The Keyonte George train is buzzing and doesn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon! After a very discouraging second season, George has made it clear to the Utah Jazz that he is absolutely a building block for their future. Among those who admitted they were wrong about George were The Athletic’s Sam Vecenie and Bryce Simon.
On “The Game Theory Podcast”, Simon acknowledged that both he and Vecenie underestimated George as a player after his ascension. Vecenie mentioned what George has done in particular to reach a new level.
“The most important thing he does is he really attacks, gets painted, drives and gets fouled. He averages seven free throws a game. I never thought Keyonte George would do that in the NBA. He’s been excellent getting to the line. Obviously he’s making his free throws as well. He’s at 90%.”
“The passing ability, too. He’s really embraced being a point guard, I think that’s the big answer here… I always thought he had the passing ability, but he got himself into a bit of trouble… but Keyonte has been great this year… I think his ability to get paint touches has been huge for them.”
It hasn’t translated into that many more wins for Utah this season, but George’s improvement has made the team infinitely more watchable this season. Ironic considering George’s failure last season played a role in how very out of touch the Jazz were last season.
How high can George’s ceiling be?
George maintaining this level for over a month shows that it is no fluke. So now that he’s proving just how good he is as a point guard, he could be good enough for the Jazz not to worry about acquiring a star at his position. That should only make fans wonder how good he could be in the long run.
His shot is starting to come around a bit, and that was a problem for a long time. So if he proves he’s a reliable shooter in terms of his ability to make mistakes and drop dimes, that makes his ceiling as high as it is ambiguous.
The Jazz won’t know for sure until they see what he, Lauri Markkanen and Ace Bailey can do as a trio as time goes on. Utah likely won’t see the playoffs, but how George does the rest of the season should give the Jazz a better idea of the type of player he is.
As high as it is, George has captured everyone’s attention again, and that’s a good thing. He made his skeptics eat their words, and the next step is to reward the optimists for their faith.
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