Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 149: 2023 Draft Profiles - An In-Depth Look at Jarace Walker

Episode Date: May 31, 2023

This episode takes an in-depth look at Houston's Jarace Walker, a polarizing prospect where the Pistons are concerned. 

Welcome back, everybody. You're listening to another episode of Drive Into the Basket. My name is Mike back here with Price again for yet another draft preview. Said it before, I'll say it once again. Price, always good to have you on here for these. I know. Thank you for having me. Absolutely, man. All right, so today we're going to go over a fairly polarizing prospect, and that is Jaris Walker out of the University of Houston. Now, one thing I want to get to before we get to Jarus Walker is that I've seen him conflate. with Isaiah Stewart quite a bit.

And just because they're both, I don't know, pretty big dudes with the same haircut. And I want to push back against that one. There are two different players. And Jeras has kind of gotten the reputation of a more athletic Isaiah Stewart, which is not accurate. They're very different in mentality, different in skill set. And he particular, in particular, seems to be getting all of the good of Isaiah's qualities. And Isaiah is some genuinely good qualities.

Yes. Yeah. So he has some stuff Isaiah does. the opposite is true to. I mean, I was saying this earlier today, but they're very different players. They have a similar build, and that's about where the similarities end. Jarris is overall just the more skilled basketball player, but Isaiah also has his strengths, too, that Jarris doesn't have, and they aren't one to one in very many respects,

other than being kind of smaller for their position. Yeah. So let's head, Najaris, 6'5. by MDA reckoning, 7.2.5 wing span, 248 pounds, about 19 and 3 quarters on draft night. With Houston, 11.7 rebounds, 2 assists, one block, one steel, on 465, 3566 splits, a pretty poor 53.5, really, 53.4%,

if we want to get super accurate, true shooting percentage. And with a really crappy shot profile. So attempted about 29.5% of his shots from the rim. Shot 67% there on a 55% assisted profile. And here comes the ugly part. 41% of his shots were mid-range jumpers. On knees, he shot 40%. Not good.

And then the additional 30% from three-point range, he shot about 35%, almost all of them assisted. So pretty strong strength and agility measurements at the combine overall, really in every category, particularly in a two-foot jump, doing an excuse me, max standing vertical, which is only really useful when you're talking about rebounding, but that's useful. So let's get on just to the physical pros, and this one is probably a little bit less obvious than all of the other players we have gone over. So where would you start in terms of his physical assets?

Yeah, this is the start of he, um, the, Jerez Walker is a very interesting player because he is very strong, very big bodied, yet I'm almost more intrigued by his ability to play in space and his quick feet than I am with his pure strength because he doesn't really utilize that. broad shoulders, tons of room to even add muscle. But at the same time, I'm not really enamored with how he utilizes that strength, all that much. And instead, I think he's more of a Twitchy type player. Yeah, I agree. He's got impressive athleticism for a player of his size. Twitchy is a good way of putting it. He moves fast.

You know, he's got a good top speed, good acceleration, good weeper, pretty bouncy. you know, the lateral movement, the agility. Yeah, he's a sneak, but I would say he's a sneaky good athlete. It's not sneaky. It's just surprising for a guy of his size. Right. If you're a Pistons fan, you're used to Isaiah Stewart not being the most explosive of players. And while I wouldn't characterize Jaris as a ultra elite, I think he's definitely in the average to above average range when it comes to twitchiness at the big position.

Yeah, he can cover a lot of ground in the interior, though. Yeah, he can do it very fast. Yeah, moving laterally and just exploding out there in terms of attacking closeouts, just roaming in the defensive end. You don't see as much on offense. But, you know, I'd say he's probably like a guy with like 75th percentile athleticism in the NBA, which is very respectable. His ability to just cover ground in the interior is, I think, maybe his most intriguing characteristic,

though he can definitely get up off of two feet as well. Yeah, not a great one-foot leaper, but two feet, he can explode upward and finish above the rim. Pretty good in transition from what I recall, a guy of his physical stature. But, you know, at the end of the day, he's not going to set the world on fire, but I don't think he's going to hold a team back with his athleticism. Yeah, I mean, I would put him as a genuinely good NBA athlete. I mean, I was pretty impressed, at least with his physical assets in that capacity. And I agree with you, he doesn't really use his strength.

