Jalen Smith Q&A: On the 4 vs. 5 debate, trade rumors and more

After Jalen Smith spent most of his rookie season on the bench, the Phoenix Suns declined his third-year player option. Just a few months later, with the NBA ravaged by COVID-19, Smith found himself starting at center for a title contender. Stix sat down with Espo, Saul Bookman and Gerald Bourguet of PHNX to talk playing the 4 versus the 5, discuss how he deals with trade rumors, sit through the Stix Kidz debut, and much more.

Espo: Well Jalen, the last month has been quite a whirlwind for you, but what has it meant to get the opportunity to go out there and showcase your skills on the biggest stage in basketball?

Jalen Smith: It means a lot. Obviously, there are times when COVID hits unexpectedly and you never know what’s going to happen, so pretty much just gotta have that ‘next man up’ mentality and just try to continue and keep up that positive production like the guys before you had. So that’s what was my main focus, just coming in and trying to help my team win as best as I could.

Saul Bookman: Full disclosure, Jalen: I don’t know shit. And I just want to let you know that EJ and I share the same vision for you, but I want to hear it from you. People talk about 4 or the 5 and blah, blah, blah. He thinks that, for the longevity of your career, you should be a 4, but obviously you feel more comfortable at the 5, and even Monty has said that he thinks you’re more comfortable at the 5? How do you balance what’s right for you versus what’s right for the team, and maneuver through the season thinking about both?

Jalen Smith: Pretty much just playing whatever position they put me out there, ’cause obviously if they put me at a certain position, it’s for a reason. That might be for a defensive matchup, it might be for an offensive opportunity, so pretty much just going out there and just trying to make the best of it. Obviously, in this league, the more positions you can learn, the better opportunities you get to play on the court. To me, I was like, learning the 4 and 5, it’s tough in the NBA, but I mean, it’s something I’m up for doing, you know. It’s just all about the learning aspect and just getting experience for it.

Gerald Bourguet: I was just curious, you talked about learning both positions, what is it about the 5 that you’re probably a little more comfortable there? And what is it about the 4 that is more of a learning process or a challenge?

Jalen Smith: About the 5, I’d pretty much say I’ve been playing it my whole life. So I mean, it’s easier to — I mean, it’s like an old trick, you know? If you keep learning and you keep doing it, you get real accustomed to it. And just being able to understand like, as a 5, most bigs are heavyset, and I’m a lot slimmer, so I’m easily able to move around and do a lot more things than most of ’em can. But obviously with the 4 in the NBA, it’s a lot about spacing and a lot about just creating, trying to find opportunity for yourself and open opportunities for your team. And that’s just something I’ve just gotta learn, and being out on the wing and on the perimeter, just trying to find that opportunity.

Espo: I’m a big nickname guy, and we all know you go by Stix. But we were looking at your Basketball-Reference page, and it has ‘Logs’ listed as one of your nicknames. Is that a real nickname you’ve had, and where did that one come from?

Jalen Smith: It’s not a real nickname. It was just like, it was like a joke. Coach [Mark] Turgeon made it for me. Going into my sophomore year, I put on a lot of weight and I gained a lot of muscle, and you could see it. And he just said, ‘Oh, we might as well stop calling you Stix and start calling you Logs now. And everybody just started joking around with it, but it never stuck.

Espo: Well do you want it to stick? Do we need to make it a thing here in Phoenix? Or should we just leave it in college?

Jalen Smith: Nah, just leave it in college. It ain’t gonna really stick much.

Saul Bookman: Well that’s good, because Espo has a nice little surprise for you. 

Espo: Okay, so before we get into some other questions, we’ve got a lot of fans of yours that watch the show and they comment in our chat and they like to call themselves ‘Stix Kidz.’ So we actually made a music video for Stix Kidz that we want to show you now. Please feel welcome to react however you feel about this. 

Espo: So is that the worst song that’s ever been written or sung about you, Jalen?

Jalen Smith: I liked it a lot. I never had a song made for me, so that was a first.

Espo: Well congratulations, I apologize I was the one that sung it, but I’m glad you enjoyed it.

Saul Bookman: Thus, the off-key notes.

Jalen Smith: Nah, it’s all good, I loved it. I appreciate it.

Saul Bookman: Stix, I mean, real talk though, we just talked about the 4 and the 5, like, how do you feel about that whole conversation? Like, how do you feel about your role? I know you identify more as a 5, but can you see yourself at the 4 for a long period of time? And what would it take for you to play that position and be more comfortable at the 4 versus the 5?

Jalen Smith: Yeah, I definitely could see myself at the 4 long-term. I mean, that’s just something I want to work towards, and just being able to be on that perimeter and just have that versatility for the offense and the defensive side of the ball. Just trying to find that niche, and I feel as though, to be able to do that, I just gotta keep becoming more comfortable with it, like how I became comfortable at the 5. Once I just continue to keep doing it and continue to keep pounding away at it, I feel as though the sky’s the limit for me.

