OKC Thunder: Could Moses Brown be viewed as center of the future?

Fresh off his first start, not just with the OKC Thunder but of his NBA career, second-year big man Moses Brown has caught the attention of fans and media alike.

Though he had a hard time keeping his hands off opposing players, collecting six fouls in 24 minutes, during Sunday’s matchup against the Memphis Grizzlies the 21-year-old faired quite well, finishing with a stat line of 13 points, four rebounds, and a block on a whopping 83 percent shooting from deep.

Now, coming in on his fourth consecutive game with the Thunder, the center is in the midst of averaging 10 points, 8.3 rebounds, and a block on 63 percent shooting from the field in 23.4 minutes per game, thus showing his dominance in the G-League prior to being called up a few weeks back was not merely due to the lower level of competition he saw himself squaring off against.

Because of this, we at TI are now finding ourselves begging the question as to whether or not Brown should be viewed as more than just a secondary option to collect minutes down low and, instead, be seen as a potential option of the future at the pivot.

Moses Brown could be a future option at starting center for the OKC Thunder

As we said earlier, during the first start of his career Brown went on to foul out. This aspect of his game has been well noticed by fans and spectators alike, as he’s averaging four fouls when finding himself logging 10+ minutes of action.

Though this is certainly not something that can continue if he wishes to make himself a legitimate starter in the league and, more specifically, for the OKC Thunder moving forward, proper defensive mechanics is something that can be taught and, at his youthful age, odds are they can also manage to stay with him as well.

What can’t be taught, however, is size and Moses Brown simply has a ton of it.

Measuring in at 7-2, 245-pounds with nearly a 7-4 wingspan, the UCLA product has the build to be an absolute menace down low, both as a rim-rattling finisher and a rim-protecting extraordinaire, the latter of which has been made evident by his 1.9 blocks average both in college and during this season with the OKC Blue.

Look, we get it — having only played in 10 total games for the Thunder and 19 total games thus far into his NBA career, one could certainly argue that it may be too premature to ponder on the idea of Moses Brown eventually becoming the centerpiece at the pivot for OKC.

Having said that, his play has seemingly only continued to get better with every passing day and, with his raw talent coupled with Oklahoma City’s track record of developing their young players, we don’t believe it to be too far fetched of an idea to think, perhaps one day, he could be the team’s mainstay down low.