He impresses me more than just about any recruit in recent memory. Helluva passer, great handles. Potential to be a monster rebounder and defender too. His body control is unbelievable...Hes a walking AND ONE. Thats not even mentioning the dunking ability which may be the best since Lebron. If he ever gets a jumpshot, he could potentially be an all-time great.
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Hard to tell. All we ever see out of Zion are dunks. That's not to say that his game's weak; on the contrary, I think he brings a lot to the table in terms of power and explosiveness.
But at the end of the day, RJ Barrett is undoubtedly the better player. If we could only have one, I'd take him all day every day.
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Don't think Zion and Randle are good comps. Zion plays out on the floor as much as he plays in.
Randle could do some of that, but where he made his money was just bullying people. Was an explosive rebounder but he wouldn't wow you with his speed necessarily. Wouldn't really rise up and dunk over somebody, though he could do that. Hellacious athlete but a different kind of athlete.
Zion is basically on another planet athletically. More in the line of a Wall/Cousins sort than a Randle.Comment
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Respectfully, I don't know what that means. You're comparing a guy that looks like Chuck to a guy that played his guts out, at a generous 6'5" with 6'8" wingspan and no shot, but played his guts out.
We've missed so many PF comparisons on this forum during the Cal era that it's not even funny, especially myself and JWORLD. I feel like he and I are responsible for Alex Poythress not reaching his potential. So when I read that Zion Williamson is closer to MKG than to Julius Randle, whoa. Randle hasn't improved any from senior year until now, call it Ron Mercer syndrome. But he had awesome potential.Comment
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Means he seems to be way more of a playmaking 3 than a bullying 4. But really this is the sort of player that a traditional discussion about positions won't touch because he's a quirkier player than most of the elite players we've had (assuming we get him). That's why I don't think he's a power forward.
Randle was great, but limited. In high school highlight videos you saw him playing out on the court; much different deal at this level. Poythress ran into the same problem: just not the kind of ballhandler that you could ever be comfortable with moving away from the basket for long stretches.
Zion's much different from what I've seen.Comment
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But is the point that Julius Randle was somehow a disappointment at Kentucky?
Guy was the go-to player on a team that played for a national championship. Fifth all-time on the single-season rebound mark at Kentucky, and the four guys ahead of him all played in the 1950s.
If Zion can be Julius Randle then I'll take that. Guy was a complete stud.
On edit: And that's why I don't think anybody missed on Randle at all. He was the same player he was in college that he was in high school. In high school they'll give these stars the leeway to do most anything, but what we don't see on highlight videos is when they screw up. What you saw him do in the all-star games was grab rebounds, lower his head in the paint and crash through people, and basically just be a hammer. Same player he was at UK.
Nobody missed on that. Everybody pretty much pegged him.
Poythress was different, but with Poythress it wasn't his game. It was his head.Last edited by Joneslab; 11-08-2017, 08:42 AM.Comment
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Absolutely not a disappointment, but I do think he played a bit different than what I imagined he would. Certainly not as skilled offensively and also didn’t play above the rim as much as I expected.
The thing with Williamson that jumps out immediately is that he is short for the position. Barkley overcame that, through a multitude of ways, but that was a different era.
I’m not trying to say he’s going to be a bust or anything, but I think high level division one competition might take away some of the plays you see in his highlights. Then what?Comment
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Another reason I say that he's not a true 4. Don't think even the term "position" fits with him because he's a guy you get it ahead to and let him rim run.
If he couldn't grab quarters off the top of the backboard this would probably be more of an issue. I've heard that Zion Williamson may have the most explosive second jump of anybody these experts have ever seen in high school, including LeBron. As great as Julius Randle was, that just wasn't the case with him.Comment
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We’re in a unique era though. In the last 3-4 year’s how many guys have we had with 40â€+ verticals. I realize they weren’t built like Zion and weren’t always the best at using that ability for put-backs and “hopefully “ rebounding, but still....
Hamidou is but one of our current examples.
So I understand that Zion is being hyped as a once in a generation athlete, but we’ve had a wealth of that here throughout this entire era. So much more to look at, and a guy like Zion will have to show elite want-to at this level.
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Hamidou is going to make a lot of money with that athleticism. And he's going to win us some games.
Looks like an incomplete player partly because he's not as strong as he'll be when he's 22 years old. At some point he'll be able to crash through people a la MKG. Right now he's thin; he's going to have to use some more tricks to get points, and I'm not sure he's got an expansive toolbox right now. So there'll be some nights when he scores 4 points and grabs a board.
Believe Williamson's power and ability to score with either hand around the rim will serve him well at this level. Think we'll see that he has more tricks because he's had to at his size. In the pros, who knows. But on the college level you can do a heck of a lot of damage by being faster and stronger and springier than everybody else on the court.Comment
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Zion is absolutely a SF or a 3, whatever you wanna say. I'm not even sure why this is a debate.Comment
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