For a lot of college basketball stars, getting drafted into the NBA is their end goal. They believe getting picked by a team is the final destination. However, few are aware that the real struggle commences after they join a roster. Former Jazz lottery pick Gordon Hayward elaborated on this in January.
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Speaking to Paul George on Podcast P, the former Jazz and Celtics star explained that, unlike college coaches, NBA coaches do not coddle players. They expect rookies to work just as hard if not harder than the stars on the team, regardless of if they are handing them any playing time or stuffing them on the bench with no explanation. Hayward said,
“The hardest part when you go from playing in college to being in the NBA for 98% of people is you’re not playing, and there’s really no explanation to why you’re not playing.”
The guard witnessed the cold demeanor of NBA coaches firsthand in his rookie season with the Jazz. He recalled,
“Coach [Jerry] Sloane threw me in one game against Minnesota in the 4th quarter… I think I played really well… And the next day at practice he was like ‘You played really well yesterday, I’m not going to play you moving forward here, you just don’t have the experience.'”
Hayward played 27 minutes in that game and scored 18 points on 6-of-8 shooting from the floor, including 5-of-5 from beyond the arc. In the four games after that exceptional display, he tallied only 36 minutes of game time. Life in the NBA is unforgiving for rookies, as Hayward learned in the 2010-11 season and several other players found out last season.
Only 22 out of 60 rookies played 1000+ minutes last year
While players like Victor Wembanyama, Chet Holmgren, and Brandon Miller received plenty of playing time last season, not every rookie was as fortunate. The trio were among the 20 debutants who averaged more than 20 minutes per game. 81 other players made their NBA debut last season and 48 of those played fewer than 10 minutes per game.
Jaime Jacquez, Keyonte George, and the aforementioned three players were the only rookies to tally over 2000 minutes last season. 17 other players managed to hit the 1000-minute mark, while 67 of the 101 debutants played less than 500 minutes.
Only a handful of teams are in a position to play more than one rookie in their starting lineup. Some teams can afford to make a young star the sixth, seventh, or eighth man in their rotation, but most players drafted outside the top 15 have little to no chance of hitting the four-figure mark in minutes played.
Most teams draft a talented player and either stuff them on their bench, play them in garbage time, or send them to the G-League to hone their skills. Life in the NBA can be extremely difficult for rookies and it could take years before they break into their team’s rotation.
