I love it when a trade comes out of nowhere and rocks our socks off. Two days before the deadline, the Utah Jazz stunned the world by swinging a trade for Memphis Grizzlies forward Jaren Jackson Jr. Hey, NBA insiders, what is the point of you existing if we got no wind of this?

The Jazz are a fascinating case in small-market team building as it relates to my own team-building philosophies. Allow me to explain why I think this trade was very short-sighted and potentially disastrous for the Jazz.

Addressing the Talent Deficit

The NBA has always been a league of the haves and the have-nots. If you have the superstar talent, you are in the mix. If you don’t have it, you spend your time searching for that talent. The Jazz learned the hard way that having stars, but not superstars, does not win you titles. Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert were a great tandem that led to a lot of regular-season success, but always came up wanting against teams with better top-end talent. That’s how we got here in the first place.

Utah has taken up a different tack since Danny Ainge came into town. Soon after his arrival in December 2021, Ainge shipped Mitchell and Gobert out of town for 11 combined picks and pick swaps. It was an admission of failure for that era of the team, and the acceptance of a stark reality: a huge volume of draft picks and a lengthy tank is the only way to get blue-chip talent in Salt Lake City.

Luxuries afforded to other teams are not afforded to the Jazz. Teams like the Lakers, Celtics, Knicks, and Warriors can fall back-asswards into star talent. Free agency is largely dead anyway, and no franchise-altering star is forcing their way to Utah via trade. So you can either pay a king’s ransom in a trade to get that talent, or you can hope the lottery balls bounce your way.

Last year was their best shot. Utah’s tank was successful, bottoming out with a 17-65 record that landed them the top odds for the No. 1 pick. Still, there was only a 14% chance of landing Cooper Flagg, a slam-dunk franchise-altering talent. Instead, they were bumped down to five, taking Ace Bailey. Womp womp. So it goes with the tank.

This year was another prime opportunity to tank into that blue-chip talent. Darryn Peterson, Cam Boozer, and AJ Dybantsa all have the look of franchise players. Odds are good that if you secure a spot in the top four, you’re coming away with a top-tier prospect, something the Jazz have not had in a decade. Until Tuesday, things were on track; Utah was sixth in lottery odds before the Jackson Jr. deal, with a 37.2% chance of a top four pick and 9% chance of the top selection. Not bad odds of changing your franchise forever.

Then the trade happened. And the evaluation changed completely.

The Sin of Gambling

Here’s why the Jazz are in such a precarious position after the trade. Utah is at the back end of the real tankers behind Sacramento, New Orleans, Indiana, Brooklyn, and Washington. All six of these teams will be racing to the bottom. But there are more contestants in this tank battle, and Utah just gave one of them an admission ticket. Here’s what the tank race looked like at the time of the trade:

At best, the five teams in front of the Jazz are standing pat, if not selling off more pieces. That makes it difficult to pass them in the standings, even if you lock JJJ in a closet for the rest of the season alongside Lauri Markkanen. You also have to look at the teams behind them.

The Bucks are actively shopping Giannis, and even if he doesn’t move, he’s going to be out injured and not motivated to return anytime soon. The Mavericks are in the same boat with AD and have other pieces to sell off. Then you have the Grizzlies, who just shed their most valuable player and seem likely to move more, possibly Ja Morant. All three of these teams got the memo: it’s over for us. Let’s hope the lottery gods bless us as we look to the future.

But the Jazz apparently missed the memo. Their chances of tanking into top-level talent worsened because of the players they acquired, and they also helped a team behind them tank. To me, that is a disastrous risk; making it 1% less likely that you get Darryn Peterson is catastrophic, even if your current chance of getting him is only 9%.

It’s also worth mentioning that the Jazz have protections on this year’s pick. If it falls outside the top eight, it goes to the Oklahoma City Thunder. Sam Presti, you dirty dog. Sitting at sixth in the odds means the Jazz only have a 3.8% chance of losing the pick. Seventh, that rises to 14.2%. Eighth, and you’re up to 39.2%. Tumble to ninth, and there’s a 79.7% chance it’s gone. The margins sure are thin.

There is an argument to be made that a boom-bust approach to this pick has merit. But look at this Jazz roster and the draft picks that have been worth keeping. Keyonte George and Walker Kessler, arguably their two best rookie-scale building blocks, were taken outside of the lottery. Kyle Filipowski was a high second-rounder. Isaiah Collier was late first. Jury is still out on Ace Bailey, but without question, the majority of the talent they’ve had worth keeping is outside of the top eight picks. Losing this pick to the Thunder would be a huge blow to the rebuild.

That is a smaller concern because the math still favors Utah, though less so than before the trade. The bigger draft concern for me is the 2027 first-round pick. The most favorable of Utah, Minnesota, and Cleveland’s first-round picks are going to Memphis. Now the Jazz have 1.5 seasons to turn it around, or else a primo draft pick is going out the door. And that’s assuming that they are worse than Minnesota and Cleveland. Jaren certainly improves their outlook (more on that soon), but it’s a big gamble that they can ascend after two straight abysmal seasons.

This is the gamble that Danny Ainge is making. He’s willing to harm his chances in this current lottery while punting on his best 2027 draft pick; those are two significant opportunities to get a blue-chip player that changes the franchise. And he did it all for a player I’m not convinced is all that transformative.

Where Is The Ceiling?

As discussed at the beginning, the Jazz got here by moving on from a core that was good, but not good enough. I’m willing to bet that this new core they’re working on is more of the same.

On paper, I like their emphasis on size. Walker Kessler, when healthy, is a tremendous interior defender and rebounder. JJJ and Lauri both provide floor spacing, secondary rim protection, and good rotational defense. Kessler and Markkanen, being plus positional rebounders, cover up for Jackson Jr.’s well-documented weakness on the glass. When on the floor together, I like that trio.

It also fits well with Keyonte George, who has been the breakout star for the Jazz at a time when they desperately need one. He’s shown himself to be an electric perimeter scorer who can shoulder a heavy usage burden. Keyonte can stir the drink enough for Jaren and Lauri, while that massive frontcourt trio covers for him defensively.

Theoretically, that big frontcourt trio, plus Keyonte and Ace Bailey, can work together on the floor. Hell, maybe it’s good enough to get them out from the bottom of the West. But where is the upside here?

If the Jazz luck into Darryn Peterson, all is forgiven. He’s got superstar perimeter creator written all over him, and would fit well at the two guard with that lineup. But that’s not something you can rely on. Assuming the Jazz don’t get one of the top picks (or lose the pick outright), the path to climbing out of the cellar is tough.

Utah has to fix a defense that has ranked in the bottom two in defensive rating for the last three seasons. JJJ and Kessler are a great step towards fixing that, but with so many perimeter players that cannot defend, it’s a tall task just to become average. You also need to take further offensive steps, which should be easier with Keyonte’s breakout and the great offensive mind of head coach Will Hardy.

There is an avenue for this team to become passable at both ends of the floor. JJJ does make a lot of their pieces click on both ends in theory. But passable doesn’t win playoff series, let alone get you to the mountaintop. That’s why the Jazz still need to be chasing superstars. And that gets awfully difficult when you look at the timeline here.

Utah will lock up Walker Kessler (RFA) and Keyonte George (rookie extension eligible) this offseason, locking in their core players for at least three seasons. That is a huge plus. After you take care of that, it’s time to win. Ask the New Orleans Pelicans about the dangers of shortening your rebuild. I’m not sure if you have looked at the Western Conference recently, but things are awfully tough out there.

A lot of the teams in the mix this year aren’t going anywhere. The Thunder, Spurs, and Nuggets will contend as long as they have their respective superstars. Both the Timberwolves and Lakers have flaws, but they have the superstars who deliver when it’s winning time. Houston has an aging superstar flanked by excellent young talent and a hoard of picks to trade. From there, things get murkier; the Clippers and Warriors are fading, but not dead yet. Phoenix and Portland have star talent and a rising cast of role players. Realistically, how far can the Jazz climb into this picture? My money is on a play-in ceiling for next year’s team, at best.

Chances are good that they’re forking over a lottery pick next year. That’s another chance at blue-chip talent gone through the draft. They will have other picks down the road, but that’s another tricky proposition.

If you’re good enough to make the playoffs in 2028, then the window for a high draft pick is gone. Then you’re reliant on later draft hits, which they have managed before, but it’s a low percentage gamble. Adding superstar talent through the draft is all but eliminated. That leaves only one other realistic avenue.

War Chest: Emptied

So many of the draft picks the Jazz had are gone now. They had four surplus first-round picks remaining before the JJJ trade; now they only have one. That pick falls in 2029 and is either a Minnesota or Cleveland pick. Ainge consolidated three lesser firsts to get a 2031 Phoenix unprotected first, then shipped it to Memphis in this deal. That was arguably their most prized asset remaining.

Let’s say a superstar that fits Utah’s timeline becomes available. As we’ve seen recently, nothing is off the table. The Jazz could have hoarded their picks and attempted to blow the doors off someone this offseason by being able to trade up to eight first-round picks, plus swaps. That’s a war chest few can match. After the JJJ trade, that dangling carrot is gone. They’re down to five picks, most of which are their own.

Don’t get me wrong, this Jazz team is vastly better now than it was yesterday. But to make serious noise, they need the guy. The draft avenues to getting that guy have decreased, and the trade avenues have decreased as well. It feels like the Jazz have painted themselves into a corner.

Time Is A Flat Circle

Jazz fans certainly have fond memories of the Mitchell-Gobert days. They cleaned up in the regular season, made the playoffs for six straight years, and brought a level of consistent excitement that was desperately needed in Utah. At the same time, they only won three playoff series in those six years and failed to get through to the Conference Finals. The West was as it always is: a murderer’s row of superstars and contending teams.

It seems that the Jazz yearn for that once again. The lottery balls haven’t fallen their way so far, and they’re tired of this intentional losing. So it’s time to assemble a handful of second-rate stars and become competitive with contention out of reach.

That’s not the worst thing ever. There’s no shame in staying competitive, but it does place a hard ceiling on your team. I’ve written before about why the Jazz are not going about their teardown in the right way; now I see them giving up on the rebuild early and settling for mediocrity. If that’s your thing, cool. But it’s not how I would go about turning a small-market team into a contender.

The post JJJ And The Knife’s Edge of Small Market Team Building appeared first on Swish Theory.

1. Cameron Boozer, Duke

2. Darryn Peterson, Kansas

3. AJ Dybantsa, BYU

4. Caleb Wilson, North Carolina

5. Kingston Flemings, Houston

6. Patrick Ngongba II, Duke

7. Tyler Tanner, Vanderbilt

When Swish Theory’s Big Board 1.0 dropped on December 2nd, we ranked Tyler Tanner 33rd when no other major outlet had him ranked in the top 60. Naturally, with his meteoric rise over the past month and a half that now has him in some outlets’ top 40, he’s similarly skyrocketed up our board as well.

