It's a tricky situation with Portland Trail Blazers former first-round pick Yang Hansen.
He showed progress in this year's Summer League, playing with more confidence, looking leaner, and even taking opponents off the dribble more.
But Blazers fans have also seen this before, where the impressive Summer League play is unable to translate to meaningful regular season games.
The NBA-level competition overwhelmed Hansen in his first year, limiting him to spot minutes and G League appearances. Hansen played 43 games with the Blazers, averaging just 7.0 minutes per contest. Interim head coach Tiago Splitter even said he didn't want to throw Hansen into the fire, and that comment was consistent with his rotations throughout the season.
It seemed like the only times Portland relied on Hansen were when they essentially had no other choice. Those games where depth was an issue with Robert Williams III's injury maintenance, sitting out back-to-backs, for instance.
Yang Hansen is a long-term bet Portland is still willing to make
Portland did a good job of quietly addressing that issue by bolstering its frontcourt depth with under-the-radar signings this offseason, bringing in Micah Potter, Branden Carlson, and Jeremy Sochan; this may allow Hansen even more time to develop with the Rip City Remix.
But one dilemma Portland still faces with that path is that Hansen shows similarities with his G League and Summer League play in terms of how his strengths fare against that level of competition. Even when he's playing well in the G League, Hansen looks like an entirely different player in those limited stretches with the Blazers.
Part of that is simply a confidence issue, which should come in time as he becomes more comfortable with life in the NBA and adjusting to the United States.
But another part of that is one of the primary reasons Hansen was a universally projected second-round pick that Portland took an unconventional flier on. The lack of mobility, physicality, etc., led many to wonder whether what Hansen excelled at in the CBA would translate to the NBA.
The Hansen hype has died down compared to his rookie Summer League, when a matchup against the Memphis Grizzlies drew an estimated 5.2 million viewers on Tencent. That said, he's still drawing in plenty of worldwide viewership and interest from those following his career.
It just goes to show how much hype could return if Hansen turns out to be a consistent part of the Blazers rotation in the coming seasons. Which obviously is what Portland intends to be the plan; otherwise, they never would've made the steep draft investment in the first place.
They always knew this was going to be a project, and nothing from Hansen's rookie season, as concerning as parts of it were, will change their stance on that long-term outlook.
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