Yang Hansen will experience his first taste of the NBA G League this weekend.
But it likely won’t be his last.
The Portland Trail Blazers have assigned the rookie to the Rip City Remix for the weekend, the team announced Saturday, affording the 7-foot-2 Chinese center a little extra practice time.
After seeing limited minutes in the first five games of the season, Hansen did not play Friday night during the Blazers’ thrilling 109-107 win over the Denver Nuggets.
Hansen opened the season as part of the rotation at backup center, but he has been largely ineffective, averaging just 1.8 points, 0.8 rebounds and 0.4 blocks over 5.8 minutes per game.
When Robert Williams III was cleared to make his long-awaited season debut against the Nuggets, the veteran center inherited Hansen’s role.
The Blazers remain bullish on Hansen’s potential, but believe he needs extra practice time — like most rookies — to foster his development. In the modern NBA, teams rarely practice. So it’s likely, according to a team source, that Hansen travels back-and-forth between the Blazers and Remix for extra practice sessions, assuming his NBA playing time remains limited.
“I told him from the beginning this is a marathon,” Blazers interim coach Tiago Splitter said Friday. “This is not (about) one game, five games, 10 games. You’ve got to be patient. You’re going to learn how this game goes. And so far we could throw him out there in some minutes and get some experience. As a rookie, you want minutes, you want to play, you want to show, but you’ve also got to be careful. That patience (has) got to be there.” XXXXX
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