Jonas Valančiūnas
New Orleans Pelicans

Player Facts

Height: 6'11"
Weight: 265lbs.

Wingspan: 7'6"

Date of Birth:
May 6, 1992
College Experience: N/A

Selections

All Star: 0
All-NBA: 0
All-Defensive: 0

Player Grades

Speed/Explosiveness: 4
Physical Strength: 10
Positional Size: 9
Positional Wingspan: 10
Paint Scoring: 9
Midrange Scoring: 5
Three-Point Scoring: 4
Dribbling: 3
Passing: 5
Perimeter Defense: 4
Interior Defense: 8
Rebounding: 10

Embed from Getty Images

JUMP TO SECTION

> Intro

> Piling Paint Points

> Bruising but Nuanced Post Play

> Screening-and-Diving

> Nabbing Offensive Rebounds

> Dash of Driving

> Using his Size on Defense

> Racking up Defensive Boards

> Stuck in the Middle

> Offensive Shortcomings

> Lumbering Nature

> Beacon Bacon

>Link to Player Contract & Salary Info

*All short clips courtesy of Smart Highlights & NF (YouTube)

*All statistical data courtesy of NBA Advanced Stats

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STRENGTHS

Intro

The Lithuanian big man stands at 6'11" with a wide 265 lbs. build and a sprawling 7'6" wingspan. He's not the most versatile big on either end but excels greatly in the areas where he is impactful. By playing hard, the gritty Jonas Valanciunas rarely allows his effort level to be the reason he gets pulled from a game.

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Piling Paint Points

One way JV makes his mark on offense is by being a terror in the paint. He is consistently one of the game's most prolific scorers here. Valanciunas makes sure that his size and bulk are felt by the opposition when he steps on the court.

Jonas does a good job of being deliberate and efficient right off the pass. A testament to this comes in the form of his majority of two's coming with less than two seconds of touch time.

He's got a dependable feel with either hand. On these particular < 2 second looks, he shot 63.6% in 2018-2019 and 66.9% in 2019-2020. Overall, he was recently sixth in the whole league with 634 points on paint touches in 2021-2022, just trailing Nikola Jokic and Jarrett Allen.

Valanciunas plays strong on the inside. He ruthlessly bullies switches or even thinner bigs down low. Jonas exhibits patience out of the dunker spot with convincing pump fakes. This helps him get to the line pretty well without having a ton of offense ran through him, where he's quite accurate for a big man.

Bruising but Nuanced Post Play

JV does his work early as a post player. He uses formidable seals on his men so that his job is much easier on the catch. Jonas gets deep post positioning early in the shot-clock after chugging to change ends.

He has really bettered his footwork in the post from when he entered the league. His timing and overall execution of drop steps, baseline turnarounds, and sweeping hooks into the middle have all been sharpened up. Valanciunas knows to play the power game in his opportunities against slighter players.

Jonas establishes tremendous space by keeping his elbows out and tightly gripping the rock right off the post entry pass. He's got enough of a face-up game to serve as a complement to his back-to-the-basket skillset. He will face up then take a power dribble inward as he knocks his man back with good physicality. The skillful center has nice touch on stop-and-pops in the heart of the key as well.

He finished up 2021-2022 with the third-most points on post-ups. His 53.5% efficiency in these sequences actually beat out the talented Joel Embiid that year. JV compiled more buckets here than players like Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo. He was also fourth in post-point output back in 2020-2021.

Screening-and-Diving

Valanciunas has good hands and is an overall nice target as a roll man. He follows up his hellacious screens by using size and length to catch lobs behind his defender.

He can finish with force or finesse, the latter most obvious through his nailing of push shots on short rolls. In fact, Jonas was seventh in the NBA in 2019-2020 with 129 non-restricted area paint scores, sandwiched between Nikola Vucevic and Kawhi Leonard.

He developed beautiful pick-and-roll chemistry with Ja Morant. Valanciunas scored 130 times courtesy of Ja in 2019-2020. On the season, JV was in the 76th percentile scoring as the roll man. Moreover, he has worked himself into a mild pop threat, hitting 29 of 76 (38.2%) above-the-break threes.

Nabbing Offensive Rebounds

Jonas piles up offensive rebounds by being such a hulking force in the key. His 7'6" wingspan helps, snatching high-up ricochets despite a less-than-stellar vertical. He has the presence of mind to do a quick scan and send it out for a potentially wide-open triple.

JV has no problem going right back up himself for second-chance points. He was second to only Hassan Whiteside for the most putback points totalled in 2019-2020. Impressively, he's had multiple years grabbing above 50% of his team's offensive rebounds when he's on the floor, including that 2019-2020 campaign.

Dash of Driving

Valanciunas has got a sprinkle of outside-to-inside attacking in his game. These drives tend to begin with a faked handoff before putting it on the deck. Through these, rolls, putbacks, and dump-offs, JV hit 72.3% of his rim looks in 2019-2020.

Using his Size on Defense

Jonas is a physical post defender and a decent rim protector. He employs his size to obstruct the path of slashers inside. Unfortunately, weak lateral quicks limit his ceiling as a dynamic, ground-covering rim protector like Myles Turner or Jarrett Allen. Instead, JV tallies his swats more so with his on-ball defense on post-ups and via his size as the drop man.

Valanciunas recorded 1.7 blocks per 36 minutes in 2018-2019 and 1.5 per 36 in 2019-2020. 2019-2020 saw him drop opponents' efficiency by 9.1% within six feet of the hoop, a number that compares nicely to the game's better rim protectors. 2021-2022 had him at 60 swats which outpaced Maxi Kleber and John Collins.

Racking up Defensive Boards

Powerful box-outs and aggressive glass cleaning help the Lithuanian center contribute on defense even against quicker, more athletic teams. With that hefty 265lbs. frame, JV is nearly an immovable object when he parks himself beside the net.

Jonas collected the third most contested rebounds in 2019-2020. This put him smack in between elite rebounders Andre Drummond and Rudy Gobert. He also averaged the most box-outs per game in 2019-2020 and then again in 2020-2021 according to NBA Advanced Stats.

WEAKNESSES

Stuck in the Middle

JV is locked into playing at center. This really constricts his squad's lineup flexibility. Valanciunas' game begs to be played alongside an at least average three-point shooter at power forward.

Offensive Shortcomings

Jonas remains a low volume shooter from deep, with virtually no perimeter shot creation. Opposing teams will still gladly let Jonas fire away on jumpers. As a more targeted critique, he should practice speeding up his slow shot release.

Though he has slowly upped his assist averages, he still has some looming holes as a passer. He's not much of an outlet passer and can also get tunnel vision on post-ups in particular. This same hyper-focus leads to turnovers in these spots, with 2.5 per 36 minutes in 2019-2020. A positionally and stylistically comparable guy like Ivica Zubac committed only 1.7 per 36 that year.

Lumbering Nature

He's got mobility issues that hamstring his defensive versatility big time. Similar to how he can only play the five on offense, he can only capably guard fives on defense. JV tries by getting into a good stance but is restricted by his physical limitations.

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Jonas earned his way onto the 2012-2013 All-Rookie second team for his solid inaugural season with the Toronto Raptors