Tyrese Hunter, JD Davison & Taran Armstrong: Draft Decisions

Three point guards who all have one fatal flaw to their game. Can their strengths carry them to draftable territory in 2022?

Cue The Clash playing their hit song off their 1981 album Combat Rock. Pour a glass of a nice, full-bodied red. It’s time to talk about one of the more scintillating portions of the pre-draft process: the decisions made by young college athletes to declare for the NBA or return to school.

This Winter, we released a pseudo-guide of questions for bubble prospects to seek answers to before coming to a conclusion. Independent of that advice, there’s a genuine soul-searching process that must occur: what does the player want to do? Regardless of what may be in their best interest, an understanding that their happiness factors in — and cannot be anticipated on the outside — has to take place.

There are some names who truly wrestle with difficult decisions on late first-round spots versus rolling the dice to come back another year and strengthen their case. Those were the paths traveled by Bennedict Mathurin and Jaden Ivey just a season ago. Others — the ones we are focusing on in this series — have a bit of a lower draft stock in 2022, making it a more erratic or complex decision.

Hidden in the midst of this draft class are some talented individuals with tantalizing upside, really unrefined tools or enough promise to garner genuine second-round interest. They could forgo an additional year of college and hope that those traits are enough to land them a draft spot. Or they could opt to return, knowing that vast development and improvement is necessary to increase that draft spot.

There are several freshmen who are, to us, pretty easy decisions to declare for the draft or have already declared their intentions. Bryce McGowens of Nebraska, Josh Minott from Memphis, Blake Wesley from Notre Dame and Harrison Ingram from Stanford have all declared already. Kendall Brown and Jeremy Sochan of Baylor, Kennedy Chandler from Tennessee and Milwaukee’s Patrick Baldwin Jr. all make sense as guys who should come out this year as well.

Six other freshmen — Paolo Banchero, Jalen Duren, AJ Griffin, Chet Holmgren, Jabari Smith and TyTy Washington — feel entrenched in the lottery at this point. Combined, there would then be 14 freshmen to declare for the draft. We’ve written previously both about the breadth of sophomores making a push for first-round status and the trends around one-and-done drafting. The results from those two studies showed that, traditionally speaking, few freshmen go in the second round.

Combine all these together and it squeezes the field a bit for other prospects just a half-step lower than the aforementioned names on draft boards. By our mark there are 15 key names to discuss and very few draft slots to covet. Will any make the leap and become “pre-draft” darlings by coming out before hitting their stride? Are there first-round guarantees even to be had? What should these players do, and what is unique about their specific situation?

Tyrese Hunter - PG, Iowa State

Stats

31.9 MIN
11.0 PTS
3.5 REB
4.9 AST
3.2 TO
2.0 STL
39.1% FG
27.4% 3FG

The Quick Scouting Report

• Lightning-quick jitterbug who lives in the lane

• More a pass-first guy than a scorer

• Plays tough-nosed defense at point of attack. Elite PNR defensive guard

• Incredibly quick hands; steals maven on-ball and off-ball

• Below-average finisher (47.9% at the rim). Doesn’t have floater to compensate

• Really poor 3-point shooter: don’t get fooled by NCAA Tourney

• Has shooting potential but is handicapped by teams sagging off him now

Our Recommendation: Return to School

Hunter had a fantastic run into the NCAA Tournament. Fans of his game have to hope this trip to the Sweet Sixteen was not a lightning in a bottle season. Izaiah Brockington will no longer be in Ames, opening up more on-ball reps for Hunter and perhaps allowing TJ Otzelberger to surround him with the right pick-and-roll pieces from the transfer market.

While Hunter is ready as a defender and is jet quick, the nuances of his game as a scorer must improve. He’s inefficient and struggles from range; push aside an insane 7-11 performance from 3 against LSU, Hunter shot 30-124 (24.2%) on the season from deep. That’s not good enough to garner first-round attention, and with his shiftiness and facilitating prowess, he should be a first-rounder if he can get north of 32% next year.

JD Davison - PG, Alabama

Stats

25.8 MIN
8.5 PTS
4.8 REB
4.3 AST
2.9 TO
46.3% FG
30.1% 3FG

The Quick Scouting Report

• Top-tier athlete for his position. Incredibly fast, agile and vertically gifted

• Puts a ton of pressure on the rim, both out of the PNR and in transition

• Underrated creator for others. Solid passing instincts

• Turnover rate, especially out of PNR, is way too high: 34.3% out of ball screens

• Has great amount of defensive potential; should be able to play the 1 and the 2

• Up-and-down season shooting the ball. Started solid, really fell off late in year

• Plays in pro-spaced offense at Alabama. Many on-ball concerns can’t be blamed on system

Our Recommendation: Return to School

Davison had a roller coaster of a season, with some great athletic highs and some incredibly low lows. As the season went on, Davison’s 3-point shooting regressed to where we anticipated coming into the season: he started the year making 38% of his triples in his first 8 games, then went 24.5% from deep over his next 22 games. The poor shooting and extreme turnover rates from trying to play too fast in ball screens makes this a pretty easy decision.

There’s still first-round upside and appeal to Davison, but no NBA team should want to invest in him now to get there. Alabama loses enough firepower on the perimeter to see his role expand in year two under Nate Oats, anyway. A return to school and better ball security/ playmaking could still see him go as a fringe lottery pick in 2023.

Taran Armstrong - PG, California Baptist

Stats

32.2 MIN
10.5 PTS
5.2 REB
6.3 AST
3.4 TO
39.3% FG
30.8% 3FG

The Quick Scouting Report

• Elite passer in every sense: out of PNR, transition, broken plays, etc.

• Great size at the point, standing 6’5”

• Not a very good shooter. Struggles especially off the bounce

• Subpar athlete. Plays somewhat stiff; needs screens to get separation

• Worry about how he plays in NBA if he isn’t a specialty PNR creator for others

• Will struggle laterally on defense. Must add strength

Our Recommendation: Return to School

Armstrong has his fans, and the high-feel point guard certainly is a big-time passer out of the pick-and-roll. He has size and a tremendous IQ to go with it. But the lack of scoring, especially from deep, gives us a little bit of pause. We’d like to see him either go back to Cal Baptist or transfer up to a major conference next year. He’d be a hot commodity for Pac-12 programs to look at and could easily find his way to a Washington State or Utah.

Our Pre-Draft Potential Series

Monday: Nolan Hickman, JD Davison & Taran Armstrong
Tuesday: Moussa Diabate, John Butler & Jaylin Williams
Wednesday: Caleb Houstan, Trevor Keels & Dalen Terry
Thursday: Peyton Watson, Jake LaRavia & Aminu Mohammed
Friday: Malaki Branham, Terquavion Smith & Max Christie

Other names to watch next season: Trey Alexander, Creighton; Matthew Cleveland, Florida State; Daimion Collins, Kentucky; Alex Fudge, LSU; Jordan Hawkins, UConn; Nolan Hickman, Gonzaga; Arthur Kaluma, Creighton; Brandon Murray, LSU; Hunter Sallis, Gonzaga.