Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had a solid rookie season for the Los Angeles Clippers in 2018-19. He played in all 82 games (73 starts), averaging 10.8 points, 3.3 assists, 2.8 rebounds and 1.2 steals per game. He also earned 2nd Team All-Rookie honors.
Gilgeous-Alexander was then traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder as part of the Paul George trade last offseason. He followed with a breakthrough season, averaging 19.0 points, 5.9 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.1 steals per game. He started all 70 games he played, averaging nearly 35 minutes per contest.
In seven playoff games, Gilgeous-Alexander averaged nearly 40 minutes per game. He also converted 40 percent from 3-point range.
The Thunder have traded Chris Paul to the Phoenix Suns, and Dennis Schroder is gone in free agency. There are some significant backcourt touches left behind. In the frontcourt Steven Adams and Danilo Gallinari are gone, replaced by Al Horford and Trevor Ariza.
Thunder GM Sam Presti has pressed the gas pedal on the fantasy hype train for Gilgeous-Alexander.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander-Star In The Making?
Gilgeous-Alexander had a 23.7 percent usage rate last season. As cited by Rotoworld, his usage rate was 31.1 percent when Paul, Gallinari and Schroder weren’t on the floor with him.
In an easy translation to per-36 minute numbers, Gilgeous-Alexander had 36 minutes without the aforementioned trio on the floor with him last season. In that small stretch, he averaged 23.8 points, 9.9 rebounds and 8.9 assists. Per-36 minutes overall last season, he averaged 19.7 points, 6.1 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 1.2 steals (1.9 steals-plus-blocks).
Compared to his rookie season, Gilgeous-Alexander traded a lot of shots from 10-feet out to the 3-point line for 3-pointers last season. According to Basketball Reference, his attempts from the corners went way down as a percentage of his attempts from beyond the arc. That, despite NBA.com showing he was 14-for-34 (41.2 percent) on threes from the corners last season.
Suffice to say, Gilgeous-Alexander will have the ball in his hands plenty. Last season, 82.5 percent of his shot attempts came with a touch time of two-plus seconds. That was paralleled closely by the percentage of his shots off two or more dribbles (79.3 percent, both according to NBA.com).
Having the ball in his hands more will invite more turnovers for Gilgeous-Alexander. Offseason acquisition George Hill is a diet version of Paul in some ways, and he should take a share of the ball-handling. If playing off the ball some yields more 3-point attempts in the corners, all the better for Gilgeous-Alexander.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander-Fantasy ADP
Fantasy Pros’ current consensus ADP (Yahoo! and ESPN) has Gilgeous-Alexander as SG7 and No. 33 overall. So the breakout hype is being bought into, and it’s well-founded.
