Our own Charlie Cummings started Swish Theory’s Finding a Role series at the start of last season, the title being self-explanatory: While much of our collective player-analysis brainpower goes into identifying the future stars of the NBA, the meat-and-potatoes of successful talent evaluation happens within the league’s middle-class.
Boston’s Derrick White and Denver’s Aaron Gordon may be high-end examples, but does Dallas make the Finals last season without journeyman Derrick Jones Jr.? Does Miami make it the year before without Caleb Martin?
With that in mind, here is Part One of my Finding a Role Introduction for this season, where I’ll be tracking some of the league’s rising (potential) difference-makers. We live in the here and now, of course, focusing on how Player X can earn more minutes and dollars by increasing his value to his current team, but keep in mind the long-term undercurrent: Can these guys show up as high-end contributors on championship-level teams? How are they going to get there?
Additionally, this season’s installments of Finding a Role would not be possible without crowdscout.net, the brainchild of Swish Theory co-founder Eric Weiss (and company), a truly game-changing way to watch and catalogue film from around the NBA.
Click on the linked playlists for the CrowdScout Experience, and more context on each of these players.
Tari Eason
After being selected 17th overall in the 2022 NBA Draft by the Houston Rockets, Tari Eason immediately made a name for himself by playing real hard and annoying the hell out of most of his opponents throughout his rookie season. However, his sophomore season was ended after just 22 appearances due to lower-leg injury troubles. First a stress fracture, then a surgery to address a benign growth in his shin. Not ideal.
But that sample of play — in addition to his start in 2024-25 — is more than enough to define Eason within Houston’s over-crowded room of young players a leap or two away from changing their careers.
Offense: Bow-Tyer (playlist)
Tari Eason is built like an athlete. He’s listed as 6’8″ with a 7’2″ wingspan, and between that and his aggressive defensive style, which we’ll cover, he’s subject to type-casting on offense. Yes, he can crash the glass and finish transition opportunities above-the-rim, but Eason has room to grow into a connective role on that end. Throughout his first two seasons, he showed considerable court-mapping and decision-making prowess despite a relative lack of possessing the ball.
This cut-and-kick creates a corner-three for Houston, and while he perhaps misses a real tough, high-value dump-off to Alperen Şengün, it showcases some skills Eason should tap into more:
Tari will make to the rim if he sees the back of his defender’s head, and he can find the open shooters in transition. This play stands out not because it’s anything ground-breaking, but because he identifies where the advantage will be early. The drive-and-kick itself becomes pretty simple:
There’s really no reason, then, for his career-assist-rate to be hovering below 8%. Eason doesn’t have to be late-career Andre Iguodala in year three, but he’s shown too much court-awareness to have none of his passing stats pop. Yes, he often stands in the corner in Houston’s half-court offense, but ending the closeouts he does attack with extra passes and even higher-value looks for teammates has to be a focus.
However, it bodes well that Eason is finishing strong at the rim to start 2024-25, perhaps invigorated by a successful rehab process. Cleaning the Glass is tracking him at 48-of-66, or 73% on shots at the rim this season, up from his previous career-mark of 56% on 415 attempts.
It’s early. But Eason looks to be a merely competent 3-point threat on low volume, shooting in the mid-30s without many attempts off the dribble or off movement (though it’s worth noting he is just 250 attempts into his career).
Eason has never had a problem getting to the paint, but he hasn’t always pressed the right button to get there. Occasionally he doesn’t leverage his physicality into an advantage, opting for a slow-step or euro type of finish that diminishes his athletic traits. Often times, he’s stunted by a lack of flexibility in his handle, forced to pick the ball up one dribble too soon.
For now, though, he’s solving the issue, and flashing signs of tying the bow on top of Houston’s offense. He can handle in transition, cut to the rim or get there off a closeout or offensive board, and for now, he’s finishing those possessions. Becoming a more consistent passer is the key, and that’ll open up opportunities to get him in the short-roll as a screener or ball-handler in some inverted actions.