We'll get to that later. But the fact that he's big, not easily moved and can jump really high off of two feet, makes him a pretty strong rebounder. And he's got a good wing span. Yeah, very good. That length. Yeah, that length is important. NBA is so much of a game of inches these days.

Yeah. So on the con side of things, I would start with just not the quickest hips, which is an issue. We'll get to later. And then his size at the position. It is most likely to be playing power forward. Maybe some small ball center as well. He's only, well, come at at six, seven in the NBA, which isn't bad size, but it's not great. Yeah, that's, he's the tweener type of break, where it's like he's not quite, Duren isn't even the, necessarily the, the, necessarily the, tallest center, but he more than makes up for it with the athleticism, strength, and sheer length that he plays at. Whereas Isaiah Stewart, and this is, you know, the last time I'm going to even compare, bring up Isaiah Stewart on this podcast, is in that tweener mold where he's very stout, big for his size, yet at the same time, not quite that traditional center profile while at the same time, a bit oversized for the general wing or big wing, power forward.

Slow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think even if he dropped weight, I think he'd still be slow. Isaiah is just not physically, in terms of his athleticism is not gifted, not explosive, not fast, not a good weber.

No. No, like 10th percentile probably in all those categories. Yeah. So just move on to the pros in the offense. I mean, I think probably the thing you have to start with, but Jaros Walker is the passing. Yeah, and that's going to be the key to his whole argument for even being an option in this range of the draft.

His basketball IQ in mind is very high, very good, soft-skill player. Really quite excellent when on dribble handoffs with like another, in a two-man action, he can pass up. out of that really well. So his vision that he plays at to me is going to be the main selling point, which is this is a guy who can scan the floor and actually be an option for moving the ball and not just a rudimentary way. He's going to be able to find the open man. He understands gravity really well. And I'm, I think there's something interesting, I think there's something interesting there on offense for whichever team drafts them. Yeah, completely agree with you on the IQ.

As a passer, he's got good vision. I mean, he's a good actual passer, you know, in terms of making the pass, good decision making a connective passer guy who can probably pass out of the short role when he's playing in the picking role. He sees the play, process. as quickly and makes good decisions. Not all guys even in the NBA can do that. It's just the ability to see ideally, well, for him, I think at least a large portion of the four and make that decision quickly, what you referred to as his processing speed. Yeah. So yeah, that's definitely going to be one of his defining characteristics. You know, going, you know, in no particular order. I think he's a guy who'd make a solid roll man in a vertical spacer. I mean, he gets up high off of two feet.

And, you know, it's a pretty strong finisher around the rim when it's created for him. Yeah. Should set mean screens, technically. You would hope. But the main strength, I think, is going to be what he can do in response to different looks that defenses throw him. He's reactive. And that's like a good thing in his case, because he's able to sort of adapt his plan very frequently. and it recognizes, okay, this is where the pressure's coming.

I can move here and get a better look for myself or I can pass out here. This is where the open man is. In general, I think that's going to be his mold as that point forward or not even just point forward, but just as a guy who can be that passing hub from the big position in a way that's non-trivial. Yeah.

I mean, this is kind of the thing you hope for from Duren as well. But there is like occasionally the rare guy. I mean, just going back real quickly to my talk about him serving as a role man, rare guy who you can get the ball in the midst of the role and might be able to make the right, you know, should be able to make the right pass, you know, even from that position, even off the dribble. So, you know, definitely, definitely a valuable quality. And strong cutter, low volume source of offense in the NBA. But, you know, useful.

Moves explosively in that respect. It can catch lobs, of course. I feel like pretty strong finisher on the basket again when somebody creates for him. Yeah. Yeah. You mentioned transition. He runs the floor really well. Yep.

Yeah. Has small ball potential upside. I think that's honestly the most interesting role for him is when a team decides to go super small. And he's able to do all of the things that he can on offense to, really be a mismatch in space against another team's big while at the same Steinbe. And we'll get to this too, being hopefully able to stretch the floor, that could be a pretty enticing utilization of his talents. Yeah. In terms of floor stretching, 34% on catch and shoot threes, not great, but 38% on unguarded catch and shoots, which is more encouraging.

