Spurs Select F Jeremy Sochan with the 9th Pick in the 2022 NBA Draft

[scott]

i dont think anybody minded the branham/wesley picks at the time either

I don't even mind them now. We took a shot at the end of the first, and those guys have ended up around the expected outcome for picks in the 20s, which is replacement level player. At the time, our team had absolutely no iden y or direction, and we took a chance on high upside swings. They didn't work out. Sure it's easy to point to guys we should have picked instead... but Kessler's the only "safe" one I can see. All of those others guys on the Spurs with our development staff might just have ended with the same outcome as Bran and Blake at this point.

We swung, we missed, we move on. If our team was situated then how it is now, I bet we probably take Kessler. But at the time, Blake and Bran were fine.

We should definitely overhaul the developmental staff though. Isn't that Mitch's specialty?

[Seventyniner]

% of the cap absolutely matters, I agree, but I think it's overused/misapplied when you're talking about bench players. It's easy to say "yeah, that's only 9% of the cap!) but all those %s add up fast when it's a bunch of bench-level players eating up.

At one point this season we had 59% of the cap tied up in Devin Vassell, Keldon Johnson, Zach Collins and Harrison Barnes. That's okay when you're not expecting much of your team and you've got Wemby and Castle only accounting for 15% of the cap... but that gets unsustainable pretty damn quickly when you actually want to win some games.

I'd actually be fine with Sochan getting an MLE-level extension, but we ened to move off of Devin and Keldon to be able to do it. And there is no reason to just give it to him, let Jeremy go out there and earn it next year and hit RFA. The risk is that he overperforms and now you have to pay him more, but it's a risk I'm willing to take because it doesn't look like he's about to take that big leap (and I actually like Sochan's trajectory).

I agree with the bolded part. A reason to give it to him in October rather than waiting until July 2026 is that if he somehow really blows up next season he could command more than the MLE in 2026. That's the risk the Spurs could mitigate by locking the extension in. There's also the risk that the Spurs do give him the extension,he plateaus or plays worse next season, and it's a bad contract. There's no risk-free play here.

Wrapped up in my take that 90/5 would be a good extension for Sochan (from the Spurs POV) is that I think Sochan would be a capable starter alongside Wemby, Fox, Castle, and an upgraded SF. 9% on a bench player versus 9% for a 5th starter is a small but meaningful difference.

This does involve some optimism on my part that Castle will improve enough to be a respectable shooter and that Sochan himself continues to improve.

I can't remember where I got the 77/4 thing. It was probably either a typo or I was using a first-year salary of 10% of the cap rather than 9.12%. Also, if another team offers a full MLE to Sochan it would only be 67/4 due to the raises only being 5%. These are the sources I used for the 2026-2027 cap number and MLE sizes.

https://basketball.realgm.com/nba/info/salary_cap

https://www.hoopsrumors.com/2024/06/...xceptions.html

[John B]

i dont think anybody minded the branham/wesley picks at the time either

Branham, Wesley were not top 9 pick. J-Dubs, Jalen Duren, Walker Kessler, Tari Eason.

Sochan is already a bust at 9th period. Can he still be a role player, yes! But for Christ sake, shoot the ball!

[scott]

I agree with the bolded part. A reason to give it to him in October rather than waiting until July 2026 is that if he somehow really blows up next season he could command more than the MLE in 2026. That's the risk the Spurs could mitigate by locking the extension in. There's also the risk that the Spurs do give him the extension,he plateaus or plays worse next season, and it's a bad contract. There's no risk-free play here.

Wrapped up in my take that 90/5 would be a good extension for Sochan (from the Spurs POV) is that I think Sochan would be a capable starter alongside Wemby, Fox, Castle, and an upgraded SF. 9% on a bench player versus 9% for a 5th starter is a small but meaningful difference.

This does involve some optimism on my part that Castle will improve enough to be a respectable shooter and that Sochan himself continues to improve.