Defense: Ball-Hawk (playlist)
Simple. He rebounds everything, and yeah, he may foul a lot, but Eason is currently in the 100th percentile for steal- and block-rate for his position in 2024-25, per Cleaning the Glass. Passing lanes, pick-pockets, swipe-downs, contests as the low-man, you name it, Tari does it.
There is a flip-side, in that he’s occasionally beat on his gambling, and he’s not always in the right positions when it comes to scramble-mode or communicating with his teammates. Last season, playing against the Indiana Pacers, Eason was occasionally tasked with guarding Buddy Hield. He did okay, but it showed that his skillset is more tailored to helping off a non-shooting threat rather than being responsible for the deadliest shooter on the floor. On this play, he survives poor screen-navigation at first, though that’s an admittedly bigger problem than biting on the ball-fake when helps on a drive:
(It’s tough to help off Buddy Hield.)
Houston hasn’t always had the rim-protection to insulate some of his gambling tendencies, though Şengün is looking sturdier in 2024-25 but Eason’s ball-hawking nature is too valuable to be constricted.
This end of the floor is a bit easier to predict for Tari Eason. Unless he’s playing in handcuffs, he’s going to rack up the deflections as a long-armed athlete with plus-anticipation skills. Molding those desirable skills into a team-context where he can more comfortably navigate switches and make funky rotations is an obvious key for him.
Playlist: https://crowdscout.net/p?p=01934941-a5b0-7990-9c53-069a08998d21&i=3329457)
Gradey Dick
Gradey Dick is here to shoot the rock.
Offense: Loose Dynamite (Playlist)
He’s 6’7″ with a high release point, and has shown stretches of being the shot-maker the Toronto Raptors envisioned when they took him out of University of Kansas in the 2023 NBA Draft. As with any shooter, Dick needs to improve on the margins: making the right choice when defenses run him off the 3-point line, not falling too in love with that mid-range pull-up, finishing at the rim, et cetera.
But Gradey has scored 25-plus points five times in his career, and they’ve all come in the early stages of the 2024-25 season. Opportunity has abounded with Scottie Barnes and others missing considerable time for Toronto, but think about the archetype here. Gradey didn’t just stand in the corner and wait to capitalize on advantages that weren’t created, he went out and got 20 shots.
Dick’s shown some malleability off that high release-point, and the anticipation/hand-eye to convert opportunies that he otherwise couldn’t, given a fairly uninspiring athletic profile. On this pair of buckets, he first push-dribbles through a dig, then drops a tough turnaround over Rudy Gobert before floating a moon-ball over him the next time down:
Is this Dick’s ideal shot-profile? No. Does it indicate that he get create real looks for himself outside the limited context of a less threatening stand-in-the-corner white guy? Absolutely.
Gradey’s always going to be a little reliant on organized offense to get his looks off; pin-downs with correct spacing, setting a ball-screen -> coming off a flare, etc. However, on a healthy Raptors team with Scottie Barnes, RJ Barrett, and Immanuel Quickley most often toting the rock, Gradey’s gonna need to find other ways to get his shots off. His growing ability to find his spots bodes well.
Of course, making the right decisions when attacking closeouts is paramount, but look for Gradey to keep firing all sorts of 3-point looks. Hopefully, he can use his anticipation and hand-eye skills to find crevasses to get to the rim a tad more, though that floater will be a real weapon for years to come. Ideally, Gradey Dick is a loose stick of dynamite; handle him with improper care and watch your house burn down.
Defense: Chain Link (Playlist)
Gradey Dick isn’t going to become a lockdown defender on the ball, but he’s going to have to bleed a little less on the perimeter. His foot-speed and short-space explosiveness is just alright, so it’s tough when the NBA’s shiftiest guards reject screens on him and whatnot. Here, he deftly switches a screen and then chases Anthony Edwards, of all people, through another one, but Ant dusts him with a simple-jab:
Of course, Gradey Dick cannot give up baseline on this play, and that worry is a part of what sends him flying, in addition to, you know. That play is the result of an off-ball switch, and while the Toronto Raptors won’t ask Gradey Dick to guard all the opponent’s most threatening players, he’ll be put in some uncomfortable situations.
In the meantime, Gradey Dick has to continue communicating with his teammates and showing in the right spots, something he’s done a nice job of for a player early in his second season.
