THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT CHET HOLMGREN & THE OKC THUNDER THAT NOBODY WANTS TO TALK ABOUT

Before we even get into what I want to say, let me know if you guys want more summer league content. I love NBA draft season, I love the summer league, but in the past I've held out on doing summer league content because I wasn't sure what the interest in it would be. If you guys could take a minute to like this video and subscribe for the youtube algorithm that would be much appreciated. Now with all of that out of the way, let's talk about this Chet clip. There's something about the new generation of hoopers coming into the league. These guys have confidence that rivals that of me playing against my little cousins. Before the draft, Chet said that he sees himself being the best player in the NBA in 2 months. Honestly I don't know what's worse, Chet saying that or Ben Matherin saying that LeBron That was a wild statement from Ben, but to be fair, I'll never really get too mad at confidence. Honestly coming up, I wish I did have more confidence hooping. I had a lot of tools, but I didn't have a lot of confidence. Yeah if anything, I'm jealous of some of the confidence that some of these hoopers have. Ben would later show LeBron love, saying that LeBron is the best player in the game, but still nobody's better than me. This is a little off topic, but has anybody else noticed an uptick in trash talk during pick up games over the past few years? Every time I go hoop now, I feel like I'm in a Nick Briz video. On a serious note, the NBA is a competitive league. Like I was saying, you need confidence. To be successful in the NBA, your mentality has to be on another level. How many times have we seen guys come into the NBA with talent, but not the right mentality? I've already noticed some people hating on Chet's enthusiasm for the game. At this moment, I'm not going to be one of them. The Thunder would draft Chet number 2 overall in the 2022 NBA Draft, and when you watch him play, you really do understand why. Chet is 7'1 and possesses a 7'6 wingspan. Doing this to Stephen Curry while in high school also doesn't hurt. On a serious note, NBA Draft.net compares Chet to a young Christaps Porzingis, calling him an extremely skilled front court player, who can initiate offense at every level of the floor. On a serious note, NBA Draft.net would go on to say that he's shown flashes of going coast to coast in the open floor, taking his defender off the dribble and getting to the rim before the opposing defense even has time to get set. This is a reminder that Chet stands at 7'1. Having somebody 7'1 that does the things that Chet does almost doesn't seem fair. In Chet's summer league debut, he would break the block record for most blocks in a summer league game with 6. The truly terrifying thing was how nonchalant he was about it, feeling that he can do even better. I know some people and some scouts view Chet as a slow footed big, but not me. I view Chet as somebody that's agile for his size, especially when you consider his 7'6 wingspan, that allows him to be a menace on the defensive side of the basketball. On this play, Chet records a block against Kofi Cockburn. Kofi was a 295 pound dominant beast in college. I should note, Kofi is actually somebody that I liked. Though Kofi has his faults due to the modern NBA, strength isn't exactly one of them. Kofi is much, much stronger than Chet, but on this play, Chet is able to compensate for his lack of strength due to his length and timing. The best shot blockers in the league aren't only long, but they also have impeccable timing. Chet's strength is going to be something to monitor as his career progresses. Now he doesn't have to be Shaq or anything, but I do think that it would benefit him to add more functional strength, as long as it doesn't come at the expense of his versatility. Now since I showed Chet blocking Kofi, I also have to show Kofi giving Chet a bucket. There are two sides to every story, though Chet's length is great, and he's going to compensate in some situations, early in his career there are going to be times where the strength of opposing players is just too much. Today I saw an interesting tweet, and it said people's reasons for Chet not being good in the league is that people thought that he wouldn't be able to guard Joel Embiid and Nikola Jokic. This tweet brought to my attention that there were a lot of people that actually ran with this narrative. Not me. I was more so focused on imagining Chet trying to block out Steven Adams, and also stopping Kenny Lofton Jr., who used his size, strength, and skill to get the better of Chet on multiple occasions. A lot of bigs in the NBA are going to be better than Kenny Lofton Jr., they're going to be better than Kofi, and they're going to be better than Taco Fall. To get back to showing Chet love, some of the blocks that he recorded in his debut were silly. He fits the mold of a player that's going to have the ability to alter shots at the basket and change a game without touching a basketball. What I love about Chet is that he doesn't have to block your shot. The length alone impacts a game, and on the other end, no center in the NBA wants to guard out to the 3-point line. Even if they're capable, we're in 2022, spacing