I love Jordan Hamilton’s confidence.
Not sure he’s very familiar with the coach and situation he will find himself in once the lockout ends, but love that confidence. Don’t ever lose that.
The first-round draft pick out of Texas finds himself in Denver and sounds as sure of himself as ever — particularly his ability to score — in an interview with Hoopshype.
The confidence? Sure, he has that. The minutes? Well that’s another thing. First, we are talking about George Karl here, not a guy known for leaning heavily on rookies. And with this Nuggets team he will not have to — at the small forward/swing spot they can put Danilo Gallinari, Al Harrington, Gary Forbes and maybe Arron Affalo if they want to go small. And that’s not even counting J.R. Smith, who could be re-signed. Good luck finding a bunch of minutes in there, Hamilton.
All of which is to say, Jordan Hamilton is going to have to play good defense and really earn his minutes. Prove wrong your rep as hard to coach (remember that slide down the draft board?), keep your head down and fit in. Scoring helps, but do it within the offense. Do that and you’ll get your chance.
Just don’t try to impress George Karl by shooting a lot rookie. Trust me on that one.