Jordan Poole: From Rising Star to Disappointment – The Fall of an NBA Talent

In the worst teams of the NBA season there is always the option of new stars emerging for the future, either from the team itself or from the competition. Minutes to play with no other intention than individual improvement, without the pressure of having to reach a number of victories for the classifications of any conference. But there is the other side of the coin, as usual. A concept makes its way among so much relaxation: downgrade. It could be translated into Spanish as a drop in level. It is possible that an athlete is given the key to a franchise, or to a highly responsible position on the hardwood, and fails. There he plays his head more than the amount of tension he puts into it.

This season there is one name that stands out in that definition: Jordan Poole. The Wizards’ shooting guard meets those requirements. He is mentioned only in a bad way when he should be one of the most consistent scorers in the League.

The player is considered one of those who had a clear path to progress on an individual level after being traded by the Warriors last summer in the operation through which they gained Chris Paul. But his gun has jammed. So much so that it is considered among the teams, according to market specialist Bobby Marks, as “one of the worst contracts in the NBA right now” based on how he is doing in Washington this year. He adds that it was “a relief” for Golden State to get rid of him. Too much change for a boy who was instrumental in achieving the last Ring of the franchise until today and who had little less than the world at his feet. Plumb like dead weights.

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ESPN’s market specialist entered Willard And Dibs (95.7 The Game) to comment on the current situation of the Warriors and left two other interesting points on which the conversation will revolve there from now until the month of July arrives. Jonathan Kuminga, who tried to encourage his coach to get more out of him by leaking his discontent to the press, wants to be in the $30 million-a-year range. He is contributing to achieve it; haircut and positive attitude for a new role on the team. The one with the least pretensions is Klay Thompson, who is seeking a three-year, $75 million deal with a franchise, which definitively opens up the option of leaving the Californian team at 34 years old. One of lime and another of sand.

Jordan Poole: the rise and fall

Poole was one of those considered draft steals in his day. He was chosen late in the first round in 2019, when Durant was still on the team. He carved a path to stardom by breaking ground, alternating between the development league team and a first team in which he appeared with more and more impetus. Having passed the Livingston or Barbosa stage in the board, a player, or several, was sought to surround the two fiercest outsiders in the League: Curry and Thompson. In Jordan they found a handhold to hold on to when they were forced to rebuild the squad. The player trained at the University of Michigan began to rise in the squad and yes, he ended up exploding.

He was among the candidates for the Most Improved Player award two years in a row. In the second of them, 2021/22, the season of the last Ring, he settled at 18.5 points. Without fear of anything, with a style that seemed like a copy of Curry’s, with a huge difference but in that profile. Him exceeding 35% in triples as a sophomore and in a season in which they won the NBA; nothing bad. But he looked grown up. This is how the incident with Draymond Green in the preseason after the success is told from within the franchise. The two were fighting in the offices for a multimillion-dollar renewal and the tension ended with Green punching Poole in training after a provocation – without excusing the action – from the young man to the veteran. Both privately and publicly it was admitted that this not only cost the image of the internal environment in the Warriors, a model franchise, but also cost a few million more to try to renew Poole and keep him happy in the face of disappointment. Finally it was 128 million gross for 4 years as a base salary and with an incentive of 3.7 for each campaign (depending on the achievements that he achieves).

Poole looked comfortable with his place made on the team’s roster. Until the last summer of 2023 arrived, after an early elimination at the hands of the Lakers, and the franchise decided to take another course. A change that entailed two paths: closing the contract extension of Draymond, Jordan’s aggressor, and trying to find a formula with which to strengthen that spine with Curry and Thompson now that age is playing a role. The forward position was revitalized with Wiggins and Kuminga and another avenue was thought of for the point guard and shooting guard: removing Poole from the position and giving it to Moody, another slow-cooked product in Santa Cruz, along with a director like Paul, of extensive quality and experience.

In the Wizards he has teamed up with Kuzma in a duel to see who takes the most shots. There is not much pretension in a franchise that does not exceed 9 wins after 55 games. But he has gone into a tailspin: his shooting percentages have fallen from 30% outside and 40% in field totals, averaging only 15.7 points when he now has no greater competition than the aforementioned. The advantage of being at his fingertips has made him zapping meat due to his constant lack of concentration, in addition to trying things that don’t work out for him. And not only that. The decline begins to be more serious at the moment when, after a change of coach (Keefe for Unseld), he will begin to enter matches as a substitute. Considerable blow to his ego in a franchise that only has to focus on giving clues to players like him, whether for the future or to give him an outlet on the market.

2024-02-23 12:15:46
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