The first criticism of a Tanner at 7 ranking would be his measly 6-foot height… but how much does that mean when he’s dunking, finishing, rebounding, and blocking shots against SEC competition at the rate of a 6-foot-4 guard? Once you go beyond his height, you find a lead guard prospect with a blend of feel and physicality on par with the greatest guard prospects in NCAA history, who’s applied this blend towards outlier scoring development without sacrificing ancillary production. With this newfound scoring prowess further opening passing windows that he’s capitalized on, the young-for-class sophomore is now the engine of a 7th-best Vanderbilt offense while also maintaining strong defense. Boasting an incredibly well-rounded profile, the question should not be “why Tyler Tanner top 10,” but “why not Tyler Tanner top 10.”

Maurya Kumpatla

8. Yaxel Lendeborg, Michigan

Yaxel Lendeborg continues to fly up draft boards as he dominates college basketball. His BPM is off the charts, and what makes his game special is the dynamic, all-around feel he brings on both ends of the floor. How many potential defensive anchors can dribble, pass, shoot, and attack as well as Lendeborg? With good-to-great attributes as a scorer, shooter, passer, rebounder, shot-swatter, and ball-stealer via Cerebro, that all-around skillset laid on top of a potentially elite and versatile defensive foundation provides a realistic path to a super high two-way potential ceiling and offers a very high floor as a high-end NBA rotation player.

Ryan Kaminski

9. Jayden Quaintance, Kentucky

10. Joshua Jefferson, Iowa State

After some unusual (for him) struggles mid-January, Joshua Jefferson returned to form with one of the most productive prospect games of the cycle: 17 points, 12 assists (0 turnovers), 10 rebounds (4 offensive), 4 steals, 1 block. How many prospects this class could do that, or in any class? Jefferson is listed at 6’9” and is highly skilled for a 240-pound player. While outside shooting is a weakness, he has still managed an acceptable 36% on 53 threes attempted this season. But you’re drafting Jefferson for his unique intersection of passing (5.3 assists per game, 2.1 ATO), rebounding (7.0 per game), and defensive playmaking (1.6 steals, 1.0 blocks per game). All signs point towards Jefferson being one of the highest feel players in class, which, when mixed with productivity and good NBA size, has a high hit rate of working out. With a major, versatile two-way burden on a top 20 NCAA offense and defense, Jefferson can take on all kinds of roles at the next level.

Matt Powers

11. Dailyn Swain, Texas

12. Bennett Stirtz, Iowa

13. Labaron Philon, Alabama

14. Koa Peat, Arizona

15. Hannes Steinbach, Washington

16. Aday Mara, Michigan

17. Malachi Moreno, Kentucky

18. Mikel Brown Jr., Louisville

19. Christian Anderson, Texas Tech

20. Darius Acuff, Arkansas

6’2 Arkansas guard Darius Acuff has quickly become one of the more polarizing draft prospects in this year’s draft. In a class featuring impressive depth at the guard spot, Acuff has managed to stand out by shouldering one of the highest offensive burdens of any high major freshman in recent memory. Currently, Darius Acuff is sporting a 45.3 Offensive Load, which is in the 80th percentile of all draft prospects since 2008. Acuff’s prioritization of the Arkansas offense has not been unwarranted, with Arkansas’ offense sitting 7th in the country in adjusted offensive rating, per Bart Torvik. Despite Acuff having a suboptimal scoring process (38% three point attempt rate would be in the 25th percentile for all guards since 2008), he’s managed to lead a prolific offense by avoiding mistakes (2.9 assist-to-turnover ratio) and pushing the pace to allow Arkansas’ supporting cast to capitalize on their open-court athleticism. Acuff is not without his flaws, though: his lack of defensive contributions has been a major limiting factor for Arkansas’ title aspirations. Versus teams ranked in the top 150, Arkansas’ defense is 13.1 points per 100 possessions BETTER without Acuff on the floor (101 possessions). Acuff’s effort and cognizance on the defensive side of the floor leave much to be desired at the moment. However, with Acuff possessing a strong 195-pound frame and a reported 6’7 wingspan, he has the physical tools to be a potential positive and transcend the roster limitations his archetype typically imposes. Ultimately, while I am skeptical Acuff will return value commensurate with his presumed draft position, there are indicators that he may be the exception to the rule when it comes to small, ball-dominant guards.

Ahmed Jama

21. Keaton Wagler, Illinois

Keaton Wagler has been the revelation of the freshman class. The 150th-ranked high school recruit quickly established himself as the best player on an Illinois team ranked seventh in the country by KenPom and is building a case as one of the top guards in the draft. At 6’6”, Wagler has the ideal size and offensive skillset for a two guard as an efficient, high-volume sniper with passing chops. The 18-year-old also pulls down an impressive 7 rebounds per 40 minutes, an underrated statistical indicator for guard prospects. I understand being skeptical due to weak or non-existent priors, but nearly 500 minutes into his freshman season, I think it can be safely said that Keaton Wagler is a baller.

Big Wafe

22. Karim Lopez, New Zealand

23. Daniel Jacobsen, Purdue

Daniel Jacobsen is a productive sophomore center for Purdue, listed at 7’4 and 250 pounds. This all but assures that he will play in the NBA at some point, as just two NBA players this season were listed above 7’3: Zach Edey and Victor Wembanyama. 

While he appears skinny and doesn’t play a high proportion of minutes, the argument to draft Jacobsen this year simply stems from his uniquely high likelihood of playing NBA minutes. It can be construed as an argument of scarcity: without major flaws with his touch, rebounding, or shotblocking, Jacobsen immediately has plug-and-play value in the NBA. Sure, he’s clearly raw, but most drafted underclassmen are. The difficulty in correctly identifying long-term professional players with any non-premium draft pick must be considered.

Avinash Chauhan

24. Álvaro Folgueiras, Iowa

25. Tounde Yessoufou, Baylor

26. Thomas Haugh, Florida

27. Motiejus Krivas, Arizona

28. Nate Ament, Tennessee

29. Meleek Thomas, Arkansas

30. Brayden Burries, Arizona

31. Cameron Carr, Baylor

32. Braylon Mullins, UConn

33. Paul McNeil, NC State

34. Bruce Thornton, Ohio State

35. JoJo Tugler, Houston

36. Kayden Mingo, Penn State

37. Elyjah Freeman, Auburn

38. Anthony Robinson II, Missouri

39. Amari Allen, Alabama

40. Henri Veesaar, North Carolina

41. Tamin Lipsey, Iowa State

Tamin Lipsey is a strange prospect by most measures – he’s old-ish, not a great scorer, nor does he have a phenomenal free-throw rate. Still, an early second-round grade seems like great value for a player who has a monstrous 5.6 A/TO ratio and a high steal percentage. Both are great signals of cognition, and both indicate that he creates/maintains new possessions, which is an increasingly valuable trait in a game where players and teams win on the margins. Of course, the low 3P/100 rate is scary, but he’s a good finisher at the rim (even if he’s down from last season). In combination with his physicality and cognition, he seems like a great value bet to be at least a rotation guard one day.

Joseph George

42. Morez Johnson Jr., Michigan

Johnson came in at 23 on my personal board, and he’s been steadily rising throughout the season. The thesis for Morez being high on my board is the simple paradigm of age-adjusted production and impact. 

The eye test reveals archetype problems that Morez needs to solve. At 6’9, he’s undersized for a big, and his perimeter skill set doesn’t appear up to snuff for a wing or forward in the NBA right now. The good news is this: Morez’s interior dominance is NBA caliber, as he’s shooting 76.4% at the rim. His rebounding numbers are down from last year. But, he put up a whopping 17.3 ORB% and 22.5 DRB% as a true center at Illinois. He’s shown enough to suggest he can hang physically in the pros. Additionally, he’s taken a jump in assist rate, steal rate, and free-throw shooting. Morez wouldn’t have an NBA-caliber perimeter skill set upon entering the league. But this rate of improvement in his touch and cognition suggests some upside for him to get there.

It would be easy to dismiss him as a Michigan merchant, given the number of great players around him. But Morez’s impact seems to outshine that of his frontcourt teammate Aday Mara. BartTorvik has Morez at a 12.6 BPM compared to Mara’s 10.1, while Hoop-Explorer has Morez with a +11.2 RAPM compared to Mara’s +7.7. I thought I preferred Mara to Morez when I formed my board, but all evidence points to more good things happening on the court as a result of Morez Johnson. He’s not a mere passenger on the Michigan train this year; he’s a co-conductor along with Yaxel Lendeborg. This is a fascinating player and prospect that deserves top 20 consideration in the 2026 draft.

Michael Neff

43. Ebuka Okorie, Stanford

44. Neoklis Avdalas, Virginia Tech

45. Killyan Toure, Iowa State

46. Zvonimir Ivisic, Arkansas

47. Isaiah Evans, Duke

48. Flory Bidunga, Kansas

49. Braden Smith, Purdue

50. Ja’Kobi Gillespie, Tennessee

51. JT Toppin, Texas Tech

52. Nolan Winter, Wisconsin

53. Nate Bittle, Oregon

54. Jalen Washington, Vanderbilt

55. Matt Able, NC State

56. Chris Cenac Jr., Houston

57. Darrion Williams, NC State

58. Acaden Lewis, Villanova

59. Richie Saunders, BYU

60. Mario Saint-Supery, Gonzaga

The post 2026 NBA Draft Big Board 2.0 appeared first on Swish Theory.

*takes a deep breath*

Hundreds, if not thousands, of data points factor into every prospect evaluation, many of which we don’t consciously consider. These data points converge into a cohesive story that informs a prospect’s placement on our boards. Scouting, in a nutshell, is the practice of surmising the story that a prospect’s film, stats, measurements, surrounding context, etc., are telling you.

If that sounds daunting, that’s because it is. That’s why simplifying evaluations, when appropriate, is critical for my process. One does so using heuristics — rules of thumb that simplify complex decisions or judgments. Put differently, heuristics use a few data points about a prospect to form a reasonably complete evaluation.

Now, there are pitfalls aplenty when relying too heavily on heuristics. Read Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman if you want proof. But, there’s a reason we evolved heuristics as humans: they can be helpful! It’s no different for scouting NBA Draft prospects. I’ll show you what I mean.

Consider this former college basketball player.

Would you draft him based on the presented information? I wouldn’t, and I’m guessing you wouldn’t either. If I asked why you came to that conclusion, you’d cite the poor production and efficiency over a large sample of games. Without reviewing any film or advanced numbers, I think we’d all feel comfortable with that decision. Guess what, we’d be correct. Those statistics belong to none other than LaVar Ball when he played college basketball in the 1980s.

