Chet Holmgren is better than you think he is
The current leader for Rookie of the Year is really good, but everybody already knows that. But is he an All-Star already? What about All-NBA? He just might be.
The current Rookie of the Year favorite, if betting odds are to be taken as law, is Chet Holmgren by a healthy margin. The rookie, who was sidelined for all of what would have been his freshman campaign in 2022-23, has been the best rookie in the league, but is that even underselling him?
In the first return for All-Star voting, Holmgren made an appearance with the ninth-most votes among Western Conference frontcourt players, the second-most-voted rookie behind Victor Wembanyama who held the eighth-most votes. This begs the question: if Vegas views Chet Holmgren as the current runaway for Rookie of the Year, why is it that fans seem to think he’s only the second-best in his year?
And if the fans are underrating Holmgren, then just how good is he? In my opinion, Chet has played at a solid All-Star level in his rookie campaign, which is something I don’t say lightly. However, before I start to explain why I think Holmgren is an All-Star, let me explain how I define what an All-Star is.
To me, an All-Star is somebody essential to their team’s ability to win in multiple facets. You can be your team’s leading scorer, your team’s defensive anchor, or your team’s leading rebounder, but the more ways in which you impact winning with those abilities, the more likely I am to consider you an All-Star. Of course, the criteria for what impacting winning looks like may be different depending on whose microscope you’re looking under, so it’s all subjective. However, my ultimate claim is that Chet Holmgren is playing at an All-Star level, and therefore should be an All-Star as a rookie.
So what is it that makes Chet Holmgren an All-Star, by that standard?
Offensively it’s his versatility, seamless fit with Oklahoma City and their other stars, and ability to scale up and down in role that gives him that level of impact.
The Thunder love using Holmgren as a trailer in half-court offense, meaning he’s coming in from behind the play early in the clock. Holmgren’s shooting from behind the arc is a huge factor in this. As of today, Holmgren is shooting 40.8% on above-the-break threes.
The Thunder have many ways of creating offense in these situations with Holmgren as a trailer, but it largely has to do with two factors.
Holmgren’s gravity from behind the arc.
The Thunder’s ball handlers’ slashing ability.
Let’s start with the first reason. Shooting gravity has long been recognized as one of the primary tenets of the offensive explosion the NBA has foregone in previous years. Typically, those who hold the most gravity are guards who spray from the outside, but guarding an offense with players who have gravity from the outside becomes far more difficult when those players are as big as Chet Holmgren.
Holmgren’s shooting, especially when he’s playing behind everyone, draws his matchup, typically the opposing team’s rim protector, out of the paint creating a softer interior defense. On the other hand, if Holmgren’s man decides to leave him alone from outside, it’s yet another highly valuable shot that the defense is conceding.
Holmgren’s shooting in these trailer situations is only made more valuable by his teammates’ ability, namely Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams, to get to the rim. Gilgeous-Alexander has been the NBA’s slashing king for the past few seasons and leads the NBA in drives per game yet again this year at 22.5 a game while Williams is still in the league’s top-35 in drives at 12.1 per game.
Their ability to get to the rim, especially early in the clock which they’re encouraged to do, is unlocked by Holmgren’s ability to impact the game as a trailer. This synergy has led to the Thunder holding one of the league’s best offenses, with Holmgren as one of the three main pillars.
They layer these trailer possessions with numerous clever wrinkles that maximize the skillsets of their core three, including unlocking Holmgren as a slasher. Jackson Frank, a writer for Basketball Insiders wrote about an action present in these layers that Oklahoma City uses with consistency to great effect.
On top of Holmgren’s incredible marksmanship from outside the arc, he’s equally incredible — if not more — at the basket. Holmgren shoots 71.9% at the rim, 10th among players with at least 100 attempts at the rim this season (via Synergy).
Holmgren’s great at the rim as a lob threat and overall play finisher with his absurd length, standing at 7’1” with a 7’6” wingspan, but his slashing game is real, and the growth he’s exhibited in his young NBA career has been nothing short of special.
In Summer League, where Holmgren averaged 3.8 turnovers per game, he struggled on his drives, getting stripped often, especially on his spin moves which he leaned on as a main weapon. Since then, Holmgren has experienced the benefits of the Thunder’s elite spacing but has simplified his slashing game, and has seen the game slow down for him.
Holmgren shoots 55.4% on his drives thus far this season, of which he has 119 total possessions via Synergy. He prefers his right but is even more efficient going to his left, albeit on a much lower number of possessions. He’s excellent at attacking closeouts, feeling for the space between him and his defender, and despite his thin frame, plays through contact very well.
Holmgren is unafraid of dealing out the initial bump, and as the five-man, typically has four spacers around him giving him ample space to operate. Additionally, if Holmgren is unable to get to the rim, he’s developed a nice fall-away jumper as a counter, a move that, if refined, could become nearly unguardable given Holmgren’s height.
Back to the spin move, with the enhanced spacing, it’s become another consistent counter for Holmgren, whose matchups are typically too slow of foot to change directions at the speed of Chet. When he can get to the rim, though, Holmgren’s touch around the rim is absurd, and he can utilize pivots, and fakes to get to hooks with either hand.
The final piece we’ll talk about with Holmgren’s offense is his playmaking, which is where I think he has the most room to grow. He’s got a solid foundation as far as passing goes, with his combination of fluid handle and towering height surely helps with his ability to cause havoc and see the court while doing so.
Holmgren’s best trait as a passer is his willingness and quickness to dish in a non-passive manner. Chet rarely passes just for passing, especially after an attempt to score. The offense just flows through him when he’s on the court, a desirable trait in any player, but especially your center.