Vince Williams Jr.
Vince Williams Jr. missed the first month of the Memphis Grizzlies season recovering from a stress fracture in his tibia, then returned for three games before spraining his ankle, which will cause him to miss around another month of action. Tough times for one of the league’s funkiest third-year players.
Offense: Gap Filler (Playlist)
In the beginning of the 2023-24 season, the Memphis Grizzlies deployed Vince as a fairly typical wing who was just getting his feet wet with consistent rotational minutes. Then, as the injuries continued to mount and Vince’s skillset became a bit clearer, he blossomed into something of a point-forward, racking up high-assist totals throughout the spring. It’s easy to see why:
Vince struggles to truly separate/blow by defenders with a live-dribble, but if there is an advantage available to him, he will make any sort of pass to get it done. ‘Ambitious’ is the word that comes to mind.
Vince could use a few more live-dribble counters to get to his spots; right now, he’s almost exclusively able to create out of dribble-handoffs or in transition rather than straight pick-and-roll. However, he did shoot 39% from deep as a willing 3-point shooter in 2023-24, perhaps a bit over his head but more than enough to draw closeouts and give his best skills and opportunity to shine.
In the half-court, he’s either taking those looks (and will pull off the dribble if his defender goes far under the screen) or trying to get all the way to the rim. Because Vince is not the most reactive ball-handler, he has trouble navigating tight spaces. While that limits his ability to consistently lay the ball up, his approach is at least partly why Memphis felt so comfortable giving him more responsibility.
Vince will make sure Memphis achieves its desired shot-profile if the ball is in his hands. He will either pass to or shoot from the high-value areas of the court. Sure, he can cut and shoot off-the-ball sufficiently; he’ll make inspiring extra passes. But Vince flies with some decision-making on his shoulders; the short-term question is how he’s going to do this while playing next to Ja Morant, Jaren Jackson Jr., Desmond Bane, and even the vaguely similar Marcus Smart.
Defense: Playmaker (Playlist)
I described Vince Williams Jr. as a funky third-year player not just as a term of admiration for his offensive play-style, but his defense too. Memphis tasked Vince with face-guarding their opponent’s best player for damn-near full games last season. From Kyrie Irving to Kevin Durant, Vince was guarding his man often with his back turned to the ball, almost like the football player he’s built like.
This encapsulates the VWJ experience on defense; he’s not always the most nimble at the point-of-attack, and he’s not racking up the deflections quite like Tari Eason, but he is a playmaker nonetheless. Vince is fantastic at contesting shots all over the court, but his verticality and ridiculous +7 wingspan really plays at the rim:
Despite his fundamentally sound skills there, Vince can be a bit of a risk-taker on the perimeter, and frequent gambles and pokes at the ball puncture holes in his point-of-attack defense. A tad too often, offensive players are able to create space by bumping him off course, surprising given his frame and physicality when sticking to guys off the ball.
Where should his skillset meet his role? Indeed, he is a playmaker on defense, with active hands, strong anticipation skills, and an ability to offer secondary rim-protection, but perhaps it is telling that Memphis stuck him on so many bona fide perimeter threats last season. Next to Jaren Jackson Jr. and Zach Edey, the Grizzlies may need him to buckle down, get through screens, and move his feet against smaller, shiftier players.
Nearly everything Vince does on a basketball court is interesting, but his role on Memphis’ defense is really something to look out for when he returns from injury.
This has merely been the first part of Finding a Role, 2025. There are a couple boys from Brooklyn I’ve yet to mention, but that will come at a later date.
Meanwhile, I will be re-visiting these three players frequently throughout this season, tracking progress in the aforementioned areas, as they look to establish themselves as upper-middle class NBA players who can make or break a contending front office. Can Gradey Dick’s ancillary offense push a championship-offense over the finish line? Will Tari Eason oversee and control playoff games on both ends of the court? Can Vince Williams Jr. toe the line between experimenting and producing at the highest level?
Those are all long-term questions, but they’ll be answered season-by-season, game-by-game, quarter-by-quarter, and Swish Theory’s Finding a Role series is here to track all of it.
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