5 Deep Sleepers of the 2022 NBA Draft
Who do we have our eyes on outside of the top-60 as prime UDFA candidates?
Shhhhh.
It’s early January, so don’t let the word get out on these guys. If we were in an NBA front office, we’d be clamoring to get them higher on our priority list, track them very closely the rest of the year and make sure the secret doesn’t spread to other teams.
Pretty much every team has some form of rags-to-riches player on their roster who came out of nowhere to become an important NBA player. Those guys are becoming just as common as lottery picks who don’t get second contracts. There are players like Duncan Robinson, Garrison Matthews and Armoni Brooks, undrafted guys who became shooting specialists. Robert Covington, Royce O’Neale and Javonte Green, defensive whiz kids who came out of nowhere to become important starters on contenders. Others like Juan Toscano-Anderson, Torrey Craig, Ja’Sean Tate, David Nwaba, Gabe Vincent, Jordan McLaughlin and Bryn Forbes were undrafted players who are vital rotation cogs on their teams.
The point is that scouting outside of the top-60 names on most boards can yield some incredibly important results. Sleepers aren’t just guys who are under-discussed for draft picks, they’re the priority lists of guys to snatch up, develop and maintain ties with through the G-League and Summer League seasons.
Thus far through the college basketball season, five players caught our eye as under-the-radar prospects. Some should be raising their stock into the top-60 and are good enough we’d spend a draft selection on. Others are priority undrafted free agents to us. These players run the gamut: major conference to low-majors, teenagers to fifth-year seniors, shooting point guards to pass-first wings. These are the standouts who we’d be going to our boss with and saying “him. This is the guy everyone is sleeping on.”
Jalen Cook - PG, Tulane
One Synergy Stat: Cook’s aFG% on dribble jumpers in the half-court is 57.7%. Amongst players to take at least 40 shots, he’s 14th in the nation, ahead of players like Max Abmas, Collin Gillespie and Michael Devoe
The American Conference has turned into the league of jump-shooting point guards. Marcus Sasser and Tyson Etienne, two of the league’s best players coming into the season, got love as second-round draft prospects who let it fly from deep. Sasser, now done for the year with an injury, impressed, as did Etienne.
Yet the most efficient scorer of the group with many of the same traits is Jalen Cook, the Tulane point guard who just lit up Memphis in a victory over the struggling Tigers and carried the Green Wave to another impressive victory at Cincinnati. An LSU transfer, Cook has high-major talent, he just needed an opportunity to show what he can do with the ball in his hands. Thanks to the overabundance of talent that Will Wade brought in year after year, Cook quickly learned that Baton Rouge wasn’t the place to showcase what he does best and headed south to Ron Hunter’s program.
Through 11 games, Cook is averaging 19.6 points and 3.5 assists while shooting an absurd 46.2% from deep. The degree of difficulty on those looks: frequent step-backs, PNR pull-ups and heavily-contested jumpers. He’s the definition of a tough shot-maker. Here’s what Cook has done just over his last three games:
As each game passes and Cook continues to score at a high level while drilling triples, we buy into him as a pro prospect. He’s a solid finisher (by far the best of the bunch between he, Etienne and Sasser) and does get to the line. Defense must improve, and in the NBA he’s likely to require a more equitable split between shooting and passing. The tools are there for a pretty solid guard we like, though.
Dalen Terry - W, Arizona
One Synergy Stat: Creates 5.7 PPG in transition
Earlier this week, we were fortunate enough to be guests on the Chucking Darts Podcast and began discussing Jordan Hall at St. Joseph’s. Chuck had a theory that players who are teenagers and excellent passers who play a primary creator role at 6’7” or larger rarely fail in the NBA: Luka Doncic, LaMelo Ball, Josh Giddey, Cade Cunningham, Shaun Livingston. Their feel is special and they’re guys worth betting on.
In the context of Jordan Hall, a young sophomore for his grade, it helped place him in first-round discussions and serve as a reason to buy into his game. At 6’7” and not turning 20 years old until after the draft, Arizona wing Dalen Terry may not command as large of a role within his offense but should merit the same upward push thanks to his combination of size and playmaking.
