OKC Thunder: ESPN's NBArank Lists Shai Gilgeous-Alexander at No. 8
ESPN’s NBArank list was released on Thursday. The list measures the best overall players in the league, where the network’s expert panel of nearly 150 voters vote on player vs. player matchups from over 15,000 possible pairings — and also the question of who will simply be a better player in the coming season.
Two spots inside the top 10, Oklahoma City’s superstar guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander landed in the No. 8 slot, ahead of the Los Angeles Lakers’ Anthony Davis and LeBron James.
The 25-year-old jumped a massive 40 spots in the rankings, and their reasoning backs it.
“Gilgeous-Alexander is coming off of the best season of his career: 31.4 points per game on 51.0% shooting from the field,” voters wrote. “As he was surrounded by younger players, his play was the reason the Thunder were able to make the jump from the top of the lottery to the play-in tournament.”
In the 2022-23 season, Oklahoma City entered the season with the team’s average age hovering just over 23 years. The Thunder were the youngest team in the league, and they had to continue to develop despite their inexperience and injury woes.
Nonetheless, they did, and at the helm was Gilgeous-Alexander. Leading them to victories off seven 40-plus point outings and absurd plus-minus numbers -- like when he notched +38 in a Feb. 4 victory over Houston -- he had to take matters into his own hands at certain points.
One question the panel of voters had surrounding his play heading into this season is his efficiency, and how he will maintain it. Pointing out he reduced his 3-point attempts to 2.5 last season from 5.3 the year prior alongside leading the league in free throws made, they’re fretting about the sustainability of his play.
“That style worked for him last year, but can he do it again?”
Although, watching his play style and complementary pieces around him last year, paired with the experience gained and the Thunder’s offseason moves, his play from last season is certainly sustainable if he can continue to remain efficient and choose his shots wisely just as he did in 2022-23.
It’d be an arduous task to duplicate his numbers and replicate his effort from a year ago, especially with the slew of defenses to be thrown at him this season. But Gilgeous-Alexander is a superstar, and he’ll find new ways to drastically impact the game if he’s obstructed from using the pathways given to him last season.
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