Without heuristics, you’d have to dive deep into Lavar’s film before definitively concluding that the NBA was not in his future. You would have to conduct similar thorough assessments for every draft-eligible player regardless of their minutes played, production, or anything else. Obviously, no one has ever operated in this way (this is why I’m always skeptical of self-proclaimed eye-test-only scouts). We can comfortably eliminate most players from draft consideration, like we just did with Ball without thinking twice, thanks to heuristics.

The Lavar Ball example demonstrates at a basic level how heuristics can apply in scouting. In this case, bad career production = bad prospect. Done. Case closed. However, we have to be more discerning when discussing prospects with actual NBA chances. That said, some evaluations are much easier than others…bringing us to Yaxel Lendeborg.

Lendeborg is a forward for Michigan by way of UAB and JUCO before that. He attended the draft combine last year, where he actually generated some first-round hype before deciding to return to school. At the combine, he measured at 6’8 1/4” without shoes and 234 pounds, with a 7’4 wingspan and 9’0 standing reach.

With that, time for pro-Lendeborg heuristic number one, courtesy of Chuck from Chucking Darts:

Wings with 7’2+ wingspans don’t grow on trees (I’m still shocked by how small this list is), and the hit rate is spectacular. So, great physical tools: check!

Now, pro-Lendeborg heuristic number two: incredible all-around production.

Analytics models loved Lendeborg last year at UAB to the point where he cracked the top 20 on some people’s boards. Going into this season, scouts rightfully asked how Lendeborg’s numbers would look at the Big Ten level. Well…pretty amazing, as it turns out.

There are no weaknesses here. Lendeborg’s efficiency from every spot on the floor is comically high. He takes care of the ball, generates steals and blocks, and his assist-to-turnover ratio keeps improving year-to-year. If his current ~20 BPM holds, this would be one of the greatest statistical NCAA seasons we’ve ever seen.

Now, pro-Lendeborg heuristic number three: his archetype. A dribble, pass, shoot, defend wing.

Had Lendeborg stayed in the 2025 Draft, downsizing to play the three in the NBA would have been more of a projection, as he was a 4/5 hybrid at UAB. Thankfully, Michigan deploys Lendeborg at the three, with Aday Mara and Morez Johnson Jr. acting as the two bigs in Dusty May’s system. As such, we’re getting a look at Lendeborg in his likely role at the next level, and it looks great.

Lendeborg has served as the perfect wing connector for Michigan on both ends of the floor. Offensively, the ball never sticks to him. Lendeborg’s court mapping is outstanding. He knows everyone’s location on the floor, and he uses that information to make quick decisions. But, what makes Lendeborg so good is that his skill level allows him to properly act on the quick decisions he makes. He’s a triple threat with the ball in his hands. He can use his handle to generate optimal shots for himself or improve passing angles. When he passes the ball, he can find open teammates through tight windows and give them easy looks. If no driving lanes or teammates are open, Lendeborg can rise up and shoot over defenders, even with a hand in his face. Put simply, good luck preventing Lendeborg from optimizing an offensive possession for his team.

Defensively, it’s the same story. Lendeborg can get down in a stance and harass multiple positions on the ball. He’s big enough to be a problem for interior players, too. Additionally, his length proves super functional on rotations, help-side blocks, and recoveries contesting shots at the rim. His verticality without fouling has become a real asset defensively, and I expect it to translate to the NBA. I can’t recall a time when Lendeborg has made a faulty gamble defensively or been out of position. He’s simply an incredible basketball player.

Unfortunately, there is one hair in the soup for Lendeborg: his birth certificate. With a September 2002 birthday, Lendeborg will be a 24-year-old rookie next year. Important heuristic number four: old prospect = less room for development. I don’t want to entirely eliminate the possibility of star upside for Lendeborg, considering his development curve and complete skillset. But, history says we shouldn’t count on it.

Let’s succinctly combine the four heuristics. Yaxel Lendeborg:

• Has an ideal physical profile (6’8, 230 lbs, 7’4 wingspan)
• Has an otherworldly statistical profile
• Has a complete skill set: dribble, pass, shoot, can make the right decisions quickly, and defend
• Will be old for a rookie at 24, likely capping his development trajectory

From these four premises, I’m concluding the following:

• Yaxel Lendeborg is a probable high-end playoff starter in the NBA. But, his age likely limits further upside scenarios.

Using a few heuristics, we have told a reasonably complete story about Yaxel Lendeborg. With so much time until the draft and more information yet to be revealed, I rarely draw formal conclusions about prospects in December. Cases like Lendeborg are the rare exception.

I view Lendeborg as a lottery-level prospect. I feel confident in my evaluation of the player, but the work with Lendeborg is far from over. I still have to contextualize Lendeborg within this draft class. How many players will I rank ahead of Lendeborg? It’s too early to say. But a reasonably complete evaluation of Lendeborg, aided by heuristics, will now serve as scaffolding as the rest of my board takes shape.

The post Yaxel Lendeborg and the Importance of Heuristics appeared first on Swish Theory.

Duke, freshman, 6’9”, 250 pounds.

29.0 minutes, 22.9 points, 9.9 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 1.9 steals, 1.1 blocks per game. 2.7 ATO and 69% true shooting.

2. Darryn Peterson

Kansas, freshman, 6’6”, 205 pounds.

25.5 minutes, 21.5 points, 3.5 rebounds, 3.0 assists, 2.0 steals, 1.0 blocks per game. 1.5 ATO and 73% true shooting.

3. Caleb Wilson

North Carolina, freshman, 6’10”, 215 pounds.

28.3 minutes, 19.9 points, 9.9 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 1.7 steals, 1.3 blocks per game. 1.3 ATO and 65% true shooting.

4. AJ Dybantsa

BYU, freshman, 6’9”, 210 pounds.

30.7 minutes, 19.0 points, 6.4 rebounds, 2.3 assists, 0.6 steals, 0.3 blocks per game. 1.1 ATO and 61% true shooting.

5. Kingston Flemings

Houston, freshman, 6’4”, 190 pounds.

30.3 minutes, 15.3 points, 3.6 rebounds, 5.0 assists, 1.3 steals, 0.4 blocks per game. 2.9 ATO and 69% true shooting.

6. Jayden Quaintance

Kentucky, sophomore, 6’10.5”, 255 pounds.

(Freshman stats) 29.6 minutes, 9.4 points, 7.9 rebounds, 1.5 assists, 1.1 steals, 2.6 blocks per game. 0.8 ATO and 54% true shooting.

7. Patrick Ngongba II

Duke, sophomore, 6’11”, 250 pounds.

22.6 minutes, 12.8 points, 6.5 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 0.5 steals, 1.1 blocks per game. 1.2 ATO and 72% true shooting.

8. Bennett Stirtz

Iowa, senior, 6’4”, 190 pounds.

37.7 minutes, 18.6 points, 2.9 rebounds, 5.4 assists, 1.7 steals, 0.1 blocks per game. 3.5 ATO and 65% true shooting.

9. Koa Peat

Arizona, freshman, 6’8”, 235 pounds.

26.9 minutes, 15.6 points, 5.7 rebounds, 2.9 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.9 blocks per game. 1.5 ATO and 57% true shooting.

10. Nate Ament

Tennessee, freshman. 6’10”, 207 pounds.

27.5 minutes, 17.9 points, 7.6 rebounds, 3.0 assists, 1.9 steals, 0.1 blocks per game. 1.3 ATO and 56% true shooting.

11. Aday Mara, Michigan

12. Mikel Brown Jr., Louisville

13. Dailyn Swain, Texas

14. Karim Lopez, New Zealand

15. Yaxel Lendeborg, Michigan

16. Labaron Philon, Alabama

17. Álvaro Folgueiras, Iowa

18. Hannes Steinbach, Washington

19. Paul McNeil Jr., NC State

20. Malachi Moreno, Kentucky

21. Cayden Boozer, Duke

22. Joshua Jefferson, Iowa

23. Elyjah Freeman, Auburn

24. Cameron Carr, Baylor

25. Meleek Thomas, Arkansas

26. Thomas Haugh, Florida

27. Braylon Mullins, Connecticut

28. Darrion Williams, NC State

29. JT Toppin, Texas Tech

30. Christian Anderson, Texas Tech

31. Nate Bittle, Oregon

32. Tounde Yessoufou, Baylor

33. Anthony Robinson II, Missouri

34. Flory Bidunga, Kansas

35. Isaiah Evans, Duke

36. Tyler Tanner, Vanderbilt

37. Jacob Cofie, USC

38. Neoklis Avdalas, Virginia Tech

39. Mario Saint-Supery, Gonzaga

40. Miles Byrd, San Diego State

41. Ja’Kobi Gillespie, Tennessee

42. Henri Veesaar, North Carolina

43. Sebastian Williams-Adams, Auburn

44. Dame Sarr, Duke

45. Jaden Toombs, SMU

46. Zvonimir Ivisic, Illinois

47. JoJo Tugler, Houston

48. Motiejus Krivas, Arizona

49. David Mirkovic, Illinois

50. Bruce Thornton, Ohio State

51. Chris Cenac Jr., Houston

52. Johann Grünloh, Virginia

53. Richie Saunders, BYU

54. Daniel Jacobsen, Purdue

55. Amari Allen, Alabama

56. Sergio de Larrea, Valencia

57. Braden Smith, Purdue

58. Matt Able, NC State

59. Alex Condon, Florida

60. Ebuka Okorie, Stanford

The post 2026 NBA Draft Big Board 1.0 appeared first on Swish Theory.

The consensus preseason top three of Darryn Peterson, Cam Boozer, and AJ Dybantsa seemed untouchable, and I broke that mold. The upside case for Wilson is obvious. He’s one of the better defensive prospects I’ve ever seen, with offensive upside to boot. I may still write an article making that case in more detail.

But, it turns out I’m not the only one who feels this strongly about Wilson:

Nathan, if you’re reading this, thanks for stealing my thunder…

In all seriousness, the Caleb Wilson train has left the station, and I don’t have as much to add as I thought I did. The No Ceilings crew did a great job making the Caleb Wilson case here. As a result, the masses have caught on, and Wilson is knocking on the door of a lot people’s top three.

Now, that leaves an obvious and intriguing question at hand. If Caleb Wilson enters the top three, who out of Boozer, Peterson, and Dybantsa do you take out? I have my answer on that, which I’ll save for another time. But, I’ve been shocked to find that many Twitter folks who are high on Wilson feel that way at the expense of…

Cam Boozer???

I can’t believe some of the takes I’m seeing. So, in the rest of this article, I’m going to try recalibrating the conversation around Cam Boozer.

I’ll start here: Cam Boozer has been the best player in college basketball this year.

Anyone who’s watched Boozer’s start to the season would tell you that there have been some hiccups here and there. He couldn’t buy a shot in his first half of college basketball, and his rim finishing has taken a noticeable hit against Duke’s tougher competition. There’s been a small adjustment for Boozer physically after dominating high school and AAU ball sweat-free — totally fair considering he’s 18 years old.

And yet, he’s been the best player in college basketball.