Hidden in plain sight, Terry is the glue that keeps Arizona’s efficient offensive machine running. He jumpstarts them in transition, blades defenses in the half-court and has so much more pick-and-roll potential that is relatively untapped. He’s athletic, sees over the top of the defense and puts pressure on the rim in transition. As a passer, he has been effective when playing under control in the pick-and-roll and absolutely dynamic in transition:
So why isn’t Terry getting a ton of love? Right now, Terry’s 3-point shot is somewhat questionable (below 30% on the season) with mechanics all over the place and a lack of impact off-ball. He rarely scores in the half-court, though that might not be his fault. Arizona’s motion-based offense, and the multitude of other creators and draft prospects on the roster, limit the overall touches that Terry gets.
There are areas we really want to see Terry improve. He plays a tad too fast in the half-court, rarely slowing down for ball screen reads and trying to get into the lane. If he’s going to be a primary ball handler, he needs to tighten his dribble. He’s also a wide driver, taking subpar angles to get to the rim and too frequently stopping off two feet in the mid-range area and searching for kick-outs instead of putting pressure on the rim. He needs to slow down more consistently and learn the nuances of the game — that’s the big difference between a guy like him and the Giddeys or LaMelos of the world.
Still, a 24.5% assist rate on a 13.7% usage rate is a bonkers metric. We’d invest based on what he’s shown, bet on developing the jumper and believe that Terry is a bargain-bin version of some of the aforementioned great playmakers and passers if he can learn to operate a bit more in the half-court. There’s a lot to fix here to really get him game-ready, but the raw tools are there. He could get picked up in the late part of the 2nd round, and we wouldn’t call that a reach. As of now, we’d probably feel safer with him as an undrafted free agent guy.
Alondes Williams - W, Wake Forest
One Synergy Stat: His 99 points scored at the rim in the half-court (on non-post-ups) is 10th-best in the nation
Slightly shorter (6’5”) and a good deal older (turning 23 on draft night) than Dalen, Alondes Williams has shot out of a cannon for the Demon Deacons to burst onto the draft scene. An Oklahoma transfer, there was always some athleticism to his game and productive minutes, but he was never the featured piece. He played second-fiddle to Austin Reaves, shot the ball extremely poorly from deep (25% over a two-year sample) and didn’t seem like a credible draft threat as a result.
Now that he’s more of a primary option, Alondes is showing exactly what he can do. He’s a fantastic passer in every facet: transition, quick drives, pick-and-roll handling, you name it. The athleticism still stands out as being a plus part of his game, and the shot is getting there (32.1% from deep on a healthy 3.7 attempts). He gets to the free throw line, is productive in most defensive metrics measurements, has a nearly 2:1 assist to turnover ratio and has helped Wake Forest to a 12-3 start. For context, their program hasn’t won more than 13 games in a season since 2017.
Williams is generating enough buzz as the catalyst behind the rise in a major conference that he’s starting to fall out of sleeper category. Due to his age and the inconsistent shooting, it’s fair to say that a second-round selection likely isn’t in the cards for him. As a priority undrafted player, we’d put Williams atop our lists. There’s just so much he can do at the next level, and he’s still getting better to the point where we think his best days are still ahead of him.
After the stat-sheet stuffer against Miami, things have only gotten better. He put up 20 points, 8 rebounds and 4 assists in a big win over Florida State. The trend of successful play is occurring at the right time. Wake Forest is a sleeper team nationally to make the Big Dance. Williams’ play is the big catalyst. They’re 6-2 in their last eight, with wins over Florida State, Virginia Tech and Northwestern.
In those eight, Alondes has been sensational: 20.9 points, 7.6 rebounds, 6.1 assists, 51.7% from the field and taking 5.8 free throws per game. A point-wing at the next level, he can guards bigger 2s and 3s, is athletic enough to make it in the league and is incredibly productive based on his feel. If there’s one area we’ve felt we missed on guys in the last few draft cycles, it’s in underrating players with tremendous feel for the game. Perhaps this year is an over-adjustment, but Alondes and the aforementioned Dalen Terry provide tremendous second-round value and should be priority names for two-way contracts.
Jamaree Bouyea - PG, San Francisco
One Synergy Stat: Ranks in the 70th percentile or higher nationally in every play type metric he’s finished at least 10 possessions on (transition, PNR handler, spot up, isolation, dribble handoffs)