NBA Rookie Ladder: “New Year, New Me”

4. Jarrett Allen

The Brooklyn Nets have reshaped their roster in the aftermath of the disastrous Billy King debacle of 2013, by trying to procure young talent that has fell out of favor elsewhere. It netted them D’Angelo Russell over the summer, and then helped them rescue Jahlil Okafor from the Philadelphia 76ers.

Instead of Okafor walking into playing time and a more defined role a la Russell, it has been another young big that has manned the middle for Kenny Atkinson and the nets, rookie Jarrett Allen. At the time of the Okafor swap, many thought that Brooklyn was a great landing space for Okafor because they were stuck with Timofey Mozgov or Tyler Zeller as their starting center.

Since coming to Brooklyn Okafor has played in two games amassing a total of 34 minutes. In that same stretch, Allen has played in 14 games for a grand total of 256 minutes (18.5 minutes per game). If anyone is being groomed to replace Mozgov/Zeller it seems like Allen is the guy and not Okafor.

The two couldn’t be any more different as players. Okafor is a low-post dynamo on offense that struggles defensively and is slow. Allen is a rim-running aficionado on offense that has the athleticism and length to control the paint on either end and is capable of defending the perimeter on switches. One of those things is a dinosaur and the other is a shiny new toy in today’s NBA.

Allen was taken with the 22nd overall pick in the 2017 NBA Draft after putting together an impressive, but inconsistent, freshman season at Texas. The potential for him to develop into the archetype big in the modern NBA has teased scouts and fans since he broke onto the national scene. While the Okafor acquisition has received more noise and hype than anything Allen has done in his short NBA career, he has so far been able to keep hold of the center of the future title in Brooklyn. 2018 is the year that he cements himself as being next in line with the Nets.