It’s been sad to see the recent minutes reduction for Josh Jackson. Not because he makes the Suns more fun to watch, because I don’t think he really does, but because of what that means for his career. He’s a top-five pick on one of the worst teams in the league; most players in that situation would get endless minutes to prove that they were good. I guess Jackson had a long enough leash earlier in the season that the Suns are kind of done trying to make him good, at least this season.
And it’s not like he hasn’t improved. Look at that three-point percentage! All the way up to near 30 percent after 26 percent last season. That definitely qualifies as improvement, no doubt about it. A four percentage point increase. He’s also averaging more assists, and if you ignore the resultant increase in turnovers, that’s an improvement is well. So there. Take that, Suns fans. You may be able to call Dragan Bender a bust, but the jury is still out on Jackson.
With Devin Booker going out early with yet another injury, Jackson stepped up tonight and hit a bunch of long jumpers instead. The Hornets certainly hadn’t gameplanned for him to shoot threes, and for good reason, because he’s still not good at them, but he made them pay. Heck, based on his unexpected scoring outburst, the Suns almost won. The game looked a lot closer until Kemba Walker hit that unnecessary 3/4th-court buzzer-beater at the end of the game.