NBA guards have, within the last few years, realized that if you want rebounds, all you have to do to get them is to stand around next to the basket and grab them. But it has taken longer for NBA bigs to realize that if you want assists, all you have to do is stand with the ball around the top of the key and run handoffs with your guards.
Nikola Jokic used this method to great effect, amassing tons of triple-doubles by augmenting his adroit passing skills with cheesy handoffs. Having passing skills as a big is great and really helps a team, but even the best bigman passers can’t get triple-doubles unless they cheese a little bit.
Sabonis isn’t quite the passer that Jokic is, but he’s very good. His chemistry with Doug McDermott is off the charts, with the two finding each other for easy looks constantly. But again, if he only got assists while making pinpoint passes leading to layups, he would never have come close to a triple-double tonight. This triple-double is all about those handoffs.
Not like I’m not complaining or anything (well, maybe I am a bit, they are assists but they’re not fun to watch at all). People love triple-doubles, and what better way to induce more triple-doubles league-wide than by mandating a policy where handoffs are assists even if the scorer takes several dribbles all the way from the three-point line to the rim?