Lonzo Ball – University of California, Los Angeles (Fr.)
Age on Draft Day: 19 years, 7 months
Height: 6’ 6” (according to recent DX article)
Wingspan: 6’ 9” (according to recent DX article)
Standing Reach: 8’ 4.75” (last measurement in 2014)
Other Recommended Content:
Lakers Film Room Lonzo Ball Scouting Report
Offense:
Spoiler:
Defense:
Spoiler:
Draft Express Profile on Lonzo Ball
couldn't find kennydorglas' chart lol
Introduction
Lonzo Ball was undoubtedly one of the most exciting prospects to come into college basketball this year. With the point guard position trending toward a ball-dominant, scoring/passing combination role, Lonzo Ball’s unselfishness moving the ball and mesmerizing passing skills were a breath of fresh air. The arrival of Lonzo Ball and TJ Leaf at UCLA drove a team that struggled heavily the previous year into one of the best offenses in college basketball, due in large part to the tempo that Lonzo pushes the team at and the shooters that he has around him. Lonzo has a lot to offer at the next level: contagious unselfish ball movement, elite measurements for his position, excellent court vision and playmaking skills, efficient shot making and selection in college, and elite basketball IQ. He runs the fast break as well as any guard in college basketball, rarely turns the ball over, and rewards players for running the floor. In my opinion, his biggest impact on the floor is something that doesn’t necessarily show up on the stat sheet: the pace he pushes the team at. A lot of guards love to bring the ball up the court slowly and let their offense get set up, but at UCLA the players are constantly running the floor and stretching the defense. Regardless of if it’s a steal, a rebound, or a made basket, the second Lonzo gets the ball he’s rewarding them by pushing the ball up with the pass or speed dribbling into the paint, drawing defenders, and finding shooters on the perimeter. The pace that he plays at and the shots he takes are perfect for the modern, fast-paced, analytics-oriented style of basketball that is being played right now.
The issue with Ball wasn’t productivity in college; his effect on the game is undeniable. The question for Ball is whether he can do the same things at the next level. It’s very well documented that Ball has a very unorthodox shooting motion; he brings the ball from his hip to his left shoulder with his shooting hand on the side of the ball, before shifting his shooting hand under the ball and flicking it up from the center of his body with his hips rotated so that the right side is pointed at the basket. For basketball purists, it’s nothing short of an abomination. The shooting motion is long with a lot of moving parts, the release point is low, and if he wasn’t wide open on the perimeter he was shooting from 4 feet behind the arc where the defender wasn’t pressuring him. Forget about shooting off the dribble; the only way he’s going to have time to pull up is if he’s stepping back to the perimeter, and the only direction he’s comfortable hitting a step back from is going left because he contorts his body so much in his shooting motion that he’d need a 90+ degree forward rotation of his right hip to square up to the basket how he likes. Another question is if he’s going to be able to get into the paint and create offense in the half-court in the NBA. He’s fantastic in the open court, but his handles are not as refined as you would like from a lead guard, and he’s not very quick/explosive from a stand-still and he doesn’t have a lot of the “shake” to his crossovers that you saw from the guards he’s compared to, so it’s tough to say if he’ll be able to get into the paint in the NBA when he wasn’t extremely successful at it in college basketball. It’s whether all of that matters that’s up for debate. Will he need to be uncovered 4 feet behind the NBA 3-point line to get his shot off clean, and can he make that consistently if so? Does he even need to have a mid-range/pull-up jump shot when mid-range shots are the least efficient shot in basketball? Did being surrounded by knock down shooters and big men help bolster his assist numbers? Is he going to have trouble getting his shot off in catch-and-shoot scenarios once more athletic NBA defenders figure out his shooting motion? Can most point guards even block his shot when he’s 6’6” with long arms? Is a point guard that isn’t very good at creating his own shot worth a top pick in the draft even if he’s an elite passer? I think that’s a big part of what makes Lonzo Ball so tough to project: parts of his game are so unorthodox that it’s tough to draw conclusions on if he’ll be able to transfer his skills, because at first glance a 6’6” freshman point guard playing for a winning team averaging 15/6/8 on 67 eFG% in a solid basketball conference would look like a no brainer.
