Trae Young: 2018 NBA Draft player profile

Strengths

Shooting 

Young has really been the first player with a game comparable to Stephen Curry. Even though I hate the Curry comparisons, it is easily to see the similarities in their games, especially with their pull-up jump shooting. Young pulls up with ease off of the dribble and can pull up from pretty much anywhere on the basketball court, at any time.

Even though Young does not make any fancy dribble moves on this play, it perfectly represents how dangerous of a pull-up shooter he was at Oklahoma. Here Young is matched up with Texas guard, Kerwin Roach. Roach is a phenomenal quick-twitch athlete with explosive leaping ability. He is also a very good on-ball defender. After Roach goes over the screen, he takes one small step back on Young, and that was all he needed.

Despite Young being such a ball-dominant player at Oklahoma, he shot the ball well off the catch as well. This chart compares Young catch-and-shoot field goal percentage to other top lead guards in this draft class. The only lead guard prospect with a higher field goal percentage on at least 50 catch-and-shoot opportunities was Jalen Brunson.

Here is Trae Young shooting off the catch on a broken play against Texas. He sets his feet well and his release is pretty low, but he is able to get it off quickly to make up for his low release point. There is not too much elevation on his shot either.

Passing 

Young was first in the NCAA this year in assists per game with 8.8. He has incredible passing vision, sees the whole court at all times and makes quick decisions even on advanced reads. He can make any pass you would want a potential NBA point guard to make — whether it’s out of the pick-and-roll, in transition, or just getting into the lane and creating shots for teammates on his own.

Young makes quality outlet passes in transition with regularity as well, which is an extremely underrated but valuable trait for any lead guard to have. Here against Texas, Young gets the ball from Khadeem Lattin’s rebound, takes two dribbles and fires the ball to Rashard Odomes for an easy layup.

Here is a pick-and-roll read from Young in the half-court. He works off the screen from Lattin and is facing a hard hedge while Kansas State guard Barry Brown Jr. tries to recover. Since there is such a hard hedge, Kansas State forward Dean Wade must help out on the role man until Kansas State’s other big can recover from his hedge.

Young senses this play out beautifully and makes an extremely quick decision across the court — while he is moving to his opposite side under ball pressure — to fire the pass to Brady Manek in the corner for an open 3. This is a quality read, but it is extremely impressive how fast he diagnoses and reacts to the proper read.

This pass is one of personal favorites when going through Young’s film, mainly because it comes out of a low-usage setting. Off an inbounds play, Young comes off a screen and a hand-off, then he fires the ball into Jamuni McNeace for a dunk.

Getting to the free throw line 

This is an important part of Young’s game. Since he does not have ideal size and leaping ability, Young’s ability to get to the free throw line is a valuable component to his game. He does a great job at driving right into the defender’s body, and you can see that here against TCU in transition.

This chart shows Trae’s number of free throw attempts per game compared to other prospects. The only point guard prospect close to Trae is Colin Sexton out of possible first round selections. Trae does the best job of selling contact to create extra free throw opportunities as well, whereas Sexton is more aggressive trying to right through every defender.