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Only Jalen Brunson of the Dallas Mavericks played more minutes among players taken in the second round of the 2018 NBA Draft than did Brooklyn Nets‘ fan favorite Rodions Kurucs.

Kurucs, the 40th overall pick after rotting on the bench at FC Barcelona in 2017-18, surprised the Nets with his solid work in the preseason and a year that was expected to be a watch-and-learn experience with lots of time with the club’s Long Island G League affiliate turned into something else.

He was in and out of the rotation for much of the season’s first two months, but Brooklyn’s seven-game winning streak in early to mid-December coincided with Kurucs being given regular minutes, a role that expanded to a starting role for 46 games, although most of those starts were at the 3.

Brooklyn was 29-17 in those games, even as Kurucs had a wildly inconsistent season that included 24 games in which he scored in double-figures as well as a stretch from late January into early March in which he was in single-digits for 13 straight games.

Add it all together and in 63 games, Kurucs averaged 8.5 points and 3.9 rebounds in 20.5 minutes per game while shooting 45.0 percent overall and hitting 31.5 percent on 2.9 3-point attempts per game.

Kurucs is now listed at 222 pounds — up from 210 last season — and that should help him withstand the rigors of guarding bigger 4s. He’s an aggressive and willing defender, but one with a tendency to reach a bit too often.

Brooklyn was 1.2 points better per 100 possessions when Kurucs was off the court, but the only other real option the Nets have at the four is this year’s second-round pick, rookie Nicolas Claxton, or moving another wing down, with Taurean Waller-Prince the most likely candidate.