If Jordan Poole can’t make an impact scoring the ball (which, looking at his percentages, seems like the case the majority of the time), he can do the next best thing: make an impact passing the ball. No one is going to criticize him for passing the ball (which could result in a made shot) rather than shooting the ball (which will only rarely result in a made shot). He could have a wide open layup, but if he decides to kick it out to a quadruple-teamed Kevon Looney standing 40 feet away from the basket with three seconds left on the shot clock, that would be fine. The layup probably wasn’t going to go in anyway.
I shouldn’t be ragging on him so hard for his cruddy shooting, because he actually had a very decent night scoring the ball. 7 of 13 from the field, that’s totally reasonable, and only the 8th time this season he’s been at or above the 50 percent mark.
But the real thing here is the assists. He had some nice passes! Okay, he had, like, two nice passes, and the rest of them were kind of lame, but it represents an EVOLUTION. No longer is he only a guy with one of the worst field-goal percentages of all time. Now he’s that same guy but with the added threat of maybe dishing the ball to one of his more talented teammates. Say what you will about Poole, but there are lots of guys who never were that threat. This is probably more assists than Allen Iverson had in a single game, if I had to guess. Don’t bother double-checking. I’m pretty sure that’s correct.