The talk of preseason has been centered around Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s willingness to play more off-ball.
During preseason, Gilgeous-Alexander averaged the fourth-most shots per game. A surprising stat considering how he did last season.
After enjoying a career season last year where he had career highs in points, field-goal attempts and usage rate, it appears Gilgeous-Alexander won’t be asked to do as much heavy lifting this year.
The emergence of Josh Giddey and Jalen Williams along with Chet Holmgren’s return should ease the load of Gilgeous-Alexander this season. Everybody — including SGA — seems bought into playing a free-flowing style of offense.
“The best teams that have played the game, the teams that have won the most games, most championships play together,” Gilgeous-Alexander explained.
This is an encouraging thing to hear from Gilgeous-Alexander — as his buy-in is arguably as important as the young cores’ development when it comes to OKC playing its ideal style of offense.
Fresh off of a career season, the 25-year-old could easily lean the other way and suggests they should continue to center their offense around him. After all, that plan was pretty successful last season considering the Thunder finished 40-42 due to Gilgeous-Alexander’s All-NBA year.
Instead, Gilgeous-Alexander is embracing letting his teammates also cook and spell him the occasional break — which could go a long way in having fresh legs for the playoffs.
Gilgeous-Alexander linked his approach to what Michael Jordan did during his playing days when he learned Phil Jackson’s triangle offense.
“I don’t know if you saw ‘The Last Dance’ documentary, but there’s a point in Michael Jordan’s career where he had to learn the triangle offense and playing (without) the ball in his hands 24/7,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “So if Michael Jordan has to do it, I definitely have to do it.”
Gilgeous-Alexander — a notable MJ stan — continues to say all the right things and have the right approach as the Thunder enjoy rostering one of the best young cores in the league.
