draft cycle—I was higher on him coming out of Michigan State than anyone I knew. I liked his athletic pop, I thought he had the gait of an NBA wing, and I really believed in his shooting. After the 35th pick played just 12.5 minutes per game and averaged 3.1 points per game as a rookie, there were definitely times when I thought, “Maybe you swung a little hard on that one, pal.” However, this past weekend had me thinking the swing was adequate and maybe not hard enough:

The Warriors weren’t exactly the 2019 Raptors out there on defense, but Christie calmly picked them apart, and at all three levels. He torched their drop coverage and exploded to the rim when Gui Santos looked surprised that Cole Swider faked the screen and popped out to the 3-point line.

There was also a time when Maxwell Lewis, a gangly 6-foot-7 wing out of Pepperdine who shared the ball well but didn’t always shoot it that way last year, was thought of as a borderline lottery pick. Enthusiasm cooled on him, and he slipped to 40. But Lewis’s size, athleticism, and activity translated in Vegas, although his decision-making and efficiency weren’t the best. He looked particularly uncomfortable when forced to improvise his shot mechanics. He could be a factor someday for this team, but he could also be a shoulder shrug. 

Jalen Hood-Schifino, the Lakers’ first-round pick this year, projects as the most likely to evolve into a full-time handler at this level. Out of the three young Lakers guards, he spent the most time on ball in college, where he carried a 25.8 percent usage rate and ranked in the 97th percentile in the country in time spent attempting dribble pull-up jumpers. The majority of those were 2s, and in that sense, he’s in that Booker-Beal-Herro (a top-tier outcome that you’re praying for if you’re the Lakers) stratum of players who enter the league primarily as pull-up shooters and show indicators that they could become more. These sequences where he chisels his way into the midrange, snaking the ball screen and looking for his midrange pull-up, are his bread and butter. Both he and Maxwell Lewis seem like candidates to log a lot of quality reps in the G League during this coming season.

It can’t be a coincidence that L.A. took these three players, each fairly similar in size and skill set, in consecutive drafts, and I can’t help but find it fascinating. This coming year, Christie’s improvement could have him chipping in, but broadly, these three players will be factors in whatever L.A.’s next phase turns out to be. In general, wings who can pass, dribble, or shoot, especially those who can do something with the ball without constantly needing it, are tradable archetypes, and they also fit next to whatever unhappy superstar might be on the move. Maybe I’m wearing a little tinfoil, but it makes me wonder if that cluster of players forecasts a big move.

Past that, Colin Castleton is definitely someone to keep an eye on. Castleton is a 6-foot-11 center from Florida who earned a two-way deal from the Lakers, and it would not shock me if he emerges as a rotation big in the next few years, if not sooner. I never took him to be all that agile for his size, but in this setting, he looked peppier than I’d seen him in a while. His passing might be his most marketable skill. Last season, his assist percentage was in the 97th percentile in the entire country, and in a league that I suspect will continue to become more cutting and dribble-handoff oriented, he could find himself at the right place at the right time, provided he defends and adds other things.

In predraft interviews, he talked about showcasing more of what he was capable of, which is ambitious but possible. He went 2-for-32 from 3-point range in five college seasons, and yet … his shot looks OK? I can’t believe I’m talking myself into the idea that his shot is coming around. I must be losing my mind.

There were four traditional centers taken in the first two rounds, and if you forced me to make a wild prediction, it’d be that it’s entirely possible that the undrafted Castleton ends up as more serviceable than any of them, save for Wemby.

Did the Hornets Screw Up?

Be not so sorry for what you’ve done, Charlotte.

Although I didn’t fall to my knees like Hugo the Hornet (seriously, did that person get reprimanded at all?), I admit that I was confused by the Hornets’ decision to take Brandon Miller at no. 2 over Scoot Henderson. I value both players and I think that they could both end up having fantastic careers, I just thought Scoot fit better. I think he would’ve paired brilliantly with LaMelo Ball, both on and off the court.

At the same time, I think it’s important to keep in mind that Miller is a fairly unique player in his own right. He’s a very capable live-dribble passer, a potent skill to pair with his overall pristine shooting. Those two features are a highly uncommon combination for a player his size. Paolo Banchero has the size and the passing, but not the shooting. Scottie Barnes—same thing. Josh Giddey is a much better passer, but not nearly the shooter. You’ll laugh, but Aleksej Pokusevski is a very creative passer off the bounce; he just struggled to get into the middle at that age and didn’t shoot the 3 consistently. Luka Doncic is the exception to more or less everything. Jayson Tatum had the live-dribble shooting, but doesn’t come close to Miller as a passer at the same age. Paul George is a better handler, but had to develop as a shooter. My point is that it doesn’t happen often!