As soon as Holmgren catches the ball, he’s looking to swing it, shoot it, or put it on the floor and attack. The prime principles of triple-threat offense that players are taught from the first moment they start playing organized basketball. The triple-threat is the key to playing at one’s best as an individual while staying within the offense.
It’s hard to compare Holmgren with other big men as a passer, as he’s rarely used in the post. On his drives, he’ll occasionally back down and throw a bevy of fakes and pivots in close to the basket, but the Thunder rarely posts him up for the purpose of posting him up. Chet has nearly had double the amount of possessions in isolation as he has posting up (both including passes).
This is for a reason, and it has a lot to do with what we’ve discussed already. Oklahoma City’s offense is founded on their star players’ ability to get to the rim as slashers, which of course requires elite spacing to unlock. On one hand, Holmgren is the perfect big man for this offense, while on the other hand, Chet still might just be too slim to reason posting him up more often.
Back to the playmaking, Holmgren doesn’t make any crazy advantages on his own, but he’s incredible when it comes to playing off the advantages made for him. That factors into his scoring, as we’ve said, but he’s adept at finding his open teammates within a shifting defense running to keep up.
A good portion of his assists come from finding relocating shooters off a kick out, or kicking it out to shooters when defenders come on his drives. He’s great at finding the simple swing pass too, catching the ball and nearly immediately finding the open man.
While it’s hard to make a concise opinion about Chet’s playmaking due to the volume at which we see it and the uniqueness of the Thunder’s offense, the side of the ball where he’s shown everything vibrantly and consistently is on the defensive end.
First and foremost, as a rookie Holmgren ranks fourth in the NBA in both total blocks and blocks per game. While he plays a lot on the perimeter offensively, Oklahoma City loves putting him in help situations, where his length, timing, and range as a defender are on full display.
The biggest knock on Holmgren coming into the NBA was his frame, as he is noticeably slim, weighing in at just 195 pounds. While Holmgren has had issues dealing with the massive and powerful post-up monsters that are still scattered around the NBA — notably against Joel Embiid, where Holmgren had issues fighting through the reigning MVP’s seals in the post and or the myriad of bumps that he uses to create space — those are the exceptions, and when the Thunder can help it, they much prefer to have Holmgren floating off-ball.
The concept of utilizing a player with similar length to Holmgren in this capacity isn’t anything new. Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, and Anthony Davis spent/have spent many years of their career playing alongside other bigs, allowing them to roam around the floor on defense and wreak havoc off the ball. This archetype has gained even more popularity in recent years with the resurgence of two big lineups. Players like Giannis Antetokounmpo, Jaren Jackson Jr., Evan Mobley, and Chet’s fellow rookie Victor Wembanyama all have functioned in this capacity over the last handful of years, and have played like Defensive Player of the Year candidates in that role.
In the Thunder-Sixers match-up from late November, Holmgren indeed struggled on the ball. However, when the Thunder decided to sub in fellow big man, Jaylin Williams, Holmgren was allowed to watch from off the ball, and it inevitably led to greater success in the team’s ability to slow down Embiid as he finished with a 44.4% effective field goal percentage, well under the big man’s season average of 56.3%.
Holmgren’s awareness off the ball helped in this regard immensely. On the ball, where Holmgren would simply get beat and concede a basket, he was instead there to add additional help when his teammates were beaten.
The Philadelphia game showed almost all of the positives and negatives to Chet’s defense, and for the most part, it was nearly all positives. Struggling to guard the league’s reigning back-to-back scoring champion isn’t anything to discredit Holmgren for. Overall, he still played incredible defense, especially once he went back to roaming off the ball, and even finished with three blocks (should also be mentioned he finished with 33 points too).
It’s undeniable, however, that Holmgren has quickly become one of the league’s best defensive players, a feat that not many rookies can say they’ve achieved. And he’s not just an interior defender either, despite the gaudy block numbers.
His lateral agility at his size is very respectable, and it allows him to switch out onto the perimeter and play in multiple pick-and-roll coverages. A good portion of bigs in the NBA aren’t quick enough to play outside of drop, which is what makes the elite defenders amongst that size range what they are.
Holmgren is an NBA free safety, and an All-Pro level one at that, in the sense that he covers a ton of ground and breaks plays up. He’s shown the ability to hedge on screens, recover to the roller, and then rotate to block the shot if the roller dishes it off. Roaming off-ball, as we’ve seen and mentioned, he’s nearly got a sixth sense for rotating at the perfect time and being in the perfect position.
Nobody, no matter how long they are, lucks into the production that Chet has managed on the defensive end, especially as a rookie leading the fifth defense in the entire NBA. He’s played at a Defensive Player of the Year caliber all year, and his dominance in that free safety role along with his versatility is exactly why, and the primary reason for why I’m campaigning him for All-Star.
While his offensive production hasn’t exactly matched the eye-popping numbers he posts on the other end, it’s still clear to me the level he’s at. Yes, he’s the third-leading scorer on his team, at a respectable 17.7 points per game, but he’s inarguably one of the pillars for the offense Oklahoma City plays and unlocks his teammates off the ball to a degree that many could never achieve on the ball.
Oklahoma City has made major jumps on both ends of the floor, going from a middle-of-the-pack play-in competitor to a top-five team in the league, and Chet Holmgren’s presence is the biggest difference between then and now. Chet Holmgren is an All-Star, and whether or not he’s recognized as such, he will still be better than the majority seems to believe he is.