Game Day - Summer League Edition: Suns (1-0) @ Pelicans (1-1), Sun 7/12/26

[Shabazz]

Maluach plays and carries himself with a star’s mindset. His skills don’t yet match his confidence. That’s ok. The mindset itself is huge for our franchise.

Fleming plays with a role player’s mindset. He doesn’t seem to know how good he actually could be.

[LazarusLong]

Maluach finished with 15 pts (2-3 from deep) 15 rebounds, 2 blocks and 0 TOs.
He was playing against Hunter Dickinson, 7-2 260, so Khaman had somebody with size playing against him.

[carey]

Man man with a line of 15/15/2 & he didn't foul out which is nice.

[LazarusLong]

Brea 1-8 from the field as of the third quarter...

2 for 17 in the two SL games so far.

Finished the game 1-10, so that's 2-19 in two games.
Oof ...

[AmareIsGod]

Maluach has me excited.

[specialsauce]

Maluach plays and carries himself with a star’s mindset. His skills don’t yet match his confidence. That’s ok. The mindset itself is huge for our franchise.

Fleming plays with a role player’s mindset. He doesn’t seem to know how good he actually could be.

Bingo. Fleming needs to go get the ball and work on shot creation. He's THAT talented. His confidence holding him back

[Wally_West]

[Wally_West]

He needs the reps but part of me is ready to shut him down for the rest of the games. Let Fleming get run as a center with Peat as a PF.

[Mori Chu]

Peat had another solid game. ManMan looks like the real star of SL for us so far, which is fantastic. He's come a long way from when he first joined our team last year. He "should" be dominating Summer League-level opposition, but growing enough as a player to do that is easier said than done. Really happy to see it. Now we have to find some minutes for him in real regular-season games. I think we should probably try to put him at 2nd in the center rotation behind Mark Williams and play Oso more as a bench PF/C.

But of course I don't know how we will resolve the PF logjam with all of Br****s, Brooks, Fleming, and Oso wanting minutes there. Maybe Brooks shifts more to SF? I feel like if Maluach blossoms this year, Oso may end up getting squeezed out of his minutes. We'll see. I guess in some ways that would be a good problem to have. I just really hope Fleming isn't the one who loses all his minutes. He is too good to let him sit and rot on the bench.

As others have said, I think Koby Brea just isn't showing NBA-level play yet. I'm disappointed in how poorly he has been shooting. All the buzz on the kid was that he had a great pure shot form that reminded scouts of guys like Booker coming out of college. But he can't hit the broad side of a barn in these modestly competitive SL games. Seems like maybe he is trying to force it too much and prove himself, maybe overthinking things to the point that it hurts his play. He might need a few years overseas to try to grow and develop in a lower tier of play before he can be an NBA player.

[TOO]

Maluach has very average hands but I think the rest of his game looks very good early on.

[TOO]

Koa Peat and his downhill spin moves reminds me of Zion, but without the obvious once in a lifetime leaping ability.

[Flagrant Fowl]

I'm wondering how long it'll take for teams to pick up on that spin move tendency.

He might be big enough that it doesn't really matter, but I'm sure a lot of teams will just foul him since he struggles to shoot right now.

[Flagrant Fowl]

I could understand last year's development plan, but Maluach is now at the point where he has to play rotation minutes even if it comes at the expense of some wins due to growing pains.

[TOO]

I'm wondering how long it'll take for teams to pick up on that spin move tendency.

He might be big enough that it doesn't really matter, but I'm sure a lot of teams will just foul him since he struggles to shoot right now.

It's like it's the only move he's got, I was surprised when he didn't do it.

[JJ Slim]

You could see the whole game change between when Maluach was on the floor and when he wasn't, both defense and offense. He has a huge impact. And I LOVE his fire! That scowl when he made that huge block and also when he confronted Pierre when he hard fouled Fleming.

[Superbone]

Was there any news on what hobbled Man Man and Fleming at the end of the first game?

I don't know what it says about these guys or our trainers than they've been working out every day of the offseason but get leg crams in the first summer league game. Never happened before as far as I can remember. Leg cramps, Jalen's hammy caused him to miss 80 games, we load managed Williams all season and he still missed the last however many games including playoffs. Something's not adding up.

Man Man had the leg cramps. Not Fleming. Fleming just got kicked near the end of the first game.

[Superbone]

Koby Brea isn’t an nba player. I think we should probably cut him.

He had a horrific shooting game. Looked like a total scrub. Something is off mentally. OTOH, he still had the heart to shoot the possible game tying three. (As color commentator Green is yelling "they don't need a three!".

[Superbone]

Maluach looks really good today.

Huge rebounding game as well as some great shot blocking and deterrents. Also hit a late 3 to close the gap.

[Superbone]

Brea 1-8 from the field as of the third quarter...

2 for 17 in the two SL games so far.

Eesh!

[Split T]

Koa Peat and his downhill spin moves reminds me of Zion, but without the obvious once in a lifetime leaping ability.

Ground bound Zion isn’t a bad comp haha