A common thread I've heard when discussing the Blazers is that they just need to wait on Nurkic's development, because "big men take longer to develop." This got mean wondering how accurate this is, and if it's something we can count on in regards to the Blazers improving. Therefore, I decided to dive into centers around the league, looking at their 4th year (which Nurkic is currently in), and their 7th year, which tends to be when a player is at their "peak". I wanted to gain a sense of how much development we can expect from Nurkic in the future based off the development of other centers in the league. Here's what I found:

Al Horford
Year 4 - 15.7 pts, 9.7 rebs 3.5 ast, 1.1 blk, 20.7 PER
Year 7 - 20.2 pts, 9.2 reb, 2.9 ast, 1.7 blk, 22.0 PER

Dwight Howard
Year 4 - 19.8 pts, 13.5 reb, 1.3 ast, 2.1 blk, 22.9 PER
Year 7 - 21.9 pts, 13.5 reb, 1.3 ast, 2.3 blk, 26.1 PER

Robin Lopez
Year 4 - 14.0 pts, 8.4 reb, 0.8 ast, 2.4 blk, 15.2 PER
Year 7 - 12.4 pts, 8.7 reb, 1.2 ast, 1.8 blk, 16.2 PER

Tristan Thompson
Year 4 - 11.4 pts, 10.8 reb, 0.6 ast, 1.0 blk, 15.6 PER
Year 7 - 8.5 pts, 9.4 reb, 0.7 ast, 0.6 blk, 11.7 PER

Joakim Noah
Year 4 - 12.8 pts, 11.4 reb, 2.4 ast, 1.6 blk, 18.8 PER
Year 7 - 12.9 pts, 11.5 reb, 5.5 ast, 1.5 blk, 20.0 PER

Enes Kanter
Year 4 - 19.6 pts, 11.3 reb, 0.9 ast, 0.5 blk, 20.3 PER
Year 7 - 18.6 pts, 13.8 reb, 1.9 ast, 0.6 blk, 23.4 PER

Nikola Vucevic
Year 4 - 20.3 pts, 11.5 reb, 2.1 ast, 0.8 blk, 21.5 PER
Year 7 - 20.8 pts, 11.3 reb, 4.0 ast, 1.4 blk, 21.6 PER

Bismack Biyombo
Year 4 - 8.8 pts, 11.8 reb, 0.5 ast, 2.9 blk, 15.2 PER
Year 7 - 9.7 pts, 10.5 reb, 0.7 ast, 2.5 blk, 10.6 PER

Marcin Gortat
Year 4 - 14.5 pts, 11.2 reb, 1.2 ast, 1.6 blk, 17.8 PER
Year 7 - 14.5 pts, 10.4 reb, 1.9 ast, 1.6 blk, 17.6 PER

Zaza Pachulia
Year 4 - 15.5 pts, 8.9 reb, 1.9 ast, 0.6 blk, 16.8 PER
Year 7 - 11.0 pts, 9.7 reb, 1.4 ast, 1.0 blk, 13.1 PER

DeAndre Jordan
Year 4 - 9.7 pts, 10.9 reb, 0.3 ast, 2.7 blk, 16.4 PER
Year 7 - 12.1 pts, 15.7 reb, 0.8 ast, 2.3 blk, 21.0 PER

Mark Gasol
Year 4 - 14.5 pts, 8.8 reb, 3.1 ast, 1.8 blk, 18.4 PER
Year 7 - 18.9 pts, 8.4 reb, 4.1 ast, 1.8 blk, 21. 7 PER

Demarcus Cousins
Year 4 - 25.3 pts, 13.0 reb, 3.2 ast, 1.4 blk, 26.1 PER
Year 7 - 28.4 pts, 11.6 reb, 4.8 ast, 1.4 blk, 25.8 PER

Pau Gasol
2.7年4 - 20.1分,8.2犹太人的尊称,ast, 1.9黑色,22岁。5 PER
Year 7 - 18.1 pts, 8.5 reb, 3.2 ast, 1.5 blk, 21.6 PER

通过这些数字,我很惊讶see how similar many of the players were. I was expecting to see big jumps between a player's 4th year and their 7th, but in reality, it wasn't much. Both Marcin Gortat and Nikola Vucevic basically had the exact same stats in their 4th and 7th years. Deandre Jordan is the only player that saw a major leap in production (a few years of Chris Paul might have helped with that). Most players saw a little increase in efficiency, but all in all, these stats seem to illustrate that a center's 4th year is pretty close to his peak production. So what does that mean for Jusuf Nurkic? Let's take a look at his year 4 stats:

Year 4 - 19.5 pts, 10.0 reb, 2.5 ast, 1.7 blk, 15.5 PER

Nurk's pts/36 is currently a career high, but his PER is the lowest it's been since his rookie season, so although he's averaging more points, he's doing so at a less efficient rate. Nurkic's point increase is simply from an increase in shot attempts, and not from his own development (his FGA/36 this year is also a career high). All of his other stats are actually trending down overall from his previous years, which is not a good sign for his future development, because it actually appears he's regressing.

Unfortunately, the hypothesis that Nurkic just needs more time because "big men develop slower" is not true. What we have seen is that in most cases, a Center's improvement between his 4th year and his peak year is marginal, and most of his development has already happened by the time he is in his 4th year. This is not good news for Blazers fans, who are banking on Nurkic's development to get the team out of mediocrity. At this point, I wouldn't hold out much hope.