The OKC Thunder have one of the youngest teams in the entire league, and two specific rookies had their production broken down in a recent Bleacher Report piece.
When one looks at the 2020-21 OKC Thunder, you see youth and potential.
With an average age of 25 years old, it’s evident that youth runs rampant throughout this roster. The youngest players on the Thunder, unsurprisingly, are two of their rookies in Theo Maledon and Aleksej Pokusevski who list in at 19 and 18, respectively.
For those of you who are unaware, both of these aforementioned players are getting the most playing time out of all other first-year players on the roster, seeing averages upwards of 16 minutes a night.
Proving to be productive and promising youth assets, recently the duo was found on one of Bleacher Report’s most recent pieces, grading every top rookie through the first month of action.
In it, we saw that writer Jonathan Wasserman was pretty high on Maledon’s play through this timespan while viewing Pokusevski as a player who still leaves much to be desired.
Wasserman’s grades and reasonings read as follows:
"Theo Maledon (Oklahoma City Thunder, PG, No. 34 Pick)Coming in with a unique amount of pro experience overseas, Theo Maledon has been one of the few second-round picks earning minutes.His versatility has been useful, and he’s shown poise and passing IQ running pick-and-rolls and threatening defenses as a spot-up shooter.Lacking quickness and explosion, key reasons teams were hesitant about his NBA outlook, Maledon has found ways to score on drives with touch and body control. And he’s flashed the ability to make jumpers off the dribble.Shooting 37.7 percent from the field and 30.2 percent from three with 2.8 assists to 1.9 turnovers, he hasn’t executed with efficiency in any one area yet. But this early, it’s just good to see his capabilities.Grade: B-"
"Aleksej Pokusevski (Oklahoma City Thunder, PF, No. 17 Pick)Grade: DPokusevski’s highlights are eye-catching, and there is still exciting upside tied to his dribble-shoot-pass skill set for a 7-footer. But he’s only making 26.9 percent of his field-goal attempts with a 21.2 turnover percentage. The NBA’s youngest player doesn’t look ready for the early reps."
So early into the season, it hard to say how each of these players will fair come year’s end. Thus far into 2020-21 they’ve shown an array of positive and negative attributes — two things obviously expected from rookies.
We here at TI have our own thoughts on what both Theo Maledon and Aleksej Pokusevski’s season-goals should be but, through one month of action, the rookies have been everything OKC Thunder fans believed they’d be and more.