Heres a long, lengthy perspective on Tony Wroten, giving insight into the player that he is, and what may come. (Some of yall might find this tl;dr) Some perspective on Tony Wroten. Hi. I have lived in Seattle for a long time, but originally hail from New Jersey and went to college outside Philly, so the conversation feels like home. Hope you can bear with me as I try to provide some background on Tony Wroten that may help us all to imagine his future in the NBA. My kids went to middle school and high school with Tony, so I’ve been following his progress since 8th grade, which really doesn’t seem so long ago. Here, in rough chronological order, are some thoughts. Tony has always been young for his academic grade. So for all of his obvious athletic gifts, the development of his intangibles has significantly lagged his promise, particularly since that relative immaturity – most of which is simply developmental – probably inclined him to lean disproportionately on his athleticism. Those of you who emphasize his age are correct – Tony is 18 months younger than Michael Carter-Williams, even though he’s been in the league one year longer than MCW! No off hand a case in point. Ambidexterity seems like an obvious skill one would acquire on the court, but Tony never needed his right hand, partly because he could simply outplay everyone with that hand tied behind his back (also because in some ways lefties possess inherent attack advantages in basketball), and now that he is 21, and never gained the skills seasoning one would normally expect from a longer college career, he may never significantly improve his off hand. It’s possible, although less likely, that he also will never acquire the outside shot he needs to mature as a player. The larger point, however, is that despite this developmental handicap, if one wants to call it that, Tony’s upside in the NBA is probably near unlimited given the progress he has made from year to year since his Junior year in high school (which was only 5 years ago). High School Junior (2009-2010) – Tony pleaded with his parents to let him play football his Junior year. The first game of the season, he intercepted 2 passes in the first quarter, then promptly blew out his knee. He did not play any basketball his Junior year in high school (again after a battle with his parents, which this time they won). High School Senior (2010-2011) – Tony returned for his senior season. As a younger kid on the AAU circuit, he had at one point, as a freshman in high school, been ranked the #1 basketball player for his grade in the country. By his senior year, his stock had dropped pretty significantly (although still top 30). There were significant doubts about whether he would ever again be the same athlete he’d been before his injury. This point is important – Tony worked incredibly hard on his rehab Junior year, under circumstances that must have been personally very difficult. And the hard work paid off, at least to the extent that he quickly proved to all doubters that his strength, quickness, speed, leaping ability, and durability were unimpaired. Tony has always been good at manufacturing a chip on his shoulder to motivate himself to elevate his game. High School Senior (2010-2011) – Tony ran track the spring of his Senior year (his mother was one of the track coaches). With probably literally no training time or meet competition, he immediately ran 100 meter and 200 meter times that ranked him in the top 4-5 percent of all high school sprinters in the country and in the top 1-2 percent of all Washington state sprinters (per Athletic.net). High School Senior (2010-2011) – I never saw Tony play AAU or international competition. I know that in high school games, as a senior, that crazy talent and terrible decision-making that make him such an engimatic player in the NBA were far more pronounced. As is the case today, I was literally shocked to experience a Tony Wroten drive to the basket, where he would slash from the key, go airborne about 10 feet from the rim, and with 3 or 4 opposing players leaping toward him, he would literally coil himself between each of them – midair – his ball arm twisting and lengthening like – I don’t know – like Flubber – and then he’d fire off an off-balance shot as he dropped toward the floor, hammered from all sides, which would generally rattle in after clanging around the hoop for 5 minutes, and then he’d shoot – and usually miss – a free throw. And I have to admit, watching him play seeded significant doubts in my mind about his future. On the court, he would often appear distracted, bored, confused, indifferent. But he was only 17, really a kid in the body of a man, and I now realize that most high school athletes – except with rare exceptions such as LeBron James or Kobe Bryant – are really not that different from Tony. They’re simply young and inexperienced, hugely gifted, but really closer to the playground player they were in 8th grade than the pro athlete they would be 4 years later. College Freshman (2011-2012): Rick Pitino, who loves Seattle ballplayers, recruited Tony, but he stayed home for his one college season, which was probably the right move. Tony was a homebody, close to his parents, and probably already knew that he would be one and done. Lorenzo Romar and the University of Washington program were a known quantity, and the success of other Seattle Area – UW players making the leap to the NBA (e.g., Nate Robinson, Isaiah Thomas, Brandon Roy), all of whom Tony knows well, made