Gradey Dick

Gradey Dick is first and foremost an elite movement shooter who creates creates enormous gravity providing spacing for his teammates.  Dick’s value starts with his strong shooting ability.  He has clean mechanics, a high release point, and the ability to get his balance and fire up an accurate shot with a quick release.  That’s already extremely valuable; however, Dick is more than a spot up shooter; he is able to hit shots relocating, coming off screens, or dribble hand offs.  He’ s equally adept at shooting after using a couple of dribbles to set up his shot, get into a stepback, or as an escape dribble to evade a defender trying to close out on him.  Compounding this value is Dick’s motor.  Offensively, he’s like a shark who is alway moving and hunting.  This forces the defense to always be aware of Dick and often to try to dedicate a defender to face guarding him, which opens up significant space for his teammates.  This also manifests in transition opportunities, where Dick has the speed and athleticism to run inside and score, but also can sprint to the corners creating spacing or can be lethal as a trailer taking advantage of a scrambling defense.

Beyond shooting, the rest of Dick’s offense is a mixed bag.  To Dick’s credit, he is savvy about using the threat of his shot to set up defenders and open up driving lanes.  He has a bit of a frenetic, sped up style and uses a series of headfakes, jab steps, and hesitations force the defender to commit or play up on him, where  Dick he does possess a quick first step and has the speed / handles to take advantage.  However, if those tricks don’t work, Dick doesn’t have especially advanced handles and when he forces the issues, it can lead to turnovers or him driving out of control into traffic.  Dick is actually pretty athletic in space (which shows on some of his dunks and charging in for offensive rebounds), but when his momentum is stopped, he looks pretty pedestrian and lacks an real countermoves at this stage.  Inside, Dick has a few good tools; again, he is athletic and possesses some decent bend and hangtime.  However, doesn’t have great touch and isn’t particularly strong so when he does absorb contact it can impact his balance and accuracy.  This may explain why he’s a bit contact adverse and when there’s congestion inside, he tends to throw up some pretty wild shots.  Further developing his floater or just stopping to drill a mid-range jumper would help.  He also may need to slow down or at least have the game slow down for him.  The frenetic style that helped him set up defenders on the perimeter seems to work against the rest of his offense.  Dick is actually a pretty decent passer.  Nothing too advanced, but when the defense shifts to stop him, he makes the right read and can deliver an accurate pass.  However, when he’s sped up or he drives into traffic, most of his turnovers come from getting stripped or forcing a poor pass out of a bad situation he’s gotten himself into.

Defensively, Dick is a bit more challenged, but also not a lost cause.  First, Dick plays with the same frenetic energy and strong motor on defense that he does on offense.  He has good anticipation, speed, and quick hands that allow him to generate turnovers by getting into passing lanes and getting some strips.  He’s also a solid defensive rebounder who uses his athleticism and speed to pursue the ball.  Oddly though, he rarely seems to try to move up court and turn the defense into offense, but tends to hold the ball and then pass to his PG or at lease pause a couple of beats before dribbling.  On the ball, Dick has good lateral speed and his quick, springy jumping ability allows him to contest jumpers.  And while the lack of strength seems to hurt him when he gets bumped on offense, on defense, he shows some wiry strength and gets most of his blocks when offensive players try to dive into his chest to create space.    The problem with his on-ball defense is that he struggles to stop and restart his momentum, which makes him susceptible to countermoves, even some pretty simple crossovers and stepbacks.  Maybe due to this, he also tend to play a couple steps off players, which can make him vulnerable to a decent jab step.  Dick also really struggles with screens.  He has a tendency to either get stuck on them or to go under the screen, which frees up a lot of shooters (which will only be worse in the NBA).  Likely because of this, he also tends to brace for screens, which then leaves him at a big disadvantage when the ball handler rejects the screen and just drives to the hoop.  Off ball, Dick hustles and shows the ability to play in a good team defense.  He’s strongest helping along the perimeter, where his speed and athleticism help him rotate and contest shooter.  Inside, while he does his best to rotate and tag down or provide weakside help, he just doesn’t have the strength or overall length to really make an impact.

Note:  I am a bit conflicted about my assessment above that Dick plays off of players, which can indicate a lack of confidence in speed / ability to guard close.  I want to mention it here, because it shows a potential flaw in scouting that’s healthy to discuss.  Dick doesn’t always give ball handlers space, but he did it enough to notice.  However, when I looked into the players he gave space to, sure enough, some were really bad outside shooters so it may have been a smart decision, but others like Sir’Jabari Rice and Adam Flagler were very good outside shooters.  So I think the point here is correct.  But when analyzing film, I do encourage people to at least consider these are often smart player and coaches.  And sometimes the “flaws” we spot are actually savvy and intentional strategies.