Denver Nuggets: Evaluating Emmanuel Mudiay So Far

Mudiay As Scorer

Averaging 11.7 points per game, Mudiay is the Nuggets’ fourth leading scorer so far in 2015-16. But the manner in which those points have come has been entirely too inefficient and extremely indicative of the kind of trial by fire we’ve seen some rookies (like Michael Carter-Williams, for example) never recover from.

It’s far too early to worry about that with Mudiay, but he’s been pretty ineffective as a scorer, shooting an abysmal 31.3 percent from the field and 24.6 percent from three-point range. It’s actually taking him 13.8 shots to reach his 11.7 points per game, and despite converting less than one-fourth of his threes, he’s still taking 3.4 of them a night.

The problem is, not all of them are bad shots. Despite 118 of his 262 total field goal attempts being what NBA.com classifies as “open” or “wide open,” Mudiay has only made 38 of those shots (32.2 percent). That means Mudiay is making less than one-third of all open shots, which have constituted about 45 percent of his shot selection so far.

Mudiay clearly needs to improve when it comes to finishing around the basket, but that should come as he continues to build confidence. He’s got the leaping ability to rise up and throw down dunks, but when the rim protectors come out to play, he seems to either shy away from challenging them head on or just flat-out fail when he does.

The other problem stems from the incredible burden that’s been placed on Mudiay from day one. Though he’s the future of the franchise and it’s great to see him learn his lessons the hard way, we should keep in mind that he’s only 19 years old. His high usage percentage was meant to instruct him for the future, not to necessarily produce wins now.

So far, that high amount of responsibility has clearly led to less than stellar individual statistics. Mudiay was never pegged as much of a perimeter shooter, and piling all these shots on was bound to be a rough learning process in the early going.

Next: Overall