2018 NBA Prospect Report Part 2: Trae Young

Shooting

Trae Young has long been considered a potential NBA prospect, but his penchant for nuclear, Steph Curry-esque shooting performances from 25-plus feet is what now has him on everyone’s radar as a possible top-five pick.

He has cooled off since his white-hot start to the season, but his stroke off the dribble is still impressive. His quick trigger forces defenders to pick him up as soon as he crosses the halfcourt line, giving his teammates ample space to operate. All he needs is a ball screen and he can make offense happen.

Young generates 0.893 points per possession as a pick-and-roll ball handler, according to Synergy. That is good for the NCAA’s 73rd percentile. He takes a jumper off the dribble on 50 percent of those possessions, where he creates 1.133 points per possession.

Many of those come relatively early in the shot clock, or on a secondary break, like the bomb against TCU Horned Frogs above.

If his man does not fight around the screen hard enough, or if the big is too slow to defend at the level of the screen, Young punishes the defense with ease.

Of course, there is another side to this coin. His shot selection can be spotty, and many of his pull-ups are not good shots.

This shot against the Oklahoma State Cowboys look great if it goes in, but when it clanks off the rim, the viewer is left wondering why the team did not work harder for a better shot. At the NBA level, you typically only see this when a player like Curry is either frustrated or white-hot. Young had about five or six more of these ugly misses all within the first half. He dropped a career-high 48 in this game as his team lost in overtime.

So far, those shots have been the exception to the rule.

His 56.2 effective field goal percentage on pull-up jumpers would be comfortable in the NBA’s top three among players with at least three attempts per game, behind only Stephen Curry and Bogdan Bogdanovic.

Everyone is well-acquainted with his pull-up daggers, but his catch-and-shoot jumper is also an important part of his game, especially when projecting him to the NBA

There are some concerns here, as his poor conversion rate on guarded catch-and-shoot jumpers (33 percent) and mediocre efficiency on spot-ups (0.872 points per possessions) might raise red flags about his ability to deal with close-outs from NBA athletes. But the results have been good overall. He has a ridiculous 71.3 percent effective field goal percentage on catch-and-shoot jumpers and has shown some creativity attacking closeouts.

Young does not quite have the strength or touch around the rim to take it to the rack yet consistently (currently shooting 45 percent at the rim – a very poor mark). But here is an example from that same TCU game about how he still manages to use the threat of a drive to manipulate defenders.

He kicks the ball out, relocates to the corner and gets the ball back. He identifies the closeout arriving and uses a shot fake to coax the defender into over-committing.

The sloppy closeout allows Young to dribble behind the TCU player, get him going backwards then use a crossover to create space for a three-point jumper. It is still a tough shot, but it is one that Young can make because of his quick dribble-to-shot transition.

Still, gauging his potential as an off-ball shooting threat is difficult. He currently has only 17 total possessions coming off screens, and while his efficiency there is impressive (81.3 percent effective field goal percentage), it is still a small sample.

He usually has the ball in his hands and when he does not, he sometimes looks disengaged. This pattern shows up in the Synergy data, where he has cut on only six total possessions.

All too often, Young will kick it to a teammate and then back out of the way like the possession is over. Here is one example that ended up with an assist.

Ideally, you would like to see him at least relocate along the perimeter to force his defender to stay glued to him, rather than standing around, allowing him to help off, get into the paint and clog up the offense’s spacing.

But this habit is not unfixable. His quickness and otherworldly range should make it relatively easy for an NBA coach either to emphasize more movement and cutting when he is off-ball or to implement him into floppy or zipper sets as a shooting threat.

Here, Young catches the ball at the logo. He is far out enough, and the defense is slow enough, that he has time to turn, set his feet and have space to fire away. Take note of the pressure this applies to the defense, as multiple defenders try to close out on him, leaving at least one teammate open.

The release motion is fluid and the sheer depth of that shot will always make it difficult for teams to defend. But it remains to be seen whether Young can be effective running around screens with NBA defenders trailing and stunting. His low release point is cause for concern, and he clearly needs to make strides in terms of footwork and understanding how to turn, catch and fire with optimal quickness.

The Oklahoma Sooners run a baseline out-of-bounds play that involves Young inbounding the ball then receiving a screen on the low block to get him out to the corner. They run this play somewhat frequently and it provides a large portion of his off-ball shooting possessions.

Again, the stroke and overall catch-and-release motion looks fluid and projectable. But he will need to speed the motion up considering his low release point. It will be more difficult to get that shot off when the defenders are smarter, bigger and more athletic.

Trae Young’s ultra-deep pull-up shooting gravity is the most eye-catching part of his game. There have been few, if any, NCAA players to replicate his performance thus far in any capacity.

That said, when projecting him into the NBA, Young must expand his offensive game. His usage rate will decrease when he enters the league as a rookie, so he will have to prove he can consistently put pressure on defenses without the ball in his hands.

He needs to find ways to make a consistently positive impact without the ball, whether it is more freelance motion around the perimeter or better footwork running off screens. His pull-up bombs are jaw-dropping, but chances are, he won’t have the same green light in the NBA that he does at Oklahoma.