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*Photo via NYPost
Now that Deron Williams is out in Brooklyn, the Nets will turn to Jarrett Jack to lead Brooklyn into the 2015-16 season. What can we expect this year now that JJ is the starter?
Jack is talented, and is probably one of the best backup point guards in the league. However, if he plans on having a successful transition to full time starter, his style of play will have to change if he’s going to prove that he can really run a team.
The one thing Jack will still be able to do as a starter is score. He averages over double figures for his career, all as a backup guard. His problem however, is consistency. Jack is the type of player that could score 15-20, but on some nights, it might take 20-25 shots to get there. His career field goal percentage isn’t terrible (44 percent), but altering his style of play could help improve his efficiency.
For someone who is a primary ball handler, he is turnover prone. He averages two turnovers a game for his career, and last year averaged 2.5 a game. As the starting point guard, he’s going to half to clean that up, especially with more minutes (which mean even more turnover opportunities). To make matters worse, he only averages 4.5 assists for his career. With more time with the ball in his hands, it’s likely that his assist-to-turnover ratio slides even further.
The last thing I fear about Jack starting is the ball movement (or lack there-of). Jack is an isolation player, who performs at his best with the ball in his hands at all times. When he’s on the floor, there isn’t a lot of ball movement involved, and players stand around and watch him go to work. He has to change his game, especially since Brooklyn already has a much better isolation player in Joe Johnson. If he is going to be a successful starting point guard, Jack will have to get other players involved more and use his skill set to create offense for others.
My only fear is that Jack has been in the league ten years now and has been a backup for most of that time. That’s ten years of “bad” habits that he’s going to need to fix in order to be successful. I know he “can” do it. It’s just a matter of “will” he?
One thing he won’t have to change is his flair for the dramatic. Jack is clutch, and clutch is everything in life. He hit a bunch of game winners for the Nets last year, and with all the All-Stars on that team, Jack was their go-to guy at the end of games. And he delivered almost every single time:
I’ve talked to a lot of players and they’ve all told me how great a person Jack is. He’s a great teammate and is a great guy to have in the locker room. He loves to mentor the young guards in the league and I heard he’s hilarious.
I think Jack is going to have a good year. It might be rough at first to get him to leave some of his old habits behind, but I think by the turn of 2016, he will figure it out. The Nets are going to need him to in order to succeed in the Eastern Conference this year.