Let’s start with some numbers. Box Plus-Minus agrees with my assessment of Boozer’s play.

And in Evan Miyakawa’s model, Boozer is practically lapping the field:

Now, Sports Reference:

It’s highly unlikely these stats hold, but if they did, we’d be looking at the greatest NCAA prospect of the 21st century. I mean, look at those numbers! 42 points, 20 rebounds, and 8 assists per 100, strong free throw rate, excellent shooting indicators, 4.0 AST:TO ratio, and sublime steal and block rates. Oh, and by the way, all from a 6’10, 250-pound player who will turn 19 a week before the draft.

You don’t have to watch a second of film on Boozer to contextualize the caliber of prospect he is. With a BPM hovering around 20 through seven games, I think it’s safe to say that Boozer will finish the year with a BPM > 12. Here’s the list of freshmen on Bart Torvik’s database to accomplish this feat:

Assuming Boozer joins this list, that’s incredible company to keep. All-in-one metrics are far from perfect, but I tend to believe them when they point me to a high-level prospect like this.

When you turn on the film, the eye test backs the incredible impact metrics. I already covered Boozer’s exceptional feel for the game over the summer. I’ll link that article here. Boozer is a possession optimization machine. His court-mapping and split-second decision-making allow him to effortlessly pick apart defenses at every turn.

Boozer’s brain is second to none in this class, but Boozer separates himself from other high-feel prospects with his functional strength and scoring ability. Whenever Boozer decides that asserting his will as a scorer is the way to optimize a possession, he can get to his spots at will. Here are two examples from the Texas game.

Boozer skeptics point to athletic limitations as a cause for concern. I honestly don’t get it. Boozer is among the best functional athletes in the entire draft class. He’s currently sitting at 42.4 PTS per 100 on 65% true shooting largely as a result of strength-based scoring.

Put simply, I care about substance over style. Those looking for raw athleticism in this draft class should look at Michigan State’s Coen Carr. Carr’s vertical leap and power combination at 6’6, 220 is difficult to comprehend. Yet, he only boasts a 56.5 eFG% compared to Cam Boozer’s 60.4%. I’ll leave it to you to decide whose physicality is more compelling.

My point here: when evaluating a prospect’s physical ability, evaluate functional athleticism. Did Nikola Jokic need run/jump athleticism to hit high-end outcomes? How about Luka Doncic? Karl-Anthony Towns? Alperen Sengun? All these guys are athletic in their own way, but more importantly, they just get stuff done on the basketball court. Believe it when a prospect tells you they can produce at a high level and check your aesthetic biases at the door. As Brad Pitt (portraying Billy Beane) says in the film Moneyball, “He gets on base a lot. Do I care if it’s a walk or a hit?”

To close, I want to reference a tweet from my Swish Theory colleague Avinash:

Avi has lead the charge in emphasizing prospects for whom high-level cognition and physicality converge. You could argue that the meta in the NBA right now is acquiring players at all five positions who hit competency thresholds in both categories. Avi’s query has a spectacular hit rate for finding such players.

Cam Boozer comfortably hits these thresholds right now. So, by the way, does Caleb Wilson. Both are incredible prospects littered with green flags. Put Wilson in your top three, by all means. He’s there for me! But, doing so at Boozer’s expense would be a dire mistake.

No one shown in Avi’s query also had Boozer’s scoring and rebounding ability as a prospect. This is a combination of physicality, smarts, production, and youth rarely seen at the college level, if ever. I’ll say it again, he’s the best player in college basketball at 18 years old. We’re talking about a slam-dunk, can’t miss, mega-star prospect that should be top two on everyone’s board.

He’s number one on mine.

The post I Can’t Believe I Need to Say This: Cameron Boozer is Insanely Good appeared first on Swish Theory.

One mold that has always fascinated me is big players with exceptional “feel for the game.” There is something intrinsically valuable about combining a point guard’s cognition with a forward’s physical profile.

Whether it was Bobby Jones in the 1980s, Robert Horry in the 1990s, or Boris Diaw in the 2000s, this type of player has reliably contributed to winning basketball. With cognitive load relative to position on the rise, we’re seeing more and more players of this mold enter the league. The next one entering the league may just be hiding in plain sight in the 2026 draft class: 6’10” Iowa forward Álvaro Folgueiras.

The most compelling argument I can make for Alvaro Folgueiras as a bona fide NBA-level prospect is via this query. We are looking for tall underclassmen ( 6`8 and above) who displayed an outlier level of feel (quantified via AST%, STL% and partly OREB%) alongside a baseline of (vertical) athleticism (quantified via BLK% and partly OREB%) 

Alvaro stands among five players who are currently returning top-8 value in their respective draft classes, including the No. 1 and No. 3 prospects on last year’s Swish Theory board, as well as Ethan Happ, who led the BBL in PER in 2022 and the ACB in 2024, and is likely a positive NBA contributor hiding in plain sight. What makes Folgueiras so fascinating within this group is that his anthropometrics align with the non-shooting “big wing” segment of the query, while his shooting indicators match those of the smaller players on the list.

This combination creates a strong case for Folgueiras as a lottery prospect in the upcoming draft: He shares statistical indicators with the highest cognition wings the league has seen in the last few years, while being bigger than the prospects who shot the ball as well as him and having the best shooting indicators amongst all the players with comparable measurements.

Let’s explore, in the following segments, to what degree this heuristic actually holds up in reality and whether Folgueiras could truly be a top-level NBA prospect in the 2026 draft.

Offense:

Alvaro is one of the most “Haliburtonified” prospects I’ve seen in recent memory (shoutout to Mike Gribanov for the term). His decision-making is exceptionally quick, whether he’s initiating transition, connecting the offense from the perimeter, or finding cutters as a hub. He can make virtually every read in the book and thread interior passes through tight windows.

What especially stands out is his spatial awareness, as he almost never over- or underthrows passes. Posting a 21.9 AST% and a 1.4 assist-to-turnover ratio at his size is incredibly impressive, even after adjusting for his level of competition.

Folgueiras could also end up one of the better “big” shooters we’ve seen in recent years. He posted a 50 3PAR for Spain across his FIBA career, and he’s maintained a 40 3PAR and 76.5 FT% in college despite playing for one of the lowest-volume shooting teams in the country.

His willingness to shoot over contests and off of different platforms is pretty special for a long, 6`10 player.

So far, Folgueiras sounds like an ideal modern forward as someone who connects offense from the perimeter and provides reliable spacing.

So, what’s the holdup?

Alvaro’s scoring process and interior scoring profile aren’t consistent with those of typical NBA wings. To illustrate this point, let’s circle back to the base query of this article.

Within this group of players, Alvaro ranks last in 2pt ASTD%, second to last in rim: non-rim ratio and dunk rate, and third to last in pull-up jumper frequency. Being heavily rim-reliant while not finishing those attempts with dunks is already a major hurdle at the next level, where opposing frontcourts get longer and more athletic. When you combine that with a highly assisted shot diet and a negligible volume of pull-up jumpers, it raises serious concerns about whether Alvaro can realistically be utilized as a wing, an essential part of his projection, given that his underwhelming verticality, sub-70% rim FG%, and modest 5 BLK% are likely to prevent him from earning meaningful minutes at the 5.

His pull-up frequency is particularly concerning when compared to the true “wings” on this list. His edge in terms of touch becomes far less meaningful if he cannot successfully leverage it into counters in the middle of the floor.

There are two potential counterarguments to this  First, Folgueiras may have ended up with a big-adjacent scoring profile simply because he was forced into that role at RMU. As the tallest player on the roster, he frequently received PnR roll-man and post-up reps that he likely wouldn’t have been given on a different team, which may have skewed his shot diet. However, this explanation loses weight when we compare these indicators to his freshman season and his FIBA sample, where similar patterns persist.

Something even more important to consider in this context is Folgueiras’s drive frequency. He drove on roughly 15% of his possessions, a strong mark for his role and an encouraging indicator of his potential as a closeout attacker. While his lack of bend and high-end handle (which contributes to a staggering 23.9 TO%) and his discomfort with midrange counters are still very apparent on film, I’m encouraged by both the frequency and the efficiency of these drives. He posted a 64 TS% on them, which is a legitimately strong number.

Defense

Alvaro offers a solid baseline as an NBA defender, with some potential upside as a genuine game-changer. He posted 20+ DREB% across multiple samples, signaling strong positional rebounding. When contextualized with his excellent anthropometrics and impressive stock rates, this forms a solid foundation for retaining defensive value at the next level.

However, he is somewhat vulnerable against quicker players on the perimeter and occasionally struggles with proper foot alignment. Folgueiras’s lack of horizontal athleticism, particularly his limited ground coverage, shows up on tape. Combined with his issues in vertical contests, this makes it difficult to project him as a reliable weakside rim protector.

Even so, Folgueiras compensates with sharp positioning and strong overall cognition, routinely disrupting actions and getting his hands on the ball.

Folgueiras has consistently posted strong steal rates throughout his career, though his BLK% has fluctuated. This will be something worth monitoring at Iowa, especially since he will take on fewer center duties there (similar to his role with Spain in last year’s U20 EuroBasket, where he recorded just a 1.8 STL% and 2.4 BLK% while carrying an increased offensive load!). 

I remain confident that Alvaro can return positive defensive value in the future. He should be able to meaningfully influence opponent turnover percentage and limit opposing offensive rebounds as he develops. The key question is whether his cognition and disruptive hands can compensate for potential issues defending in space. In my view, the answer is yes.

One best-case scenario is Alvaro replicating Kyle Anderson’s defensive impact—trading some of Anderson’s elite cognition (career 3.2 STL% for prospect Anderson vs. 2.4% for Folguerias is noticeable) for a higher SR. 

Conclusion

I believe Folgueiras’s eventual placement on my final draft board will come down to two factors: What will his role and production look like at Iowa? And will he measure as well as he is rumored to?

Coach McCollum built a slow, pick-and-roll–heavy offense around point-guard maestro Bennett Stirtz at Drake, and he has carried that system over to Iowa. So far, Iowa ranks in the 93rd percentile in PnR frequency, 100th percentile in cut frequency, and 12th in team assist rate—figures that closely mirror the stylistic profile of his Drake team. In a context that centralizes advantage creation to this degree while boosting assisted-two volume through cuts and PnR roll-man possessions, it is highly unlikely that we will see a meaningful shift in Folguerias’s overall scoring profile.

McCollum retained his two highest-frequency rollers, meaning Alvaro will likely replace some of his old post-up and rollman possessions with spot-ups. It will be important for Folguerias to continue showing confidence as a shooter in these situations, while also maintaining a reasonable drive frequency to help offset his otherwise shaky offensive projection. So far, he has done exactly that—scoring 1.7 PPP on spot-ups and opening the season with a 16:0 AST/TOV ratio through his first five games. Another encouraging sign: Folgueiras has recorded 5 dunks on 12 total rim attempts, compared to just 12 on 167 as a sophomore.

