The Phoenix Suns might draft the next Charles Barkley in 2019
By Adam Maynes
Zion’s fame grew out of high school mix tapes. The kid can fly. I mean it. He has hops the rival Michael Jordan, Dominique Wilkins, Darryl Dawkins, and the like. And he was doing it in a man’s body will still only a high school senior.
Then, in a brief exhibition tour in mid-August, Zion – against much better talent than he regularly faced in high school (although admittedly, still not great) – had a fantastic three game slate, including 36 points,13 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals, and 2 blocks versus McGill University of Montreal, Canada, with most of his scoring coming on finger rolls and short jumpers, very much like Charles Barkley – especially the Barkley of the Phoenix Suns years.
That said, Zion is athletic, but unproven. In high school he was literally a man against boys. There were times when I’d see clips of him and I swore that he was at least three years older than the Seniors he was playing against.
He never really had to learn the nuances of the game because he could simply out jump everybody, shooting over them, blocking any shots that were in his vicinity, and yes, posterizing kids who will never play a game of basketball beyond their high school graduation.
Even in the highlight video of Zion against McGill, he still wasn’t playing versus young men who were anywhere near as tall or athletic, and most of his impressive plays (and scoring) came with very little athletic defensive resistance – at least nothing like what he will face in true Conference competition, and eventually in the pros.
If Zion is willing to accept that he has much to learn, even only half a year under the tutelage of Mike Krzyzewski should be enough to get Zion’s intellectual growth going, and learn how to use his athleticism to become a better player, rather than a hype man waiting for an alley-oop then disappearing into the crowd of other nine players.