Washington Wizards get “steal of the draft” in Deni Avdija with the No. 9 pick

What’s Deni Avdija’s upside?

For almost all prospects their upside is dictated by how much they improve their areas of weakness. Deni Avdija’s most glaring flaw, as it stands right now, is his inconsistent jump shot.

In the Euro League, the world’s second most competitive basketball league behind the NBA, Avdija shot 59.6 percent on his 2-point attempts and 27.7 percent on 3-pointers. The massive disparity was a result of Avdija’s adherence to attempting the most analytically friendly shots of lay-ups and threes.

When Avdija gets to the rim his ability to finish is not in question, but everything outside of the paint has been a struggle over his career. The most concerning shooting metric for Avdija is that he shot 55.6 percent from the free throw line, albeit on only 18 total attempts.

If Avdija’s jump shot continues to be subpar in the NBA he’ll have almost no chance of reaching his potential as a two-way star. Wizards fans shouldn’t fret if his three-ball is poor in year one, but if he continues to shoot below 65 percent from the free throw line then there is very little chance he’ll ever be an average three-point shooter.

If he is able to pair his elite playmaking with an average 3-point shot then Avdija has a chance to be an offensive fulcrum in the mold of Luka Doncic. As silky as Doncic’s step-back three is, he has only shot 32.1 percent on 3-pointers in his career.

Avdija is not the ball handler or passer that Doncic is but a player that is 80 percent as good as Doncic is still a borderline All-Star. His upside is as a two-way player capable of carrying an offense on his own but that is more adept at being a team’s second option.