I can't remember where I got the 77/4 thing. It was probably either a typo or I was using a first-year salary of 10% of the cap rather than 9.12%. Also, if another team offers a full MLE to Sochan it would only be 67/4 due to the raises only being 5%. These are the sources I used for the 2026-2027 cap number and MLE sizes.

https://basketball.realgm.com/nba/info/salary_cap

https://www.hoopsrumors.com/2024/06/...xceptions.html

I agree with your analysis for the most part, I'm just not overly worried about the risk of Sochan blowing up... but if he did blow up and deserve more than an MLE deal, I'd be fine with that too because now he's taken a huge step and will be worth whatever that new contract is. So long as you get off Devin and Keldon, it will all be fine. I'd still just let him hit RFA or see if he'll take a bargain deal now just to lock it in.

[scott]

Branham, Wesley were not top 9 pick. J-Dubs, Jalen Duren, Walker Kessler, Tari Eason.

Sochan is already a bust at 9th period. Can he still be a role player, yes! But for Christ sake, shoot the ball!

It's easy to talk about JDub, but Tari Eason is honestly the guy we should have drafted. He's essentially what we hoped Sochan would be, and there was a lot of discussion here about him. Seemed like it was his personality that caused folks to kind of sour on him IIRC... but it's not like Sochan's personality is any less goofy.

[KobesAchilles]

Dude is a bench player and the Spurs are looking to add Reid and we are going to be worried about Sochan blowing up? How? Literally how is he going to blow up? His stats have stayed the same all three years PLUS he doesn’t fit in the starting line up since he can’t shoot.

You can’t ONLY look at the cap percentage when building a team. Vassell and KJ are already bench players making 20+ million. You can’t have a third bench player making 20 million. You just can’t have that on the bench and expect to be a winner. Cap percentage be hanged.

Sochan has the same stats 3 years in a row. His playing time will be less. His ball handling will be less and his shot attempts will be down too and he can’t shoot. He’s not going to blow up. Take the risk. It’s smart business. He’s not a rising commodity.

Give me the scenario where Sochan just magically has his break out season. What does it look like? How does he fit in the offense? How many minutes does he average? Like actually think it through.

[Obstructed_View]

Observation. His shot no longer has the 45 degree axial rotation, and is going in at a 35% clip. It’s like some of you people don’t watch the ing games.

I said anyone with a brain. You didn't catch the insult.

[Obstructed_View]

The discussion point is ‘has he been working on his shot?’, and the answer is clearly yes.

His attempts per game have dropped by nearly fifty percent from last year. People aren't even covering him. But yeah that small bump in accuracy means he's been putting in work.

[Seventyniner]

Dude is a bench player and the Spurs are looking to add Reid and we are going to be worried about Sochan blowing up? How? Literally how is he going to blow up? His stats have stayed the same all three years PLUS he doesn’t fit in the starting line up since he can’t shoot.

You can’t ONLY look at the cap percentage when building a team. Vassell and KJ are already bench players making 20+ million. You can’t have a third bench player making 20 million. You just can’t have that on the bench and expect to be a winner. Cap percentage be hanged.

Sochan has the same stats 3 years in a row. His playing time will be less. His ball handling will be less and his shot attempts will be down too and he can’t shoot. He’s not going to blow up. Take the risk. It’s smart business. He’s not a rising commodity.

Give me the scenario where Sochan just magically has his break out season. What does it look like? How does he fit in the offense? How many minutes does he average? Like actually think it through.

