During last season’s NBA All-Star festivities, Minnesota Timberwolves guard Zach LaVine and Orlando Magic forward Aaron Gordon put on a dunk contest showcase for the ages. The two then-reserve players may have lacked the star power of Michael Jordan and Dominique Wilkins, but they made up for it in raw athleticism and jaw-dropping slam dunk ability. LaVine and Gordon are not content to rest on their dunk dynasty laurels though. It seems they are both using their slam dunk success to bound into bona fide NBA players.
Before LaVine racked up back-to-back dunking titles, he was a one and done at UCLA who really didn’t do much while he was there. As a freshman, LaVine averaged 9.4 points (and not much else) as a sixth-man but somehow turned that into a first-round draft selection in 2014. Sure, he could jump out of the gym, but not much was expected from the 6-foot-5, 180-pound project outside of Sacramento.
Even with one dunk championship under his belt, before last year’s All-Star game, LaVine posted averages of 12.8 points, 2.9 rebounds and 3.2 assists. After his virtuoso performance though, the team put him back in the starting lineup (He started for an extended period during his rookie year due to an injury to Ricky Rubio). Armed with confidence, LaVine’s scoring average jumped to 16.4 points per game while his rebound and assist numbers dropped ever-so-slightly to 2.5 and 2.8 respectively.
This season, LaVine has continued his ascent. Though Andrew Wiggins and Karl-Anthony Towns get most of the praise in Minnesota, LaVine, now a starting combo guard, is quietly putting together a nice early season. LaVine is averaging 17.8 points, 4.2 rebounds and 2.4 assists. More importantly though, his three-point percentage has increased from 38.9 percent in 2015-16, to 45.2 percent so far this season.
If LaVine can continue to stretch the defense and become a knockdown shooter and improve on the defensive side of the ball, the sky is the limit in his development as a player.
Air Gordon rises
Aaron Gordon had a similar path to the NBA. He was also a one and done player at Arizona. Gordon’s pedigree was a little more polished as he departed college averaging 12.4 points and 8.0 rebounds per year en route to being named the Pac-12 Freshman Player of the Year and All-Pac-12 honors in 2014. However, he was primarily used as a reserve for his first year and a half in the league.
Before last year’s All-Star break, Gordon averaged a modest 7.7 points, 6.1 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game. After his coming out party, the Magic traded away Tobias Harris and Gordon earned a starting spot at power forward. The second-half of the season, he averaged 12 points, 7.3 rebounds and 2.0 assists.
This year, Gordon stayed in the starting lineup, but moved to small forward after the Magic acquired Serge Ibaka from the Oklahoma City Thunder. Gordon’s scoring numbers are around the same (11.6 points) and his assist numbers have risen to 3.0 per game. Like LaVine, he’s shown a substantial increase in three-point shooting after jumping from 29.9 percent to 36.4 percent. The rise in outside shooting shows that Gordon is making progress morphing from a post player into a wing player.
More importantly though, the 6-foot-9 pogo stick is developing quickly on the defensive end. Gordon’s defensive field goal percentage is at just 39.3 percent. That means the man he guards shoots under 40 percent each night. Compare that to Kawhi Leonard (49.1) or LeBron James (40.0) and you’ll see that Gordon’s defense is legit. Of course, Leonard and James are tasked with guarding the other team’s best player every night, so let’s not get carried away. But the defensive aptitude is there.
So far, both LaVine and Gordon have committed to a much-awaited rematch in the Slam Dunk Contest in February. However, it’s been nice to see both players develop into real ballers instead of just one-trick ponies.
Mayweather vs Pacquiao 2 on the horizon?
After Manny Pacquiao easily outpointed Jessie Vargas last weekend, rumors started about a rematch between “Pac Man” and Floyd Mayweather Jr. It’s been a year and a half since the overhyped “Fight of the Century.” Mayweather has stayed mostly quiet in retirement. Pacquiao, however, has stayed active (despite a bogus ‘retirement’) by beating Vargas and Tim Bradley to prove that he still has something left in the tank.
Mayweather was sitting ringside in Las Vegas during Pacquiao’s most recent bout, fanning the flames for a rematch. Many boxing insiders and fans have long-believed that Mayweather would not be able to resist the urge to come back for a chance to push his undefeated record to 50-0.
Top Rank promoter Bob Arum even went so far as to say there was a 75 percent chance that Mayweather and Pacquiao would meet up again. Of course, Arum is known for stretching the truth like an unnamed wealthy politician-elect.
If the match happens, it’ll make sense. Mayweather still feels he can easily beat Pacquiao and make decent money by doing so. Pacquiao has rebounded from the loss well, so there’s a storyline that a shoulder injury really was the cause of his lackluster performance in May of 2015. Also besides next weekend’s matchup between Andre Ward and Sergey Kovalev (more on that next week), boxing has been short on blockbuster bouts. At this point, we’ll have to wait and see, but all signs are pointing to a rematch.
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