the choice pretty easy. That said, it isn’t hard to conclude that his one college season didn’t much benefit him as a player. He never seemed terribly challenged or engaged on the court, and it’s fair to assume that he was thinking about his future most of the time, which doesn’t lend itself to the kind of personal investment one needs to make the most of a college experience. Remember, at this time, he was still only 18 yeas old. NBA Year 1 (2012-2013): For these reasons, I was very surprised that Memphis selected him in the 1st round of the draft in 2012. But the Memphis organization is first-rate, and they must have seen something – who knows what, I can’t say, as I can’t pretend to understand anything about draft philosophy, strategy, and tactics. At any rate, while Tony played very little during his first season, he played with a winner, with a physical, blue-collar team that emphasized defense, and in a small city out of the media spotlight. Sam Hinkie knew these things when he traded for Tony. NBA Year 1 (2012-2013): Getting time on the court is sometimes all a player needs to flesh out everything that has been developing quietly and in the shadows, while no one is noticing. Here I’m going to throw some numbers at you to help position Tony with his age cohort. His first year in the league (2012-2013), as a 19-year old, Tony averaged 8 minutes a game in 35 games, about 2 1/2 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist, 1 turnover, and 1 foul per game. The other five 19-year olds in the NBA that season (Andre Drummond, Anthony David, Brad Beal, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, and Maurice Harkless) all played about 6 times as many total minutes through the course of the season, with contributions that received national notice. By comparison, Tony’s numbers paled, and they probably obscured the progress he made as a player that season. NBA Year 2 (2013-2014): Last season, Tony’s age cohort (now 20 years old) grew to total 16 players (the previously mentioned 19-year olds and rookies who included Steven Adams, Anthony Bennett, Ben McLemore, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, and Otto Porter). In what may testify, generally to the value of getting a year in the NBA under your belt, or perhaps simply an indication of the weakness of last year’s rookie class, the 2nd-year 20-year olds all performed at a consistently higher level than their 1st-year peers. What one really notices, however, is the degree to which the performance of these 2nd-year players improved only marginally in 2013-2014, with the significant exceptions of Anthony Davis and Tony Wroten. While Brad Beal played significantly more minutes than Tony last season, and is now regarded as one-half of one of the most premier back courts in the league, the reality is that his numbers are not dramatically better in his 2nd season than they were in his 1st season. On the other hand, no one can doubt that Tony took a huge leap forward last season. He became the first NBA player to achieve a triple-double in his first start. He scored more than 30 points in another game. And when you compare rookie and sophomore seasons in the NBA, the improvement is exponential, not incremental, with 3x more minutes, but generally around 4x more points, assists, rebounds, and steals. Tony’s shooting percentage improved and while everyone bemoans his terrible form and lack of any jump shot, really, from anywhere, he did nail almost 50 percent of his 2-point shots, and of course displayed his skill at drawing the drive foul. Did he turn the ball over too much – of course, at a rate per 10 minutes of playing time each game that nearly doubled the rest of his age cohort. But if you compare him straight-up with Brad Beal, for example, who entirely bested Tony during their rookie season, the numbers change dramatically in Year 2. Brad Beal is obviously a much better pure shooter than Tony, but with 30 percent fewer minutes per game, Tony has a much-higher 2-point shooting percentage, 45 percent more free throws made each game, and better per-minute rebound, assist, blocked-shot, and steal numbers. NBA Year 2 (2013-2014): The final observation might be that I noticed how dramatically Tony’s physical appearance changed as a 20-year old. For the first time, he looked like a man, not a boy. He still brought the same antic energy, and genuine joy in playing basketball, that he’s always displayed, but he looked as if he had crossed a physical and emotional threshold. I noticed this change at the beginning of the season last year, and thought immediately of male adolescent brain development, and how the pruning and wiring that has to occur for boys to become men really doesn’t typically stop until they’re 25 years old. We far too often forget that these are kids playing games for money – but Tony’s exciting growth arc reminds us that, at the age of only 21, the mental and emotional aspects of the game, where developmental progress and decision-making skills will yield the most exciting advances in the quality of his play, indicate that he can continue to improve each year, quite dramatically, for at least the next 3 or 4 years of his career. Exciting to ponder and anticipate, particularly as we can fold Tony’s progress into the organic emergence of a young team of players who grow and develop together. by Peter Schwartz on Nov 2, 2014 | 1:11 PM reply unrec (2)
Posted on: Mon, 03 Nov 2014 00:12:06 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015