The different shades of Jeremy Sochan's blossoming game

With rugged defense, a high motor and a unique skill set, the former Baylor Bear has plenty of untapped potential bubbling beneath the surface.

Jeremy Sochan has been places.

The 19-year-old Polish-American was born in Oklahoma but grew up in England, spending much of his life playing basketball around Europe. Over the last three years he’s led the Polish U-16 National Team to the 2019 FIBA U16 European Championship Division B title, played American prep ball at La Lumiere in Indiana alongside Jaden Ivey before the pandemic cut his experience short, returned to Europe to play for OrangeAcademy in Germany, put up 18 points, three rebounds and two blocks as a 17-year-old for Poland’s senior national team in a EuroBasket qualifier against Spain, and finally, became Big 12 Sixth Man of the Year and earned Big 12 All-Freshman Team honors in his one season at Baylor. Now he’s about 36 hours away from hearing his named called as a lottery pick in the 2022 NBA Draft.

To call that a whirlwind experience might be an understatement, and to refer to Sochan’s rise in the basketball world as improbable might be as well. Make no mistake, there were people out there who saw his talent — he was a 4-star recruit at Baylor — but this self-proclaimed “citizen of the world” garnered next to no buzz as the college basketball season tipped off last fall. Comb the archives for any way-too-early 2022 mock drafts and you’ll hardly see even a mention of his name.

Sochan seems to often be labeled by many around the internet as a safer pick — a high-floor, high-IQ, high-level defender with positional versatility and a great motor who, at the very least, you can trust will impact the game doing a lot of the little things regardless of where he peaks. And while this may be true, these intangibles are only part of his baseline development.

The guy woke up like this. It’s natural.

It isn’t often you see 19-year-olds land in the draft with this combination of rawness, intelligence and experience. He has a clear and natural feel for the game that shows up in nearly every category, along with some animalistic instincts and tendencies that manifest themselves in exuberance, high energy and different shades of hair color. He’s an infectious type of player, and it all starts on the defensive end.

Let’s get the small stuff out of the way first. While Sochan has plenty of fluid athleticism at 6’9, 230 pounds, he’s not an explosive leaper; and while he’s got decent length, he’s not in the same category as some of the long-armed pogo sticks that will be floating around in the first round. Because of these factors he’s not an elite shot-blocker for his size and reputation as a defender, but his 1.1 blocks per 40 minutes last season at Baylor (to go along with 2.0 steals) was a more than serviceable number. And in the bigger picture, it’s nothing but a minor quibble.

Sochan’s defensive abilities have been widely covered for most of the calendar year. His ability to switch 1 through 5 at his size and guard nearly any player archetype is an incredibly valuable skill, and on an aesthetic level it is just a damn pleasure watching this guy play defense.

Against smaller, quicker guards, he stays down and moves his feet very quickly for such a big dude, often sucking up ball-handlers who try to knife through his gravitational vortex and swallowing them whole. He flips his hips and changes directions well, keeping his chest to his opponent and rarely allowing himself to get twisted around off the dribble. Most perimeter defenders tell on themselves against faster players by leaving a cushion for the man they’re guarding. Not Sochan. He lives in offensive air-spaces, allowing very little room to breathe and displaying good quickness to recover when beaten.

Against bigger guards and wings it becomes even more obvious. This is where Sochan really starts to bring physicality into the equation. He slides his feet and stays connected to his opponent, taking advantage with swipe-downs if they get in too close while being disciplined enough to know when to stay vertical on shot attempts. He doesn’t afford you any level of comfort, no matter where you are on the floor.

Off the ball and in the passing lanes he’s excellent at taking advantage of opportunities to jump the gaps and initiate transition offense, but it all starts with the fundamentals. Sochan is not a big gambler. He rarely loses contact with his man off the ball and springs into action once it’s in the air. As a help-side defender he’s solid when rotating over and staying vertical on rim attacks, largely avoiding any significant foul trouble — an important ability considering how active he is. A lot of Sochan’s tape is a coach’s dream world.

Against big men you start to see his frame and lack of serious length come into play. While he can certainly hold his own in the post and against bigger, longer players for stretches, he does most of his work before his man even catches the ball. Sochan does well swimming over the top of players to create deflections or flatly fighting to front the post. He isn’t a traditional 5 by any stretch, and if bigger players get in too deep they’re going to give him trouble. But he’s going to make them work hard for whatever they get.

Defense is where Sochan’s basketball bread is buttered. Whichever team drafts him can rest comfortably knowing they just drafted a hugely impactful player on that side of the ball. But that’s the obvious part of the equation. The variable that rounds it out is the offensive upside bubbling well below the surface.

Here’s what we know about it.

Per Synergy data, nearly 85 percent of Sochan’s scoring output came from play types that required minimal levels of self-creation. At this point of his development, he’s proven much more effective as a beneficiary.

But there is necessary context here. Sochan wasn’t asked to play a lead role in Baylor’s guard- and wing-heavy perimeter-oriented offensive attack. His job was essentially to be opportunistic, act as connective tissue and bust his ass in the hustle categories — a job he did quite well. But running and cutting alone wouldn’t offer the kind of versatility needed from a guy you take ninth overall. It’s a start, but the Spurs would need to see more upside in other areas.

