Some rough fans in here, geez. Summer league is never good for unathletic bigs. It's not the right environment. Also factor in he probably hasn't played ball properly since his injury, he is a bit rusty. Looks to have slimmed down a lot while retaining solid muscle. Excited to see how he plays this season!
We just got a lil worried but i been saying the same thing.. Lets wait till the actual pre season finale to see where hes truly at.
Better game offensively from Zu. But his defense was pretty much absent. Too many layups, shots in his face, and sitting back in the pick and roll.
Cannot understand why Zu can't seem to jump any more. Never was a leaper but was he this earthbound last year? He wasn't kidding about that 10 inches it seems. Maybe he should be checking out BoingVert? https://boingvert.com
We gotta believe hes still a project on D. . but having a coming out party on offense was pretty big of him. He needed that and something good that was positive for him.
He's still not holding onto the ball in the post real strongly and looks at the refs way to much when he just needs to try and tear the rim down when he get the ball as low in the post has he has. Had a nice stat line last night but still needs to be a lot better. Only 3 rebounds and as I just mentioned he needs to be stronger going up and not losing the ball as much. Clutch FTs though to win the game
OK back to glass at least half full with Zu. He had a bunch of nice plays last night, looked more coordinated and hit some shots. But so far in Summer League I hope it's been a wakeup call to him about how far he has to go to get stronger and quicker for this his 2nd season. Maybe to some extent he is playing himself into game condition (only way to do it) as Lonzo seems to be doing. Let's see how he looks tonight against Cleveland.
Was really important to see him have success on offense... Needs to follow up with a good game tonight and have two consecutive games of something positive.
Played better defensively and on the boards today for sure which was great to see, but still Charmin soft on the offensive end. With all this said, you don't give up on this kid at 20 years old.
He was pissing me off so much tonight. Dropping easy passes, missing gimmes, couldn't even take it strong with a smaller guy on him half the time and I believe he even got blocked by a 6 foot guard. He better keep working his a** off in the gym and be ready for training camp, this sort of play won't be acceptable at that point. For now we can let it slide, but he will get destroyed in real NBA games if he plays like this.
No one better in the league for Zu to now measure himself with how incredibly far he has to go to be as good as I'm thinking he was getting to take for granted that he is ..... and practice against and learn from .... than Brook Lopez. Marc Gasol sure, but older now and I bet Zu fancies himself more versatile offensively. Those hooks not close to Sky Hooks since he is earthbound and the opposition sees them coming 5 seconds before they happen. Use the time wisely and gaddammmit get stronger Zu. Or you'll be gone.
This dude is pissing me off big time. He's white kwame out there minus the defense but with a nice mid range jumper. TBH, Tarik would be finishing around the rim like a monster with the looks Zo is serving up Zu only to be botched or blocked .
While I also think Zu has taken a step back in Summer League, I also think there are a couple factors that are limiting his success. Pace is one of them. Zo is definitely made our team play much faster, so maybe Zu is finding it hard to keep it with the pace and transition game on both ends and just tiring out overall. Additionally, the team is running fewer screen and rolls and the spacing wasn't quite right. The times he did get good looks was when the defenses collapsed and he was wide open for a jumper or layup. He kept getting passes in traffic, but he also was soft on a lot of his attempts, which was frustrating. I'll give Zu the benefit of the doubt. He's still young and is probably more utilized in half court sets, but he needs to toughen up and rebound a lot better.
