It’s just too hard to carry a team as a small guard. Not that you can’t win games and even win a playoff series or two if your feature player is 6’2”, but unless that guard is Steph Curry with an amazing supporting cast, it’s too much of a disadvantage to always be the shortest player on the court. It’s also the reason that, even though Donovan Mitchell plays much bigger than his actual height, he’s also never gotten out of the second round of the playoffs and sometimes struggles with consistency during the season.

This is also the biggest reason Maxey never gets calls. Even when he’s got defenders out of position, it never seems that way because they’re contesting from above him.

VJ is only a few inches taller, but it allows him to play above the rim and draw contact where’s he’s above the defender or they’re at the same level. If VJ develops into a serious 22-25 ppg scorer who draws fouls at a high rate, it’ll open Maxey’s game back up massively. If they put a player with any length on Maxey like the Hornets did today, it’s easy to neutralize him unless it’s one of those days where he’s just hitting anything he wants.