Shai Gilgeous-Alexander has been categorized as several things: a free-throw merchant, a foul artist, and whatnot. In essence, he was constantly criticized for his ability to get to the free-throw line and draw fouls even in situations that would usually be 50-50 calls but end up going in his favor.
Gilgeous-Alexander does not seem bothered about the criticism; he is enjoying the attention he is getting. Neither does his father, Vaughn Alexander, who was recently asked about this criticism in an interview.
“I’ve mentioned this about 400 times, here goes 401. At the end of the day, basketball is a game that has rules, right? And some of the rules are that you can’t– if you get caught out of position, you can’t stick your hand out. You can’t touch people, can’t foul, and if I know that and I’m playing the game, I’m going to play the game by the rules, right?”
“So I’m going to blow by you, you hit me, I go up, you get caught in the ear, you get caught in a bad angle, you get caught leaning the right way. I put my feet, I attack your feet, I put my shoulder on your hip. All these great stuff, all these good things, it’s going to result in fouls.”
Vaughn further went on to compare his son’s season to other superstars who drew a lot more fouls than his son, Gilgeous-Alexander.
“He’s just playing basketball. If you want that to stop, you guys can change the rules. I don’t think we want to change the rules right now, we want to leave them the same– He’s not drawing as many fouls as Michael Jordan and the top guys, just name all the guys back there, even this year he’s not drawing as many fouls. He’s probably like top, not even top 10 in fouls drawn, what are we really talking about?
“Talk about the guys that are drawing more fouls, I guess they’re not ‘the man’ right now, so we don’t have nothing to talk about. It’s just about Shai being loud right now, MVP and all that stuff, so we’re going to have there’s things to talk about. Whatever, at the end of the day, we’re not really worried about it.”
To be fair, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is not even in the top 20 for free throws attempted and made in a single season across NBA history. Jerry West made the most free throws in a single season (840 in 1965-66), while Wilt Chamberlain dominated the free-throw attempts record with the top 5 seasons in his na.me (over 1000 attempts in four of those five seasons). Even Michael Jordan made the third-most free throws in a season with 833 in the 1986-87 regular season.
Meanwhile, Gilgeous-Alexander made only 601 free throws in 669 attempts this season and at maximum made 669 free throws in 739 attempts (in 2022-23). In total, combining both the Playoffs and the regular season, Gilgeous-Alexander averaged 8.9 free throws per game and sank 773 free throws.
We have seen multiple superstars go to the free-throw line like this over the years. Instead of letting this criticism destroy his confidence, Gilgeous-Alexander has seen it as a step in his leap to superstar status in the NBA. When asked if this discourse bothers Gilgeous-Alexander, especially during games, he responded confidently.
“Not at all because like I said, it’s a part of the game. We understand why they’re talking about it; there’s nothing else to talk about. Like find something bad to talk about, right, and if that’s the worst thing you can find, I’m a free-thro merchant, I must be doing something right. Honestly, you can’t find nothing else wrong with my game? Free-throw merchant guys?”
He concluded and said, “We’ll take the label all day, man.”
Gilgeous-Alexander has so far averaged 32.4 points, 5.0 assists, and 4.6 rebounds in the NBA Finals. He is the favorite to also win the Finals MVP award if the Thunder beat the Pacers in this series, which they are currently leading 3-2. Will the “free-throw merchant” successfully make NBA history for OKC, leading them to their first-ever NBA championship? Let us know what you think in the comments section.