And, you know, maybe some post-upside on hooks, though he tends to take them pretty far from the basket. We're going to talk about that very briefly. Yeah. So anything else to add to the list as far as his pros at the NBA level on offense? Yeah. Just to get into it on the shooting, it's kind of a mixed bag, and we definitely need to talk about that in the cons section too, but he seems pretty confident and comfortable when taking an open three feeling like he can do it. Yeah. And at the end of the day, if he's going to be playing five for long stretches, then that's a very good skill to have. Just a big who can take the open look is valuable.

Yeah, definitely the ability to pull the opposing center out to the three-point line is definitely very useful. So moving on to the cons on offense, we're both going to say the same thing. And this is a con as a result of which the more I watch tape, the more the west I liked him than almost the more I disliked him. He is painfully,

horribly contact diverse. This is another way I'm going to bring up Isaiah Stewart again. I'm going to bring up one more time after this. Isaiah Stewart, if you set him up at the baseline and you said, Isaiah, I want you to run the length of the floor and then run straight into the opposing center at full speed. You probably do it on every play. I mean, Isaiah is in the 100 percentile

as far as work ethic on the court and also team focus. He'll do whatever it takes to help. his team. One of those rare guys, I think, would happily take zero shots if he thought that was the best. If he was told, that was the best thing. Jarris Walker, like, horribly contact avoidant on offense. I mean, on defense, it's not as much of an issue, but like settles for bad jumpers, bad floaters, hooks for, you know, hooks from a distance. He'll even take floaters from near the basket. If there's anybody nearby, he stops for pull-ups, like eight feet from the basket.

He doesn't drive into contact. He won't use his. size and strength to get himself good opportunities around the basket. Yeah, it's just, it's awful to watch. Yeah, it's weird because he wants to get to the post, but not actually try to score from the post at all. He wants to pass out of it. And eventually teams are going to, they're going to key in on that and they're going to make him pay. And that's, I saw that happen way too much, and that's not even coming with the driving. If there's an open lane, he can drive in and score. And that's a pretty comfortable look for him.

But how often is that actually going to occur at the NBA level? Even, and we can talk about this, the Houston system was not super conducive to generating that for him. So one could argue that in high school, the, that in high school, the first. is a lot more encouraging with his driving ability that he actually was much more straight line, not trying to take these longer routes to the basket that avoided contact as much, but instead he would charge at people, run downhill, and hopefully create a look in high school. And the hope, I guess, would be that in a bigger spacing league,

And then the NCAA, he'll feel more comfortable with the type of looks he's going to get when he's driving that maybe he'll feel better about not taking really ridiculously terrible orders. I don't know. It's almost like watching Killian Hayes at times where it's like in a completely different body, three inches taller and much, much more built, just 50 pounds heavier. Yeah, right. stopping and and settling for a terrible floater or hookshot or bad jumper. Yeah.

Yeah. It's painful. It doesn't have. And this is the next con too is he doesn't have the pull-up shooting to make teams punish for going under on him. Yeah. At a sure. Yeah. The shooting is, I can't remember the stat.

It's ridiculously bad. Oh, I have it. Yeah. He's at 30% on pull-up twos. Yeah, also 34% on floaters. So, I mean, I see maybe where you're coming from at the high school level. Of course, guys like Jaros Walker are deities amongst men at the high school level. And I don't think it's a matter of comfort.

I mean, even when it comes to just clearing space out around the basket rather than just pulling up and taking a bad jumper, he won't do it. I think it's more of a matter of lack of willingness. And when it comes to just him driving, I mean, his touch is terribly shut like around 40% on half-court layups when he was attacking off the drive. Yeah, his mid-range jumpers and floaters, 35, excuse me, 30% on pull-up two, is 34% on floaters. He has that hook shot he likes, but he takes it like 15 feet from the basket because he, I don't know, maybe like 10 feet because he can't be bothered to try to back anybody down

and that's not going to fly in the NBA against much better, longer defenders. So, yeah, he's real bad at those shots and he loves to take him. He will not, you know, he will not attack through contact. He will not, like, okay, Isaiah Stewart again. Like, Isaiah will do whatever he can do his staff. position. He will back down anybody he can on mismatches. Even on mismatches, Jaris Walker will not try to push himself close to the basket. This is true. The guy is

