Grading the 2021-22 Oklahoma City Thunder bench unit

The Oklahoma City Thunder have found their sixth man of the future in bucket getter Tre Mann

Lost in the shuffle of the 2021 NBA Draft was Tre Mann. The 2021 Draft lottery did not go the Thunder’s way with visions of Cade Cunningham dancing in their heads, what a perfect situation just bring Cunningham a few hours down the road from Stillwater and get him a locker at the Paycom Center, what could be better than that? Well, the team not only did not land the top pick, but they went from a shot of two top-five selections to not having a single pick inside the top-five landing at pick-six.

With the sixth overall pick, Jonathan Kuminga was still on the board, a player who was in everyone’s top five just two months before draft day. Their smoke screen draft crush, James Bouknight, was available as well, and yet, Sam Presti like a thief in the night grabbed Josh Giddey who turned out to be better than both options and looks set to help lead the Thunder back to contention eventually. However on draft night, not many around OKC had that confidence.

Then, another smokescreen darling, Alprene Sengun, was on the board at pick 16 and the Thunder selected him! Only to trade him to the Houston Rockets for future draft picks, this left fans spiraling on draft night, not able to recover in time to celebrate their 18th selection in Tre Mann who quickly made fans take notice and rose above the noise.

Mann logged 60-games during his rookie campaign, 26 of which were starts, and averaged 10-points, three rebounds, and nearly two assists to go along with 0.8 steals per game on 39-percent shooting from the floor but 36-percent shooting from deep. At the line, Mann hit 79-percent of his free throws giving the organization confidence his shooting splits will improve throughout his career.

Tre Mann turned in 30 or more points twice as a rookie, headlined by a 35-point outburst against Boston in March just a few weeks after dropping 30-points in historic Madison Square Garden, and a month after barely missing out on 30 hanging 29 in the American Airlines Center in Dallas.

Mann produced over ten points per game 27-times, seven of which were over 20 points. The Florida product shot 42-percent on corner threes while that number drops to 34-percent on non-corner triples. On long mid-range jumpers (shots past the free-throw line but not a three) Mann posts 43-percent just two percentage points higher than his total mid-range average. The area of shooting Mann has to improve at is around the rim, just 48-percent at the cup. While he does not need to get better than 36-percent from distance there are significant signs that he will.

Tre Mann mesmerized Oklahoma City with his step-back move and eventually used it to open out paths to the rim, create a dribble-in jumper in the Mid-range, and of course just space to launch a three. Speaking of space, Mann provides a ton of gravity on the floor. On more than one occasion, Mann was sitting at the hash to create space from his defender who eventually had to respect his deep shot which in turn gave Shai Gilgeous-Alexander more room to drive to the rack for example.

Grade: A, who knows if Tre Mann can ever be more than a 6th man bucket getter that finishes games in closing lineups, but even if that is his ceiling, that is insane value.