2017-18 Pacers Player Reviews: T.J. Leaf

The Bad

Calling TJ Leaf’s defense bad is an insult to the word bad. His defense was atrocious. It was dreadful. It was every synonym for those words.

This is what kept him off the court. He could hang with the Pacers when he was on offense, but he was completely lost on D far too often. Someone needs to get him a map because he needs to find his way on the less glamorous end of the floor.

Leaf just couldn’t keep up with the pro game in his first year. His rotations were often late on help-side defense, and his lack of lateral mobility made him useless on-ball. There weren’t a lot of situations where he made his impact felt.

He does not realize he needs to help on the Tarik Black roll here:

And here, on-ball, the result is… bad:

How do you fall for a fake from *checks notes* Paul Zipser?

A lot of it is that Leaf was a rookie. He will have to figure the game out as he grows and matures. But the early returns suggest he has a long way to go on that end of the floor.

Leaf was just okay on the glass. His rebound rate was 10.1 percent, around the rate of Denzel Valentine and Carmelo Anthony. This wasn’t really his role, but given his height, one would hope he could make his presence more felt on the glass. Maybe calling him bad here is a stretch. Let’s go with underwhelming.

The final weakness of Leaf’s game? Dribbling. His bounces don’t really feel like they are going anywhere. He couldn’t get by much of anyone, even though it looked like that was a skill he had at UCLA. Leaf isn’t particularly strong with the ball either:

Leaf clearly has a lot to work on. But he is a rookie. There is supposed to be more bad than good. Let’s give him two more years before we are too critical of his weaknesses.