Jared McCain is a Stud

Shout out to the Sixers, who battled the undefeated Cavs for four quarters on Wednesday night. They fell by a 114 to 106 scoreline, but without Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, Paul George, and Andre Drummond, they weren’t supposed to keep it close. They did, however, largely in part to rookie Jared McCain:

Jared McCain over his last 4 games:

34 PTS – 10 AST – 6 3PM
23 PTS – 3 REB – 2 AST
27 PTS – 3 REB – 2 AST
18 PTS – 1 REB – 2 AST

(Via @realapp_ ) pic.twitter.com/6FRYp2Pj0X

— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) November 14, 2024

The kid can play. He’s the real deal. He’s already got four games of 18+ points, while no other rookie has more than one. StatMuse noted that McCain’s Cleveland performance – a 34 point, 10 assist, two steal, 6 threes made stat line – has only been replicated by Jason Kidd and Steph Curry among all NBA rookie seasons. It’s one of those arbitrary statistics where you pick a bunch of random thresholds, but still, hitting the same plateau as those two guys is really cool and something to hang your hat on.

“Another great game for him,” said Nick Nurse in the postgame presser. “Probably the biggest thing was the 10 assists for me. 34 (points) is a huge number, but mostly you’re doing it one way and (now he’s) starting to create, and I thought he did a good job for the most part of getting it out to other people, to create some buckets, and that’s pretty fast learning. That’s pretty fast learning. He’s really taken a lot of opportunities, got a lot of shots up, (has) a good feel for the game, so that was most encouraging. He’s confident and playing well and that’s certainly a super bright spot.”

A bright spot for a team off to a horrendous start. The Embiid/PG/Maxey thing is super annoying, a buzzkill to begin the season, but you look up at the same time and realize that the 1st round draft pick can hoop. You see Guerschon Yabusele step in as a legitimate rotation player. Caleb Martin has been better. There’s enough there to think “what could be?” if the stars can get it together and stay healthy.

The thing about McCain is that he seems to combine good awareness and decision making. That’s another way of echoing Nurse’s comments about “feel.” McCain has no problem firing three pointers, be it off the dribble or catch and shoot, but that’s not the entirety of his game. He’s got good handles and moves well on both ends. He also gets into the paint pretty easily and has a high midrange ceiling that should be able to punish closeouts and perimeter aggression. There were a couple of sequences in this game where he rounded the corner then stopped on a dime, about a foot inside the elbow, and pulled up for smooth jump shots. He’s not just a one-trick pony and he knows how to use screens and make the next pass. The ceiling looks really high for the kid.

First career start, first career 30-piece AND first career double-double for Sixers’ rookie Jared McCain.

Here’s all 34 points he scored against the Cavaliers tonight. pic.twitter.com/WcDRIWrPCj

— Erin Grugan (@eringrugan) November 14, 2024

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