Philadelphia 76ers: Shake Milton is Landry Shamet 2.0

With a desperate need for a sharpshooting sixth man off the bench, Shake Milton already looks like Landry Shamet 2.0 for the Philadelphia 76ers.

When Elton Brand made the controversial decision to include Landry Shamet in the Philadelphia 76ers‘ blockbuster move to acquire Tobias Harris from the Los Angeles Clippers, it turned a lot of heads in the Delaware Valley.

Sure, Harris, Boban Marjanovic, and Mike Scott have played about as well as anyone could have hoped, but it’s hard not to be a little disappointed every time you chance by a Clippers game to see Shamet thriving as a starter for one of the league’s most complete teams.

But fear not Philly fans, as Shake Milton may be just as good.

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Much like Shamet, Milton played point guard in college, but SMU‘s best player actually projected better as a quality off-ball combo guard at the next level.

While Milton’s initial numbers are hard to judge honestly, as he’s only played 165 minutes in the NBA this season spread out over 15 games, when given an ample sample size from which to operate from, lets say 15 or more minutes, Shake has played pretty well; scoring an average of 7.6 points while knocking down 5-15 shots from 3 point range.

Again, it’s hard to extrapolate those numbers out over an entire 82 game season, as Milton has only attempted 29 3 pointers this season, about the same number J.J. Redick attempts a week, but between his size, speed, and skill set, it’s hard not to be excited about his prospects in a more full-time capacity.

Apparently Brett Brown would like to see it too, as Milton has been given serious minutes over the last two games to fill Shamet’s former role.

And really the results have been almost identical.

No, Shamet and Milton aren’t on the same level right now, as the former has played 1466 more minutes over 58 more games, but in his first five professional games playing at least 15 minutes of action their stat lines were almost identical; 7.6 points per game on 9-25 from downtown (36 percent).

Crazy, right?

Now it seems like a virtual impossibility to get Milton enough minutes to fully step into Shamet’s shoes before the postseason rolls around on April 13th, as there are only seven games left to play at the time of this publication, but still, Milton’s development has been one of the most pleasant surprises of the last quarter of the regular season.

Baring an unexpected free agent signing or another Shamet-esque steal in the 20s of the 2019 NBA Draft, it looks like Milton will be in line to play a big role in Brett Brown‘s scheme next season, and could even earn a surprise spot in the team’s playoff rotation if the team opts to release either Amir Johnson or Justin Patton to convert his contract before April 10th (more on that here).

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Either way, after shipping Landry Shamet, the steal of the 2018 NBA Draft to add Tobias Harris into the fold, it’s pretty amazing that then-GM Brett Brown was able to secure a second steal of the draft in Shake Milton to take his place.