Miller is sinewy and smooth, a capable athlete vertically and highly coordinated, but he’s not exactly twitchy. It can prevent him from turning the corner with the ball in his hands, which is why I think strength and ballhandling will be massive for him. It’s not terribly different from my feelings on Cade Cunningham: the size, handling, passing, and shooting skill sets are all useful, but without a real burst for separation, everything is being curbed a bit. At that point, the impetus becomes growing into a less-movable object that’s harder to speed up while also finding other ways to create separation as a means of getting to his spots.

Related: This is hilarious—Wemby looks like a massive tarantula stalking a garden spider:

I trust Miller’s passing and his ability to make reads, but I think his middle game has to get more confident and patient, which will call for him to continue getting stronger and growing as a finisher. For me, it’s a key strand within the helix of his overall development. Miller was a destroyer from 3 this past season at Alabama, but he shot a meager 31.3 percent on non-rim paint attempts. I’m optimistic about his floor and cautiously optimistic about his ceiling.

I also think there’s plenty of reason to be hopeful about Nick Smith Jr., both because I think his year at Arkansas was wildly misleading and because there are paths for him to succeed.

I get the sense that the most effective role for Smith is evolving. In the past, and I’m speaking sweepingly here, skinny non-facilitators were largely on-ball and let it all hang out, often overlapping with the first unit as a jolt of energy. Lately, though, I get the sense that players like Smith are turning into handoff and cut-heavy roamers that act as play finishers as opposed to probing decision makers.

Just as a quick example, let’s pit two guys like Jordan Poole and Malik Monk against one another. Before this past season, I’d say they were players of the same ilk. Similarly sized, similar preferences, and yet one is more maligned at the moment than the other. Poole’s game is tilted a bit towards the pick-and-roll and isolation. Monk, for the first time in his career, is playing off of a fantastic screener and elbow creator. He’s in more handoff and cutting action, and less isolation than ever.

A year ago, I would’ve bet you some amount of money that Smith would’ve been a potential volume creator. I thought he was so crafty and smooth at all three levels that he’d just have to set his mind to focusing on becoming a playmaker. The scoring seemed implied for me.

Smith plays with a ton of energy, although at times he can be like an overzealous kid coloring outside the lines. That has led to sequences at Arkansas, where he was originally the headline recruit on a team loaded with guards, and during the first weekend of summer league where it seemed like he was trying to reclaim all of the time he missed. When he slowed down, there were also times when he looked like that player that had filled me with so much optimism in the past.

The real-time awareness to feel the weakside help coming here and to flip the floor on New Orleans is also really nice:

So, did the Hornets nail this draft? I wouldn’t go that far either, but they definitely added some talent that was sorely lacking. Could Scoot’s ascension torment them in the coming years? Very possible. They’ll be possibly the skinniest team in the league and they still have a million questions to answer, but stacking LaMelo on top of the free-flowing and freewheeling duo of Miller and Smith could produce some extremely fun offense.

Finally, we knew coming in that James Nnaji (the no. 31 pick) was a slab of marble that needed to be chiseled into something, but my god, that guy’s frame in person is just breathtaking. His arms and shoulders are terrifying. Bryce McGowens looks like an interesting piece. And I just want to make sure this gets said: Amari Bailey (no. 41) is not a two-way player. He does more things than James Bouknight on both ends. I don’t even care what happened at summer league. That’s a great value for Charlotte.

Did the Magic Get It Right?

In February, I argued that Orlando needed accelerants for their offense, and there were plenty of options for them to do that with the sixth and 11th picks. Personally, I think they tackled that need with a two-pronged approach.

The first was with Anthony Black, the 6-foot-7 connective playmaker who is high in feel, and an advanced and aggressive processor on both ends. His pace with the ball is irregular and nuanced in a good way, in that he’s harder to predict and generally very creative. Orlando has a roster with a lot of plants that need to stay watered, and Black has the type of green thumb they need. He’s also a major pain in the ass defensively. Because of the speed of today’s game, it’s more critical than ever for players to be active-minded if they want to be plus defenders, and I see that when I watch Black play. There were some concerns about his challenges as a shooter, but I didn’t hear a ton of grumbling about that pick. He was an easy sell at summer league.

