Wouldn't say natural point guard but he needs more reps. Hard to develop when you're passing to KD at the top of the key as soon as you pass half court Would prefer we try to find a future backcourt next year or two and move Amen to the 3 after KD leaves. He’s a couple years away from being a point guard but think he’d be a better 2nd ball handling point forward. Need to find a future point guard
Does Amen now have his own sub-genre of snaps? Amen’s shooting is so bad, he got a summer job as a Stormtrooper.
I should have said "good enough to space the floor" rather than "good", I don't think Amen will ever be a good 3P shooter by NBA standards, and most players as bad as him didn't get there either. I just do think he can get to 34% on a few attempts or so. Anyway, here are some guys off the top of my head who either shot a comparable percentage (below 25%) or just didn't take them at all and were "non-shooters", who eventually got good enough to be real three point threats: Brook Lopez Blake Griffin Bam Adebayo Al Horford Demarcus Cousins The thing is that most guys as bad as Amen are centers, and until recently, if they were bad at shooting threes they weren't even encouraged/allowed to take them. But we've seen a lot of examples lately of these "non-shooting big men" actually developing that shot to help them stay in the league. When it's considered important to a guy's career it's actually not that rare. If you expand the threshold to more like 27-28% on 1 attempt per game the list is a mile long, by the way.
Amen can run the break but not the half court sets. Amen should work on his 10-15' shot, so team have to guard that. Then Amen can add a 15-18' shot. A 18' shot should help spread the floor a bit. :shrug:
Yes, he's a defense slashing power forward who can sometimes pass. Playing him out of position to force Jabari into the starting lineup is the issue.
I think a lot of people forget what happened last year with Fred. He doesn't really create the offense in the way people make it seem. Most of the time, he'd drive, struggle to beat his defender, and then kick it out because teams already knew what was coming. A lot of our offense was just pick-and-roll with Alpi, forcing him to make a quick read—either take the floater or hit Amen in the dunker spot. It became very predictable. What Fred does bring is ball security, veteran leadership, and the ability to keep the offense organized so we don't turn the ball over. He also provides some spacing with his shooting, even though his regular-season numbers were pretty rough. Even with Fred, we still had a bad offense. I think people are forgetting that we need better shot-makers and floor spacers to make the offense function at a higher level. There were plenty of games where shots were falling, and you could see flashes of Amen looking like our point guard. At the same time, Amen still has areas he needs to improve. He has to become a more consistent shooter, tighten up his ball handling, and continue improving his decision-making and ball security. As those parts of his game develop—and as the roster adds more shooting around him—the offense should naturally open up and look much better. I think us Rockets fan get way too impatient.
You act like we have some sort of offense and we run sets lol we have always been an iso heavy team with ime.
I dont think his close to mid range shot is bad. I wish he would take more of it tbh. But its also very hard to shoot that type of shot when you have a center on the team that just clogs the space up.
none of that changes Amen’s flaws teams without a PG often look clueless on offense in the half court Amen’s ball handling, shooting, and court vision are all below average for an actual NBA PG
his midrange shot is awful 32.5% from 10-16 ft, 33% from 16 ft-3 point line on NBA.com, on shots they classify as midrange, he shot 27.8% and these percentages are with him not being guarded and teams not even contesting the shot
Yes, I agree he has areas to improve, but I don't think anyone expected him to be a full-time point guard this season. Because of that, he probably didn't spend as much time focusing on those specific skills last summer. Then Fred's injury came out of nowhere, and the entire team had to adjust quickly. Amen was suddenly asked to take on a much bigger role as a primary ball handler and playmaker than originally planned. That's a tough adjustment for any young player. I think people forget that development isn't always linear, especially at the point guard position. It takes time, reps, and experience.
