How Tre Jones Starting for the Spurs Helps Everybody

In three games as a starter, Jones has led improvement on offense. The Spurs narrowly lost to the Milwaukee Bucks and Cleveland Cavaliers, and clobbered the Detroit Pistons. To be fair, everyone clobbers Detroit, but the Spurs snapped a five-game losing streak.

As a starter this season, Jones is averaging 15.7 points, five assists, and a steal. He is also shooting much better than he did off the bench. The Spurs have also won every third quarter since they made the switch, which was a big struggle earlier in the season.

It seems like the ride has finally turned. Jones isn’t taking it for granted, though. “It always feels good, being able to get a start,” he said. “Growing up, it was always a dream of mine to be in this position, so never take anything for granted…I pride myself on trying to be a leader for us on the court, try to be an extension of Coach on the court as well.”

Not only is Jones playing better with the first five, but everyone else seems to be, as well. Devin Vassell is scoring six more points on much better shooting with Jones starting, Sochan is grabbing more rebounds and scoring more, and Victor Wembanyama was averaging an insane 18.9 points, 10.2 rebounds, and 3.1 blocks with Jones on the bench, and has somehow improved to 22.3, 10.3, and 3.3 with Jones starting. Oh, and his field goal percentage is up, too.

Having someone on the floor whose only job is to make everyone better turns out to be an excellent move next to a rookie phenom.

Interestingly, Keldon Johnson's scoring has regressed. After being moved to the bench right before Christmas, Johnson averaged 19.8 points and 30 percent shooting from three. Since Jones became a starter, his points have fallen to 16.3 points, but his efficiency has risen to 38 percent.

When Johnson was averaging nearly 20 points off the bench, Jones was out there to get him the ball. Since he joined the starters, Johnson has had to create for himself more and gets to lead the bench unit, which has been working out for everyone.

The bench unit as a whole is also not missing Jones. The Spurs have the seventh-best offensive bench in the league, scoring 39.3 points per game, but since Jones became a starter, the Spurs have boosted their bench points to an insane 47 per game.

Why? The bench now has more firepower, shooting, and self-creation, while the starters get to run more set plays. Starting Tre Jones has been working for quite literally everyone on the team, and all the Spurs can do is look back on their blunders of games past and laugh.