I was excited (one could even say…hyped) for Gary Harris to take the next step this season and turn himself into a true star in this league. Instead, he’s scoring the same PPG as last season, on way lower efficiency but higher volume (to make up for the lowered efficiency). He’s still a hella good player, there’s no question, but I wanted him to score 20 PPG and establish himself as the main scorer on the Nuggs, ahead of even Jokic (sorry to any Serbs who might be watching this video). It’s cool that the Nuggs have this “scoring by committee” thing going where they have a bunch of players who evenly distribute the scoring load, but wouldn’t it be even cooler to have a more efficient version of prime Kobe on your team? Or a version of D-Wade with a three-point shot? Because that’s what Gary Harris was poised to become.
Harris is still young. He can become Kobe/D-Wade yet. But DTB is impatient sometimes, and when it seems like players are regressing or stagnating, those are the times when he discards players from his mental “favorites list” in favor of others who are developing at a more rapid, exciting pace. For now, Harris is hanging on to the bottom of that favorites list thanks to his supremely clutch three-pointer that had me hyped (there’s that word again), but one more good game from Monte Morris or John Collins could easily displace him.