He barely had any D-1 teammates at Washington. I wouldn't place too much weight on metrics from a different league with true zone defenses allowed where he had such a unique situation of being on such an abysmal team.
Markelle Fultz, Year Three: He's back! Big....?
- Thread starter PedroKsBambino
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Yeah, that’s not true. There were a bunch of four-star recruits and good players on that team. And they won 21 games last year under a new coach.
That could be interpreted in a few different ways, however. Perhaps they weren’t willing to throw him into a package they already felt was more than fair. Or maybe they just couldn’t accept the shame of dumping a #1 pick they gave up so much to get after only one year. It doesn’t have to mean they expect him to perform like a true #1 talent. If they valued Fultz over Kawhi, everyone needs to be fired.
Looks like the same player who was benched in last years playoffs to me. He's god awful. Horrible decision making. Horrible everything.
Tiny sample size but 2-7 from the field with three turnovers and a -16. Let's give the kid a chance before we proclaim him anything other than a rookie+ who is going to struggle a lot this season.
He doesn’t even look like he has a Rozier level ceiling right now. He’s smooth so there is something there, but is he even in shape? Kid looks a little fat and he is a young pro athlete
Might be more soft than fat. He had more muscle tone in college I thought. Maybe he couldn’t touch weights because of his shoulder. He has an aura of melancholy that is weird to see on a basketball court.
I just finished saying I wouldn't trade Rozier for him in the game thread...but let's not forget what Sophomore Scary Terry looked like.
He has a fat face so it doesn't help but soft is the word I'd use. Last year he looked like a guy who skipped leg and core day to focus only on his arms so a shoulder injury could affect that greatly.
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This picture was around the draft and describes what I mean. He's swollen from working out but his arms don't match the rest of him.
My biggest takeaway is that he and Simmons can't be on the floor together. You can maybe survive one non-center who doesn't even attempt 3s, but 2 is crippling to the offense
I'd be less concerned with his appearance (he looked ripped with Hanlan this summer) and just watch him play. Markelle was MIA, it was glaring last night and I'd expect it to continue. He's just not very good at this stage. Forcing him into the starting lineup is silly. Let him earn his minutes and gain confidence by playing well against 2nd units to start the season. It's a long season, Philly/BB isn't really helping this kid grow and thrive as a player.
BB will eventually put JJ back in the starting line-up, so Ben and Joel can get open shots. Ripping Markelle from the starting line-up will do wonders for his self-confidence.
BB will eventually put JJ back in the starting line-up, so Ben and Joel can get open shots. Ripping Markelle from the starting line-up will do wonders for his self-confidence.
The good: hit his first career 3; Sixers won; +5; 5-1 assist-turnover.
The bad: 5-15 overall from the field (1-3 from 3).
The bad: 5-15 overall from the field (1-3 from 3).
I don’t think being +5 is a “good” in a game his team won by 19 and when the other starters were +21, on average.
Reading about it today, sounds like the Bulls were having his man double down off of him onto Embiid and Simmons. We saw the Cs sag way off him and disrupt passing lanes. I don’t know how viable it is in the half court to have him and Simmons out there together.
Reading about it today, sounds like the Bulls were having his man double down off of him onto Embiid and Simmons. We saw the Cs sag way off him and disrupt passing lanes. I don’t know how viable it is in the half court to have him and Simmons out there together.
he was terrible in the First Half when it was a game.
Markelle put up most of those numbers (like last years triple-double) when the game was over. He re-entered the 2nd half with 4 minutes left in the 3rd when the Sixers were up 20pts
This was with Dunn not with the team due to the birth of his son to boot. It could have been REALLY ugly against a full Bulls squad (words you won't hear often anytime soon).
Ainge's stones never cease to amaze. He could have done the safe thing, but instead he pulled off an all-time heist. Guts of a burglar on that guy.
Starting for the injured Simmons tonight. He hit a nice 18 foot pull up, high release, closer to his college form than I’ve seen recently. But the thing that sticks out most is his difficulty navigating screens. He’s gone under a handful already, giving up easy jumpers, and got caught up in a couple more. Probably just his lack of practice and game reps, but it’s weird to see him have so much trouble with it considering how good he is in tight spaces with the ball.
Hits a corner three. Playing with way more confidence. He’s so much better with the ball in his hand, running the show. Anytime I’ve seen him on the court with Ben he looks disengaged.
