Ball Hog: Donovan Mitchell becomes 2nd player with 35 shots and 0 assists over the last 20 years
Utah Jazz sensation Donovan Mitchell scored a team-high 31 points against the Sixers on Friday night. But there was one line in the box score that would have irked him on top of the stinging 113-107 loss that night.
The dynamic sophomore took 35 shots from the field and made just 13 of them, including 11 attempts from downtown out of which he could convert just one. Also, while doing so, he dished out zero dimes, something which was pretty unlikely for such a versatile talent.
This sort of hostile playmaking was last seen by our very own Carmelo Anthony back in 2014. He dropped 62 points in a win over the Charlotte Bobcats and assisted not even once. Before Melo, this was done by Boston Celtics' Antoine Walker on Jan 7, 1998, making Donovan just the second player in around 20 years to showcase such ball-hogging.
With the reputation he has made over the last season, Coach Quin Snyder seems to be having no problem with his shot selection lately. He's all in for Mitchell being aggressive on a nightly basis.
"If he feels good about the shot and it's a good shot within our offense, he needs to shoot it. If he's 1-for-20 or 20-for-20, it doesn't matter for us. He's our guy. That's what he does. He's aggressive."
Such a statistical line might seem cringe-worthy to a youngster who has been compared with the likes of Dwyane Wade, one of the most complete players the league has ever produced. Evidently, Mitchell is undergoing some noticeable growing pains in his second season, and hasn't really catapulted off of his impressive rookie year, as many would have expected him to.
Even though he's averaging 21.2 points per game this season, he's shooting just 40.8 percent from the floor and taking almost 19 shots every game. In a team that is stacked with veteran talents like Rudy Gobert & Ricky Rubio, the ball stays a bit too much with him, most of the times ending in a missed field goal.
Rather than letting a 22-year-old take the initiative for the most part of the game, it would fare well for the Jazz to use his trigger when needed and not whenever(and from wherever) he feels like.