Milwaukee Bucks: Grading rookie MarJon Beauchamp’s play thus far
By Elaine Blum
The last time the Milwaukee Bucks selected a player with a first-round draft pick and had that player turn into a core piece on their roster was when they selected a lanky Greek prospect in 2013 who is now known as one of the best players in the world. Many fans have high hopes that this year’s first-round pick, MarJon Beauchamp, will end that drought.
Beauchamp did not take the traditional route to the NBA. After bouncing around several high school teams, Beauchamp played a lone season in junior college, during which he averaged around 30 points a game. He then decided to play for the G League Ignite, where he stood out, especially defensively, as a tall, energetic wing. The Bucks drafted him exactly for those reasons. They hoped that he would fix the team’s wing depth issues and add some size on defense.
Marjon Beauchamp’s impact on the Milwaukee Bucks
It’s difficult to be a rookie on a contending team with a group of established veteran stars and core players, and Beauchamp has already experienced those difficulties. In October, he barely got off the bench before cracking the rotation for the first nine games of November. During that stretch, he saw between 11 and 34 minutes of playing time. His performances were inconsistent, especially scoring-wise, but he showed some real flashes of talent, potential, and even some greatness too.
Beauchamp’s best performance of this young season and his young career came when he played 34 minutes in Milwaukee’s recent loss to the Atlanta Hawks. He scored 20 points and grabbed 8 rebounds while shooting 7-9 from the field and 3-4 from three.
Before that game, he recorded two other double-digit scoring performances, but he is currently only averaging around 5 points due to his rather inconsistent scoring (38.5 percent from the field and 29.3 percent from three). Shooting struggles like these are not unusual for rookies, though. The third overall pick from the same draft class, Jabari Smith Jr., went through a similar slump until recently.