The Jett Howard pick was another story.

They could’ve leaned all the way in on the movement or relocation shooting and taken a player like Jordan Hawkins, someone whose mechanics seem fairly impervious to breaking down as the action speeds up, or Gradey Dick, who was absolutely scorching from 3 in transition this past season at Kansas. Instead, there was some grumbling about the Magic going after Jett Howard, who’d faded from the lottery discussion in the months leading up to the draft, because the conversation in the public draft sphere had drifted towards the idea that Kobe Bufkin, his Michigan teammate, was a better overall player.

I think Kobe Bufkin will be a good player—he might even be very good—but near draft time I started to wonder if “Bufkin is actually better” became something of an “I know ball” move for (some, not all) people who were looking to find an edge. I found the outright dismissal of Jett to be fairly bizarre.

He has more passing touch, “draw two” sense, and flair than I think he gets credit for. This sequence caught my attention in person: First, he comes off of this right-side dribble handoff with Robert Baker II as Jared Rhoden, the on-ball defender, stays attached over the top. Jett softly and comfortably tees this up to Baker with his right hand. The lob isn’t converted, I grant you that, mainly because it’s slightly off the mark and because Jalen Duren is a tough customer to throw this kind of pass over, but the idea is nice and the execution was encouraging. We’ll try and forgive Jett for jogging back in transition here as his man gets the ball and nearly scores, but as he leads Orlando back the other direction with the rock in his hands, he attacks the middle of the floor at the 3-point line and sells his dribble pull-up before flowing right into an overhead pass—again to Baker—who dunks it this time.

This matters because (although his selection can be a little wild) I think the shooting gravity will be there, which is what Orlando was after with this pick. In three games, Howard shot 40 percent from 3, and that’s come in a variety of situations. He might need to tread that line between audacious and sensible in order to really become a helpful distraction for their stars.

He needs to commit himself to getting stronger and staying focused on the defensive end, but I have a good feeling about Jett Howard.

Twinning Time

For all the dogging of the quality of competition at Overtime Elite, it turns out that Amen and Ausar Thompson are comfortable playing at this level. Who knew?

Amen’s game is funky and yet cerebral, there’s no doubt about it. He’s always been angular, slippery, and his “lefty on the right” layup is one of the more oddly effective go-to finishing tricks I’ve seen. In a short run, he repeatedly showed off his ability to create paint touches that spurred Houston’s offense.

It’s tough to file Amen under any particular archetype when you look at players that are his size with the production (and caveats) that I expect him to bring. On that front, I frequently find myself a bit lost with him, in the territory of black swan fallacy, wondering if I should even bother. I do think that there is such a thing as comp sacrilege; names that you should not bring up because, a) it typically speaks to a lack of appreciation for how special the player happens to be, and b) because you might get struck by lightning.

That said, I can’t help but get some … and I’m hiding in a storm shelter as I type this … [I’m whispering now] Andre Iguodala vibes from the types of things Amen does. I KNOW. I’M A HYPOCRITE. I’M SORRY.

Amen’s not the same type of powerful, forceful driver as Iggy, but there are glimpses of a similar skill set. The size—dude is 6-foot-7 with damn near head-to-toe body elasticity and world-class explosiveness—the keen playmaking sense with passing touch, and the processing speed on both ends of the floor. This type of slithery-ness with the ball just does not typically come with elite vertical explosion. Ja Morant is the only other comparable example that comes to mind. Antoine Davis is only 6-1, I graciously grant you that, but watch Amen shoot this gap and nearly steal the ball, fall down to the point of being nearly horizontal, get back up and trail the handler by a good five feet, meet the screener and swim move him like Nick Bosa, and get a fingertip on this shot:

Earlier in this draft cycle, before I became a boring chalk thinker and cowardly backed away from taking a bold stance, I flirted with the idea of moving Amen to the second spot—ahead of Scoot and Miller—on my board.

Amen is capable of orchestrating in transition and even getting to the rim in a ball screen, but I think he’ll be immensely valuable for Houston when he’s roaming off of their scorers and killing rotating defenses with smart cuts and extra passes. 

I just love watching this guy play.

Cashing Out

• Can this be the new logo?