The more pressing question, however, is how well he will measure. If he comes in closer to 6’9″ in shoes with a wingspan under 7’3″, I will struggle to view him as a lottery-level prospect. Without elite positional size and given his middling athleticism and ball skills, Alvaro’s entire projection could begin to unravel. But if he measures at 6’10” in shoes with a 7’4″–7’5″ wingspan and a solid BMI, he may possess one of the most favorable cognition-plus-size intersections we’ve seen in years, paired with what could be an elite jumper.

A pillar of my evaluation process is identifying historically favorable skill intersections. For decades, big players with exceptional feel for the game have consistently provided positive on-court value in the NBA, and  Alvaro Folgueiras appears to be next in line.

The post Prospect Preview: Alvaro Folgueiras appeared first on Swish Theory.

For this piece, I’m talking to Swish Theory’s Avinash Chauhan, who makes an optimistic claim about Texas wing Dailyn Swain. You can find Avinash’s Swish Theory work here, additional basketball musings at his Substack here, and follow him on Twitter here.

Avinash’s claim: Dailyn Swain is a top-20 level talent in the 2026 NBA draft.

Question #1:

The list of drafted players Swain’s height with a <15 three-point attempt rate (3PA/FGA) is littered with misses. Opponents leave him wide open. Do you think his outside shot is absolutely cooked (career 11-54 from three, 27-74 from midrange) or is there some hope?

Avinash:

How could it not be cooked? Swain is an astonishing 3 for 23 on open catch-and-shoot 3s. I would advise against expecting strong 3P development across his career, and I remain quite high on Swain despite this cognizance. He does not need to shoot to be a productive NBA player.

But is there hope? There will always be hope with a profile as contradictory as Swain’s.

Swain shoots extremely well from the FT line (career 81.6% FT across 152 attempts). While FT proficiency is usually a sign of future shooting goodness, it can’t be that easy.

See, Swain is in this weird zone, shooting enough threes to not be a complete non-shooter, but shooting a relatively low number of threes overall and bricking them.

To showcase this, let’s focus on the three main indicators of shooting upside: FT%, 3P%, and 3Pr.

High FT% + High 3PR + High 3P%: elite elite shooter

• Ex. Steph Curry, Sam Hauser

High FT% + High 3PR + Low 3P%: still an elite shooter, likely lots of OTD 3s

• Ex. Austin Reaves, Franz Wagner

High FT% + Low 3PR + High 3P%: usually a rim-heavy guard that can still end up shooting

• Ex. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jalen Williams

High FT% + Low 3PR + Low 3P%: ???

This is an extraordinarily rare intersection: just 7 NBA-appearing college players since 2008 have shot worse than 40% 3P with less than 4 3PA/100 while still shooting 80% from the line. What’s even more interesting is that just 3 of these players had a true career sample: it’s really just Delon Wright, Hansbrough, and Mike Muscala that met this intersection over multiple seasons, and only Mike Muscala did it over more than 2 seasons. Swain appears poised to join him.

What makes this even more baffling is that Swain has been shooting 80% from the line all the way back to his AAU days. In 37 AAU games over 16U and 17U Nike EYCL seasons, Swain shot 83/107 (77%) from the line. That means Swain has been shooting ~80% FT since 2021.

75% FT, < 30% 3P, < 2 3PA/game. From my AAU database with ~2000 player-seasons, just 5 players met these criteria. Despite every one of the NCAA players here having lower career FT% in NCAA compared Swain, they at least doubled his 3Pr.

Some other notes:
Swain has shot 13/33 (39%) on dribble jumper 2s across 2 NCAA seasons. He shot 7/25 (28%) on dribble jumpers in AAU. At least there’s touch improvement somewhere, and there’s a bit of asymmetric reward to risk. It’s the type of shot someone with a 14% PnR BH scoring frequency could really use (this is a superb rate for a wing-sized player).

And Swain narrowly missed this query with a number of impressive developmental stories, sporting an assist percentage just 1% off the 12% threshold.

So we have 100 games of Swain’s low 3P make + high FT% tomfoolery across AAU+NCAA, and he has at least 30+ games left in his college career. This is uncharted territory, and your guess is just as good as mine for whether he ever meaningfully shoots. For what it’s worth, the only person close to this sort of volume (Muscala) shot 37% 3P on 8.2 3PA/100 for his NBA career, but it took him 6 NBA seasons to actually hit that rate across a season.

And, Swain kinda ended the season with some momentum. He went 3/5 from 3P in his final game vs Illinois in the first round of March Madness. It was actually his best college game ever (27 points, 27 BPM, 33% USG, 6 assists+steals : 0 TOs). Positive momentum for the win?

Maybe. For those keeping track, that also means he was 1/9 from 3 during that month, excluding the Illinois game. Still, his 3PA/100 was doubled relative to his career average across that final month.

To summarize: Swain’s profile holds an unparalleled long-term integration of FT% goodness x 3P badness, nice dribble jumper proficiency, high levels of cognition typically associated with strong development, and positive momentum. And he’s super young for class. This year, I expect some 3P shooting improvement for the first time in years.

But he’s missed so many 3s for so long that it’s still more likely than not that he does not end up shooting well. There’s hope, but he doesn’t really need it. He should be a solid NBA contributor regardless.

Question #2:

A big part of the appeal for Swain is his being a wing ballhandler. This premise makes his fans excited about his transition game and utility as a pick-and-roll operator. However, his turnover rates for both pick and roll when pressured and when used as a transition ballhandler are a very high 30% for each.

Avinash:

A big part of Swain’s appeal is indeed his wing ball-handling upside. He clocks in at an impressive career 15% assist rate on just 17% usage. However, his career 16% TO rate is unimpressive relative to this lower usage. What gives?

The unifying theme of Swain’s turnovers is errant passes. This is important to me, as most other wings that I’ve watched have turnover issues more concerned with scoring process or poor dribbling technique.

More specifically, Swain is trying to get rim assists at a pretty high clip, which is actually a feature of the Xavier offense: they ranked in the 4th and 1st percentiles in spot-up frequency in 2025 and 2024, respectively. There are some gimme assists that he fails, like bouncing off his foot, but his biggest issue is just forcing passes into very tight windows, as well as poor pass accuracy on the move.

In defense of Swain, he didn’t quite have the safety valves that others may have. First, Xavier probably had the worst “center” rotation out of any reasonably good high major team. Their center was Zach Freemantle, a 6’9 225 lb power forward with a mediocre wingspan. Forcing the ball to a guy with such a limited catch radius is just not ideal, but he just didn’t have those other safety valves. Beyond their uber-low spotup frequency, Xavier didn’t run many cuts either (13th percentile in 2025, 7th percentile in 2024), meaning that many of Swain’s passes out of PnR had to be post entries.

As a side note, Swain probably should be used more on cuts. He has the body and intuition for it, along with 1.3 PPP last year. Unfortunately, Xavier’s primary perimeter PnR was 6’2 Dayvion McKnight, who shot 49% at the rim and less than 3 3PA/100. His abhorrent 0.702 PPP on PnR BH, and the departure of the four Xavier players with higher assist rates than Swain in 2024, were major reasons why Swain’s PnR BH frequency doubled from 2024 to 2025.

So, Swain’s TO rate when defense commits is concerning, but it was a bad enough context that we can hopefully expect strong improvements with his feel and another year under his belt. It is something to monitor.

Swain’s turnover rate in transition is less defensible. The most obvious culprit again seems to be errant passing. He’s more pass-heavy in transition than I expected, considering a massive 30% of his scores came in transition. He’s just moving too quickly and isn’t able to make dynamic, accurate kick-ahead reads.

Ultimately, Swain has clear turnover issues, but not something I would consider truly pivotal: I’d be more concerned if more of these were bad scoring TOs rather than bad pass TOs (see below: his drive TO rate). His career 1.7 A:TO and 3% steal rate indicate strong enough cognition that we can partially cope that this is an issue of poor technique rather than processing. I expect more turnovers with increased usage, but hopefully he trims the rate somewhat.

Question #3:

Additionally, his 1.4 drives per game lags the second-year drive rate of Herb Jones (1.8 per game), Kyle Filipowski (2.9), or Mikal Bridges (1.7), among prospects with relatively similar production profiles. What kind of ball-handling burden/complexity is Swain really capable of when faced with tougher comp?

Avinash:

Yes, to activate higher-end outcomes worthy of meaningful draft capital, Swain needs to demonstrate creation capacity. His career 17% usage + 55% minutes share after two seasons lags a bit behind these names mentioned. While it remains to be seen how well he scales up, his playtype rates, rather than per-game numbers, is probably more instructive.

Let’s compare his playtype numbers to the names mentioned, plus three more I added. I used Bart’s Career Player Comp feature to generate this query that ranked the most similar careers to Swain, and added an NBA filter and height filter. I chose the top 3: OPJ, Cody Martin, and Dalen Terry.

Swain’s 13.4% drive frequency isn’t as pressing in this paradigm, but it still notably lags behind Filipowski and Herb.

However, Swain crushes the field in drive efficiency, with over 0.9 points per drive possession. He does this with the lowest drive turnover rate, while still drawing a healthy number of fouls per drive. This micro turnover rate is an interesting antidote to his turnover concerns.

However, since there is typically no double-counting between drive possessions and PnR BH possessions (a drive does not involve a screen), I like to account for these PnR BH “quasi-drives”.

Immediately, Swain’s massive PnR BH frequency stands out. Part of why Swain’s drive frequency was so low is that he scored on PnR BH possessions at a high rate.

It’s not just higher PnR BH frequency relative to the field. Swain’s scoring approach out of PnR BH playtypes was far better than any other player here. If we ignore Filipowski’s inflated stats out of a 1.3% PnR BH frequency, Swain paces the group in PnR BH frequency, PPP, AND free throw rate. His TO rate ranks 3rd out of 6.

To recap, Swain is the most efficient on drives and PnR BH reps among these players…while ranking close to the top in TO rate and FT rate. His drive+PnR BH aggregate frequency trails just Herbert Jones and his query-worst aggregate PPP.

To be fair, none of these guys were really creating like that in the NBA. But Swain’s production transcends this comparison. And he’s the youngest here, while weighing at least 10 more pounds than anyone besides Filipowski. With potentially the best wingspan. There’s just no argument to me: Swain has by far the best creation upside of the group.

Increased ball handling burden is inevitable, and while improving handling control and complexity are not something I can easily project, there’s just too much here for me not to expect continued improvement.

You can’t get better datapoints than size/age-adjusted creation efficiency (not that it needs to be adjusted) and strong cognition. While you raised exceptional points that cannot meaningfully be refuted until we see it manifested, this is my best cope.

Question #4:

That all sounds great, and I am struggling to poke holes in Swain’s fairly complete game otherwise. But I do struggle to see what kind of role Swain would fit into immediately that both keeps his development curve sharply sloped and the friction with NBA lineups low (absent a major shooting leap). How does he fit in right away?

