quote:
Contract year so I would expect him to ball out. He'll never be KD those comparisons were kinda unfair but 20 points per game type of guy that's a solid defender easily.

I forgot what podcast it was but they made an interesting point about the anchor of expectations and why we should rethink how we judge Ingram.

They did this by comparing Ingram to Giannis(making note not to claim Ingram is or will be as good as Giannis, they don't think so).

One came into the league as the second pick, from Duke, to LA, with lofty comparisons of being in the mold of KD.

The other was an unheralded international kid taken at 15.

At the end of their third seasons respectively their stat lines don't look all that different:

Ingram: 18.3ppg, 49.7%fg, 33%3p, 5.2fta, 67.5%ft, 5.1reb, 3ssists.
Giannis: 16.9ppg, 50.6%fg, 25.7%3p, 5.1fta, 72.4%ft, 7.7reb, 4.1 asts.

Again, not comparing them, as even by then Giannis just had "it."

The difference:

Ingram was immediately judged through this prism of being compared as the next KD. Picked apart for every advanced analytical failing.

Giannis was simply the underdog, the nobody, the guy who had no expectations. The guy everyone was just wondering, at such a young age, where will his game go next?

So Giannis by his third year is this guy who is simply treated like the sky is the limit, but Ingram is simply seen as the guy who hasn't lived up to insane expectations of being one of the best players in the modern NBA by age 21. But the sky's the limit for him too, and perhaps we just need to re-align our expectations more neutrally to appreciate it.

This post was edited on 6/23/19 at 3:34 pm