How High Is Matas’s Potential? An Analysis.

Matas Buzelis finished his rookie year strong, but how high is his potential? In a fairly weak draft class, Buzelis is likely to finish around fifth in rookie of the year behind Castle (#4), Risacher (#1), Sarr (#3) and Ware (#15).

In terms of advanced stats, the top rookies with positive VORP are Ware, McCain (#16) before injury, Filipkowski (#32) and Edey (#9).

Buzelis finished the year with a modest 8.5 ppg, 3.5 reb, and 1 assist. But much like the rest of the Bulls, his was a tale of two seasons. After the All-Star break, Matas doubled his minutes to 27 min per game, eventually becoming a starter. His splits went to 13ppg, 5reb, 2ast on 36% 3pt shooting and being fairly efficient as well.

He's also shown the ability to be a plus defender, averaging a block per game. It's the combination of all three, plus defending, plus scoring and with efficiency, that has Matas's potential feeling sky high. Good rookie years usually feature 1 at the detriment to the other two. Ware, for example, is a plus defender but very inefficient at scoring. In my estimation, Buzelis feels most likely to do all three, of the class still.

Coming into the draft, the most common comp for Matas was Franz Wagner. At first glance, Buzelis's first season fell far short of that. Wagner was an immediate starter for the Magic, posting 15ppg, 4.5reb and 3 assists his rookie yead.

But at closer inspection, it doesn't feel that far apart. The main difference between the two were simply minutes. Per 36 minutes, Franz's rookie year was 18ppg, 5reb, 3.5 assists.

Matas is 16ppg, 7reb, 2asts and nearly 2 blocks per 36 minutes. Even more impressively, with his added minutes post All Star break, Matas's shooting efficiency stayed the same and didn't drop at all.

The main area to improve for Buzelis, is getting to the line more. Franz averaged 3 trips per 36 minutes his rookie year, while Matas is below 2 sttempts. Franz was quickly up to 4-5, his sophomore year and Matas should aim for that.

Buzelis's goals for year two should be to lock in as the starter, get to the line more often (4 FTA / game), aim to slightly improve 3pt shooting from 36% to 38%ish and aim for 17/7/3 splits with positive box/minus on both ends.

That would basically continue pace with Franz but with worse playmaking and better defense. But being paired with plus defense makes another possible comp: Khris Middleton. Middleton, quickly became a plus on both ends of the court by year 3 and eventually became an All Star.

That feels like Matas's optimistic track is somewhere between Middleton & Franz. Both were All-Star caliner which is why our optimism feels well-founded. And while there are even more optimistic scenarios, they seem possible because Matas's defense has kept him on the court, like we saw with some superstars in their first two years as their offensive game developed (i.e. Jimmy Butler)

It'll be very fun to see him grow next year!