LaMelo Ball unleashes Miles Bridges’ potential with the Hornets

Miles Bridges first appeared on this website in July 2015 during the Nike Global Challenge in Chicago. At the time, Bridges was a rising high school student from Flint, Mich. Who had become a five-star rookie on the base circuit earlier this summer. He was choosing between playing with De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk (who were also at the event) at Kentucky, or Cassius Winston and two other top 50 rookies (Nick Ward and Josh Langford) at Michigan State.

Even then, no one really knew what Bridges’ role would be. It was a powerful and explosive 6’6 wing that struggled to pull and had a shaky grip but had immense explosiveness around the rim. How do you get a player like that down to the basket? As Bridges competed in Chicago, we were only weeks away from the Warriors winning their first championship with a small ball attack, and months from Duke winning the NCAA tournament after moving Justise Winslow from three to four.

“I know for sure I’m a winger,” Bridges told SB Nation at the event. “If a coach wants me to play the fourth stretch sometimes, I’ll be okay with that. I know I have worked on my handling of the ball, my shooting is improving a lot. So I feel like I’m a two or three in college.

Bridges ultimately chose the state of Michigan. He typically played alongside a single big man as a rookie, but still spent most of his time scouting around the perimeter (25% of his belongings were spots, per Synergy Sports, which was 15% higher than any other type of half court game.). Bridges was good enough to be screened as a late lottery pick, but he made a shocking decision to go back to school after the Spartans were upset on the first weekend of the NCAA tournament. Bridges posted similar numbers as a sophomore playing mostly all three alongside Jaren Jackson Jr., Ward and Xavier Tillman. MSU lost again in the first weekend of the tournament (this time with Jackson Jr. on the bench), and Bridges was selected No.12 overall by the Hornets, which is exactly where we have it. placed after its first year.

Bridges’ early years in Charlotte were for the most part forgettable. As a rookie, he averages 7.5 points playing against Kemba Walker while spending 53% of his minutes on the small forward, per basketball benchmark. After Walker went into free agency that summer, the Hornets went from a No.8 prospect to one of the worst teams in the league. Bridges nearly doubled his score in his sophomore year, averaging 13 points per game, but still struggled to score effectively with a 52% below-average live shot. He played 72% of his minutes to a small forward in his second season.

Five years after John Calipari and Tom Izzo fought for him as a rookie, Bridges still didn’t feel fully optimized as a player. That has finally started to change this season in a Hornets team that is suddenly a factor in the Eastern Conference playoff image. What happened?

Now he can play with LaMelo Ball.

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Photo by Michael Reaves / Getty Images

The Hornets are one of the NBA’s biggest surprises at the start of the season. Entering Wednesday night, Charlotte was the No. 6 seed in the East. A year after posting a net rating of -7 as a team, the Hornets suddenly came out of the red with a net rating of +0.4.

The Hornets are not awesome, but they’re feeling really hot for the first time since returning to Charlotte. Gordon Hayward stuck to his big off-season contract to become the primary scoring option. Terry Rozier has a year of career and Malik Monk is finally starting to show what made him a lottery pick. There is no doubt that Ball was the catalyst, however. We had Ball as the best overall prospect in the draft, but he was even better than expected early in his career after slipping to No.3 on draft night, where Charlotte was happy to pick him up.

Ball injected life into the Hornets, and no one has been a bigger recipient than Bridges. It seems the pair combine for at least one viral dunk every time they speak up. Sometimes this happens during the transition, where Ball loves to drop passes behind the back and Bridges is one of the few players alive who can easily spin to avoid a block.

This often happens in the pick-and-roll (more on that in a second), where Ball has a special talent for placing a lob where only Bridges can get it, and Bridges has a special talent for flying in. the tunes for home dunk passes 6’6 forward shouldn’t be able to muster.

And classic Ball passes are also paid even though they don’t result in highlight dunks. Ball will push the pace in any situation, including after making baskets, as you’ll see in the second clip. Bridges knows the value of running the floor when playing with a guard who can come out and lift the ball in any situation.

Not even halfway through his rookie season, Ball has already created enough memorable games with Bridges for their own highlights package. This is proof of Ball’s magnetism as a lead guard. This is proof that its loudest critics had concerns that were totally exaggerated when entering the project.

It also shows how adding a key element, especially as a lead designer, can improve the appearance of everyone around them. Bridges, just weeks away from his 23rd birthday, now looks a lot more interesting than last year.

The ball is ready and willing to throw any pass, especially ones the defense doesn’t think are possible until it attempts them. The fact that defenses need to focus on Hayward as well helps Bridges find openings as well, and he has been more effective on those opportunities even though his per-game numbers are down slightly.

Finally, he feels like he’s finding the role he’s always been meant to be.

Hornets put bridges in a better position to succeed on the pitch

Part of the key to unlocking the bridges has been letting him tackle the four-speed incompatibilities rather than trying to use his strength to score by three. Hornets coach James Borrego has pledged to use Bridges exclusively as a big man for the first time in his career this season, and that has been a big part of his breakout campaign.

Bridges has spent 93% of his time playing next to a single big this year, according to Basketball Reference. He only played one percent of his time on the wing. It’s a huge change from the way bridges have been used since college. Even during his first two years in the league, he was playing a small forward 53 percent and 72 percent of the time respectively.

Playing a foursome allowed Bridges to ultimately be used as a roll man rather than a point shooter. Bridges has always had a natural ability as a lob catcher, but that has rarely been put at the center of his game. It has changed this year, and the results have been electric.

Here are Bridges’ numbers as a roll man dating back to his freshman year at Michigan State, along with the percentage of overall attempts that occurred as a roll man, points per possession on those attempts and how he got. noted these opportunities relative to its peers, by Synergy Sports.

This is what the production of Roll Man from Bridges looks like on a spreadsheet. It’s a little more fun to watch it on video.

Even Joel Embiid couldn’t stop this one:

The Hornets have found their cornerstone of the future in Ball. Bridges is proving this season that he can play a supporting role in everything to come.

Bridges has gone from prospect to player before our eyes this season. Finally, finding the right way to leverage his talents has certainly helped. The same goes for adding a sublime playmaker like Ball.