painful to watch on offense. And it's like what what is going through your head? Like, why are you doing this? Yeah. It doesn't use that size of his. Like, it just hurts to watch. And it's going to be a massive weakness at the NBA level. Not only is it hamstring him as a scorer. But yeah, NBA teams are just going to give him enough, happily give him the rope to hang himself. Just take a bad shot. Here. Yeah. Take it. We're back off. Take a bad shot. You're welcome to do it. That is the key for so many NBA defenses is we know that we can't guard everything. So we have to just limit the damage to the low percentage areas. Obviously, offenses know that too. And they have counters designed to not be funneled that way. But when you have a player whose mismatches on film are so

obvious that even I can spot them that the NBA teams are going to see that and they're going to game plan like you're saying and just okay we'll give you all that space in the middle and sure you you might be able to pass out of it but what what can you do and we take away the pass two in addition to that yeah I mean unless he gets much much better at these mid-range jumpers but even then I mean he's he is locking himself out of a very important category of offense around the basket in particular. But the fact that he will even take these jumpers that he is horrendous at, and very few guys in the NBA can make these pull-up jumpers on volume. Very few. And I doubt Jarrah's is going to be one of them, particularly against harder defenders, much better defenders

in the NBA. Yeah. And just like, goodness gracious, the contact aversion is just so blatant. And again, I just don't get it. And it's not something you can count on him changing in the NBA. And we've seen that in the case of Killian Hayes, that's for sure. So major warning sign. That is definitely a huge area of concern about if he's going to be this guy who's using a lot of high IQ, high feel, he can really relocate the ball well, both on and off ball. Can he actually exploit that mismatch that's created for him when, say, Ivy or Cade breaks down the defense? Yeah. Oh, I can't wait.

You know, Cade is going to attack in a high pick and roll, you know, draw cover, draw double coverage, on his way to the basket, pass to Ivy, who's going to slash in, pass to Jaris, who's going to take a mid-range pull-up. It's going to be awesome. I can see it. I can see it. That's the crazy thing. Don't jump like that. Yeah, and if he's playing small ball center, he's not going to do anything to clear lanes around the basket. Yeah, that's an undervalued aspect of playing the small lineup is that you have to have a guy like Kevin Looney who can at least open up lanes to the basket. Yeah. Yeah. It's like this is something that just playing physically, you know, putting, putting your body on the line like that is something that is expected of NBA players, you know,

period. The fact, if he will not do it, it's a huge weakness. But Killian, it's like a shameful weakness. And it just severely impacts his game. And Jarris Walker, I mean, with the size and strength, what he should be able to do. Yeah. And the guy's just willing in the course of avoiding contact, to, you know, to attempt a bunch of really bad offense. And that is a huge red flag, too. So I don't remember who brought up this term But it's like you know your dog per 100 possessions Dog with a W you know Isaiah is like a hundred And Jarrah's on all events is more like I don't know like five

There it's it's weird I wonder if it's a There was a poor scheme fit at Houston I'd be shocked if that were it But that that's where where you would hopefully see that improve if you are a real big Jaris fan is that you take the offensive skill and then the defense hopefully or not defense the ability to sort of actually impact near the basket comes back in a different system. I don't know. How likely do you think that is? If I could give a percentage that would be accurate, I would have a very different job.

but I was more in on it when I was just thinking of him as a four. But when I revisited the tape again this week, I kind of came down on he's more of a tweener four or five. And his best utilization is probably as a five for big stretches of games. So in that way, I kind of. view it as this is going to lower my overall take on what he can do on offense, which is just not enough of the big things that you need to actually give him that utilization and let it be really effective because I don't believe in his ability to clear lanes to that extent that you're

talking about. Not even that. I mean, let's say you get him the ball 10 feet away from the basket. He should be able to use that strength to get himself closer and get a good opportunity around the rim, but he won't. He just doesn't do it. Or even just clear out space for him to receive a pass from the driver. Yeah. Yeah. So it really hurts. And for me, it's a huge red flag. Also, just something I strongly dislike in Killian that I strongly dislike in Jarus Walker. But, I mean, the thing about Killian is that it's not so much that he was not contact diverse in Eurocup. It's just that he was fast enough and big enough that he often didn't have to attack. through contact. He'd just get to the rim. But if he did get confronted, he would take a floater.