Offensive Ability
Lonzo Ball was extremely efficient in just about every aspect of the game. His TS% was a ridiculous 67% with a 65.2% eFG%, he had a 78.9 FG% at the rim and 41.2 3PT% on great volume, and even in non-transition attempts at the rim he was at 71% despite very low volume for his position. He was so efficient that he had the sixth highest effective field goal percentage and fifth highest offensive BPM in college basketball. A lot of Lonzo’s success comes out of transition, which accounted for approximately 30% of his possessions, where he showed the ability to get into the paint, accurately hit shooters on the perimeter, push the ball with the pass, and find cutters at the rim, and even be a lob target himself. He is perfect for the fast-paced style of basketball that is becoming more common in the NBA, as he is best operating in transition where he had a 4 to 1 assist to turnover ratio. With his rebounding ability, he controls the pace of the game and can push the ball hard off the dribble or pass to flip the court quickly to force the defense to have guys back and defend every single time. His shot selection is very analytically-favorable, as only 26 of his 343 attempted shots this season not at the rim or 3-point shots, with 194 3-point shots and 123 shots at the rim on the season.
The lack of mid-range game in college does make me worry he isn’t creating a lot of his own offense. The worry is only reinforced by the fact that over 50% of his made shots at the rim were assisted compared to Fultz at 17.4%, Smith Jr at 20%, and Fox at 19.6%, along with Lonzo averaging less than 2 non-transition attempts at the rim per game this season, compared to Fultz and 5.8 and Fox at 4.36. Some of the difference can be explained by Lonzo looking to find shooters over scoring for himself, but in the current NBA it’s important for the primary ball handler to be able to create offense for themselves and their team. It’s going to be difficult for Lonzo to do that when he can only shoot off the dribble by going left, and he only has the time and space to get his shot off when he’s taking a deep step back. If he’s not willing to work on his form, or reworking it doesn’t work out well, then he would seriously benefit from adding a floater to his game to make him a threat from mid-range so teams don’t just run him off the 3-point line.
Passing
Lonzo is the definition of a pass first point guard. He was excellent in transition, he sees the floor extremely well, he commands the floor and keeps the ball moving, and he makes the game easier for everyone around him. He had the second-best assist rate in all of college basketball and facilitated UCLAs transition to becoming a top tier offense. The ball never sticks with Lonzo, he’s constantly pushing the ball up into transition when his team runs the floor, and he always knows where the open shooter is. He has the ability to turn a made basket into a quick transition bucket if the defense doesn’t catch a run out. The thing that impresses me most with Lonzo’s passing is how he hits the target in the shooting pocket every time, regardless of if he’s attacking in transition, going to the basket, or swinging the ball on the perimeter. He needs to improve on his pick and roll game, it’s a major component of every NBA offense and he didn’t show much of a pocket pass game with the roll man. In addition, while his assist number are impressive regardless of setting, I do feel like his assist numbers benefited from having knock down shooters and scoring big men around him. Regardless, he is clearly a very gifted, contagious passer and the best at it in this draft.
Ball Handling
I feel that Ball needs to improve his ball handling before he can be a primary ball handler in the NBA. He’s fine pushing the ball in transition and bringing the ball up, but his dribble is a bit high for my liking right now, he struggled against defensive pressure, doesn’t have a lot of craftiness or shake to his 1-on-1 game, and he needs a lot of work as a pick and roll ball handler. In pick and roll scenarios he wouldn’t come off the screen tight enough to turn the corner and get into the paint before the help could get to him, leading to an ineffective pick and roll where the big man helps until Lonzo’s defender recovers through the screen and he can take away the roll man. For a guy that’s compared to Jason Kidd and Steve Nash, I don’t see a lot of craftiness or shake to his crossovers, and he doesn’t get the defender moving side to side to create angles to the paint very well. He’s very rigid when he’s going one-on-one, while guys like Nash use a lot of hesitation and body and head feints with their crossovers to sell it better. I think that he might be very predictable once an NBA scouting report is put together on him. He very visibly shies away from going right if he isn’t getting to the basket because he knows he can’t pull up going right, and if you can stay in front of him when he’s going left then he’ll inevitably go to his step back jump shot or pass the ball. The fact that he averaged just under 2 non-transition attempts at the rim, compared to his competition Markelle Fultz averaging 5.8 non-transition attempts at the rim a game makes me think that he's not able to beat the defense to the rim off the dribble in the half court.
