Jaden Ivey played his best game of the season last night according to coach JB Bickerstaff and it’s no surprise it all happened with him sharing the floor with a point guard.
Ivey had struggled mightily in his previous two games, which had the impatient, trigger-happy fans on social media ready to ship him out, which is simply ridiculous. The guy is jumping back onto a playoff team after not playing for a year. He’s not only trying to get up to game speed but is learning new teammates and trying to fit in with a team that was winning without him, which is not easy.
It’s especially not easy when he’s been asked to do things which are not his strengths. While Ivey can handle the ball at times, he is definitely not a point guard, which was exposed in the minutes that he and Caris LeVert played together in the loss to Orlando.
The offense was stagnant and awful with two secondary attackers play-acting as point guards, and we saw how one tweak instantly benefitted Ivey last night.
Jaden Ivey needs to play with another point guard
After the bench disaster against Orlando, JB Bickerstaff made some tweaks to the rotation, and they paid instant dividends.
He staggered Ivey’s minutes so that he was always on the floor with either Cade Cunningham or Daniss Jenkins so that Ivey was not tasked with running the offense.
This allowed him to attack the rim as a secondary playmaker, which is what he is good at, and he got to the line four times in just 14 minutes, finishing with a +16 net rating on the night.
Both he and Jenkins were able to attack and draw fouls and finished a combined 9-of-10 from the free-throw line.
This was a stark contrast to what the bench offense looked like when Ivey was playing with LeVert.
The problem is that LeVert was injured last night, so coach Bickerstaff’s choices were made for him, which won’t be the case when his rotation is back to full strength.
Will he continue to make the necessary adjustments, or will he force-feed LeVert back into the lineup even though the team has been better with Jenkins? It’s a fair question to ask, especially considering LeVert is eligible to be traded on December 15th.
What’s clear is that Ivey benefits from having another ball handler on the floor and is not a guy who should regularly be initiating the offense.
It was good to see coach Bickerstaff make the adjustment, but you do have to wonder if he would have made it had LeVert been available.
It’s wild how some fans have turned on Ivey before he’s even back to full strength, a choice that will probably look silly in a few weeks when he’s playing well. Hopefully, he turned a corner last night, and his coach figured out he needs a point guard to thrive.