So even for him, yeah, it was there. So another thing, no creation as a score at the NCAA level, except for this. He is great at creating bad shots. He is awesome at creating low percentage shots. If you want to talk about creating, that's all he creates, aside from that odd, you know, hook out of the post. You know, he's not attacking off the drive. His mid-range jumpers suck. His floaters suck. he's not creating a offense around the basket. Yeah, that is all very apparent where the term zero level score might be thrown about because I'm not exactly sure how he scores effectively from anywhere except on the catch at three point line because he's not even very good at the free throw line either.

No, yeah, not at all. you know if you're going to even draw that that contact you'd hope to at least capitalize on the easy points but he's not even a reliable three point shooter which is pretty concerning and yeah i don't know i'm not as married to the idea that free throw percentage necessarily translates into NBA three point the same as like a linear thing but that if one number is really low it's very oftentimes an indicator for problems shooting elsewhere, especially at that standstill shooting, which is going to be the absolute minimum of offensive skill he'll need to play any starting role in the NBA, quite frankly.

Yeah, pretty much. I mean, you're not even going to throw him out there as your starting center, of course, because he's just too short. I mean, six, six and a half, he's giving up five inches to a lot of guys, and, you know, your length can only compensate so much. But yeah, uncertain future as a shooter, I agree. I think probably he'll be decent, but may never be good, may never be a guy you want shooting at volume

and not a guy you're going to really treat as a real catch-and-shoot threat on volume. You know, his shot, like you said, when he gets the ball, you know, he's confident shooting it. He had some bad bricks, though, like some actual bad bricks, which I consider to be another warning sign. But here's a guy who doesn't, he isn't there as a shooter yet, and there's no certainty that is necessarily going to get there.

And yeah, he needs to have that. And one of the key things to look at is how do teams defend him? They tend to sag off, which is a pretty big indicator that they're not afraid of the shot. I mean, they look at the numbers too. They see those pull-up numbers and they're going to give him all the space that he feels confident in. I mean, quite frankly, you wonder outside of being probably a pretty pretty, pretty good three-point shooter position. I think that he's not going to really be a threat to get defenses to collapse on his shot

without massive, and I mean massive improvements in that regard. Yeah, they don't have to worry about him attacking also. I mean, they can just, they can sag off, they can, you know, and defend on somebody else. They can, you know, his shot is slow, so if they're anywhere close, they can contest. And they don't have to worry about him driving past them for obvious reasons. Yeah, that's pretty much all I got to say about Jiris on offense. Yeah, well, I'd say his free throw percentage is also super low for a guy his size and at his position, but that's not surprising given his strong aversion of contact.

And his overall efficiency was not good, you know, not terrible for the NCAA level, but you want to see a lot better from a guy who'd taken this high. So let's move on to his defense where we have more nice things to say about him. Yes. And say engage, active, you know, very mobile. and moves very well and seems to really enjoy playing defense. Yeah, it's kind of like that switch that goes off on some players where they get real comfortable on that end of the floor

and they're just happy playing defense. And you can tell that with Jeras. He's super active. And this is something I was looking at more. He's probably maybe the best pure rim protector outside of Victor Wenbanyama. obviously in the class. In terms of just the overall activity level that he plays with, he's super good at getting in front of people and setting his feet.

His IQ and anticipation lets him jump into lanes before they're even fully created in order to get the foul or to alter shots in a meaningful way. And while yes, he isn't the tallest or biggest center, I think there's something there that teams can actually build with. Yeah, I mean, in terms of at center, I mean, you should be able to bang in the post and hold his own. Yeah, he uses his strength well in that role. Yeah, on defense, yeah. So, I don't know, you can say it again, similar to Killian, who is not afraid of contact on defense, only on offense for whatever reason.

So, yeah, he's got a combination of length and lateral mobility and anticipation that really makes him a great interior roamer. Explodes into passing lanes, just uses his length to disrupt stuff, can easily represent. from the perimeter back to around the basket to block a shot, you know, should be a strong help side defender, should be a decent rim side, decent rim defender straight on as well. Yeah, his mobility on defense is genuinely very good, like impressively good.

