Rookie of the Week: Jalen Williams, SF, Oklahoma City
(Note: This section won’t necessarily profile the best rookie of the week. Just the one I’ve been watching.)
After a slow start due to an early eye injury, Jalen Williams has steadily gained traction in Oklahoma City, playing at least 25 minutes in six of the last seven Thunder games and scoring double-figures in all six.
The 12th pick in the draft, Williams’ efficiency stats are his most notable contribution. He’s shooting 57.9 percent on 2s and averaging nearly two assists for every turnover — not a big shock given that he played point guard in college. Williams has been good enough that his true shooting percentage remains solid (57.9 percent) despite his inability to get going from 3 (he’s just 11-for-39 on the season).
Williams is capable of some pretty sweet one-handed finishes when he gets a head of steam downhill to the rim, and this is the foundation of hope for him emerging as a higher-level shot creator at some point. Here’s one example with each hand:
Williams still operates as a fairly low-usage offensive player right now, a tertiary weapon next to Josh Giddey and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Even Tre Mann gets more time with the rock. He’ll have to develop more wiggle on the ball to complement his straight-line bursts and obviously get his 3s to go down.
Williams has the size and athleticism to be a plus defender, but he’s still figuring things out on that end. He had four steals in his first extended pro action but hasn’t profiled as a disruptive defender since, and the data with him on the floor is getting a bit concerning. While his weaknesses don’t seem overwhelming, Williams has played 16 NBA games so far and has failed to have a positive plus-minus in 15 of them. That can’t last.
The Thunder are outscored by 14.5 points per 100 possessions with him on the court and win by 8.5 points per 100 when he’s off. Yikes. Yes, this is colinear with two other regulars (Josh Giddey and Aleksej Pokuševski) who often share the court with Williams and have on-off numbers that are nearly as bad. And yes, it’s partly driven by 3-point noise. That said, a differential this large is significant enough to raise some red flags.
Even if the poor on-off numbers keep up all season, Williams wouldn’t be the first rookie to post awful plus-minus numbers; a lot of them still turn out to be valuable players. He’s already established himself as a playable rotation fixture — a lot of players in his range in the draft can’t say that yet — and has some clear pathways to being a plus wing player for the long term.
