Denver Nuggets: Troy Brown’s lack of offensive role

Troy Brown is a name commonly mocked to the Denver Nuggets. While he offers intriguing defensive value, Brown’s lack of an offensive role should be a reason to pass at No. 14.

As the 2018 NBA Draft approaches, it’s always hard to keep up with all the late risers and fallers, rapidly fluctuating stock as analysts and teams alike evaluate and re-evaluate and second, third and fourth guess.

One of this year’s risers is Troy Brown, a freshman wing out of the University of Oregon. Brown’s box score numbers don’t elicit excitement; he averaged 11.3 points, 6.2 rebounds and 3.2 assists per outing.

There’s a lot more to Brown than those numbers, though. At 6’6.75” (in shoes) with a 6’10.25” wingspan, Brown offers ideal size for an NBA wing. He couples his frame with an intriguing two-way skill-set that has him shooting up boards, and seemingly in contention for the Denver Nuggets’ 14th overall selection.

Brown’s main selling point is his defense, and unlike in the case of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (who I wrote a Tolstoy novel concise breakdown on here), he absolutely lives up to his reputation:

Brown’s stunt helps to shut down the drive, he recovers to his man well, forcing him to dump the ball. Brown shuts off another drive, then sprints cross-court to recover to his man and forces him left, directly into a shot-blocker.

Brown is a smart and active defensive player. He almost always makes the correct rotations in a timely manner. He’s a great team defender. On an individual level, Brown’s very good. He slides his feet well and sports a strong, sturdy frame. The only concern in Brown’s defensive game is his ability to contain explosive guards:

I doubt Brown defends point guards in the NBA, but I’m confident he can stay in front of most players 2-4. Combined with his high-end team defense, Brown should be no worse than a good NBA defender.

The issues with Brown’s NBA projection come on the other end.

Brown is not without strengths as an offensive player. His passing, in fact, is a major strength:

Brown displays impressive vision, creativity and accuracy as a passer. He even demonstrates some ability to pass on the move, an essential skill when you’re driving into the teeth of the defense:

Brown has some facility for scoring himself, when he gets to the rim:

His ability to finish through contact, even when fouled, is a major plus; his strength around the rim enabled him to shoot 65.45 percent at the rim on a high volume of attempts in his freshman season.

However, I do have doubts about Troy Brown’s finishing translating against longer and stronger NBA athletes. What’s more, he may struggle to get to the rim in the first place:

Overall, Brown’s handle is quite good for size, but he really struggles going left. In college, opponents had a great deal of success forcing him to his off-hand and preventing him from reaching the sanctuary of efficiency that is the rim.

Brown still had success attacking close-outs, something he’ll need to do well in the NBA. That is, provided teams ever close out on him:

Brown was a surprisingly willing shooter in college (a good sign, if you’re looking for one), attempting 3.1 triples per game. Of course, he only hit 29.1 percent of them, and his ugly, slingshot mechanics do not inspire confidence.

Brown’s shooting struggles make pinpointing an offensive role for him extremely difficult. He is a wing who can’t shoot, whose best offensive skill is passing and who’s not capable of being a primary ball-handler. That’s not a successful offensive archetype in the NBA.

That’s Evan Turner or DeAndre’ Bembry. The player of that ilk closest to being a positive offensive player is probably Andre Iguodala.

If the hope is that Brown can be Iguodala offensively (Brown, for what it’s worth, fancies himself an Iguodala facsimile), I have my doubts. For one, Iguodala’s a superior ball-handler, far more capable of occupying a primary role. More importantly, latter-day Iguodala still has a sizable athleticism advantage on Brown.

Iguodala is no longer the high-flyer who nearly won a Slam Dunk Contest in 2006, but he’s still a fairly explosive player. Iguodala’s high-end athleticism has empowered him to be an elite finisher at the rim on a high volume of attempts every single year of his career.

Brown simply doesn’t have that. Even in the open court, his explosion is limited:

Brown won’t be Iguodala as a play-finisher. He won’t be Iguodala as a playmaker. He’ll be much more Turner, Bembry, Josh Jackson. Offensively, that’s just not a worthwhile player.

No matter how successful Brown is as a defender, if he can’t fill any role offensively, it’s going to be hard to get him on the court for major minutes. Barring an overhaul of his shooting mechanics, it seems unlikely that he will fill a role offensively.

The concern with Brown is that he winds up as a middling rotation player. The likelihood of him being better than that, given the importance of his shot, seems low — too low to take him with the 14th overall selection.

Brown looks to be a far more natural fit with some of the teams picking in the late teens and early 20s like the San Antonio Spurs or Utah Jazz — teams that value team defense and look for some playmaking from wings.

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Denver, on the other hand, would be wise to target players with more projectable roles on each end, or players with more realistic upside. Brown, therefore, is one late riser the Nuggets should choose to pass on.