Yeah, I would agree that the tools that allow him to be an effective player are really shown on defense. And if he could play the same way with the same intensity and anticipation, on offense, then I think we would have a lot less to criticize him for. Yes, I agree. Yeah. I mean, yeah, he just, he does well, quite well at most things. You know, on ball, he, yeah, he moves really well laterally.

He uses his length really well. He sticks to guys for the most part, you know, mostly players around to, you know, around his position. And so, yeah, just strong overall defender with one big gap that we're about to get to. anything else to add on the pro set of things overall i would say this is a strong defensive prospect and he's going to be able to make the defensive game just flow much more effectively for whoever he's playing with pretty good communicator and good reader of the basketball and anticipator of where plays are going and getting guys to the right spot i think that

it's just a matter of how much can he actually guard in space? And we'll... Yeah. Well, yeah, that's something I think it'd be fitting to mention right now. So as a switch defender, I'd say guard down to the three for the most part. But he's not actually all that good at switching on guards. And he doesn't mention Isaiah Stewart again. Isaiah Stewart has a combination of quick feet and really loose hips,

which just allow him to reposition. just that first defensive first step when a guy's trying to get past him and also when a guy's trying to ball handle against him. Wallace does not have that. It's not Wallace. She's mixing up that name. Walker's not have that. So he got beaten by guards at the NCAA level with the first step,

and these are not necessarily explosive guards. And that is a big weakness in general, especially in the postseason. But it's also just a big gap for a guy who profiles to provide a lot of his value on defense. I would agree where if he's supposed to be this multi- positional guarding one through whatever defender, it does feel like it's a massive area of concern that he can't really guard ones and the fastest of players that well at all. And I would say not even, sorry to interrupt, but not even the fastest of players, I would say, even just above average athletes at the guard positions. I think he has he'd have trouble

with in the NBA. And point being, he's just going to be. a guy that is going to maybe provide less perimeter defensive impact than you would think. And for a team like the Pistons who need as much defensive help as anybody, I'm quite frankly a little bit hesitant to say that he's going to be that franchise alterer on that end that guys in past drafts have been. Yeah. And just again, I come back to, this is not like a highly complete defensive player. I mean, the inability to really switch on to guards is a weakness and it's a big gap for a guy, you know, who do think of as this like defensive stalwart's because that's, that's just a big gap.

It's not a ruinous gap, but it's a big gap. Yeah. And in the boat season, it'll be exploited. As every mismatch will be exploited ruthlessly. Yeah, absolutely. It's not to say that he won't be a good defender. I feel pretty confident that he will be. It's just that when we are talking about a high first round pick, like pick five is,

the standards are just that much higher than the generic lottery pick. If we were picking four or five picks later, I'm ecstatic to see Jaris Walker's name unavailable. And we're running that pick up there. but there's almost a talent sort of difference that I get kind of concerned about, the more I think about what role he would actually play. Yeah. I mean, you look at some of the better scorers in the league. I mean, if you look at the West and you look at all the guys who are going to be able to get by him,

you know, Willard, Curry, you know, you play him up against the Mitchells of the world, Devin Booker, even somebody like Jalen Brown, who I know I'm saying this did after he was terrible against the heat. but even him like small forwards who just have a good degree of burst should be able to get by jeras walker on the perimeter you know even the guy like j and ivy maybe um oh without a doubt yeah but uh that i'm i'm definitely in the opinion where his defensive where he's strong defensively he's very strong it's just that it's a little bit more narrow than is usually talked about at least at this stage And you need some intel to say that actually this guy is going to be a much more complete defender

and will at least be able to switch on in late clock situations on a guard and not be absolutely cooked. Yeah. His hips are just slow. He just does not turn well when a guard tries to get past him to the side. So yeah, I think that hurts. And again, like you said, this is the fifth pick. if you're selecting a guy in part on his defensive prowess is a big gap. Absolutely. Yeah. All right. Anything else about his defense before I move on to fit?

