Michael Beasley says he can average 25 points on 10 shots in today’s NBA
A half-decade removed from the NBA, Michael Beasley still believes he’s got game.
On a recent episode of “The OGs Show” with former NBA veterans Mike Miller and Udonis Haslem, Beasley delved into how good he would be in today’s NBA.
“If I played 48 minutes in a game out of a game, I would score 75 (points),” he said. “But today, in this game, with 10 shots, I’d average 25 points in 20 minutes easy … (players) don’t work on their game no more.”
You need some sort of irrational confidence to play professional sports, and Beasley was one of the most gifted scorers across college basketball in the mid-2000s. In his freshman (and only) season at Kansas State, the 6-foot-8 forward averaged a Division-I most in points (26.4) and rebounds (12.4), in addition to 1.3 steals and 1.6 blocks on 53.2 percent shooting and 37.9 percent from 3-point range (2.9 3PA). He had 18 25-point performances, including 13 30-point performances and three 40-point outings.
It parlayed him into being the second overall selection–behind only Derrick Rose–to the Miami Heat in the 2008 NBA Draft. He couldn’t find footing in Miami, getting traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves ahead of 2010-11, averaging 19.2 points in his first season up north across 73 games (all starts).
He was never a consistent starter the rest of his career, starting less than 20 percent of his 377 games. He also was apart of the Phoenix Suns, Houston Rockets, Milwaukee Brewers, New York Knicks and, most recently, the Los Angeles Lakers.
The now-35-year-old last appeared in an NBA game in 2018-19, when he averaged just 7.0 points in 10.7 minutes per contest. Plus, a lot has happened since then, including a whole global pandemic that ultimately voided Beasley’s contract in 2019-20. I’d be very hard-pressed to believe a player who hasn’t played an NBA game in a half-decade could average 25 points on 20-25 shots, let alone 10.
But you don’t get to play professional sports without that mindset, which I highly respect.
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