Defense
Ball was a bit of a mixed bag when it came to defense against NBA prospects this year. He played a very good defensive game against Markelle Fultz and made it difficult for him to make plays and get shots off when he was on him, and he did a good job switching on to Dillon Brooks after he was torching them all game, but De’Aaron Fox made things very difficult for Ball in their first matchup at Rupp and torched him the second time they played in the NCAA Tournament. As long as he isn’t getting torched like Fox did every night I think he’ll be fine as far as on-ball defense, because a lot of NBA guards are just too good to guard one-on-one these days, and you pretty much have to hope they have an off day or they’re getting theirs. Off ball defense is where Ball really needs to make an impact, he has the basketball IQ and length to play the passing lanes, be a good help defender, and hit the boards to prevent second chance points, and him being active off the ball will only create turnovers and rebounds to help push the pace on offense more.
Fit with the Phoenix Suns
It’s tough to picture the Suns drafting Lonzo Ball without Eric Bledsoe being on his way out the door, especially with rumors going around that Rich Paul told the Suns to trade Bledsoe if they draft a point guard. Ball and Booker has the potential to be a very exciting offensive duo, where Booker would be the go-to scorer late in the shot clock and Ball can push the ball, facilitate the offense, and hit open 3-point shots. I think Ball would be a good fit with the young players in Phoenix with Ulis being a great backup that can also be on the floor with him, TJ and Booker being good off-ball scorers, Chriss and DJJ as lob targets, and Booker, Chriss, and (hopefully) Bender being good outside shooters. At the very least, that would be an exciting offensive team to watch develop, and hopefully they can develop into a good defensive team as well.
Conclusion
A lot of Ball’s success in the league depends on if his shot can translate to the NBA and if he can defend NBA guards. I have no doubt in his ability to run a successful fast paced offense, but he needs to be more than just a great passer to be worth a top pick. At this point he’s about an average defender at the college level, with some good showings against guys like Dillon Brooks and some struggles against athletic guards like De’Aaron Fox, and I think he’s going to struggle a bit at the start when a lot of NBA guards are as quick as Fox is and he’s going to be running through ball screens and getting attacked every possession. I like Ball’s game a lot and if you made me bet on if he’ll bust or not right now I’d say he’ll be fine. With that said, my fear with him is that if his shot doesn’t translate to the NBA as well as hoped, he can’t defend NBA guards at an average/above-average level, and/or he isn’t quick/crafty enough to get into the paint and create offense consistently, then what makes him different from guys that are great facilitators but struggle to score like (worst case) Kendall Marshall or (better scenario) Ricky Rubio? The team that picks him toward the top of the draft will have to have a strong feeling that his shot translates, because it’d be tough to justify a non-scoring playmaker as a top 3 pick in the draft.
Well, I had originally started this to cover what was considered the top 6 by most people around here, since we were looking to be the 3rd worst record with the 6th pick being our worst possible pick, but now we've moved up and can only drop to 5, so I did one extra lol. I'll do a couple between now and the draft on whoever gets requested the most in this post, but I'm not going to guarantee any time frames right now. They might take awhile depending on how much I can find on them and how much I watched them this season. Hope you guys enjoyed, like I said I really like Lonzo Ball, but he also scares the **** out of me for a top pick with that ugly shot, lack of shot creating, and questions on if he can defend point guards.