• I already said I want Vassell and Keldon traded. My idea that 90/5 is fine for Sochan is predicated on him being a starter and believing that Castle's outside shooting will be respectable in the future (around 34% from three), so that a Fox/Castle/upgraded SF/Sochan/Wemby lineup would be good on offense and awesome on defense.
• Naz Reid is a much better player than Sochan, and if the Spurs do land Reid then Sochan's value to the Spurs drops significantly.
• You're way too hung up on the $20M number. As a % of the cap it's smaller and smaller each year. A 90/5 full MLE deal from the Spurs would only have one year (the final one) be over $20M, and Keldon's deal has no remaining years over $20M. In fact, only the final year of Keldon's contract ($17.5M) overlaps the first year of Sochan's extension (would be $15.5M if it's full MLE-sized).
• He fits in the offense as a cutter/dunker and connector. He really shouldn't be spotting up. There is room for one non-shooter in a lineup.
• His stats are much better this year than in his first two. He has gone from a putrid 0.513 TS% to a very good 0.595 this season, and has had big bumps to free throw rate and rebounding. And this has happened while playing 22% of his minutes out of position at C.
• "Blow up" doesn't always mean raw counting stats. If he can be an elite defender and rebounder while being at worst a slight negative on offense, that's well worth MLE money and a spot in the starting lineup imo. His breakout season would have him starting at PF (sorry, Harrison), playing 30-32 minutes, and further increasing his defense/rebounding/TS% numbers into elite territory.

[scott]

Seventyniner - what contract do you offer Sochan without the predicate that he is a starter? Because my opinion on his contract is kind of predicated on the notion that he won't (or shouldn't) be.

[Obstructed_View]

Seventyniner - what contract do you offer Sochan without the predicate that he is a starter? Because my opinion on his contract is kind of predicated on the notion that he won't (or shouldn't) be.

Without a reliable three, he cannot be a starter. He does a lot of things really well, but in today's NBA he isn't of much value without a three pointer.

[NASpurs]

Without a reliable three, he cannot be a starter. He does a lot of things really well, but in today's NBA he isn't of much value without a three pointer.

Unless PATFO think he's the next Draymond Green which is laughable when there's no Curry on our team.

That stint he had as a PG last year worries me that they think/thought he's like Green. Hopefully that illusion is gone.

[SpursBills]

So I really go back and forth on this issue, I think partially because I really want Sochan to make a leap and also because I like weird players like him.

Last week I looked at a bunch of contracts from prior perimeter players, and concluded that Sochan wasn't too far off from 3rd year guys like OG and McDaniels and Okongwu in impact metrics. But I think I failed to appreciate how he affects playability of certain lineups, so that even if he's a highly impactful player when he's on, he's a very high friction player that forces certain lineup decisions with his combination of lack of (physicality, shot creation, passing creativity, and shooting). I do think that his closest comp in the league currently is Jarred Vanderbilt, who's also a highly impactful defender and shares similar high impact metrics and similar per 100 stats (except scoring), is sort of an undersized big with wing agility, but is limited by his lack of a shot.

Age 24 Vando got a 4/48 contract last year and I think Sochan if he doesn't learn to shoot in the next 2-3 years is probably worth a similar contract cap-adjusted. If he does learn to shoot at "good shooter" levels (at least 3 3PM/100 possessions), he may actually be worth 25-30 million because he jumps into the young OG/McDaniels. I am most interested to see what the Rockets end up doing with Tari Eason this summer, as his contract would basically be what Sochan's value would be if he could shoot at "league average" levels, since he is two years older than Sochan and their impact metric curves seem to overlap quite well.

So all this is to say, maybe scott is right and it's a better idea just to wait for restricted free agency with him unless he signs a very team friendly deal. His next contract is so leveraged on shooting performance that you need as much time as possible to accurately evaluate whether it's going to translate or not. I don't think he's going to become a deadeye high volume shooter overnight even if by some miracle it ever happens, so next year at this time if his shooting is trending up, the new form translates, and he's a league average shooter then you can offer him an Eason-like contract, and you have a better point of comparison by that time. It protects you from yet another recent first rounder getting a big contract and then sucking it up and turning into an albatross contract.

[Obstructed_View]

Unless PATFO think he's the next Draymond Green which is laughable when there's no Curry on our team.

That stint he had as a PG last year worries me that they think/thought he's like Green. Hopefully that illusion is gone.

