Next season will be an interesting one for the Lakers. Coming off of one of the worst years in franchise history, the Lakers will look for improvement from just about everybody. One player who could be poised for a breakout season is none other than Jordan Hill.
The last few seasons haven’t been the best for Jordan Hill. For one, Hill suffered a few injuries that helped set him back, and two, Mike D’Antoni was his coach for the past two seasons. If you don’t remember, D’Antoni was also his coach during his rookie year with the New York Knicks, where D’Antoni criticized the young center and didn’t feature him prominently within the rotation. More of the same happened last season, as Jordan Hill produced numbers good enough to play more minutes, but D’Antoni only gave him 20.8 minutes per game. It’s certainly a disappointment that Hill didn’t get more minutes on the court, as his production on the glass was sorely missed by the undersized Lakers.
With Mike D’Antoni out of the picture, things seem to be looking up for Jordan Hill. When you combine that with the fact that the Lakers are precariously small along the front court, you get a recipe for success for Hill. The reason I’m so excited about Jordan Hill getting more minutes is because of his very good production in limited minutes.
Here were Hill’s numbers last year.
| Season | G | GS | MP | FG% | FT% | ORB | DRB | TRB | AST | STL | BLK | TOV | PF | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 | 72 | 32 | 20.8 | .549 | .685 | 2.7 | 4.7 | 7.4 | 0.8 | 0.4 | 0.9 | 1.0 | 2.4 | 9.7 |
Provided by Basketball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/19/2014.
It looks pedestrian, on the surface. 9.7 points per game and 7.4 rebounds sounds underwhelming and replaceable by a lot of NBA players. But, when you take a look at his Per 36 minutes stats, that perspective changes quite a bit.
Here are his Per 36 minutes numbers:
| Season | FG% | FT% | ORB | DRB | TRB | AST | STL | BLK | TOV | PF | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 | .549 | .685 | 4.7 | 8.2 | 12.8 | 1.3 | 0.7 | 1.5 | 1.8 | 4.1 | 16.7 |
Provided by Basketball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/19/2014.
That looks a lot better. In fact, 16.7 points and 12.8 rebounds per game would put him in the upper echelon of centers. In fact, Hill was one of the Lakers most effective players last season. Clearly, D’Antoni should have been playing him more than just 20 minutes per game. With new coach Byron Scott, and a front court that will have Carlos Boozer, Julius Randle and Ed Davis get a good amount of minutes, Jordan Hill’s minutes could easily sky rocket, simply by being the biggest of that bunch and his production will go up with it.
With Jordan Hill being the starting center for next year, the Lakers could end up being one of the best rebounding teams in the league. Between Hill, Randle and Boozer, there are plenty of extremely capable rebounders there. It’s great to have guys who can keep offensive possessions alive and end defensive possessions with their rebounding.
Jordan Hill isn’t without any flaws, of course. Most of his scoring is from him working extremely hard on the glass and getting himself a lot of put backs. Hill is not a player who can create for himself on a consistent basis, and the result of him working so hard on the glass also meant foul trouble for him. His style of play makes it very hard to continue to produce at a high level for 36 minutes a game, be it because of foul trouble or because he simply runs out of gas. We haven’t seen what Jordan Hill can do with consistent starter minutes, so we don’t know if he can handle that work load yet.
Nonetheless, Jordan Hill will definitely be a candidate for the Most Improved Player of the Year award, and he will being opening some eye balls. I believe, should he stay healthy that is, that Jordan Hill will easily average a double-double as the Lakers finish a bit better than expected.