Avinash:

Swain is largely theoretical in impact right now. He possesses a slew of important traits, from his FT touch to his cognition to his impressive ballhandling at size…but he hasn’t been particularly impactful.

A net offensive rating impact of -0.8 when Swain is on compared to Xavier’s baseline is very underwhelming for a decent offense. Swain has a positive FTR influence, and his positive TO influence is an improvement from last year. We can attribute this to his scaling up (higher PnR and driving responsibility) while maintaining A:TO.

The lack of on/off impact is emblematic of a more pressing issue with Swain: there just isn’t a whole lot of “guarantees.”

He’s promising in a lot of areas, but not truly adept at anything in relation to halfcourt offense. You’d think a player with his athleticism and transition prowess would be able to be more effective at the rim, but Swain shot a pedestrian 64% at the rim on a majority-assisted rim diet. While there’s some sliver of ball handling upside, there’s also a chance Swain isn’t able to convert self-created rim attempts at a respectable rate.

Swain is what I’d call a “trait-maxxed” player: he checks lots of boxes that indicate high upside. He’s super young, he will measure and test exceptionally well, and he blends cognition, physicality, and touch in a way that typically translate to NBA goodness. But he simply hasn’t quite done anything worthy of NBA status … yet.

Without improved shooting volume, the projection is somewhat difficult but not impossible. Something like an athletic finisher with defensive impact, something in the realm of Ausar or Josh Minott. He could carry over his 98th percentile transition frequency to the league and do his best Christian Braun impression, though that is somewhat dependent on the context. This may not sound too compelling, but my thesis is that Swain’s ancillary production is too good to fail. It’s quite similar to my case for the aforementioned Josh Minott, who also faced questions about his NBA role, but is making it work given his cognitive and physical strengths.

To answer the other half of your question: based on historical trends, I believe that trait-maxxing is the most important predictor of development over expectation. Massive arms and feel, for instance, has been Sam Presti’s method to draft success. This is why I believe his development curve will be sloped upwards regardless of role, for the time being: he’s entering the critical period of development (age 20/junior year) where the big-time leaps occur.

Can he access super high-end outcomes without being able to shoot at reasonable volume? Probably not. But the guy is an S-tier athlete with huge dimensions, can run creation playtypes at efficiency, and he’s an elite stocker with strong passing and rebounding. There is a small (and improbable) chance that Swain could check every single meaningful “trait” box and parlay that into stardom, particularly if he shoots (and as I outlined before, higher volume shooting isn’t as unlikely as you may think).

In an expected value paradigm (probability x value), a miscellany of small probability x high upside avenues can aggregate towards a sneaky-high expected value. It is difficult for me to project the specifics of Swain’s development curve, but I feel that his expected value is somewhere in the tier of a real deal NBA player. Let’s see if ancillary production and trait-maxxing can manifest in legitimate impact.

The post Show Me a Prospect: Dailyn Swain appeared first on Swish Theory.

Offense

At a glance, the statistical case for Aday Mara is a fairly straightforward one to make, small sample size notwithstanding; Mara was virtually unassailable across all impact metrics and possession-adjusted statistics.

Despite the stellar analytical resume, I definitely have some consternation towards Mara’s offensive projection. Per Bart Torvik, since 2010 there have been 515 seasons of players labeled as ‘Centers’ in their database who also played in the NBA. The average rim finishing of this ‘Center’ group is 70.9%. Mara doesn’t fall short of this threshold at all — as I write this on 11/8, Mara sits at 69.7% at the rim for his career (76/109). However, further examination of past centers’ touch profile would reveal another unofficial benchmark Mara has fallen short of. Since the summer of 2023, Mara has only finished 56.7% on layups (48/86) in all competitions. As insignificant as this number may sound, underwhelming rim efficiency paired with limited mobility is a fairly airtight method for determining whether bigs are NBA caliber or not.

While the value of queries in draft projections can and will be heavily contested by others, yielding a list of almost exclusively NBA also-rans with so few parameters should sound a major alarm in any evaluation. But in Mara’s case, there are a few contextually-rooted reasons for optimism. This past season, 42% (8/19) of Mara’s missed layups were on putback attempts. In designed offense (PNR Roll-Man and Post-ups), Mara was actually very effective, continuing the trend of improvement from the past few years.

Mara’s enhanced ability as a roller was evident throughout this past season. Mara made significant strides as a screener in addition to improving his patience on the catch. Compare the clips below, for example. The first clip is from a pre-conference game versus Arizona, and the second is from a mid-season conference matchup with Wisconsin. In both clips, UCLA runs a variation of ‘Spain Leak’ versus hedging defenses. And with the hedging coverage forcing the backline defenders to tag the roller early, Mara’s footwork and awareness after the catch are placed under duress. In the first clip, Mara is rushed by the speed of the help rotations, shuffles his feet, and logs a turnover. However, in the second clip Mara up-fakes, nimbly pirouettes around the recovering Nolan Winter, and creates a window for an emphatic finish.

Mara’s improvements as a play finisher and opportunistic scorer materializing within the 2024-25 UCLA team context is nothing short of astounding, considering the restrictions within the environment. In an attempt to streamline my analysis (and perhaps avoid a few query-incited eyerolls), I created a composite metric to describe the quality of an NCAA team’s finishing environment using a variety of team metrics and adjusted for year and position. The rating is called a ‘Context Quality Score’, and I will hopefully write something detailing the methodology in the near future.

In Aday’s case, he played in one of the least-friendly finishing contexts in my entire database which dates back to 2010. The 24-25 iteration of UCLA posted a -61.9 Context Quality Score, which falls in the 27th percentile for all players 6’10 and taller in Bart Torvik’s database. Amongst NBA players who came through the NCAA pipeline, this CQS is in the 21st percentile. UCLA played an extremely half-court heavy style with minimal shooting or passing talent. Mara’s inefficiencies were exacerbated by the fact that he was used as the fulcrum of the Bruins’ offense in his minutes. And while playing in an unfriendly environment doesn’t totally excuse Mara’s finishing, referencing the players who were similarly underwhelming at the rim in bad contexts reveals the path to success for Mara.

Cody Zeller and Steven Adams were the only two players 7-feet or taller who played for teams with 30th percentile or worse Context Quality Scores, finished below average for their position, AND still managed to log more than 3000 minutes. Both players have been career positives and certainly in Zeller’s case, an underrated player despite underperforming relative to his draft slot.

Looking at each player’s scoring output in the pros confirms their issues at the rim did persist, even though Zeller had some years of Kemba Walker-induced positive true shooting influence. Both Adams and Zeller possess negative playtype weighted rTS% (-2.4 and -1.4, respectively). However, both were highly impactful players in a manner I see Aday Mara capable of replicating at the next level, with elite contributions to the possession battle.

The highlighted column above is these players’ possession rank, which consists of their impact on team possessions in terms of net rating. While Zeller and Adams differ in their turnover influence, when it comes to rebounding, both are undeniable positives relative to position. This is where Mara should be able to establish himself amongst the league’s best. In the 2024-25 season, Mara posted a 20.5% total rebounding rate, 94th percentile for all players 6’10 or taller in Bart Torvik’s database. Mara’s presence on the offensive glass places a great deal of pressure on defenses, as even in limited minutes, Mara managed to get opposing bigs into foul trouble.

In the clips above, Mara’s effect on rival frontcourt players is apparent. Any lapse from the opponent, taking them out of position, makes securing a rebound virtually impossible. Mara’s size and consistent hands make early boxouts mandatory from opposing bigs, and when they fail to do so, often times their desperation to prevent easy second-chance points leads to fouls. Albeit in a small sample (555 possessions), UCLA’s free-throw rate with Mara on the floor is 32.3, good for 193rd in the country. In the 1157 possessions without Mara, UCLA posted a free-throw rate of 29.8, which would have been 275th in the country.

For as unambiguously encouraging as Mara’s rebounding translation is, turnover generation is a much more tenuous discussion. Generally, jumbo-sized NBA big men do not have positive defensive turnover value. My theory on the cause is the reliance on drop-coverage and the predictability of help rotations as a result. At the collegiate level, though, turnover generation can be a useful proxy for mobility and processing, and it’s here where Mara really falters historically.

Falling under 1% steal rate isn’t necessarily the kiss of death for Mara and his career 0.7% steal rate, but for a player who I expect to be a limited scorer because of the aforementioned touch issues, Mara’s defensive outlook needs to be clearer. If you compare him with the success cases in the query above, his scoring acumen falls well short. Similar to the offensive end, though, there are schematic factors that may have kept Mara out of the passing lanes and suppressed his steal count.

Over the 420 minutes Aday Mara played across three separate FIBA events, his steal rate never dipped below 1%, which stoked my curiosity as to what could’ve been behind his precipitous decline at UCLA. Obviously, it’s easier to accrue steals versus similar-aged competition than in the NCAA, but beyond this, there was a stark contrast between Mara’s defensive deployment at UCLA and any other team he’d been on.

UCLA Coach Mick Cronin is known for his defensive aptitude, and in the past has described his defensive philosophy as being rooted in generating turnovers, preventing layups, and above all else, not fouling. The first and last tenants seem somewhat contradictory; however, Cronin-led teams’ statistical resume shows he’s been near the bottom of the country in foul rate and two-foul participation (the percentage of time that a starter with two fouls in the first half has been allowed to play) and an above-average turnover rate team for most of his tenure.

Cronin has cultivated this defensive identity by deploying an aggressive switching scheme with bigs typically playing at the level of the screen. Cronin has aligned his personnel with this defensive philosophy by sacrificing size in his big men in favor of length and mobility. Since 2008, Cronin has only had two players 6’11 or taller play over a 30% minutes share: Nysier Brooks and Aday Mara. This is because of how taxing his style of defense is on bigs specifically. Take the clip below, for example. Mara has to hedge two separate ballscreens, and in the process is forced to cover a great deal of ground before having to fight through a pin-in screen to close out to a shooter.

Cronin’s defensive style is evident in their playtype frequency as well; they are consistently near the top of the country in percent of possessions spent guarding isolations and committing multiple defenders to ballscreens.

Of course, there are many ways to build a good defense ,as Cronin has exhibited. But it is defense-inconducive to larger players like Mara. An aggressive defense regularly tasking bigs with guarding on the perimeter, stopping drives, and demanding they do so without fouling, is going to be difficult for any 7-footer to perform. At times, Mara proved to be no exception to this.

But this is where Mara’s transfer to Michigan should prove to be a boon. Michigan head coach Dusty May has primarily run a drop defense, and in Michigan’s first exhibition, this is how Mara was utilized. Obviously, it is too early to tell if this schematic shift on its own will be enough to boost Mara’s steal rate to an acceptable level. My prediction would be that Mara’s absurd block rate slightly declines as his minutes increase and he is tasked with a more static role in PNR coverage. But, playing more inside the arc, Mara will be able to get his hands on more interior passes, as he had in international settings.

