Most Impressive Rookies of the 2023 NBA Draft Class

With the end of the regular season, many of the rookies of the 2023 class's seasons have ended, and it's worth reviewing just what we've seen from a class filled with talent all across the first and second round. We're going to deep dive some of the most impressive rookies that may haven't gotten as much love as Wemby, Chet and Miller and project how their rookie seasons can be built on in their coming years.

Jaime Jaquez Jr.

The Heat seem to always do it, and with Jaquez they find themselves a capable ball handler, defender, and in general rookie that seems to fit their team first style of basketball, with a side of flair (and great hair).

While it's somewhat customary for teams who throw their rookies into the fire to expect a lot of bad isolation possessions, Jaquez all around talent fits like a glove into Spoelstra's schemes as a plug and play player that gives a lot of positives on both ends. Jaime's game has a lot of "old-man" feel to it, and as a rookie that is a huge compliment. The game never looks too fast for him, and Spoelstra has given the 22-year old UCLA product a ton of opportunity to work his own strengths of post-work and elite footwork to the Heat's advantage. Jaquez scores 1.05 Points Per Possession on Jaquez post-ups, where he ranks 67th %tile of scorers. Even in film, Jaquez takes his time, backing down slowly, but methodically as he surveys the floor to find open cutters, skip-passes, or just enough space to give a very LA-esque fadeaway midrange jumper. This ability to flip between Bam and Jaquez operating as hubs in the elbow and post respectively has given Spoelstra a couple of styles to run through effectively, for a Heat team that seems to be strung for any offensive juice outside of Bam, Jimmy and Herro.

Amen Thompson

Much was made about both the Thompson twins coming out of the Overtime Elite program and how they would fare against NBA competition their age, as well as seasoned veterans. Amen's physical abilities were lauded the moment he came in, but his lack of any shooting was always a concern.

After a slow start due to lack of playing time and early injuries, Amen proved he has limitless potential as a wrecking ball on defense. He is a deflection and steal monster, knowing exactly when to poke and bother an offensive player without being overly aggressive. He's constantly scanning the defensive field and has great spatial awareness of every offensive player, allowing him to roam, switch, and anticipate passing lanes to then lead to fast transition buckets. Additionally, he's an elite rebounder that has such great anticipation of where and how high a ball will be off of rebounds, and can make extremely quick reads of when to tip it back to a teammate, or contort his long wingspan to grab the rebound. As a rookie, he's in the 89th %tile of all players in OREB%, and 82nd in DREB%.

A difference between his brother and he early on in their careers is Amen, despite the same shooting woes as Ausar, is not a complete offensive liability. At a high level it shows in the advanced stats (-0.8 Off EPM vs -2.5 for Ausar), but when you watch Amen, you can see how his rebounding on both ends, quick decision making, and passing all alleviate some of the other issues that may arise with having a non-shooter on the floor. He creates a ton of additional possessions on the offensive side, and projects to be an elite passer as he learns to cut the turnovers down. These two traits, combined with his elite ability to get to the rim with quickness and length that not many people have show that their is a path way to him being a good offensive player.

Dereck Lively

Luka has been begging for a lob threat and the Mavs seem to have found a great long-term PNR partner for the next couple of years. Non-shooting bigs usually have a hard time adjusting to NBA offenses and defenses for good reasons: the game simply is too fast and physical for them to guard both skilled bigs and perimeter players.

On defense, Lively is extremely disciplined for a rookie big. He's already showed he has the makings of an elite rim protector, where he blocks 5.2% of opponents FGA while on the court (94th %ile in the league). He's improved throughout the course of the season and very good at determining when to try to block a shot, vs leveraging his length and verticality to alter an opponent's ability to get a good shot off.

Lively's nimbleness helps him offensively too. Lively is +8.3 pts/100 possessions when on the court, and boasts a 4th best 1.39 Points Per Possession as the PNR man, with a whopping 73% from the field. Safe to say, he's taking advantage of any time with Luka he can. Furthermore, of rookies he leads the pack in screen assists, which checks out with the eye test as he is able to handle elite defenders just enough off of picks to give Luka and Kyrie just enough space to get a good shot off.

Brandin Podziemski

Coming off a disappointing end-to-end loss in the play-in to their NorCal rivals the Sacramento Kings, the Warriors find themselves in a confusing and unclear off season. Despite a season marred with ups and downs, they found a player who fits Kerr's style of play/glue guy in Podziemski. A rare case of consistency for the team, Podziemski saw a minutes and role increase when he saw himself playing with starters after Kerr worked to move Thompson to the bench.

Podziemski seems to project well as a jack of all trades player with multiple skills that will be valuable for a long time. His rebounding is extremely impressive not only for a rookie, but as a guard in the league as a whole. He fights for rebounds, and is able to create transition opportunities immediately. At times, he feels almost like a Josh Hart-esque engine that keeps the pace in the Warriors offense humming. He's in the 97th percentile of grabbing offensive rebounds off misses at 5.9% and 98th percentile of defensive rebounding off opponent misses at 14.9% when in the lineup. Furthermore, lineups with Podziemski were +5.1 when in transition, which was evident by his ability to fill lanes correctly, utilizing his ability to shoot the corner three well or cut to the basket.