DeMar DeRozan has improved in every facet of his game this season, Jesse Blancarte of Basketball Insiders contends in a piece that breaks down the shooting guard’s season to date. DeRozan’s ability to drive to the rim has been remarkable this season. Blancarte notes that he leads the league in drives to the rim this season with 11.8 per game and he is generating .99 points per possession, which is the seventh most in the league. DeRozan holds a player option for the 2016/17 season, but he will reportedly turn down his option and become an unrestricted free agent.
Here’s more from the Eastern Conference:
- Nets combo forward Thaddeus Young dismissed the rumors about being traded to Detroit, which he first heard about from his wife, Brian Lewis of the New York Post writes. “She don’t want to go to Detroit, I know that,” Young said. Pistons president of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy shot down those trade rumors earlier this week.
- Center Nikola Vucevic believes the Magic shouldn’t make any trades before the deadline this year, Brian Schmitz or The Orlando Sentinel writes. “That’s no reason to think we need to change anything. We have to find a way within each other to get back to what we were doing early in the year,” Vucevic said. The Magic are 21-28 on the season, going 1-9 over their last 10 contests.
- The Heat own a record of 29-22, but Jonathan Tjarks of RealGM believes the team is underachieving. With Hassan Whiteside and Dwyane Wade set to enter free agency this summer, Miami doesn’t have much time to figure out if this is the core it should invest in for the long term, Tjarks adds.