Game report — Panathinaikos OPAP Athens@Zalgiris Kaunas9/12/2020 | Rokas Jokubaitis

I’m Kuzey, 19. I’ve been writing about basketball since I was 9. I have been working in Eurosport Turkey for the last 1,5 years. I have written on various sites and magazines before. I’ve been working as a freelance scout for three years. I worked as a consultant. I have interviewed dozens of prospects such as Theo Maledon, Deni Avdija, Henri Drell, Aleksej Pokusevski, Arturs Kurucs, Yves Pons, and dozens of notable basketball people such as Luis Scola, Xavi Pascual, Jonathan Givony, Dimitris Itoudis, Sasa Obradovic, Joan Plaza, Sarunas Jasikevicius, Derrick Williams. I write an article every day. I live in Turkey, I go to all the Euroleague and Youth League games. My main areas are all of age group in Africa and from U12 to U20 European and NCAA. MY BIGGEST GOAL IS SCOUTING! Anyway, don’t forget to follow me on Twitter and feel free to DM!

PS: Played with 16 points (6–10 FG)

• 5x Pick-and-Roll handler
• 1x ISO
• 4x Spot-up shooter

First and best note

This was the point I was most surprised about Rokas Jokubaitis. He lost weight, even a serious weight. But I saw that while losing weight, he did not lose muscle. The solidity and fullness of his upper body still existed. I think it was much more fluid in this game thanks to the weight loss.

Offense

He was the top scorer of the match. He scored 16 points. My favorite thing about his offensive performance was his consistency. I mean, Rokas Jokubaitis stepped in to lead his team to score throughout the match. He did not avoid taking responsibility. With 02:34 minutes to go to the end of the first quarter, he took the ball in the left wing, made a good burst fake and hit the mid-range two-dribble jumper.

He started the second quarter as a catch-and-shooter in the left corner. The third pass came to him. After taking the ball, Rokas drove to the right perimeter, used two screens well, and created his own shot, but he didn’t get the hit.

My favorite offensive position was in the second minute of the second quarter. Rokas took the ball and used the screens one and a half steps ahead of the half-court line. He gave the screen fake and passed Nemanja Nedovic. Then, he did not hesitate to go over a physical, aggressive defender like Kostas Mitoglu and made 2 + 1. In doing so, he used his fluid athleticism, good first step and soft-touch in my opinion.

With five minutes to the end of the second quarter, RJ using Lauvergne’s screen perfectly, he surpassed his defender, and, hit a floater over Aaron White with using his change direction ability.

I think he wasn’t perfect as a scorer in the second half, but he was not stagnant. He did well in the mid-range but showed his main contribution as a passer. Jokubaitis gave beautiful drive-and-dish passes to Arturas Milaknis with Lukas Lekavicius. While making these passes, he used his body balance well, read the game well, managed to pull his opponent on him, created spacing for his teammates and gave them passes with a good court vision in my opinion.

I think he wasn’t perfect as a handler and passer in general terms, he was average. I noticed that he was not very good at physical struggle against pressure in his TOs. As an offensive, I think his biggest improvement on the offensive end compared to last year is his ability to using the screen. Jokubaitis already knew how to use screens, but he used bursts and screen fakes perfectly in this game. He was good at using screens early and broke the opponent’s defensive geometry.

The only question I have in mind about his offensive performance is whether he can be a little more active on off the ball motions. Apart from that, I think he played a perfect match on offense.

Defense

I think Rokas Jokubaitis was slightly below average on the defensive end overall. His motor , activity, and energy on the defensive end still remain, but some physical problems and lack of high defense BBIQ hurt him in four positions.

With 59 seconds remaining to the end of the first quarter, he returned slowly to his own half of court against Pana’s transition attack. Then, e made a rotate mistake in the half-court game.

In the sixth minute of the third quarter, he had a very wrong reaction to Nemanja Nedovic’s simple body fake, he was unable to prevent Nedovic’s floater that enabled Pana to gain momentum because he made a timing mistake.

In the fourth minute of the third quarter, he followed Nedovic bad on off the ball screen game. Couldn’t cover Nedovic’s pass and dribble angles.

Seven minutes before the end of the last quarter, he read well the pick-and-roll played by Ben Bentil and Marcus Foster, but could not do the sliding and block the score due to his physical lack of elite power.

I think he showed his best position on the defensive end at 06:49 minutes before the end of the second quarter. Jokubaitis pursued Pierre Jackson with perfect intensity for 12 seconds, disrupting his opponent’s entire attack geometry, playing the leading role in Zalgiris’s steal.

Showed a pretty nice effort to grab rebounds eight times in the game.

RJ showed his effort on the defensive end again, but I think the problems he experienced last year continue this year as well.