The Rise of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander…How Good Is He?

The Rise of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander…How Good Is He?

Well the Oklahoma City Thunder just took a massive dump right on the Portland Trailblazers faces I go poopy this one was ugly boys and girls the National Guard was called in to assist and rescue Portland send the National Guard please that need emergency help from what ultimately was a 62o Beatdown what yes

You heard that correctly 139 to 77 final score bringing the Thunders record to 26 and 11 for the season which is now tied with the Minnesota Timberwolves for the number one seed in the Western Conference and please raise your hand at this time if you had Minnesota and

Oklahoma City tied for the top spot in the west at the approximate midpoint of the NBA season while the Thunder squad has been balling all year there is no doubt who the Undisputed head of this snake is sheay gilis Alexander the Transcendent 25-year-old shooting guard who came from relative obscurity to

Explode onto the scene last year during the 2022 2023 season with this kid posting Prime Jordan numbers maybe it’s time the basketball World took note of just who the hell Shay gilis Alexander is all right let’s do it born in Toronto Alexander grew up in Hamilton Ontario

Where he would also play his high school ball before committing to the University of Kentucky while he would begin the season as the Sixth Man eventually throughout the year Shay would work his way into a starting role and he would parlay that successful freshman campaign into forgoing the remainder of his

Eligibility and declaring for the 2018 NBA draft a draft that was headlined by first overall pick DeAndre eight third overall pick Luca donic and fifth overall pick Trey young sheay Gil just Alexander was a bit of an afterthought in this draft initially being selected 11th overall by the Charlotte Hornets

The charlot Hornet select Shay gilis Alexander before ultimately being traded to the Clippers on draft night and Alexander would go on to have a decent rookie season averaging 11 points 3.3 assists and nearly three rebounds while playing in all 82 games and starting 73 while being named to all rookie second

Team but in the summer following his rookie year on July 19th Alexander was traded again this time to the Oklahoma City Thunder and in his second year aged 21 season Alexander would take a big leap averaging 19 points six rebounds and nearly three and a half assists per

Game for the 2019 2020 season playing all but two games that year while leading the Thunder to a surprise playoff spot though the point fraud Chris Paul would predictably usurp most of the credit for that accomplishment but last year sheay would take another massive leap being named to his first

Career allstar game while erupting for 312 points per game and being named First Team all NBA well he has gotten even better this year duplicating that scoring average from a year ago but upping his averages across the board in everything else posting ey popping averages of 31 one and A2 points six

Assists six rebounds while leading the league in steals with 2.3 per game all of this while shooting 56% from the field 35% from three and 89% from the free throw line this with the aforementioned shocking number one seed for the thunder in the Western Conference and the odds makers were not

High on this team preseason Oklahoma City had just the 19th best odds on favorite to win the NBA title to start the year at plus 10,000 and they were picked to finish 10th in the Western Conference but not only are they tied for the one seat out west they Trail the

Boston Celtics by only two games for the best record in the entire NBA as Elite and absurd as nicoa yic is and has been this year and the last four years if we’re being honest and while yes nicoo was without Jamal Murray for half of the Season who the hell would have thought

The Thunder would have a better record than the nuggets at the start of this season and while Joel embiid is posting ludicrous numbers this year career highs across the board he has already missed nine games this year of the Philadelphia 76ers 36 to this point of the Season

Sitting out a legitimate quarter of the year invalidates you from any serious MVP consideration not to mention how much easier it is to post numbers when you’re resting so many days in between games so while Alexander is getting some run in various MVP rankings perhaps it’s time to start normalizing him as the

Leading candidate as sgaa also ranks very highly in these madeup Advanced analytic categories that get the voters sprung sitting third currently in League wide PE second in VOR third in BPM and he is leading the NBA in win shares he has been so good there will be some

Inevitable comps springing up to Kobe Bryant and even Michael Jordan while the 316 and6 line is preposterous in this or any era let’s bear in mind yet again of how easy this relative era is the lack of Defense the meteoric pacing the outrageous scoring Jordan and Kobe were

Doing their work in an NBA where nightly scoring averages were in the mid to Upper 90s average nightly scoring currently is at an obscene 116 points per game this year while looking at the per 100 possession averages will normalize for Pace there realistically is no way to address the differential in

Defensive effort by an entire generation of players who seem disinterested in defense altogether or the rules changes such as the removal of hand Che in and illegal defenses Etc so this is not an Apples to Apples comparison but looking at those per 100 possession averages yeah it’s undeniable Shay Gil just

Alexander is having a Stupify andly good season when compared to the golden standard of players at his two guard position all time and arguably the two best players overall of the last 30 years Alexander is currently averaging 43 and half half points per 100 possessions eight rebounds and nine

Assists while in Jordan’s top season the 86 87 League year he averaged 46 points seven rebounds and six assists per 100 possessions and in Kobe’s Marquee season of 20052 2006 he also averaged 467 and six again this doesn’t take into a count ease of scoring amid the non-existent

Defense being played in this era nor should we be getting ahead of ourselves in comps including two of the ultimate winners of all time but it does highlight just how good Alexander has been this year so while the pathetic NBA media continues to thirstily hyperventilate over a 39-year-old who

Isn’t even the best player on his own team Monica I I think I believe LeBron James is still the best right this minute is the best player in the world and he’s almost 39 years old I’m drenched I’m drenched in sweat or some guy sitting out a quarter of his team’s

Total games that they already gifted a thoroughly undeserving League MVP 2 just last year maybe it’s high time we put some damn respect on Shay gilis Alexander’s name and recognize him for what he should be at this time the leading candidate for the most valuable player of the NBA this season

SGA has rapidly skyrocketed up the list of elite players in today’s NBA. But how good is he?