No, it's pretty positive, to be honest. Outside of the one thing. Yeah. All right. So, fit, which I think with the Pistons is questionable. Like, you know, the questionable shooting means potentially poor fit next to Duren, the traditional center. You don't want shaky shooters next to your,

traditional center. Also, Caden Ivy, you want that space for. So not ideally to, not ideal to bring a guy who may just not be a high level score, a high level shooter ultimately. And I just don't think he's a natural jump shooter. And then you mix the fact that we're at this point pretty uncertain about his ability to be an effective score period. Yeah. That it makes the fit that much more tenuous with what the core. seems to be. Obviously, things are very fluid with a young team, but it doesn't seem all that great on paper, especially when we have a lot of these developmental bigs in the system. Oh, yay. Yeah. I forgot. I forgot about that aspect. Bagley and Wiseman. Yeah. I want to remember

that as what it was possible. The offseason should give me the opportunity to forget, but it doesn't. No, no, it's that that knife that just keeps getting term, just ever so slightly in Pistons fan psyche as we move through the offseason here. But it's, I'm not that big. I was a little bit more on it when I felt like he could be a four who could very easily slide up and down lineups, whereas I think he's he's kind of like 4.5 player and leaning even five in terms of where he's the most effective. And that is an absolute non-starter for me. Yeah, yeah, it's hard to say definitely like it. I agree he's a little bit above power forward.

Yeah. And I mean, the thing is like some of his offensive utility is on the role where I think he can be fairly strong. you're not going to have him running the role next to Jalen Duren. No. Yeah. No. You just need a guy who can be a little bit more adaptable and moldable to different situations. If he's in his, in his Jarus Walker's archetype, not every player needs to be highly adaptable, necessarily to be effective.

But I'm just a little bit more skeptical on his ability to actually. meet the billing of this very versatile player that he is sold as. Yeah, especially playing next to a traditional big. A traditional big whom we hope will have passing that will come along to, where you could see some overlap, which would lessen the value of the passing for them both, because you can't really run two dedicated interior blame makers. No, no, there's not, that's one case where there's just this one rock

and there's not enough touches for both of them. Yeah, I mean, more guys who can pass is better than less, but, you know, we're talking about really capitalizing on that talent, which is hopefully they're in Duren as well. Yeah, you can't really do it with both of them on the floor at the same time. Agreed. Yeah. So, I mean, for me, like, I feel like the T of the Pistons are a team that needs spacing or that needs passing. I mean, Kate's going to have the ball a lot.

Ivy's going to have the ball a fair amount. And you want to be able to space the floor for them. You want to be able to not have a shaky shooter next to Jalen Duren. The Pistons cannot run a warrior's model. Nobody can. So, except for, like, sort of the heat during the regular season. but that's spolstra. Yep.

And yeah. And I don't want to at this point here any compare it. I haven't heard any, blessedly, between Bam out of bio and Janaris Walker. I mean, Bam, the maniacally hard worker and Jaros, the guy who avoids contact. And Bam's just a different level of athlete. It's not really comparable. I mean, I have heard a little bit of that as a comparable where it's like, imagine if Bam's sort of fell because he didn't have great tape in college and put up pretty good tape in high school.

And the idea is that maybe, maybe Jarris just had a bad stretch of games, low sample size with NCAA, obviously. The whole season. The whole season was a sample size. Yeah. No, I'm just saying that the NCAA season is short. Yeah, that's true. I'm trying to just sort of talk, talk us through. the argument and it's it's something where I feel like the upside is there it's just I'm not very

confident on the floor being a fit so you need a lot of development for Walker to sort of become this sort of offensive hub type player who can just beat teams in a ton of different ways with his passing, with better scoring, better off ball utility in general, and obviously better shooting too is part of that. And that is there, if only because he has the toughest component, which is the basketball IQ requisite for this to even be in the conversation. But I worry that the basketball skills just are never going to come to that point because it comes, very few players get that good.

like, yeah, there's that, and I just feel like he's not the sort of player. You really want to put next to Kate Ivy and Duren. And try to maximize all four of them. Yeah, for sure. That's the point. So let's assume he gets the shooting together and radically alters himself as a score. I mean, I think he has it in him to be a high-level defender.

