Welcome to the NBA, Mikal Bridges. Following the rookie’s impressive debut on Saturday against the Nuggets — no, I’m not including the 11 seconds he logged in the season opener — Bridges proved exactly why Phoenix made an aggressive move on draft night.
In only 15 minutes of action, Bridges produced 10 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 steals while hitting 50 percent (2/4) of his three-pointers. Bridges also led the Suns in plus-minus with an eye-popping plus-21 in a 28-point blowout loss. Sometimes, plus-minus doesn’t correlate with the eye test, but that definitely wasn’t the case for Bridges versus the Nuggets.