Saul Bookman: Listen, Jalen, if you throw that ball down to the Deandre and he kicks it back out, you let it fly. You don’t look, you don’t second-guess it, you just shoot it.

Espo: That’s the Saul Bookman basketball strategy and hosting strategy.

Saul Bookman: Again, I don’t really know shit, but there you go.

Jalen Smith: I hear that.

Gerald Bourguet: I wanted to ask, obviously the trade deadline’s coming up, and around this time of year, there are rumors flying about everybody on every team. How do you kind of approach the trade deadline? And what’s your mentality as far as, you know, do you pay attention to trade rumors? Do you just kind of block it out? How do you approach it?

Jalen Smith: Pretty much just not to pay attention to it. I feel as though if you pay attention to it, then you start to feed into it, and it starts to affect you mentally, and then you feel as though you’re not in it. And I just try to stay away from it as best as I can and just continue to keep doing what I can do and controlling what I can control. So I mean, at the end of the day, that’s all outside noise, and nothing happens until it actually happens. So every day, I just come in and do my job and try to get better each and every day.

Espo: I always find it interesting when talking to guys who have made it to the pros to kind of understand where and when they fell in love with basketball. What was it for you about the game? And what was the moment you went, ‘This is what I want to dedicate my life to’?

Jalen Smith: I’ll say it was probably all the times I started playing one-on-one with my dad. I never really won ’em, so just that love and that desire to be him, like, it increased until overall, like, ‘Oh yeah, this is something I want to do.’ ‘Cause pretty much the main goal was to beat my father, but at the end of the day, that goal just passed. And then I just wanted to be the best player I could be. And it just grew after that.

Espo: At what age did you beat him the first time?

Jalen Smith: I didn’t, I never beat him. It would always come down to some technicalities or something like that. The last game we played, I think it was maybe when I was like 14 and I started getting more physical with him, and it just just ended there.

Saul Bookman: Well, I mean, let’s go back to that question. Was there a moment maybe in high school or in college? I feel like every pro has that one moment where you’re like, ‘Damn, I’m pretty good. Cause I just did this, and I didn’t think I could do that,’ or whatever. Was there a moment in your young career that you can kind of point back to like, ‘That’s when everything kind of changed’?

Jalen Smith: Yeah, pretty much I would say it was probably the summer going into my sophomore year of high school. I went to this camp, I forgot the name of it, it was like Elite 100? I think that’s what it was. I was pretty much there with everybody in I think the — I want to say the 2017 or ’18 draft class. It was like Marvin Bagley, Jaren Jackson, Mo Bamba and all of them. And I was doing good against all of them. And I saw that they were all highly-touted players, and I was like, ‘Okay. Yeah, I can definitely do something with this.’ And that was my moment.

Espo: How’d that poster dunk the other night feel? The poster dunk the other night that you had, how’d that one feel? I mean, I feel like that was a moment you probably felt like, ‘Yeah, that’s pretty good too.’

JALEN SMITH, OH MY GOODNESS 🤯 pic.twitter.com/CKoYOLGzfP

— NBA (@NBA) January 3, 2022

Jalen Smith: Oh yeah, that was an amazing moment. I mean, Chris told me that whenever I got my first technical for doing something aggressive, like getting a dunk like that, he would pay for it. So I mean, at the end of the day, I wasn’t worried about it after that.

Espo: Hey, you got Chris’ money’s worth, that’s for sure.

Gerald Bourguet: Would you consider that probably the best highlight of your basketball career so far?

Jalen Smith: Yeah, obviously on the pro level, I would probably say. Any highlight in the NBA is gonna be the highlight of your career so far. So that’s my first one.

Saul Bookman: What’s the best dunk you’ve ever had on somebody? Like how many times did you serve dudes up at Maryland?

Jalen Smith: A lot. Actually, a lot. I had a dunk at March Madness. That was like my first ever, my first ever dunk in the NCAA tournament and it blew up after that, so I’d probably say that was the one before it.

Espo: You bring up Chris Paul, talking about paying for that fine, but what has it meant to play alongside a guy like that, and how has he helped you with your career? I know different positions, but Chris always seems to have some wisdom that he can pass along.

Jalen Smith: It’s been amazing. Pretty much every day, every game, sitting on the bench, coming into the game, walking out to the arena, Chris is always talking to me and feeding me some type of information. Rather if it’s like a little tidbit of like footwork or how to read a defense, it’s just always something, and pretty much everything he tells me, I take it in. Good or bad, if I don’t feel like it or if I’m out of it any day, I still take it in because obviously Chris is a Hall-of-Famer. I want to have the career that he had or better, so pretty much just gotta continue to keep listening to him and just feeding off everything he tells me and try to find a way to incorporate it into my game.

Espo: Well Jalen, we really appreciate your time, man. It’s been a pleasure watching you over the last month, we wish you nothing but the best of luck the rest of the season. And again, I’m sorry I sang. I really am.