Honestly I don't even know if the PG role even exists in the NBA anymore as we continue to move to positionless basketball. So much offense is built around attacking defensive personnel in mismatches these days so the role of the point guard varies wildly from night to night depending on the matchup and from team to team depending on how the team is constructed. The only consistent role left that applies to all NBA level PGs is just a guy who can reliably take the ball from out of bounds to "start" the offensive set without getting the ball stolen and said PG likely being a good "connector" on the court - helping the ball move quickly and efficiency from side to side to find open players on the weak side. I think Amen does both of those things well enough to meet modern NBA PG standards. The function of a player creating opportunities for others to hit open shots is specifically a Playmaker role and not all offenses necessarily have that - some teams have entire offenses built on that(James Harden teams for example), others have well coached offenses built to get players open(Pacers, Warriors, etc), and others just put a dominant scorer in place and let them pass to open guys and hope for the best(SGA, Brunson). Honestly, I would say there aren't a lot of true playmakers left in the NBA - maybe 10ish tops. Its mostly guys like Jokic, Cade, Halliburton, Luka, Harden, Lebron, and maybe even a guy like Lamelo Ball. Although they also get assists, I don't think guys like SGA and Brunson are true playmakers so much as high level scorers who always draw the double so they gets lots of opportunities to find open guys. Amen gets assists the same way but with less frequency because he doesn't always force defenses to double him. The problem was never "is Amen a PG or not?" - the problem we are actually trying to solve is we don't have ways to generate good looks for our players which was the job of a PG in the old days...and this is because: - we have an offensive system that does not have many movements designed to get players open scoring opportunities to make a quick play - the offensive movement is designed just to get the ball in the hands of scorers in mismatches and then clear out. - we have a genuine playmaker in Alpi but he lacks the efficiency to draw consistent doubles and be a threat for anywhere except right at the hoop which impacts how man opportunities he has to make plays for others. His offensive limitations make it easier for teams to negate his best skill...and frankly Alpi's ego makes him think he is a better scorer than playmaker - THAT is the huge switch from the Alpi we all love to the guy he is today. - we have a dominant scorer similar to SGA/Brunson (KD) but who lacks the ability to find open guys consistently and often turns it over when teams blitz him In all honesty - Amen can't be the guy who saves us from poor coaching and poor roster construction - he adds value to this roster as one of the best one on one defenders in the league and highly capable off ball player offensively. Its true that Fred helps us cut down on some careless turnovers but at this stage in his career he is also not a reliable playmaker although he has been one for parts of his career. Ultimately we need some combination of better coaching and better roster construction to change the culture here. Trotting FVV out there or minor improvements from Amen are ultimately just bandaids hiding the real structural issue here.
It might not have been career threatening for him, but he had a hundred million reasons to level up that shot this season - becoming extension eligible, Rookie Max Vs ??? Not only did he not level up, he went backwards. If I'm Stone, I'm not handing that guy a max deal, no way, no how, not close.
You can want to do something and be capable of doing something but the process might still take longer than you'd like. I've been careful not to claim any time frame on Amen figuring it out. It might not even happen until he's past his physical prime. I hope that's not the case though.
Its becuase he's not a guard. He's a forward and people are afraid of his height. Playing him at forward means he will be faster than his opponent. Playing him at guard he will sstruggle because he cant shoot.
Pre-injury Ron Harper was insanely good. He lost a ton of his explosiveness after the injury. I think he was always pretty much a combo guard, but after the injury and with the Bulls he changed how he played, relied more on his BBIQ, and was more of a playmaker/PG/defender. His offensive game is miles better than what Amen's shown to this point. I'm still pissed the Spurs got his son. That's just unfair. lol. With the way the Spurs and OKC (sometimes) run and gun, it'd be neat to see how good Amen would be in that type of offense.
Doesn’t matter to me what position he’s labeled at, he should have 2 other guards playing with him that have half court organization skills and jumpers. For instance, with the 24’ Celtics back court Jrue Holiday and Derrick White, you wouldn’t discourage Amen bringing the ball up quickly and being the first option chronological order PG much as possible off of live ball turnovers and rebounds. Off of made shots, pulling the ball out of the net, you would have a different guard bringing it up with Amen improving his screener and dunker spot stuff.