Sochan’s biggest flaw is his shooting. He shot just 30 percent from the 3-point line and connected on 59 percent of his free throws, both areas that need serious improvement especially considering his sneaky ability to get to the line (4.8 free-throw attempts per 40 minutes is a solid number for a low-usage player). But a lot of that was a byproduct of the types of shots he was taking. Sochan hit 36 percent of his catch-and-shoot attempts (compared to 29.6 percent off the dribble), per Synergy data, inspiring confidence that even at this point of his development he’ll be at least somewhat of a threat.

And Sochan’s shot certainly doesn’t look broken. San Antonio has the benefit of having a guy like Chip Engelland around, a shooting coach who has helped improve the shooting of many throughout the years. So unless a player’s mechanics look absolutely terrible, it’s reasonable to view cases through the “Chip” prism. Sochan’s setup and motion look a little stiff, coming up in front of his face before releasing above his head, but it’s far from a lost cause.

The good news for Sochan is he’s going to have plenty of space on the perimeter to work on his form until defenses begin to respect him (See: Keldon Johnson). It’s going to be a process, but he’d be in the ideal situation in San Antonio.

But all the shot talk is burying the lede of the Sochan story. What potentially makes him special on the offensive end is literally everything else. He’s a big forward who can handle, pass, cut, score at the basket and run out in transition. He’s possesses excellent spatial awareness and is able to diagnose developing plays and opportunities with precise timing. Off the ball he seeks out the gaps in the defense to make himself available for teammates or to crash the glass. He can do a lot of things on the floor, and under the right circumstances he can be an absolute Swiss Army Knife as a player once his raw tools and understanding of defenses develop.

Where the real intrigue comes into play is his potential as a point-of-attack big, or point-center, if you will. Sochan’s playmaking chops reveal themselves most often in transition, semi-transition and in random-basketball situations, but with his handles, passing acumen, sneaky burst and natural feel, he could very well be a candidate to run some unique pick-and-rolls — especially in small-ball lineups — as his game matures.

As a screener he’s got pick-and-pop, dribble-hand-off and fake-keeper potential; but as a ball-handling 4 or 5 he may be able to really raise that long-term ceiling. The glimpses into Sochan’s upside came in flashes at Baylor, but when you caught them it was easy to see why this guy was climbing draft boards.

I watched a lot of Big 12 basketball this season (Wreck ‘Em), but it wasn’t until this game — when Baylor adjusted and went at Kansas with Sochan at the 5 — that I really started paying attention. (Check out Adam Spinella’s channel, by the way. There’s a ton of great draft stuff in there.)

Sochan was everywhere on the court that night, on both sides of the ball. His 17 points and five rebounds will not be remembered in any history books, but it was an interesting marker on his timeline. Attacking the eventual national champions by freelancing with a freshman at the small-ball 5 made for some very entertaining and eye-opening basketball.

And that’s the complicated part of the Sochan analysis on offense: Outside of his strong 67-percent shooting around the basket, the efficiency numbers and overall consistency just weren’t there. But the more you watched, the more you saw. The shot-creation potential in the short-midrange, the touch in the paint, the improving catch-and-shoot game, the playmaking, the point-center lineups out of nowhere — little nuggets left along the way for teams to piece together come draft time.

But in the mean time, his shot must improve; without exceptional burst or athleticism he’s going to have to develop some go-to scoring moves; he’s got to devote plenty of time ahead with strength-and-conditioning coaches; and if he’s going to be used optimally, learning the nuances of defensive coverages is going to be critical. It will certainly be beneficial for him to find a stable NBA home, and San Antonio has traditionally offered just that.

The topic of “cultural fit” has long been common around these parts, as the Spurs put a ton of stock in character and competitiveness when it comes to draft prospects. Sochan was gregarious and thoughtful during his pre-draft media availability on Tuesday, and came across as the exact type of person San Antonio gravitates toward. Throw in the world experience and obvious maturity level for such a young kid, and you get some serious Joshua Primo vibes flowing in from last summer.

Sochan said during the interview his workout with the Spurs went very well, and that San Antonio connected afterward for more follow-up. There is clear interest between the two sides, and we’ll find out soon exactly how much.

“It was a good group of players. It was really competitive … the feedback was good,” he said. “They’ve stayed in contact and asked for a few other things, so I feel like it’s an exciting place.”

This draft is a difficult one to project — there’s a twist to every plot and a caveat to every scenario. But when it comes to Sochan, the abundance of pathways toward a high-floor, high-ceiling, high-level foundational role player is very intriguing. It’s unlikely he’ll ever be the type of high-caliber, three-level scorer teams crave, but those aren’t exactly prevalent in this draft. If the Spurs trust their developmental staff to take Sochan’s baseline, work ethic, character, intelligence, and pliable skill set to the lab, there’s real potential to create something special. It will take patience, but for now time is still a luxury San Antonio has, and talent is something it badly needs.