A Look At Nerlens Noel’s Early Season Performance

Well it’s been awhile peeps. Unfortunately, my “real-life” job has taken me away from writing the nonsense that I love to write. I have a little bit of free time and figure to give it another whirl.

There’s a lot of topic’s I could choose from. MCW struggles (besides getting to them rim) with shooting (19.7 percent from beyond 16 feet), and turnovers (4.6 per game). Though some of his struggles are directly from his off-season  shoulder surgery. Instead of him working on his flaws in the off-season, he was rehabbing his shoulder.  My love for K.J. McDaniels, even his mom would be fun to write about. The gem of find in Robert Covington. He has made the same amount 3’s made as Steph Curry over his past 15 games, reported by Max Rappaport. Or, I could just talk about the Sixers in general and what might be next in Hinkie’s plan. BUT… I figured to talk about Nerlens Noel.

Noel had an up and down rookie season thus far.  Noel, 20, is averaging 7.7 ppg, 7.2 rpg, to go along with 1.4 blocks and 1.6 steals a game. He has looked like an “Elite” defender, being able to guard multiple positions at times.  Holding opponents to 46.8% shooting at the rim, according to NBA Stats. He is a big part of the reason why the Sixers creeped into the top ten in “Defensive Efficiency” (the number of points a team allows per 100 possessions) at one point this year. Yes, that actually happened for about a day (OK, maybe a few hours). You can clearly see the effect he has on the game on the defensive side, when he is fully engaged.

Offensively? Well…that’s a different story. We all knew that Noel was going to be project. Brett Brown basically spent the entire 2013-14 season breaking down Noel’s jump shot and building it up again. Obviously, that jumper still has a ways to go. He is shooting an awful 37% from 3-10 feet out from the rim. He struggles to even catch the ball at certain times. His best move seems to be that running left-handed hook he does.  He is shooting 50% from the charity stripe and is shooting 41% overall.  He does have decent passing skills though.

I have seen NBA people project him to Samuel Dalembert (our good old friend). “Slammin” Sammy. There’s a dude with ZERO basketball IQ. That would be very disappointing. I have seen people say, maybe Serge Ibaka. Man, I would love that, but Noel has a long way to go for that. Personally, I’m not crazy about  comparing players, especially when (in Noel’s case) comparing a player in such a small sample.

Noel hasn’t played a lot of basketball at a high level. His freshmen year was cut in half at Kentucky with his knee injury and has only played 29 games in the NBA. So I’m going to hold off on calling him  the next Sammy Dalembert or the next Ibaka.  I’m going to give him time. Time is what he needs. He needs time to gain strength. Time to develop a decent jumper. Time to learn how to focus on a consistent basis. Time to see what it takes to be an NBA player. Luckily, he’s on the Sixers. There’s plenty of time to develop.