You can bet he would've been nervous as hell.

From r/NBADimensions:

Just got back from attending the Utah Jazz open scrimmage so I thought I'd share some of my impressions of Dante Exum. To sum it up shortly, he played pretty well, but shot the ball terribly. He finished the scrimmage, which lasted 24 minutes, shooting 0-5 from the field and 0-2 from the line. He missed a tough layup, missed badly on his free throws, clanked 2 open threes, bricked a pull up mid range jumper, and airballed a jumper from the elbow after a very impressive step back.

He did, however, show a lot of good things. His defense was sound, his blazing speed was obvious, and he really did a great job of creating shots for others. The most impressive thing I saw was his ability to dart cross court passes on the money.

He was visibly nervous throughout the game. The crowd of over 9000 :ahh: was probably the largest crowd he's played in front of besides the Nike Hoop Summit. It probably didn't help that Rodney Hood was absolutely dominating the game, scoring in multiple ways with ease.

constantly moving...but I'm sure everyone runs through the sets in a practice type setting. He had a very nice backdoor cut that led to a foul at the rim. He had the ball a lot though, more so than Trey/Nick Covington who shared the backcourt with him.

he hasn't played since december plus all the draining efforts to get him there. he will be fine in time. on positive notes that many observed his quickness and defense. the Jazz management mentioned earlier that they will not expect much on Exum during his rookie year. so he's a kind of project

give the guy a break - Skylar Diggins had a shocker rookie wnba but look at her sophomore season this year. cant keep quality down too long.

lol... great to see all the focus on his really shocking shooting in the comments and not the understanding about how well he did with everything else (based on Trey Burke and Coaches comments). Plus not having played proper games for so long and having trained so hard and nerves on top of everything, he's gonna have some rough shooting until he gets his legs under him properly... Get proper match fit, it's not just for players that ate too much cake in the off season...

If he still can't shoot by the end of the season, sure, lay the criticism out, but jumping to this straight away is premature... I think nearly everyone else is expecting more from him since he went #5 but the Jazz know that he's not going to be a starter on their team straight away but he has so much more upside down the track and it will totally be worth the pay off...

I have not seen him play a single game.

And this is the exact reason why I think too much too soon, he's still a kid and all this negative stuff could damage the huge potential he has, he would have been better going to college, may not have had the huge money but it would come to him in the end. Just hope these huge expectations that are going to be placed on him are not going to destroy him, poor kid hope his patents are there to keep him grounded.

I think he did the smart thing in going in the draft while he was seen as hot property but the expectations on him will be huge. He is very young and will take some time to develop his NBA game. Of course I will be hoping he starts off well but the reality will probably be that he will take quite a while to be anywhere near what the fans expectation is. Hopefully he has some good people around him during this period.

He will struggle a lot in year 1 i think.

I am still trying to figure out how/why he went so high (regardless of what he done today). 5th pick is exceptionally high for a guy who hadn't played in any real competition - he scored 16 pts in the 'glorified pickup game' that is the Hoop Summit and had a nice WC but Smart tore him to shreds as a PG against Team USA.

The concern is that people knew his shooting was a concern and this doesn't help that. Unfortunately, they were really bad misses as well.

He will be a good player I think. Nonetheless he went to too high IMO.

I think the whole ' 6"6 PG thing helped him as well". He was marketed as that and certainly from the recent success of Carter-Williams they raised his stock. In reality he is (at this stage) a 6"6 SG without a J.

I know he will do some work in the league one day though. Will just have to be patient.

Smart tore him to shreds?? They matched up for like four possessions before Exum went off injured.. Don't know how denying someone the ball is tearing them to shreds... If that's the case I've torn Tom Abercrombie to shreds!! LOL

The only people disappointed by Exums first public scrimmage were those that know nothing about basketball and whose expectations were too high

But I agree with MACDUB to some extent that Exum probably went too high, but i believe most team scouts viewed Dante as more as a project, a player who has attributes and talents that you can't necessarily teach but still had a lot of work to do and some glaring deficiencies noticeably his shooting.

So so far some are saying his shooting has always been a problem and his ball handling needs work, these are his deficiencies as a PG. What the hell did they do with him at the AIS all those years, and if these are his deficiencies then why has he ranked so high, surely these are main requirements for a PG. Think his PR management have over marketed this kid way too much.

Some_Fulla,

Go to youtube.com and watch Dante Exum vs Team USA U19.

Smart made him like second rate. Exum had 4 turnovers in just 11 mins..all of those were strips/result of pressure from Smart.

I counted numerous times in the video where he denied Exum from getting the ball and Exum didnt want it (because he didnt want to get striped) - for me that was an early indication that he isnt a natural PG.

But Smart is an absolute beast defensively. I havent seen a PG play D like that since The Glove Gary Payton.

Exum had little trouble against Payton. Payton fouled him a bit and couldnt keep him in front.

But yes Some_Fulla, Smart tore him to shreds IMO. Dont have to score 30 on someone to tear them up. Theres a whole other side to bball called defense and Smart eliminated Exum from the game defensively and it got to the point where Exum didnt want to handle the pill.

But as above there is no disrespect to Exum..Smart is the new glove

I'm with others who really have no idea how he went so high, but there's no doubting his natural ability and other non-shooting skills that he's impressed with, and as long as the coach is happy and understands his likely progression (from interviews it seems he does) then I think the only people that have expectations too high are fans that think he's the second coming...

For that they're going to have to wait for Simmons, I think... Now THAT kid is a beast...

Macdub.. Rewatch your little 5min highlight video.. By your logic exum 'tore elfird payton to shreds, Payton was so scared that he looked like he will never want to try and stay in front of someone again'

Some_Fulla,

Smart matched up with Exum directly 6 or so times

Exum turned it over 4 times and the other time he was denied.

But chill im on your side. Exum will be a good player and has the potential to be a very high calibre all star.

Unfortunately the FIBA comp is all we have to work on and im simply.commenting on what i saw from his matchup with a guy who went a fewspots behind him.

Really! Not a fan of the heading on this post, so subjective and without a real understanding of what an opening pre season session is all about.

Hi hits one or two of those shots and it all changes does it? He will be fine, those who know something will be there to guide him and the rest will take care of itself in time, which is what he has in spades...

I have seen alot of kids come out of the AIs with funny techniques/poor shooting.

My theory is this:

The kids go in every a.m and get shots up with that shooting machine that rebounds and passes the ball back out. They are unsupervised and the aim is volume of shots i.e. get as many as you can up.

Without supervision and with the focus on volume they develop poor habits. as they shoot.more and more with those bad habits it becomes ingrained.

Maybe this happened to someone like Delly who has a release from his chest. Did he develop that at the AIS. Not such an issue with him though as he is lights out

Don't think anyone is calling Exum a bust.

We all know his potential.

I just think there is a general consensus that he went high based on what comp he played in.

When it comes to Exum, I will believe it when I see it really. Has a lot of potential, but everything has potential.. the sun has the potential to explode today, but it probably wont.. This is why I don't jump to put him on the Boomers team personally because right 'now' he isn't yet a 'player' in the adult mens game

An inauspicious start to be sure, but I'm far more interested in watching how he performs in tomorrow's match-up vs Philly.

The scrutiny and pressure in Utah must be intense for the kid. A neutral venue in Vegas might just be the ticket to playing a bit more loose and letting the game come to him. Looking forward to the game.

Would be much worse in a bigger market.

Utah people are a lot more tolerant than others

Exum 13-7-95 is only a matter of months younger than Parker and Wiggins.