Charlotte Hornets: 2017-18 player grades for Malik Monk

Weaknesses

Malik Monk’s biggest weakness, in my opinion, is his poor efficiency.

Shooting 36 percent from the field is unacceptable for any player at any stage in their career. That’s just horrendous, especially when said player has the offensive tools that Monk has in his arsenal. There’s just no way he should’ve shot that poorly.

Let’s move on to a weakness that’s perhaps less obvious: ball-handling.

The Charlotte Hornets are in desperate need of a backup point guard. Monk definitely isn’t that guy for the future, and that’s okay. His natural position is the 2-guard, where he is much more effective playing off the ball. But as every good 2-guard knows (maybe outside of Klay Thompson), you have to be able to handle the ball to alleviate some of the pressure from the point guard. Monk can’t do that right now.

Check out this video of Monk going against Chicago Bulls point guard Kris Dunn:

In this sequence, Monk barely gets the ball across half court before simple one-on-one defense results in a turnover and layup on the other end. This is inexcusable. Later in this same video, Monk’s lack of ability to bring up the ball against Kris Dunn forces his backcourt mate and fellow rookie, Dwayne Bacon, to try and bring the ball up next possession.

Bacon is perhaps an even worse ball-handler than Monk (which is understandable) so this results in another steal and layup. (In Monk’s defense, Dunn is one of the elite on-ball defenders in the NBA).

Monk doesn’t have to have Kyrie Irving‘s handle to be successful in the NBA, but he has to be able to confidently bring the ball up the court and get the Hornets into their offense, even if it’s against a little ball pressure.