I didn't think he was that bad at point. Nobody else on the team could do it, they don't set screens or generate good shots. Sochan basically gave them slightly more size than a regular small ball lineup.

[ambchang]

Dude is a bench player and the Spurs are looking to add Reid and we are going to be worried about Sochan blowing up? How? Literally how is he going to blow up? His stats have stayed the same all three years PLUS he doesn’t fit in the starting line up since he can’t shoot.

You can’t ONLY look at the cap percentage when building a team. Vassell and KJ are already bench players making 20+ million. You can’t have a third bench player making 20 million. You just can’t have that on the bench and expect to be a winner. Cap percentage be hanged.

Sochan has the same stats 3 years in a row. His playing time will be less. His ball handling will be less and his shot attempts will be down too and he can’t shoot. He’s not going to blow up. Take the risk. It’s smart business. He’s not a rising commodity.

Give me the scenario where Sochan just magically has his break out season. What does it look like? How does he fit in the offense? How many minutes does he average? Like actually think it through.

Sochans finishing and rebounding took a significant leap this year. His PER jumped by almost 50% form last year. I won’t call those the same stats.

That said, agree that he should go earn the contract, let the market determine it. I was thinking $18 per is fair but hope the spurs can work something around $15-$16.

[KobesAchilles]

• I already said I want Vassell and Keldon traded. My idea that 90/5 is fine for Sochan is predicated on him being a starter and believing that Castle's outside shooting will be respectable in the future (around 34% from three), so that a Fox/Castle/upgraded SF/Sochan/Wemby lineup would be good on offense and awesome on defense.
• Naz Reid is a much better player than Sochan, and if the Spurs do land Reid then Sochan's value to the Spurs drops significantly.
• You're way too hung up on the $20M number. As a % of the cap it's smaller and smaller each year. A 90/5 full MLE deal from the Spurs would only have one year (the final one) be over $20M, and Keldon's deal has no remaining years over $20M. In fact, only the final year of Keldon's contract ($17.5M) overlaps the first year of Sochan's extension (would be $15.5M if it's full MLE-sized).
• He fits in the offense as a cutter/dunker and connector. He really shouldn't be spotting up. There is room for one non-shooter in a lineup.
• His stats are much better this year than in his first two. He has gone from a putrid 0.513 TS% to a very good 0.595 this season, and has had big bumps to free throw rate and rebounding. And this has happened while playing 22% of his minutes out of position at C.
• "Blow up" doesn't always mean raw counting stats. If he can be an elite defender and rebounder while being at worst a slight negative on offense, that's well worth MLE money and a spot in the starting lineup imo. His breakout season would have him starting at PF (sorry, Harrison), playing 30-32 minutes, and further increasing his defense/rebounding/TS% numbers into elite territory.

So many things are wrong with what you said I think you are either his agent, family member, or don’t know the Spurs. Ofc his efficiency went up. He stopped shooting threes. And he is taking a career low in shot attempts. So yeah when all he is doing is shooting the ball 8 times a game and every single shot is uncontested or at the rim, he’s going to have higher efficiency. His free throw percentage is 69% which still sucks but he attempts a whole 2 free throws a game so does it wouldn’t really matter even if he was averaging 90% from the line. He can’t get there.

I hate when people say that you can have one non-shooter in the starting line up when it comes to defending Sochan. First off, you really can’t. Any non-shooter would be unplayable in the playoffs. Literally the easiest way to guard the Spurs in the playoffs would be to guard Wemby with a 4 and have your center just play way off Sochan and either double Wemby or clog the paint. Pretty damn easy scheme that we would have zero answer for.

Sochan isn’t good enough to be a starter on a winning team. Sorry. He sucks that badly at offense. He’s scared. And I don’t want a scared player on my team as a starter. I can’t imagine playing basketball and being afraid to shoot the ball but the dude literally is scared to shoot.

