3 ways Jalen Suggs will improve for the Orlando Magic in 2024
3 ways Jalen Suggs will improve for the Orlando Magic in 2024
Shooting at the Rim
If Jalen Suggs is not shooting 3-pointers then, a lot of his offense comes down to his ability to get to the basket.
If there is a defining trait for Suggs, it is his willingness to dive headfirst and throw himself at the basket. Suggs is certainly not afraid to put his body on the line to get to the basket and at the rim.
After above-the-break threes, Suggs took most of his shots in the restricted area. But he made only 59.3 percent of his 123 attempts in the restricted area. That is far from the worst mark in the league, but he is clearly leaving some points on the board.
According to data from Basketball Index, Suggs’ 59.02 percent shooting at the rim is just above the league median.
Suggs’ offensive game is predicated a lot on his ability to get to the basket. He averaged 3.9 drives per game last year according to Second Spectrum and shot just 50.0 percent on those drives.
There is a control issue at play here for Suggs. It is one of the bigger themes for his improvement and next level as a player. He has to learn when to attack and when to pull back and how to measure his attacks better.
Suggs is the kind of player who should be able to live at the rim. It feels like he can get there any time he wants. It also feels like he should be able to draw fouls too — he averaged 3.4 free throw attempts per game in his rookie season and 2.2 attempts per game last year.
His passing was not much better but still encouraging.
Suggs averaged just 2.9 assists per game after averaging 4.4 assists per game as a rookie. His per-36-minutes assists dropped from 5.8 to 4.5. It was not just him coming off the bench in his second season.
According to data from Basketball Index, Suggs averaged 10.7 assist points per 75 possessions. That put him in the 75th percentile in the league. So there is the potential for him to be a better passer.
More impressively is that his passes did seem to lead to points more often than not — he averaged 15.4 potential assists per 100 passes (good for the 61st percentile in the league) and 0.87 potential assists per 75 possessions more than expected for a player in his role.
He posted 4.1 high-value assists per 75 possessions — assists that led directly to layups or 3-pointers or free throws. That was good for the 80th percentile in the league.
There are just constantly all these indicators that Suggs can put everything together. But the whole thing has not come together yet.
Suggs’ offensive improvement will indeed come on two fronts. It will come with his improved shooting from the interior and with better efficiency at the rim and in the paint. Those are the biggest two pieces for him to take a leap offensively.