• Indiana brought a squad to Las Vegas. It’s pretty amazing how quickly things can fall into place and start to make sense when you have a player that inspires everyone else to give a shit and makes their lives easier. I’ve said this a million times, but culture trickles down, and I think that’s partly what’s happening with Tyrese Haliburton, who was visibly supportive out in Vegas. As far as Indy’s youngsters, Ben Sheppard looked like a plug-and-play, quick-draw 3-point shooter who could end up being a useful option in the near future. I thought Jarace Walker also looked like a spacing, ball-hawking behemoth on defense. When you consider their other offseason moves, it’s safe to say that the Pacers are on a heater right now.
• Parisian Pippen (Bilal Coulibaly) will be a monster. Ignore what I said earlier about comp sacrilege. I want to call him Parisian Pippen.
• Every living person has Nike Panda Dunks.
• Tale as old as time: Emoni Bates let it fly, as he should. In one game, he got up four transition 3s in the first two and a half minutes of action. 

I respect it. In terms of pure ability, he’s on the short list of most talented shot creators in this draft. Of course, it’s never really been about that with Bates. It’s been about rigidity of play style and everything else. Last season at Eastern Michigan, he was near the top of the country in usage and had only a 9.2 assist percentage. There’s understandable worry about him as a finisher. We got to know him as the next potential superstar on the horizon, and now I’m envisioning him with a much narrower role. The Cavs supplemented their spacing and perimeter depth this offseason with proven playoff players, so it’s hard to envision Emoni getting much of a shot with their main roster in the short term. 

• Golden State’s summer team was more fun than expected. I didn’t get to see Trayce Jackson-Davis play. I really wanted to see that. However, other guys had moments early on. Lester Quinones and Gui Santos looked like prototypical Warriors picks of the past. Also: I’ll assume I saw Brandin Podziemski’s family in the stands and not some group of 5-10 people who each had on a different jersey with his name on the back. Going by that and his dad’s Twitter and draft night energy, they seem like a fun group.
• The Sphere is every bit as confounding in person as people say. I initially did a full-blown, Russillo-style “wait, what?” when I saw it on the horizon as I came into town. Surely that’s some kind of projection. A mirage near the Mirage. Trippy as all get out, and even trippier when you discover that James Dolan is a driving force behind it. I read that the entire project was nearly derailed when Dolan tried to trade it for Arron Afflalo and a second-rounder.
• Double-zero is apparently having a moment. Last year we had Jonathan Kuminga and Bennedict Mathurin, and I thought, well that’s pretty cool. This year we have Scoot and Nick Smith Jr. and I thought well this is officially a movement. Robert Parish and Tony Delk just raised their glasses and toasted to that.
• The jarring shock of seeing NBA players walk around casinos and concourses eventually wears off. It’s cool, but you play it cool. Don’t make a scene, baby. That said, for me, all of that goes out the window with some of my formative heroes. At one point, someone excitedly patted me on the shoulder to point out a nearby Tayshaun Prince—easily one of my top five Kentucky players ever—and I will admit, my eyes widened and I tensed up. My colleague Tyler Parker chuckled and said “you reacted like your high school crush had walked by.” Well, Tyler, my high school crush did walk by.
• Lastly, I’d forgotten that Old Vegas … kinda rules?

Is it seedier? Absolutely. Will your safety be increasingly questionable past a certain hour? Possibly. Is it state of the art in any way? Absolutely not. Can you get steak and lobster for $11.99? You bet your sweet ass you can.

I’ve been a few times, purely in the “you gotta see this” sense, but rarely for very long. On an Uber ride out there this year, our driver gave us a solemn “so you know what you’re getting into?” disclaimer as she glared at us in the rearview mirror. New Vegas, that is the Strip, is wringing luxury out of every available subatomic particle—accounting for every conceivable accommodation and bewitching you with design and razor-sharp tech. A different kind of sorcery is going on in Old Vegas.

The seams are more visible and the mechanical tactility of the place sends the mind wandering, wondering just how many (hopefully only) hands have touched this Kenny Rogers slot machine before you. In Star Wars terms: if New Vegas and the Strip are the latest movies (most of which are bad), Old Vegas is the original trilogy. Functional, but weathered and generally weird. Wars happened here. It’s unpolished, but plenty of memorable stuff has gone down and will continue to go down here. None of that stops me from being a fan. All of that stops me from wanting to do it more than once a year. Sounds a lot like summer league to me.

J. Kyle Mann