John Wall Thus Far

Amazingly, the John Wall Watch has been pretty tame this year, no doubt due to Blake Griffin obliterating all things rookie-related. I wanted to look at Wall's season thus far, to look for trends and comparisons, in hopes to get a feel for where he is going. I was worried Wall was all athlete, raw skill coming into the draft and I got curious to see if that has any play so far. Starting with the basics, Wall is 4th in rookie PER with a 15.43, behind (my boy!) Paul George and Ed Davis. Already, Wall has established a solid player rating, unlike 2nd pick Evan Turner, who has an abysmal 10.36 PER.

Wall's strengths are in his passing ability, which actually kind of surprises me. I wasn't sure how his vision would be, if it would be elite level. But he's already 10th in Assist Rate, which is doubly impressive when you consider he plays with some really iffy basketball players. He's also good at using possessions, as his 23.4% Usage Rate would indicate. Wall is solid in terms of steals, and is a solid rebounding point guard. He gets to line 4.8 times a game, which is decent, especially for a rookie.

Wall's weakness, though, are awfully glaring. He has a horrendous 48.7% TS% and 13.1 Turnover Rate (League median is 10.7). He forces a lot of action, which helps him get assists but also costs possessions at a pretty high rate. He struggles, as most rookies do, at the defensive end. The most interesting thing about Wall is his maligned jump shot, presumably the biggest thing holding him back. He is shooting 33% eFG on jump shots, which is really bad. The good news is, Wall attacks the basket frequently and shoots a strong 61% at the rim, which is higher than comparative players like Derrick Rose and Russell Westbrook. Though Rose is someone fans might point to and say 'he improved his jumper, so can Wall!' it's important to note that Rose still had a good jump shot, even though he couldn't hit a 3. Even Westbrook had a sturdier jump shot as a rookie, even though it was (and still is ) rocky. So just because conventional wisdom is that a jump shot can be worked on, at some point 33% is alarming and might not be a quick fix. It's hard to be great without a jump shot.

The silver lining is that Wall is a point guard, a typical slow-starting position. Steve Nash wasn't a viable starting PG until his 4th year. Jason Kidd started out solid, but wasn't a star until his 4th year. Chauncey Billups took until his 6th year to become a star, and bordered on below average for his first 4 years. Deron Williams was unbearably bad his rookie season before becoming viable in year 2, and a star in year 3. The same for Rondo. Only Kidd, Derrick Rose, Russell Westbrook, and Chris Paul started out strong (relative to rookies, though Paul was great from the beginning). Of those, only Paul was 'star' material in year 2. So, Wall is doing things right by getting off to a solid start, but PGs usually need 3-4 years before they even reach 20 PER.

As of now, due to Wall's 15.43 rookie PER, it seems safe to assume he has a 20 PER season somewhere in his future. But for Wall to reach his potential of being a franchise player, he has to slave away at becoming a viable jump shooter. Eventually, he'll learn to increase his Assist Rate while managing Turnover Rate. He'll learn how to play good defense. But Wall must learn, first and foremost, how to shoot the damn ball.