Btw Castle, Fox, and Wemby are all aight shooters at the 3. We really can’t afford to start Sochan if he can’t shoot. And also you haven’t answered my question. Which contender has three bench players making that much money? Sochan is a bench player now. He plays “out of position” bc he is so bad at offense we don’t know where to put him. He’s a tweener who can’t shoot. That’s a bench player. He’s a good bench player. But the point is that really you are bidding against yourself. Nobody bid against the Lakers. Why are you dead set on that 11% when we can have him for 7?

[rascal]

So many things are wrong with what you said I think you are either his agent, family member, or don’t know the Spurs. Ofc his efficiency went up. He stopped shooting threes. And he is taking a career low in shot attempts. So yeah when all he is doing is shooting the ball 8 times a game and every single shot is uncontested or at the rim, he’s going to have higher efficiency. His free throw percentage is 69% which still sucks but he attempts a whole 2 free throws a game so does it wouldn’t really matter even if he was averaging 90% from the line. He can’t get there.

I hate when people say that you can have one non-shooter in the starting line up when it comes to defending Sochan. First off, you really can’t. Any non-shooter would be unplayable in the playoffs. Literally the easiest way to guard the Spurs in the playoffs would be to guard Wemby with a 4 and have your center just play way off Sochan and either double Wemby or clog the paint. Pretty damn easy scheme that we would have zero answer for.

Sochan isn’t good enough to be a starter on a winning team. Sorry. He sucks that badly at offense. He’s scared. And I don’t want a scared player on my team as a starter. I can’t imagine playing basketball and being afraid to shoot the ball but the dude literally is scared to shoot.

Btw Castle, Fox, and Wemby are all aight shooters at the 3. We really can’t afford to start Sochan if he can’t shoot. And also you haven’t answered my question. Which contender has three bench players making that much money? Sochan is a bench player now. He plays “out of position” bc he is so bad at offense we don’t know where to put him. He’s a tweener who can’t shoot. That’s a bench player. He’s a good bench player. But the point is that really you are bidding against yourself. Nobody bid against the Lakers. Why are you dead set on that 11% when we can have him for 7?

Clogging the paint with Sochan's defender because Sochan isn't a shooting threat also hurts Fox and Castle as their biggest offfensive moves are going to the basket, also it hurts the offensive rebounding numbers with another defender near the basket.

[poopbox]

I didn't think he was that bad at point. Nobody else on the team could do it, they don't set screens or generate good shots. Sochan basically gave them slightly more size than a regular small ball lineup.

Who gives a about size when you can't dribble or shoot or pass and you are the person who is supposed to be initiation the offense?

This dude is a complete bust. Top 10 pick and if I bet you a million dollars that Sochan would score at least 12 points in 30 straight games would you take that bet?

[Mal]

Sochan pure numbers are getting destroyed by coaching decisions. Play PG, play backup C while being primary on guys like Cade Cunningham, play off the bench, while Barnes starts and he is good only when his shots are falling in. Sochan is plugging all the holes this roster have, he is not complaining, he is improving year-to-year. He is only 21 and some re s are saying he is a bust.

[Pauleta14]

Spurs need to involve him in a trade ASAP while he still have some hype, the dude is a bad seed and even a friendly deal would be stupid because he's unusable.

Why hold on to such a limited player when you have so many other options to develop...

[rascal]

Sochan pure numbers are getting destroyed by coaching decisions. Play PG, play backup C while being primary on guys like Cade Cunningham, play off the bench, while Barnes starts and he is good only when his shots are falling in. Sochan is plugging all the holes this roster have, he is not complaining, he is improving year-to-year. He is only 21 and some re s are saying he is a bust.

He isn't really improving all that much.

[Mal]

He isn't really improving all that much.

