OKC Thunder starting lineup grades:
Aleksej Pokusevski has had an up-and-down season for the OKC Thunder, although it has mostly been down.
One night after dropping 20 points on the Phoenix Suns, Pokusevski had trouble scoring just eight against the Trail Blazers.
His style this season has been mostly erratic, as each shot that leaves his hand has the potential to miss its mark completely. It doesn’t seem to slow him down as he is content to shoot his way out of a funk rather than defer to another player. Saturday night featured a little bit of that as he made three of his 13 shot attempts.
He wasn’t much help on the glass, finishing with two rebounds. But on the plus side, he made a few defensive plays coming up with a steal and two blocks.
It’s hard to knock Roby’s scoring as the forward took just four shots and made half of them. He also made one of his four free-throw attempts to finish with five points.
But his seven turnovers hurt the team, which left Roby doing far more damage on the court than good.
Moses Brown is doing what the team asks of him. He’s gone from barely producing because he’s not shooting to hitting nearly everything he puts near the rim.
On Saturday, Brown notched another double-double after scoring 10 points and dominating the boards to finish with 14 rebounds. He shot just seven shots in the game and made four.
Brown is evolving into a beast of a player.
Svi Mykhailiuk shot the ball five times, but he only made one of those shots. Add in his one free throw, and it gives Mykhailiuk a total of three points.
He spent just 23 minutes on the court, which takes some of the heat off of him for this game. But Brown also spent 23 minutes on the court and more than tripled Mykhailiuk’s output.
He’s got a long way to go, but he’s shown flashes of brilliance from time to time.
Watching Saturday night’s game, it’s almost hard to believe Theo Maledon is the same player who dropped 33 points against the Suns, but it’s him alright.
Maledon looked nothing like the player who hit 71.4 percent of his 3-point shots one night ago. Instead, Maledon reverted to the inexperienced rookie trying to dig himself out of a slump.
Of the 12 shots he took on Saturday, Maledon made just one. It was a 3-pointer that, combined with his four made free throws, gave him seven points on the night.
It’s a game to forget for the young guard.