{"id":729163,"date":"2026-05-08T19:30:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T19:30:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/729163\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T19:30:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T19:30:19","slug":"chet-holmgren-ajay-mitchell-have-been-stellar-for-the-thunder-vs-the-lakers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/729163\/","title":{"rendered":"Chet Holmgren & Ajay Mitchell have been stellar for the Thunder vs. the Lakers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nekias Duncan and Steve Jones Jr. highlight the many ways both Chet Holmgren<\/a> and Ajay Mitchell<\/a> have put their fingerprints on this series. Check out the full conversation on \u201cThe Dunker Spot\u201d and subscribe on Apple Podcasts<\/a>, Spotify<\/a>, YouTube<\/a> or wherever you listen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Video Transcript<\/p>\n

What a series this has been.<\/p>\n

What a shot-making series this has been for Chet Holmgren so far.<\/p>\n

Averaging 23.<\/p>\n

He is blazing from three right now, but there’s just a general comfort that he seems to be playing with.<\/p>\n

A.J.<\/p>\n

Mitchell has been probably my favorite player in this series so far.<\/p>\n

He just does not care at all about what Shay got going on.<\/p>\n

It’s like, oh, y’all committing to him.<\/p>\n

That means I get to go one-on-one.<\/p>\n

Here’s a drive.<\/p>\n

Here’s an eight-foot jumper.<\/p>\n

Here’s another drive.<\/p>\n

Here’s another drive.<\/p>\n

Here’s a six-foot jumper.<\/p>\n

Shout out T.J. McConnell.<\/p>\n

Here’s another drive.<\/p>\n

He’s been insane through these first two games, and I want to give him the salute on that.<\/p>\n

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And again, just overall to the defense, they’ve been able to turn the Lakers over in these second halves and just effectively end games.<\/p>\n

And the Lakers just have to find a way to protect the field in this matchup.<\/p>\n

Well, one, I think OKC has continued to look to problem solve and deliver answers.<\/p>\n

And that’s where it’s like, okay, this group is a different team from the playoff run we saw last year.<\/p>\n

Like they’re a machine to a degree.<\/p>\n

They have been for two years, but there’s a decisiveness, you know, even when things get tough that I don’t think we saw last year from this group.<\/p>\n

To the Chet portion, he’s been huge.<\/p>\n

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And like for me, bald-headed person talking to a mic, yeah, let’s make it tough on Chet and Isaiah Hartenstein.<\/p>\n

And Chet’s consistently been like, “Well, actually it– that’s harder than you think.”<\/p>\n

And yeah, it is.<\/p>\n

He’s really good at basketball.<\/p>\n

So, you know, salute to him.<\/p>\n

To the A.J.<\/p>\n

Mitchell portion, the, the journey for him as far as did you see Mark Dagnault be asked, “Hey, how’s it feel to watch A.J.<\/p>\n

grow ’cause you put him in game one of the finals and that didn’t go so great?”<\/p>\n

He was like, “Boy, I just felt like I made a mistake then.”<\/p>\n

He’s like, oh.<\/p>\n

But, but he, but he continued to empower A.J.<\/p>\n

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throughout this year.<\/p>\n

And now you have a A.J.<\/p>\n

Mitchell who is like, and this is the funny part, because OKC, you know, we have quote unquote dogs.<\/p>\n

We attack, we work to move the ball, we defend.<\/p>\n

But A.J.<\/p>\n

Mitchell is very much a, I’m gonna get this shot off, and that’s not always what we’ve seen in OKC, but it works for this team ’cause it’s like, no- Yeah I’m gonna go to work.<\/p>\n

So like I’m gonna hunt this shot.<\/p>\n

I’m gonna, I’m gonna attack and pick and roll.<\/p>\n

I’ll work my tail off defensively so I can do these things offensively.<\/p>\n

So we’re good, right?<\/p>\n

Like we’re good.<\/p>\n

Like this is an agreement.<\/p>\n

We’re fine.<\/p>\n

Like it’s been fun to kinda watch him.<\/p>\n

Like I feel like OKC has a perceived player archetype, but no, they have a bunch of people who can operate within the system.<\/p>\n

And so it’s fun to watch them prosper.<\/p>\n

Close<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nekias Duncan and Steve Jones Jr. highlight the many ways both Chet Holmgren and Ajay Mitchell have put…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":729164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3783],"tags":[5577,2153,7,366,90420,6,50418,310,475,179,3966,3965,52510,312,3263],"class_list":{"0":"post-729163","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oklahoma-city-thunder","8":"tag-ajay-mitchell","9":"tag-apple-podcasts","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-chet-holmgren","12":"tag-fingerprints","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-nekias-duncan","15":"tag-oklahoma","16":"tag-oklahoma-city","17":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","18":"tag-oklahomacity","19":"tag-oklahomacitythunder","20":"tag-steve-jones-jr","21":"tag-thunder","22":"tag-youtube"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116540619097806484","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=729163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/729164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=729163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=729163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=729163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}