Take out January/February 2025 where he played injured/backup C - he is getting better in almost every statistical category

[Raven]

he's playing well, but coaching is really hurting him

[Seventyniner]

So many things are wrong with what you said I think you are either his agent, family member, or don’t know the Spurs. Ofc his efficiency went up. He stopped shooting threes. And he is taking a career low in shot attempts. So yeah when all he is doing is shooting the ball 8 times a game and every single shot is uncontested or at the rim, he’s going to have higher efficiency. His free throw percentage is 69% which still sucks but he attempts a whole 2 free throws a game so does it wouldn’t really matter even if he was averaging 90% from the line. He can’t get there.

I hate when people say that you can have one non-shooter in the starting line up when it comes to defending Sochan. First off, you really can’t. Any non-shooter would be unplayable in the playoffs. Literally the easiest way to guard the Spurs in the playoffs would be to guard Wemby with a 4 and have your center just play way off Sochan and either double Wemby or clog the paint. Pretty damn easy scheme that we would have zero answer for.

Sochan isn’t good enough to be a starter on a winning team. Sorry. He sucks that badly at offense. He’s scared. And I don’t want a scared player on my team as a starter. I can’t imagine playing basketball and being afraid to shoot the ball but the dude literally is scared to shoot.

Btw Castle, Fox, and Wemby are all aight shooters at the 3. We really can’t afford to start Sochan if he can’t shoot. And also you haven’t answered my question. Which contender has three bench players making that much money? Sochan is a bench player now. He plays “out of position” bc he is so bad at offense we don’t know where to put him. He’s a tweener who can’t shoot. That’s a bench player. He’s a good bench player. But the point is that really you are bidding against yourself. Nobody bid against the Lakers. Why are you dead set on that 11% when we can have him for 7?

• Efficiency is efficiency. If you're going to have high usage players like Wemby and Fox you have to have some low usage players. Those players being efficient is a good thing.
• Saying that having one non-shooter can't work is just plain wrong. Players like Draymond and Gordon played key roles on le teams, and guys like Amen Thompson/Sengun are bad three point shooters while having a positive impact overall.
• Your third paragraph is merely your opinion, and I disagree with it. Stating it as a fact doesn't make it one.
• The Spurs will have three bench players making that much money for at most one season even if Sochan gets 90/5 and doesn't start. Keldon will be on the last year of his contract. Hopefully Vassell will be shipped out by then too.
• I'm not dead set on 11%. I think 9% (MLE) would be a decent deal, and 8% would be good. I don't think he would take 7% but instead test the market, though of course if he would take that I would let him have it.
• Bench players making 9% of the cap isn't at all unheard of, by the way. Guys like Obi Toppin, Terrance Mann, Grant Williams, and Onyeka Okongwu all make around that amount this season.
• Sochan is mainly a bench player now because of the other starting-spot-promise the Spurs seem to have made. Both Sochan and Barnes are natural 4s in today's league.

[Seventyniner]

So all this is to say, maybe scott is right and it's a better idea just to wait for restricted free agency with him unless he signs a very team friendly deal. His next contract is so leveraged on shooting performance that you need as much time as possible to accurately evaluate whether it's going to translate or not. I don't think he's going to become a deadeye high volume shooter overnight even if by some miracle it ever happens, so next year at this time if his shooting is trending up, the new form translates, and he's a league average shooter then you can offer him an Eason-like contract, and you have a better point of comparison by that time. It protects you from yet another recent first rounder getting a big contract and then sucking it up and turning into an albatross contract.

On paper it makes perfect sense to let Sochan hit RFA and just match reasonable offers. However, the Spurs don't seem to operate that way. If Sochan signs with another team and asks the Spurs not to match, their track record indicates that they would let him go even if they would have liked him to stay on the same contract.

So given how the Spurs have shown that they operate, it would be better to lock Sochan up early if the price is right. Again, this is predicated on the idea that the Spurs don't tend to play hardball in RFA.

I think Sochan is worth MLE money even if he doesn't become a shooter, and 9% is small enough that it is unlikely to be an albatross contract even if he never improves and never starts again. Again, 9% is less than Keldon making now (13.5%, albeit on a declining contract) and Vassell (20.9%, ugh).