Welcome to my inaugural draft breakdown post, beginning with arguably my favorite player in this draft class: Santa Clara’s Jalen Williams. Tons of people became familiar with Williams during the pre-draft process and throughout the combine, but his tape at Santa Clara goes overlooked, despite some real flashes.
Williams is a 6-foot-6, 210-pound wing with three collegiate seasons under his belt. Having just turned 21 in April, Williams’ trajectory is fascinating, considering just how much he improved in each season. In his junior season, Williams averaged 18 points, 4.4 rebounds, 4.2 assists and 1.7 stocks per game on 51.3/39.6/80.9 splits, registering a 60.1 true-shooting percentage that ranked higher than players like Ohio State’s E.J. Liddell.
Another point of interest for Jalen Williams is his whopping 7-foot-2 wingspan, which is greater than that of Nikola Jovic, who is over five inches taller than Williams. The eight-and-a-half-inch difference between height and wingspan puts Williams in the top 1% of players in this class and gives him the perfect physical toolset to truly guard every position in a pinch.
Williams’ strengths start with passing, and I can’t emphasize enough how strong he is in that regard. In a weak passing draft class where the best passer is a big man (Paolo Banchero), Williams has a legitimate claim to be one of the top five passers in the class. Williams is fantastic at go-ahead passes and is especially dynamic at finding players in transition. Running plays for Williams works wonders as he is a strong passer in dribble handoff and pick-and-roll situations.
Williams is a truly dynamic passer and one of the best wing passers I’ve ever evaluated. His 7-foot-2 wingspan makes his extremely difficult passes flow with ease and it allows him to hunt for passes over the top of larger defenders. When faced with bigs down the middle, Williams routinely passes over the top of them and finds teammates with ease. Some detractors of the WCC will claim that the talent level works against him, as it does with players like Gonzaga’s Chet Holmgren, but there are two arguments against this for Williams. For one, passing over the top of 6-foot-11 or 7-foot bigs is impressive regardless of the conference, considering every big is bound to have a standing reach between 9 and 10 feet. Secondly, the WCC saw its greatest strength of schedule in years, with five teams finishing in the top 76 of the KenPom rankings.
Something else Williams excels at in the passing game is finding the catch radius of bigs for lobs. When comparing the point guard position to the quarterback position in football, Williams is a perfect case study. Even when working with more athletically limited teammates, Williams still put the ball in the perfect spot for them to make the play, finding just the right window for the pass. In the 2021-22 season, we continually saw Nikola Jokic and Chris Paul show up on SportsCenter’s top-10 plays for spectacular passes. Interior passes, finding cutters, bounce passes, no-look passes, finding shooters you name it, Williams has tape for it all. When I was watching Williams’ tape, it looked like his bounce passes were fast-forwarded. It’s truly unfair for opposing defenses.
The 6-foot-6 wing is also just a smart player. When we look at some of his other strengths, particularly on the defensive end, you’ll notice that half of his skills come from his ability to read offenses and defenses alike and put himself in the right position to make plays. For some of the more raw guys in this class like Caleb Houstan, Blake Wesley, Max Christie or John Butler Jr., this isn’t a given. Coaches will appreciate Williams’ attention to detail and it will make him a particularly intriguing candidate for contenders to trade up for.
As for shooting, Williams is also exceptional, especially considering his wingspan. I noted earlier that he shot just under 40% from deep on over three attempts per game, but that doesn’t do him enough justice. Williams shot 48% on catch-and-shoot situations this year, a truly elite mark. He’s quick to load up his shot and his form isn’t the prettiest I’ve seen but it gets the job done with enough of a sample size to show that it will translate to the league, further proven by his 81% free-throw rate which is usually a decent indicator of how a player’s three-point shot will fall at the next level. Williams is also a great off-movement three-point shooter, consistently knocking down shots with very limited time to get to his spot. With his handle, Williams flashed some ability to create shots off the dribble, though I wouldn’t consider this a given. Just a word of advice, don’t go under screens on Williams, he will punish you. Giving him enough space to hit the three, which we just talked about, or drive, is not a good idea.
It isn’t just threes though, Williams is a truly gifted three-level scorer. One of Williams’ go-to moves is the mid-range shot, and he is able to hit them over opposing defenders, off-balance or go for floaters. Consistently on the game film, Williams punished players for closing out, often going for a jam or a similarly easy score.
Of course with his wingspan, Williams is obviously great around the rim and driving, finishing at a high clip on such shots. Unlike some other players with large wingspans, Williams has the bulk to absorb contact and still finish the shot while getting called for a foul. We’ve seen plenty of that in the modern NBA from Jimmy Butler to Joel Embiid, players that can absorb contact are a hot commodity for teams.
Defensively, it’s pretty cut and dry when it comes to the Santa Clara product. Williams’ wingspan allows him to be pretty switchable, even though he’s not the strongest in that regard. Like Cade Cunningham, Williams is better at reading defenses and using that to his advantage than using quickness or great hand timing to help exploit opposing offenses. Williams’ weaknesses mostly come from the defensive end, where he isn’t good in space and isn’t a solid one-on-one defender.
Still, it’s clear that the strengths outweigh the weaknesses and I firmly believe that Williams’ strong combine puts him in rightful consideration for a lottery pick. For some players in this class, it’s hard to envision a role in the NBA for them, but that couldn’t be further from the case for Williams, who will have a clear trajectory as a bench playmaker and shooter that eventually transitions into a valuable wing starter once he comes around on the defensive end.