Maybe not an all-defensive guy, but up there. And then on offense, if he can shoot his threes and use that frame to clear out more space and serve as a passer. I mean, I feel like that could be a very valuable role player. Yeah, I think that there's even slightly above that in terms of peak ceiling where he's a in the conversation for all defensive team. It's just and providing good scoring as well, good passing being just a good offensive piece, but that to me is just the absolute pipe dream with his development if it

really just takes off in the next however long. Whereas I think you're right, he's kind of like a really good role player if he can iron out some of the shooting inconsistencies, which I think are pretty workable. The form is a little wacky, but not to the level of like a Thompson twin wacky. And there's there's probably some hope there that the shooting will at least. elevate and that maybe the contact version will get a little bit better, and then you might have a pretty good role player for a lot of teams. Yeah, I'd be surprised at the all-defensive thing, because unless you're Rudy Gobert, I don't think there's a big over the last many seasons who wasn't a strong switch defender who's made all-defensive. Well, Rudy is like an average

switch defender. It's just like he's a thousand percent better. drop. I mean, he's one of the probably four or five best drop defenders to ever play the game. So that's sure. You can't expect that out of anybody. No. Other than maybe Victor Wenbanyama, but you know. He can hold his own in switches. He's just much less valuable there. Yeah. But yeah, I don't think there's another guy over the last, you know, in the spacing era at least who wasn't able to switch. And nonetheless, well, if you want to call Hassam Whiteside in 2016, but that was really at the beginning. Yeah.

But after that, there really hasn't been anybody. I feel like that is, well, whatever. That's a different story. I'm going to say absolute ceiling. Yeah, for sure. And as Floor, a guy who never learns how to shoot remains contact diverse. I mean, you've got basically an undersized center who can't play any other position. A guy who makes Isaiah Stewart look like a legitimate NBA starter.

Ouch. I think that's the absolute floor with Jarris Walker. I'm not going to pretend like the floor doesn't scare me because it really does. Yeah, I mean, like I said, I think he'll be serviceable as a shooter, but even if he gets that shot together, if that's all that happens, you know, Mr. Contact, averse, non-complete defender who just shoots threes in a mediocre percentage and does some passing. Not an ideal, not ideal for me, certainly not a number five.

So, yeah, so where is he on your draft board? So I kind of hinted at this. He was higher probably about a week ago than he had ever been for me. And I had him right there in the top five. But I kind of felt that both for the Pistons and just an overall sense of where these players are in a team agnostic context. He's probably closer to 10 at this point for me, 7, 8, 9, 10. Yeah. I couldn't have him any.

higher than seven because there's one guy who snuck up there a lot. And I just... Who's that? Anthony Black. Ah. And in general, I think that there is real potential for Walker. I just don't think that he's a good fit for the Pistons. And if that's the pistons show, so that's the context I'm framing it under, I think

that there are better fits. and better players who can maximize both themselves and the players we already have on the roster at five. If we trade down, sure. I mean, Jarris Walker at 7, I really couldn't complain because you're getting a guy with at least very good basketball mind in the building. And hopefully you can just build them up. But you're getting the value of trading down from five with him. Which probably marginal in this draft. Still, it's extra value. Yeah, fair enough.

I mean, if the pastons were to trade down, I'd probably be more interested in Hendricks. But as far as my draft board goes, I mean, I'm just thinking about the typical four guys, which would be Walker, Hendricks, Whitmore, and Assar Thompson. He would be four out of four there for me. I feel like Asar just, yeah, I feel like Asar. I'm not hot on him. But I feel like, you know, you have to consider. Again, yeah, you have to consider fit.

Nobody's looking at Wallace, I would guess, and saying, you know, best player available. But even though best player available, I think is a very reductive way of thinking about it. The pistons aren't a blank slate. This point, so fit is important. And I think the fit is bad. I think he doesn't have a particularly good ceiling.

And I hate his version of contact. I just hate it. Yeah, he's just not your player. Yeah, no, not at all. That's fair. All right, any closing thoughts? again i think i've i've wound up where i started but i i sort of see the upside to the point where i think that there is a good player there but i just don't think that the the fit with the pistons

is good enough to justify a top five pick and in that case we should look elsewhere i would hope we would look elsewhere. Yeah. I would say, I mean, just to go back to it, it's not that he's not my type of player. I think that the contact aversion is going to hamstring him. Yeah. It's going to be, yeah. But, yeah.

Both can be true. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I just didn't want it to come off. It's just like, oh, I really don't like players like that. I think it's going to be, it would be a real problem for him. But even absent that, I think he would not be a good pick for the Pistons, not preferable. All right.

So that'll be up for this episode. Folks, next week will be Taylor Hendricks. And Price, thank you again for joining. Yes, absolutely. And so we'll catch you in the next episode.