San Antonio Spurs: DeMar DeRozan vs. Bojan Bogdanovic
Although Bojan Bogdanovic enjoyed the best years of his career the last two seasons with the Indiana Pacers, for whatever reason he really struggled those pair of years against DeMar DeRozan, be it when he played in Toronto or San Antonio.
In four of the six contests, Bogey put up just seven points or less whereas DeRozan had 26, 24, 12 and 18 respectively. Overall for their careers, DeRozan has averaged 22.4 points against Bogdanovic teams where as Bojan has averaged just 11.4.
However, that isn’t taking into account how much Bogdanovic has improved over the course of the last two seasons, so I suspect we’ll actually see a much closer matchup between the two moving forward. That’s especially true considering that Bogey made massive strides as a defender in Indiana and that he’ll have tons of space to operate in a Jazz offense in which he’ll be the third or fourth offensive option (depending where you rank Rudy Gobert).
Then again, with DeRozan now having a full season in the Popovich system under his belt, many suspect that he’ll also be more effective this upcoming season, so Bogey could have his hands full. Fortunately, he’ll now have the two-time Defensive Player of the Year watching his back, which should allow him further liberty to challenge DeRozan this time around.
DeRozan is unquestionably more athletic and the more dynamic scorer of the two, and with multiple All-Star appearances on his resume, there’s no disputing he’s the better player. But with Bogey in a system wherein he should thrive and holding an ability to drain threes at a clip that DeRozan couldn’t even dream of, this will be a fun individual battle to behold as Bojan looks to hold his own and challenge his All-Star opponent.
Scheduled Contests:
- 1/29 Utah at San Antonio
- 2/21 San Antonio at Utah
- 3/22 Utah at San Antonio
- 3/24 San Antonio at Utah