Circling back to an earlier query I’d referenced to highlight Mara’s touch concerns, even though I anticipate Mara putting together a season this year which would elevate him outside of this group, this query is instructive in determining what is appropriate risk to take when drafting big.

The only player here to play a meaningful number of NBA minutes is Luke Kornet, who uncoincidentally has comfortably the best assist-to-turnover ratio of the group. Even with their playmaking duties being considerably lower than other positions, centers’ cognition cannot be dismissed. If anything, metrics like assist-to-turnover may be more useful gauges of feel for bigs because their roles are more standardized than other positions. And for Aday Mara, who was given more playmaking responsibility than most bigs (90th percentile in Offensive Load for players 6’10 or taller) and maintained an A:TO of 1.21 (95th percentile for players 6’10 or taller) the currently available data indicates he may be an outlier when it comes to big man processing power.

All of this is to say Mara’s feel for the game eases many of my concerns with his defensive translatability and finishing. Any study on jumbo-sized bigs like Aday Mara will be limited because of the shallower pool of comparable prospects. But, to date, Mara has cleared the largest hurdles for center prospects; His rim-protection, passing, and two-way rebounding are all in line with successful NBA centers of the past. Checking these three boxes alone greatly shrinks Mara’s range of possible outcomes, and even if his rim-finishing issues aren’t resolved, there are past cases of ineffective scorers at Mara’s size becoming NBA mainstays. Zydrunas Ilgauskas has played the most minutes this century of any player listed 7’3 or taller, and was above league average rim field goal percentage only once in his career! In fact, if I were to make a comparison for Mara it would be Big Z, a player impact metrics consistently rated near the top 150 players in the league, despite being a negative scoring influence on offense.

Ultimately, the floor seldom seems to fall out for prospects, and considering how valuable a super-sized big can be, there’s a case to be made that these players are worth taking based on scarcity alone. Many of the recent ‘busts’ at this size aren’t unambiguous failures relative to expectations. Even though they fell short of the previously outlined feel thresholds, Tacko Fall and Walter ‘Edy’ Tavares have plausible NBA cases today. Fall has been consistently productive internationally and in the G League, while Tavares has been in the top 20 of PER in the ACB since he arrived in the league eight years ago.

Aday Mara is not without his flaws, and the offensive production Mara provides will be heavily dependent on his offensive rebounding and turnover aversion. Understandably, this elevator pitch may not be the most appealing within the lottery range, and any analysis rooted in statistical precedent can be tenuous with how friendly impact metrics can be towards centers. However, simply put, players of Mara’s size should be given the benefit of the doubt considering how outsized returns can be, and how their developmental trajectories seem to be the most reliably constant relative to other position groups. A theme of NBA prospect development seems to be that bigs are given up on too early: the nomadic early careers of Ivica Zubac and Isaiah Hartenstein immediately come to mind. Attitudes towards bigs have changed since then, and if Aday Mara continues on this trajectory, he should not slip through the cracks like his predecessors.

The post NBA Prospect Preview: Aday Mara appeared first on Swish Theory.

The draft model All-American team is comprised of the highest-rated NCAA players at each position according to my DMX model who are not currently listed on mock drafts at ESPN or NBADraft.net. For more background on the model and the xVORP metric, check out this explainer. 

Guards

Tyler Tanner / PG / Vanderbilt
HT: 6’0″
xVORP: .341

As a freshman at Vanderbilt, Tyler Tanner went his first 15 games (313 minutes played) before committing his first career turnover, compiling 31 assists and 35 steals over that span. Tanner finished the season with an impressive but of-this-earth 4:1 assist-to-turnover ratio, which, along with his 3.2 steals per 40 minutes and 60% 2pt% as an 18-year-old in the SEC, makes him one of the model’s favorite returners in 2026. On the downside, Tanner is listed at just 6’0” and is very limited as a scorer, posting a measly 11 points per 40 to go along with a poor 3-point percentage, 3-point rate, and free throw rate. It could be argued that Tanner is more of a statistical anomaly than an NBA draft prospect, but with some improvement offensively—a real possibility given his age —his outlier abilities could be worth taking a shot on.

Markus Burton / PG / Notre Dame
HT: 6’0″
xVORP: .171

Markus Burton was one of college basketball’s most productive underclassmen over the last two seasons, but generated little draft buzz due to being 6-feet tall with questionable point guard skills. As this is a list of unranked prospects, it makes sense that some of these players have an obvious flaw to explain the disconnect between the model and scouting consensus, and in the case of Burton and Tanner, it is that they are short kings. While the model does factor in height, it still sees Burton as an above-replacement NBA player because the young man is a bucket. As a sophomore, Burton led all high-major NCAA players in usage rate, and his career 22.2 ppg is tied with draft model darling Bennett Stirtz for the most in my database of over 700 draft-eligible players. His mega usage comes alongside an ugly 48% career eFG%, though he supplements his efficiency by getting to the line and converting 83.5% of his free throws. Burton’s development towards becoming a more efficient offensive engine could determine whether he is a future pro or just a fun college guard. 

Forwards

Alvaro Folgueiras / PF / Iowa
HT: 6’9″
xVORP: .334

Since DMX is a “one-size-fits-all” model that is trying to account for a wide variety of player prototypes, it benefits versatile players with an intersection of skills that are typically inversely related, i.e. rebounds and assists, or steals and blocks. This brings us to Alvaro Folgueiras, whose breakout sophomore campaign in 2025 was broadly strong statistically (his 8.3 Box Plus-Minus was top 10 among high-minute sophomores), but, more specifically, he was good at everything that the model values. Folgueiras combines rebounding (12.3 per 40) and passing (4.3 assists per 40, 1.4 A:TO), steals (1.9 per 40) and blocks (1.6 per 40), 3-point shooting (41.3% on 4.2 3PA/40) to go along with 2-point efficiency (61.6%) and free throw shooting (78.4%). Folgueiras did all of this as a 20-year-old and is actually a normal height for a power forward prospect at 6’9”. The only drawback is that he played at Robert Morris and did most of his damage against Quad 3 and 4 NCAA opponents, but we should have a clearer picture this year as Folgueiras will have the chance to test his skills against Big Ten competition. 

Robert Miller III / PF / LSU
HT: 6’10″
xVORP: .244

From Robert Morris to Robert Miller, who flew below the radar as an efficient young freshman in the SEC. Miller’s box score production was modest, and he was not especially impactful, logging only 500 minutes for the 14-18 LSU Tigers, but he has enough positive statistical indicators (72.8 2P%, 1.2 A:TO) to go along with broader attributes like youth, size, and strength of schedule to project well in the model. Miller emerged throughout his freshman season, and, if he continues on that trajectory, could enter draft conversations with a breakout sophomore year.

Center

Amael L’Etang / C / Dayton
HT: 7’1″
xVORP: .101

The case for Amael L’Etang is relatively straightforward: skilled 7-footers don’t grow on trees. As a freshman at Dayton, L’Etang started the team’s final 15 games and posted solid all-around stats, most notably dishing out 3 assists per 40 minutes to only 2.5 turnovers, a rare feat for a young 7-footer. The towering Frenchman also flashed shooting potential, trying 4.7 3-pointers per 40 and connecting on 34% of them. Though slight in frame, players who look like L’Etang in terms of height, production, and versatility are all but guaranteed to get looks at the next level, and should probably be on draft boards, too.

The post 2026 Draft Model All-Americans appeared first on Swish Theory.

A strong freshman season with notable statistics offers an encouraging rubric of sorts. As a lower-usage wing (16% usage rate), Riley still managed to get to the foul line at a solid clip (1.3 shooting fouls drawn per 40 minutes) and shot efficiently inside the arc (61.3 2P%), proving to be a key piece of San Francisco’s offense while flashing game-changing potential on defense.

According to the RAPM (Regularized Adjusted Plus/Minus) metric from CBB Analytics, which measures on-court impact without relying on individual box score stats, Riley ranked in the 98th percentile nationally (5.8). He also finished in the WCC Top 20 in Evan Miya’s BPR metric, ranking second among rookies behind only Mikey Lewis of Saint Mary’s.

Going back to the 2007-08 season, only seven Division I freshmen have shot better than 60 percent on 2-point attempts while recording 25 or more dunks and attempting at least five 3-pointers per 100 possessions. Riley cleared all those benchmarks last season, including 35 dunks and 5.4 3-point attempts per 100 possessions, joining a list that includes five first-round picks since the 2018 Draft: Mikal Bridges, Lonzo Ball, Chet Holmgren, Noah Clowney and Asa Newell.

However, a new challenge awaits Riley this season. With significant roster turnover, he steps into a larger role with plenty to prove, including a claim as a top mid-major prospect. How will he explore the studio space on offense? Can he elevate his game even further on defense? Before projecting ahead, let’s rewind and take a closer look at what Riley showed on film last season.

Team Defense & Athleticism

At 6-foot-6 and 200 pounds, Riley is on the lean side, but there’s some strength to his game and shows it when battling for rebounds and finishing cuts around the basket. With his long frame, he has the potential to add muscle and get even stronger, while his ranginess contributes significantly to his defensive upside.

Riley is a consistent contributor on the glass, posting a defensive rebound rate of 16.9 percent. During WCC play, that number dipped slightly to 16.6 percent, still good for the Top 20 in the conference. He also shows excellent range as a rebounder, routinely securing contested boards. According to CBB Analytics, Riley averaged 5.0 rebounds per 40 minutes on missed field goals (excluding free throws), the highest among USF’s rotation players and ranking in the 92nd percentile nationally.

There’s some dissonance that comes with evaluating Riley. He wasn’t a stocks machine as a freshman, which is a bit of a surprise. His steals and blocks numbers — 2.4 percent steal rate and 1.4 percent block rate — aren’t bad, but they seem to undersell his potential as an event creator, especially around the basket. He has a good sense for when to rotate to the rim as a back-line protector, and he displays positive defensive interior principles, including two-handed verticality.

Add in his straight-line speed and springy leaping ability, and Riley can cover a lot of ground while making an impact around the basket.

In this sequence, Santa Clara runs a 5-out action with a slot handoff between center Christoph Tilly (now at Ohio State) and wing Adama Bal. The 6-foot-7 Bal turns the corner on Thomas; with the center pulled away, there’s no immediate rim protection. Bal’s drive for an easy layup is thwarted, however, as Riley rotates from the weak-side corner, reaches the opposite side of the basket and pins the would-be high-percentage shot on the glass.

Even when Riley makes a misstep and must snap into Recovery Mode, he has the length and short-area quickness to get back into the action and make a play.

Factor in more experience, added strength and extra film study, it’s reasonable to expect Riley to surpass 12 blocks this season. The flashes are certainly there in terms of his upside as a defensive playmaker.