matters. Chet is going to feast on centers that don't have the foot speed to step out. And if you're short, relatively speaking, what did he say earlier in the video again? Oh yeah, that's right, too little. If you're too little, he's just going to shoot over you like KD does, or get to the basket for an easy lay in. I don't think that Chet is going to be one of those bigs that is comfortable settling. Chet truly does have an interesting offensive repertoire. I mean, look at this Dirk fadeaway. The game is evolving and it's a beautiful thing. My coaches were stubborn. If you were one of the bigger players on the roster, you had to camp the paint. Fortunately, it seems like OKC is anything but stubborn. They let their players experiment, and they let their players learn. In Chet's first summer league game, he would drop 23 points on 9 shots. He would also record 7 rebounds and 6 blocks. He did this in only 23 minutes of action. What I hate so much about the Thunder is that they've stockpiled such an abnormal amount of picks and have drafted so well that them doing this is normal for them. Outside of Chet, the Thunder also drafted two of my favorite prospects in this year's draft. Now I want to preface what I'm about to say by saying this. If you guys couldn't tell, I've been getting bolder with my takes lately. Alright, let me just be real. I just said that so I don't get too much hate for saying Jalen Williams reminds me a lot of Kevin Porter Jr, Brooklyn James Harden, and screw it, I see some shades of Luka. With his passing, his IQ, and the way that he manipulates defenders, he's incredibly talented at using his craftiness and his body to get to where he wants to go on the floor. Now before anybody gets mad, I didn't say what Luka. To continue to talk about Williams though, he's also a plus athlete that can throw down and by the way, he has a 7'2 wingspan. I thought that this was a guy that was going to get drafted closer to the 20s this year. I had no idea that the Thunder were convinced that he'd be this cold. He also had the numbers. Honestly, it was really hard to find a knock on him. I'm not saying he's perfect by any means, but when it comes to prospects, you can easily talk yourself into this guy. At the Combine and the Summer League, he's shown flashes and I know it's just the Summer League. But like another tweet that I saw earlier today, what's the fun of the Summer League if you can't overreact even a little bit? Right now, I'm just enjoying basketball. I'm not trying to hear all of that it's just the Summer League stuff, even though it really is. By no means are careers defined by the Summer League. We all know that they're just starting. In the comments below, I actually want you guys to name some players that peaked in the Summer League. I might do a video on something like this soon and I want to see who you guys got. But I mean, yeah, at the end of the day, it really is just the Summer League. That's why I'm really not down on my guy Jiang having a slow start. The 2022 number 14 overall pick is still 6'9", still has a handle, and is still probably going to be fine once he figures everything out. The Thunder really aren't fair guys, when I say I hate them, it comes from a place of love. I didn't even talk about Josh Giddey, the versatile 6'8, 6'9 point forward, who was fantastic before injury, threatening a triple-double virtually every game. I also didn't talk about Trey Manne, who if you squinted your eyes, you know what, I've had enough wild takes this video. I'm just going to say that Trey Manne creates great space, and he could hit from anywhere on the floor. Then there's Shea that speaks for himself. This team has too much talent to be honest with you guys. Sometimes I wonder if it's talent will ultimately hold back it's other talent, if that makes any type of sense. Have you guys seen how many picks this team has, I mean seriously at some point Adam Silver has to step in right? Now I want to close this video by circling back to Chet. I think there were a lot of people that liked the talent that Chet possessed, but at the same time people were scared. Some people didn't like the strength, because yeah if you're not strong enough you may be foul prone, but at the same time we've seen so many players come in the NBA and figure things out. Even as recently as last year, just check out Evan Mobley. Evan Mobley was always a special defensive talent, but there were some concerns. To be honest with you guys, I think Mobley pairing up with Allen could have been one of the best things to happen to his career. There were questions about Chet's strength, and also questions about Chet's medicals. People were asking the question, what is Chet's durability going to look like? There was an interesting report that dropped pre-draft that stated that Chet was refusing to give his medicals to the Magic and Thunder. This article led to some speculation that Chet might fall in the draft. Oddly enough though, Woge would report the opposite, and maybe the truth. Regardless of what anybody thinks about Chet, I think we all have to agree that the sky is the limit for him if he truly reaches his potential. Clicking the video on the screen right now is a great way to support my channel. I'm Gili Coop, bringing you guys the scoop, until our next upload.