Nearly everyone switches and shows nowadays......are you sure this was Fultz' responsibility on these plays? It's a pet peeve of mine to watch team defense breakdowns make one player look bad when it was another teammate who screwed up his assignment.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure. Just checked Twitter to see if anyone else is seeing what I’m seeing, and though I have mixed feelings about Nate Duncan, here’s him 10 minutes ago:
Anyway, off to more pressing concerns. LET’S GO SOX!!!
I'm going to watch this on replay after the Sox game now since I'm curious. I'm not a Nate Duncan guy and would be interested to see for myself how Fultz handles these screens. Thanks
Brown has talked about not changing the bench roles of Redick and McConnell when starters are injured. He likely views McConnell as the better option and simply choose to get him his 32 min off the bench and in closing out the game.
Impressions from the game from Kyle Neubeck, who's a great resource for all things Sixers and Fultz particularly- he wrote that really in-depth piece about Fultz's issues that was linked somewhere in here last year. He thought the first half was Fultz's most promising stint as a pro, but adds this caveat: "Fultz's offensive effort was encouraging, but man does he get eaten alive by screens at this stage of his career. He may already pretty decent at using his length to bother other players or come up with chasedown blocks, but he has a lot of work to do before he can be a legitimately impactful defender. And that's kinda fine. Young players are almost universally bad defenders, and the Sixers can live with that if he comes through on offense."
https://www.phillyvoice.com/instant-observations-sixers-pistons-markelle-fultz-joel-embiid-ben-simmons/
https://www.phillyvoice.com/instant-observations-sixers-pistons-markelle-fultz-joel-embiid-ben-simmons/
He did a nice job taking it to the hole, mostly in transition, but with one nice cut to a feed from Saric. The 15-footer he hit looked awkward (like he shot it on the way down), and the 3-pointer he hit was unguarded, so he took 2 or 3 seconds to set up, and it was a push shot. Can't find video of the 3-pointer that he had blocked, but it's not surprising based on the form of the one he hit.
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Fultz is off to a good start at dispelling the biggest question about him: whether he could come back from what may have been the yips. I'm not sure his ceiling or his floor are as high as we thought they were during summer league after the draft, but at least his floor is a whole lot higher than I thought it was 2 months ago. He's a rookie in a lot of ways so it's early to judge his ceiling. We'll see how he progresses.
Agreed. The yips (whatever it was???) are cured. He looks like a rookie that will improve with increased playing time.
Take a trip through the looking glass and get to know the Long Thoracic Nerve Injury Theory making its way through Sixers Twitter recently:
Most of this guy's other tweets are about smoking weed.
Philly's 2018 first round pick is out for the season because of a foot injury exacerbated by a food allergy and it doesn't even register on the Sixers draft-pick bizarro-meter.
Most of this guy's other tweets are about smoking weed.
Philly's 2018 first round pick is out for the season because of a foot injury exacerbated by a food allergy and it doesn't even register on the Sixers draft-pick bizarro-meter.
He is adrift at sea...
I guess he’s gotta keep experimenting until he finds something that feels comfortable, but that’s seeming further and further away.
I guess he’s gotta keep experimenting until he finds something that feels comfortable, but that’s seeming further and further away.
How can that possibly work? Ball is never set. This is getting even more sad.
Why not though? I always wondered why some terrible FT shooters didn't try underhand.We know what's coming...
Those may have been the two best looking shots of Fultz' career. I wish I were kidding.
I wonder if this is the work of the sports psychologist suggesting that keeping the ball moving will trick him into not thinking about it?
Kind of like how Chuck Knoblauch could still turn double plays but couldn’t make the routine play with time.
Kind of like how Chuck Knoblauch could still turn double plays but couldn’t make the routine play with time.
100% that's what it is. Get into a second-nature rhythm that takes your brain out of the um process and you flow into the appropriate motion and position. You see these idiosyncratic movements with hitters and pitchers all the time but this one is a little odd because as BigSoxFan says the ball doesn't quite settle in the way you usually see with free throws and that doesn't seem ideal. It might help him in some way but it really doesn't look like a permanent solution.
My dad is a big Sixers fan. I played him Fultz college highlights last night. Tears were produced.
There's a this American Life about this (quick google says it's episode 590, "choosing wrong" https://www.thisamericanlife.org/590/choosing-wrong).
I haven't listened to it in a while but if memory serves it's about how mechanically it makes more sense to shoot FTs underhanded and specifically describes Wilt Chamberlin using that strategy briefly with great success. The theme of the episode is people knowingly making the wrong choice so as you can imagine it concludes with Wilt and other poor FT shooters whom the technique is suggested to choosing not to do it because it's "granny shooting" and they don't want to be embarrassed .