Dennis Smith Jr. and Kris Dunn are NBA's paragons of persistence

For some NBA players, thingsdon’t click right away. But a rookie struggling is no reason tofret; most rookies in the NBA are, to put it bluntly, kind of bad.Adjusting to the size, speed and strength of NBA veterans is a talltask, but franchises understand that and will usually show patienceregarding rookies.

Sometimes things don’t click inyear two either. Of course, teams want to see improvement in aplayer’s counting statistics and feel for the game, but growingpains are expected for sophomores too. If things haven’t clicked byyear three though, alarms start to go off. When a player stilllooks lost on the floor – or is already on his second or third team– his future prospects start to look a littlebleak.

That’s why the stories of DennisSmith Jr. and Kris Dunn are massively impressive. Both are formertop-10 picks who lasted less than two years with the teams thatdrafted them (the New York Knicks and Minnesota Timberwolves,respectively). They have each been waived, overlooked andaltogether neglected. But now, Smith and Dunn have found homes withteams that expect legitimate production from them this season – andmaybe beyond.

Smith signed a one-year,$2.5-million deal with the Brooklyn Nets this summer and he willserve as the team’s backup point guard, leading a second unit thatwill also include Dorian Finney-Smith and Royce O’Neale – and hassome serious potential for excitement on the defensive end. Dunn,meanwhile, just had his 2023-24 contract guaranteed by the Jazz andwill almost certainly get regular minutes in Utah’sbackcourt.

For DSJ, this is all happeningabout 18 months after he was cut from an actively tanking PortlandTrail Blazers team when an elbow injury sidelined him for a fewweeks. A midseason waiving by one of the league’s worst teamscertainly feels like the metaphorical closing of a curtain thatcould signal the end of a player’s career.

Less than a month before the2022-23 season, though, the Charlotte Hornets signed Smith to aone-year deal. The signing was mostly out of necessity, as theHornets didn’t have a point guard to back up LaMelo Ball – but itwas a deal nonetheless. If there was ever an example of“last, lastchance,” this was it.

Back in his home state, Smithshowed from day one that he wasn’t going to let this be the end ofthe line, becoming one of the best guard defenders in theentire league last season. He was in the 95th percentile fordeflections per 36 minutes (via CraftedNBA), fifth in the entireleague in steal rate (2.6%) and opposing teams averaged 10.7 fewerpoints per 100 possessions when

Smith was on the floor. Thatcan’t allbe attributed to him, of course,but that number in conjunction with other defensive stats show justhow important Smith was to Charlotte’s (surprisingly) stoutdefense.

Smith showed flashes ofdefensive brilliance long before last season; here he is in 2018locking up Paul George on a crucial crunch timepossession.

HOLY DEFENSE DENNIS SMITH JR. pic.twitter.com/KEwMsLiQmT

— Nick Angstadt (@NickVanExit) December 31, 2018

But his complete buy-in on thatside of the ball in 2022-23 is what solidified Smith as someone whowill more than likely stick around for years to come. Stops likethis one against Stephen Curry became the norm forDSJ.

HORNETS beat the WARRIORS!Dennis Smith Jr had 13/9/8 & forced OT with this bucket & defenseon Steph Curry pic.twitter.com/2pCMn4eltC

— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) October 30, 2022

Stifling defense wasn’t the onlyreason Smith earned another contract though; he posted the lowestturnover rate of his career and the best assist-to-turnover ratioof his career too. His own shooting splits weren’t pretty (47.5%true shooting), but Smith protected the ball and made enough thingshappen for his teammates that calling him a defensive specialistfeels like a disservice.

The man with a vision🤞 @Dennis1SmithJrx @PJWashington| @HornetsOnBallypic.twitter.com/XPbrrP6J8Y

— Charlotte Hornets (@hornets) November 21, 2022

Dunn’s career has been just asbig of a roller coaster as Smith’s. After just one season inMinnesota, he was essentially a throw-in piece of the ZachLaVine-to-Chicago-Bulls trade on draft night in2017.

