OKC Thunder: 3 things we must see during final stretch of season

Thing to see No. 3) Offensive consistency from Darius Bazley

We hear the media constantly speaking about how the OKC Thunder must look into adding upgraded talents to the roster and a potential sidekick to run alongside Shai Gilgeous-Alexander over the next couple of years.

However, some fans are under the impression that the team already has that potential running mate of the future for their star guard in sophomore forward, Darius Bazley.

Seeing his minutes per game double in comparison to 2019-20, the 20-year-old has managed to post a solid all-around stat line of 12.7 points, 7.4 rebounds, 1.6 assists, and just over a half-block on 40 percent shooting from the field.

While he has shown the ability to produce at high levels, most recently with his 16 points and eight rebounds performance on 60 percent shooting from deep against the Toronto Raptors, throughout his second year in the association, these games have proven to be highly inconsistent.

Sure, this past Monday he managed to surpass his point total against the Raptors with 26 on the night versus the Washington Wizards, but he did this while shooting just 37 percent from the field and a miserable 17 percent from deep.

This season, more often than not it appears as though whenever Bazley seems to be turning the corner in regard to offensive inconsistency, he inevitably plummets back down to reality.

On the year, the forward has posted 15+ points in a game on 17 different occasions, which equals to about 40 percent of his games. Of these games, he has only managed to shoot at over 40 percent from the floor as well as 33 percent from deep in seven of them, equating to 41 percent of said games.

Lastly, when it comes to follow-up games for such performances, Bazley has managed to fall into this aforementioned range just once.

See where we’re going with this?!

Consistency is key in this league, and we have yet to see if Darius Bazley has what it takes to produce at a consistently high rate on the offensive side of the ball.

Hopefully, during this final stretch, he’ll add more high-end follow-up games to his collection.