{"id":791006,"date":"2026-07-20T02:48:32","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T02:48:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/791006\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T02:48:32","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T02:48:32","slug":"how-darius-acuff-jr-fared-vs-top-rookies-at-summer-league-nbc-sports-bay-area-california-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/791006\/","title":{"rendered":"How Darius Acuff Jr. fared vs. top rookies at summer league \u2013 NBC Sports Bay Area & California"},"content":{"rendered":"

You would think Darius Acuff Jr.<\/a> hurt a puppy the way people were talking about him after his NBA summer league showing.<\/p>\n

The expectations are higher as the No. 7 overall pick, sure, but some feedback has been extremely exaggerated regarding the young Kings point guard.<\/p>\n

Before Acuff even put on a Kings jersey, several critics scrutinized his defense and lack of effort on that end of the floor. So it seemed like every defensive mistake he would make from there on was magnified and blasted on social media.<\/p>\n

The clips went viral and, while they didn\u2019t make Acuff\u2019s case look great, they didn\u2019t paint the whole picture.<\/p>\n

Acuff did have a lot of bad defensive lapses, but he also had some pretty impressive plays on that side of the ball. Of course, those didn\u2019t go viral.<\/p>\n

Acuff isn\u2019t and likely never will be a lockdown defender, but that\u2019s not why the Kings drafted him. In that same breath, yes, he does have areas to improve defensively, but it\u2019s not anything he doesn\u2019t already know.<\/p>\n

He is his own biggest critic, and those around him, including his teammates, Scott Perry, and even his father, believe he\u2019s fully capable of making a leap defensively.<\/p>\n

Now let\u2019s dive into the things that don\u2019t matter and won\u2019t show up anywhere in the future: his summer league stats. Acuff played five of the eight games, averaging 20.8 points on 35-percent shooting from the field and 27.8 percent from 3-point range, with 1.6 rebounds, 4.6 assists, 1.0 steals and 3.8 turnovers.<\/p>\n

Now let’s compare them to those players taken before him in the 2026 NBA Draft: AJ Dybantsa (No. 1)<\/a>, Darryn Peterson (No. 2), Cameron Boozer (No. 3), Caleb Wilson (No. 4), Keaton Wagler (No. 5) and Mikel Brown Jr. (No. 6).<\/p>\n

Dybantsa showcased his top-pick talent in just two games, including one against the Kings, averaging 25 points, 7.0 rebounds and 2.0 assists. If there was something to nitpick at, it’s that he shot just 39.4 percent from the field and made just one of his 11 3-point attempts.<\/p>\n

The former BYU star also demonstrated potential on defense, recording three blocks in his two summer league appearances.<\/p>\n

Peterson<\/a> has made the Wizards contemplate their decision, but the Utah Jazz surely are grateful. Peterson has shone, from the Salt Lake City Summer League to the NBA Summer League in Vegas, the Kansas standout has looked like the best player in the draft.<\/p>\n

He had an efficient 28-point performance in his Jazz debut, followed by dropping 25, 24, 23 and 15 in the games following, respectively. Excluding one game, Peterson has shot very efficiently.<\/p>\n

Boozer had a standout showing<\/a> for the Grizzlies, leading his team to the Las Vegas Semifinals and posting averages of 18.8 points, 6.5 rebounds and 3.5 assists per game while shooting around 58 percent from the field and 38 percent from distance.<\/p>\n

The conversation around his game has been that he has the most translatable NBA skillset that should instantly help Memphis.<\/p>\n

Wilson was one of the biggest breakout stars<\/a> of summer league in Las Vegas. Wilson turned heads after averaging 23.5 points, 7.3 rebounds and 2.5 blocks over four games.<\/p>\n

Wagler<\/a> slightly struggled to begin summer league, but he capped off his Vegas run with a game-high 26 points in an overtime win against the Minnesota Timberwolves. The Clippers guard averaged 17.5 points, 4.0 rebounds and 3.0 assists per game but struggled with efficiency, shooting 34.2 percent from the field and 35.3 percent from 3-point range.<\/p>\n

In his matchup against the Kings, Wagler couldn\u2019t get much going offensively through 27 minutes, finishing with seven points on 1-of-7 shooting and 1 of 5 from 3-point range but making three of his four free-throw attempts. He also had two rebounds, one assist and one turnover, and was a minus-23 in plus\/minus rating.<\/p>\n

Acuff\u2019s showing was much more promising after taking 13 more shot attempts than Wagler. Acuff finished with 19 points on 6-of-20 shooting from the field and 3 of 9 from long range, with three rebounds, seven assists, two steals, one block and four turnovers in 28 minutes.<\/p>\n

Finally, Brown Jr. had a highly impressive summer league debut with the Nets. Across his Las Vegas Summer League appearances, he averaged 18 points, 4.7 assists, and stellar shooting splits, shooting nearly 52.2 percent from the field and 45.5 percent from 3-point range.<\/p>\n

Does any of this matter? Probably not.<\/p>\n

But it still is fun to dissect, as this draft class was viewed as one of the best in recent NBA history.<\/p>\n

These future matchups will be fun to watch. <\/p>\n

Download and follow The Deuce & Mo Podcast<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You would think Darius Acuff Jr. hurt a puppy the way people were talking about him after his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":789914,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3792],"tags":[7,41665,4056,6,3494,986,477,4055],"class_list":["post-791006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento-kings","tag-basketball","tag-darius-acuff-jr","tag-kings","tag-nba","tag-nba-summer-league","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-kings","tag-sacramentokings"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116950027755511194","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791006","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=791006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791006\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/789914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=791006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=791006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=791006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}