He spent three years withChicago, showing some promise in his first season there. But hisproduction declined over the next two seasons, and the Bulls lethim walk after the 2020 season. Short stints in Memphis, Atlantaand Portland were discouraging too, and Dunn was teamlessthroughout most of the 2022-23 season. It looked like theend.

Shortly after an opportunitypresented itself for Smith, Dunn was also given a chance to redeemhimself. Dunn was playing in the G League when he got the call fromthe Jazz, who were basically just looking for a healthy body toprovide backcourt depth after Collin Sexton went down with aninjury.

Former No. 5 overall pick Kris Dunn issigning a 10-day contract with the Utah Jazz, sources tell me [email protected], a six-year NBA veteran, has played for Capital City Go-Go inG League this season.

— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) February 21, 2023

However, Dunn was much more thanjust a healthy body. He scored in double figures in his first sevengames with Utah, while also averaging almost two steals per game.Overall, he posted counting stats of 13.2 points, 5.6 assists and4.5 rebounds while shooting 53.7% from the floor. His turnover rate– a big problem in all of his stops – was at a career low 11.0%too.

These weren’t just empty statsor “gimme” buckets either. Dunn was creating for both himself andothers at a pretty high level in his 22 games with Utah. (A smallsample size, but still impressive). Only 25% of his buckets wereassisted, putting him in the 87th percentile among point guards –AKA Ja Morant, De’Aaron Fox and James Hardenterritory.

kris dunn is shooting 97.13% on reallydifficult-looking layups since joining the jazz. don't botherfact-checking this. it's incredibly accurate. you can tell becausei went out two decimal places and everything. pic.twitter.com/TtUptfzc01

— Dan Favale (@danfavale) April 8, 2023

That flare for creation carriedover to the preseason as well:

Well this is tough stuff from Kris Dunnpic.twitter.com/ZsflOF2Jq6

— Nekias (Nuh-KY-us) Duncan (@NekiasNBA) October 15, 2023

Smith and Dunn’s late-bloomingnature brings a few things to mind.

Firstly, it exemplifies just howtalented the NBA is right now. Smith was solid enough in his shorttenure with Portland, and it was an injury that got him cut – amove that was pretty darn close to ending his NBAcareer.

The margins are so thin aroundthe edges of the league that a ton of NBA-caliber players are leftwithout teams – forced to battle for an incredibly small number ofroster spots. Is this a good thing? Well, an excess of talent is abetter problem to have than a dearth of talent, and the NBA doesdeserve some credit for investing in the G League and giving it theresources necessary to become a legitimate minor league system. So…kind of.

Secondly, it raises a questionabout how patient teams should be when trying to develop players.How patient should teams be? Because at first glance, payingplayers who haven’t proven much of anything on the court seems alittle reductive. But the NBA may have reached a point where thereare enough examples of guys developing into good, productiveplayers three-plus years into their career thatextendingguys based on upside might becomeas common as drafting them for upside.

If teams fully embrace thedevelopment of players rather than giving up when the developmentis actually an intensive process, it could pay dividends. But it’scertainly a risk – doubling down on a player because of theirperceived ceiling could look pretty bad if he never turns into thatguy.

Regardless, we could be watchingthat shift happen already. In recent days, players like Zeke Nnaji(Denver Nuggets) and Deni Avdija (Washington Wizards) signedcontract extensions with the teams that drafted them. Both arehighly talented to be sure, but neither has blossomed into theplayer they were drafted to be – hence, they mostly got extendedbased on their untapped potential, not what they’ve shown on thecourt thus far.

But no matter what Dennis SmithJr. and Kris Dunn’s success stories say about the NBA – if anythingat all – these guards are two of the best stories in the NBA thisseason. Brooklyn and Utah are reaping the rewards of two journeymenwho have finally started to become the players that teams wantedthem to be from the start.