Further away from the hoop, Riley can be a disruptive presence as a closeout defender. While he doesn’t always perfectly contain catch-and-go drives, when he fully commits on a closeout, he can turn seemingly wide-open catch-and-shoot opportunities into contested, less comfortable shots.

Riley is at his most advanced defensively when operating as a gap defender — whether zoning up to limit the offense’s advantage or acting as a deterrent in driving and passing lanes.

On this possession, Riley ideally would have his arms out wide, creating a larger presence in the gap as he helps on Tully’s short roll, stunting down from the left wing. But when Tully tries to kick out to Tyeree Bryan (now at Texas Tech), Riley flashes his anticipation and quickness, jumping into the passing lane for a pick-six steal and score.

Initially on this screen-roll possession against Saint Louis, Riley starts gapped up on the backside. As the ball handler approaches, he shifts into a denial stance in the passing lane, with his assignment positioned in the strong-side corner. When Isaiah Swope tries to kick out to a relocating teammate on the wing, Riley is all over it, smothering the passing lane and deflecting the ball for another scoop-and-score.

Riley’s ability to create turnovers is a key part of his transition game, another standout feature of his skill set. According to CBB Analytics, 21.2 percent of his field goal attempts came in transition (90th percentile), where he shot 66.7 percent on 2-point attempts (63rd percentile).

Trailing in the second half of a one-possession game, San Francisco’s transition defense faces a dangerous situation: imbalanced and with no real rim protection in place as Gonzaga’s vaunted fast break races down the court. The Bulldogs have everything they want: Ryan Nembhard, an NBA-caliber point guard, pushing the pace as Graham Ike (61.8 2P%) runs the rim. Riley, however, disrupts the play entirely — establishing the point of attack on Nembhard, then snapping into the passing lane to deflect the ball and create a turnover.

Making a Point

While Riley showed that he has the ability to be a game-wrecker in gaps and on the back-side of the defense, USF will also use him as an on-ball matchup piece — putting Riley on the toughest opposing perimeter option, including lead guard creators. Due to his length, Riley can be a nuisance here for opposing ball handlers, using his arms and hands to apply pressure or contests in rearview pursuit.

Riley doesn’t have the most fluid of hips, though, and he can struggle to navigate screens with precision. This tendency causes him to lose touch with his defensive assignment, and when that happens Riley doesn’t always take the most efficient path back to the ball. This caused issues for Riley and occasionally resulted in points or fouls.

Defending against Gonzaga, Riley is set up to “weak” this ball screen and push Ryan Nembhard to drive with his weaker left hand. The initial setup is fine, but Riley gets buried on the other side of Graham Ike’s pick. This gives Nembhard a lane to drive and effectively shields Riley from getting back to the ball, which results in a lightly contested jumper for a pretty good shooter.

Out in space along the perimeter, opposing ball handlers attacked Riley’s feet with crossovers and quick first steps, leaving Riley in the dust and reducing his length advantage. For example: LeJuan Watts (now at Texas Tech) is a really nice player — with good size, skill and finishing ability — but this is too easy as Riley loses leverage and gives up a straight-line drive to the rim.

Does the jumper make a leap?

Stating the obvious: the biggest swing skill for Riley will be his 3-point jumper. Regardless of archetype — whether Riley goes the route of 3-and-D wing or two-way guard with some creation abilities — he’ll need to establish a solid base with his perimeter shot.

As a freshman, Riley shot 32.6 percent from 3-point range (29-of-89 3PA) against Division I opponents. Including USF’s December 2024 win over Cal State Stanislaus — when he went 0-of-1 from beyond the arc — he finished 29-of-90 from deep (32.2 3P%), with 38 percent of his total field-goal attempts coming from 3-point land.

Riley’s shot versatility will be something to monitor this season, too. With an expanded role and another year of development, Riley could show more off-platform shooting. Riley doesn’t need to immediately become an electric shot-maker, but some more simple forms of movement shooting — curling down screens, running off flares or dribble-handoffs in USF’s offense — would be significant.

The in-between wasn’t a strong suit. Riley was just 5-of-20 on 2-point attempts from outside the lane, accounting for just 8.7 percent of his total field goal attempts, per CBB Analytics. Moreover, Riley made just two unassisted 3-pointers last season, which means that 93.1 percent of his triples were assisted, ranking in the 31st percentile nationally.

In terms of his touch indicators, it’s a bit murky as well. Riley can hit a floater, though the process isn’t super fluid. Riley made 73.5 percent of his free throw attempts last season. That’s not a red flag percentage, but it doesn’t necessarily imply some underlying touch trait — at least at this stage.

There’s also a range factor to keep an eye on. Riley shot just 27.9 percent on NBA-range 3-pointers (19-of-68 3PA) last season, per CBB Analytics. Riley’s jumper features a slight dip during the gather phase, which prices in a little more load time to his shot. It’s not glaring, though, and he still displays a high release, along with good wrist snap and a consistent base. Overall, it’s a repeatable process.

San Francisco starts this possession with Riley cutting left to right across the Iverson screens. From there, the Dons look set run Malik Thomas (now at Virginia) off a staggered down screen out of the right corner. This, however, is fluff, designed to occupy the weak-side defenders. Carlton Linguard will spin opposite and look to find Riley on a backdoor cut. When the basket cuts gets covered up, Riley quickly relocates back to the corner and drills a movement 3-pointer over a closeout from the 6-foot-7 Nate Kingz (now at Syracuse).

With another offseason of work, there’s hope that he can both increase his 3-point volume and efficiency. A more streamlined release would go a long way for his approach. If he continues to improve his footwork and shot prep, it’ll also lead to more comfort with off-screen opportunities from deep.

CUT EM IN

This might feel a bit like a cliche, given how often it comes up when evaluating lower-usage wings with questions about their shot or handle, but Riley is an impactful cutter. Whether within the structure of USF’s offense, in random flow or simply by taking what the defense gives him, Riley can serve as a pressure point on the rim in the half court through his movement.

Against Washington State, the Dons run an empty-side pick-and-roll late in the shot clock, with Riley stationed in the weak-side corner. As Ryan Beasley drives into the paint, the low man helps off Riley to contain the ball, leaving Riley with a choice: stay put in the corner and wait for a kick-out, or get moving. Sensing the opportunity, Riley slides along the baseline to open up a passing window for Beasley, who finds him for an easy finish at the rim.

On this possession against Santa Clara, the strong-side corner isn’t emptied out, but it’s another ball screen action in the right third of the floor — with Riley tucked into the weak-side corner. As Marcus Williams turns the corner and pulls in the low-man defender, Riley trails with another cut along the baseline, resulting in a lob dunk.

Clemson puts two on the ball in this middle pick-and-roll action from Beasley, which he attacks by splitting downhill. Beasley’s drives sucks in help defenders and, once more, Riley takes advantage — cutting down the baseline for a lob finish, which he dunks over the 6-foot-11 Viktor Lakhin.

To start this 5-out possession, Riley and Thomas perform a little exchange on the right side of the floor: Riley lifts from the corner to the wing while Thomas cuts down to the corner. As Linguard receives the pass atop the key, Riley remains in motion with a 45-degree cut into the teeth of the defense. Like a tight end running a slant over the middle and finding a seam in the defense, Riley snags the pass in traffic — between two layers of defenders — and is light off his feet for a quick finish.

Scaling Up?

Playing next to veteran guards Malik Thomas (28.7 percent usage) and Marcus Williams (25 percent usage), Riley mostly functioned on offense as an efficient spot-up wing and cutter with limited on-ball responsibilities: 59.5 percent true shooting, 16.2 percent usage rate and 6.6 percent assist rate. When Riley played with both Thomas and Williams at the same time (459 minutes), according to CBB Analytics, he posted a usage rate and assist rate of 15.4 percent and 6.5 percent, respectively. 

In a limited sample sans both Thomas and Williams (61 minutes), Riley’s assist rate jumped to 12.1 percent while his usage hovered at 16 percent.

Regardless of how you slice his minutes from last season, one of the biggest topics to address, for both USF and Riley’s pro development, will be his ability to scale up as an on-ball creator. Riley had moments of connective playmaking last season, making good decision with the ball. There were flashes of slashing ability, too, out of the occasional ball screen or dribble handoff.

It’s partly a byproduct of his role, but 60.9 percent of Riley’s 2-pointers were assisted last season — a rate closer to that of a center. That said, there’s some subtle wiggle to his work as a driver. With his long strides and a little bit of shiftiness, Riley can slink his way into the paint and make stuff happen.

He’s reliant on driving to his left hand, but his high release point allows him to finish over length when contested, including this tough runner over Nolan Hickman and Ike. The high release is a crucial feature for Riley. In lieu of creating big separation with his handle, Riley should be able to shoot over his fair share of perimeter defenders.

He showed some fun shot-making flashes last season, including this effort while working against a switch. Riley gets a little added space when Ike’s left foot lands on his right, causing the big fella to momentarily lose his balance. However, Riley takes advantage of the space, stepping back and going right into his gather for a beautiful high-arching 3-ball.

Thanks to his height and length, Riley can make passes over the top of the defense, making him a tricky initiator to guard in inverted ball screen actions. If a smaller defender shows or hedges in his direction, Riley can simply deliver an outlet pass over the coverage.

On some of his drives, he’s shown quality coordination and awareness as a passer — absorbing contact, drawing a second defender and finding the open teammate.

Riley isn’t the most accurate passer, nor does he always make sound decisions with the ball — at least not yet. He’ll force skip passes that turn into easy interceptions for weak-side defenders or overthrow cutting teammates. Riley’s assist-to-turnover ratio against all opponents (34 games) was just 34-to-33 — or 1.03-to-1 — and he created only 17.4 points per 40 minutes (31st percentile).

Again, some of that has to come with his role and usage last season. He’ll have more opportunities as a sophomore, though that’ll likely come with more defensive attention and game planning pointed in his direction. As such, Riley will need to handle contact better and get more comfortable passing on the move, especially going to his right or when forced to pick up his dribble.

Putting It All Together

At the risk of placing Riley into a box — with just one season of college hoops under his belt — I’m more bullish on his ability to find traction as a prospect in the 3-and-D capacity: defend multiple positions, cause havoc as a help defender, avoid turnovers on offense, move without the ball as a cutter and hit open 3-pointers.

That doesn’t mean there isn’t another gear for Riley to hit offensively. There are obvious growth areas, and he’s shown flashes of impactful scoring from the wing, with some self-created offense. If he’s able to scale up his on-ball opportunities, drill a few more 3-pointers and continue to provide punch as a help defender, Riley forms the outline of a prospect that can translate to the NBA and stick in rotations for a long time.

Defense, positional size and efficient scoring, with room for growth. There’s work to be done, but the archetype is there for Tyrone Riley.

The post Sophomore Spotlight: Is Tyrone Riley ready to make The Leap? appeared first on Swish Theory.