NBA Rookie Rankings: What’s Luka Doncic’s biggest weakness?

2. Deandre Ayton: Help defense

Rookie big men who manage to average 16 points and over 10 rebounds per game are pretty rare. Ayton’s body type and skill set might be more suited to basketball in the early-90s, but centers who can score at a super efficient clip are still valuable in today’s game.

Instead, Ayton needs to find a way to improve his poor defense. It’s worth noting that he does a reasonably good job against similarly sized post guys in one-on-one situations. He’s never going to be Hakeem Olajuwon, but he’s shown enough to reasonably project him as an adequate post defender in single coverage.

When Ayton is asked to move his feet things go downhill pretty quickly. When he’s engaged in the pick-and-roll he’s shown zero ability to switch and guard smaller players on the perimeter. Frequently, his strategy is to hang back in no man’s land which doesn’t allow him to challenge the ball handler at the 3-point line or the roll man at the rim.

Watching him try to figure out required rotations is even more painful. Ayton is frequently multiple seconds late even when he does make the right read. Some of that should be helped with practice time in the Suns’ scheme, but some of it might be irreparable. Ayton might not have the instincts to become an average defender overall. His defensive lapses don’t trouble the Suns at the moment, but it’s going to a big problem when Phoenix starts competing for a playoff berth.