How Pritchard has broken through Boston's rookie wall

https://www.nbcsports.com/boston/celtics/how-payton-pritchard-has-broken-through-celtics-rookie-wall



How Pritchard has broken through Boston's rookie wall


14H AGO


BY CHRIS FORSBERG
CELTICS INSIDER



There was no shortage of Payton Pritchard highlights on Tuesday night. Enough so that Jaylen Brown dubbed him “the G.O.A.T.” after Pritchard sparked Boston’s rally from a 17-point second-half deficit for a 116-111 triumph over the Indiana Pacers.

But the moment that hammered home why Pritchard has so quickly earned the trust of Celtics coach Brad Stevens, breaking through a rookie wall that has slowed up many a first-year player, came during another early season crunch-time cameo in which Pritchard showed exactly why he’s nicknamed FastPP.

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With Boston clinging to a four-point lead with under five minutes to play, Pritchard accelerated past Victor Oladipo and, when Myles Turner shuffled over to help, the rookie lobbed the ball at the rim for Tristan Thompson. Alas, TT was a little late leaving the ground for the lob from PP, and TJ Warren was able to punch the ball away for a steal.

Pritchard’s heels were essentially on the baseline as Oladipo broke out from above the charge circle. With a series of powerful steps, Pritchard closed the gap by midcourt and, when Oladipo slowed to time his approach to the basket, the rookie lunged and poked the ball free.

Marcus Smart retrieved it. The action went back the other way, with the ball quickly back in the hands of Pritchard, and, despite being thin on numbers, Pritchard’s threat of attacking the basket in transition had three defenders shuffling to his side of the floor. The rookie zipped the ball across to Smart for an open 3-pointer and a much more comfortable seven-point cushion.

Pritchard finished with 10 points on 4-of-8 shooting with five rebounds, five assists, and that key theft. He had three turnovers but, much to Brad Stevens’ pleasure, none were caused by inadvertently stepping out of bounds during an offensive possession.

Four games into his NBA career, Pritchard, the No. 26 pick in November’s draft, is fifth on the team in total minutes played (88). He’s logged more floor time than two of Boston’s key rotation players during their bubble run in Grant Williams (61 minutes) and Daniel Theis (86). He’s just ahead of veteran offseason acquisition Jeff Teague, who he was supposed to be ahead of him on the point guard depth chart entering the season.

All of which is to say that Pritchard has blown away any sort of reasonable expectation. Sure, being a four-year player at Oregon made him a bit more NBA ready than some of the teenagers the Celtics have snagged in recent years. He is older than Jayson Tatum. But to muscle his way into the rotation this early, to have Brown dubbing him the GOAT, and Tatum playfully calling him “8 Mile,” is still remarkable.

While Kemba Walker is sidelined, there will be suggestions that Pritchard should even be considered for starting duties in small-ball lineups, especially if Stevens navigates away from the two-big variation he’s used to start the year. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what Pritchard’s role is because if he continues to impact winning the way he has, he’s going to be a key rotation presence on this team.

The Celtics don’t win Tuesday night without Pritchard’s game-changing energy.

“Payton came in there with the confidence,” said Brown. “Definitely needed a spark coming off the bench and Payton was everything and more for us tonight. We're gonna need more guys to continue to step up. Excellent guy. Excellent job from Payton Pritchard, man. Kid can play and we're looking forward to him and other guys stepping up as well in the future.”

Before Tuesday’s game, Stevens playfully needled the rookie about his propensity to step on the sideline early in his pro career. All while doing his best to keep the Pritchard excitement from ballooning too fast.

"He’s a good player. He’ll be a good player for a long time,” said Stevens. "I don’t want to overdo it. The rookie hype train can sometimes be a good thing and sometimes be a bad thing. He just needs to keep playing, keep getting better, do the best he can, and try to catch the ball inbounds.

"That’s the No. 1 goal. If he can go a whole game without being out of bounds, that’d be quite a victory.”

Well, chalk Tuesday night up in multiple win columns. But it turns out staying inbounds wasn’t Pritchard's biggest contribution. He changed the entire complexion of the game — with help from fellow bench mobber Robert Williams — by bringing energy and effort after a dreadful start to the third quarter left the Celtics staring at a 17-point hole.

Pritchard even got some fourth-quarter run with a starter-heavy group. He’s now had multiple games with crunch-time lineups. It speaks volumes about the confidence the team has in him this early.

"Having that confidence from your coach and also from my teammates, it means the world to me because it can allow me to keep growing as a player and being able to help this team when I can,” said Pritchard. "Coming off the bench, I want to be able to provide a spark, get the team either going or help the team build more of a lead.

"I'm all about winning. That's why we play this game. I want to win and I want to help as much as I can to get a win. So, just tried to do that tonight.”

Pritchard certainly has a bit of Smart in him, especially if he’s going to produce those sort of winning plays. Danny Ainge drafted a younger version of himself and Pritchard has helped fill an obvious void with Walker sidelined to start the year.

Sorry, Coach, the rookie hype train is already nearing a high velocity. Fortunately for the Celtics, Pritchard doesn’t seem like the type that will get too content based on a small bit of early praise. Yes, even GOATS have to work to do on this team.


Bob
MY NOTE: As Red used to say "it doesn't matter who starts, what matters is who finishes". Thompson came in with 2:05 left and the Celtics with a 4 point lead. Payton came in and replaced Thompson with 55.2 seconds left in the game, with the Celtics owning a 2 point lead, and finished the game. Not Teague, Pritchard. Those 1:09.8 seconds were the only time Pritchard was out of the game in the 4th quarter, he played roughly 10:50 out of the last 12. His boxscore in the 4th was 6 points on 2-5, 1-2 from the line, 1 turnover (and then stole it back 4 seconds later), 1 assist and 1 rebounds.

Watching Oregon play the last 4 years I in no way saw this coming. Not even close.

Pritchard has been a total surprise to me so far and could end up making me eat my words about drafting him. That would be nice.

He's going to make rookie mistakes but every player does. He's earning time and Stevens' trust with the game on the line. Impressive.

He looks like he's a 2-guard more than a point, but was drafted to shoot it and he's doing that quite well.

I think we also drafted another kid at 14.

NYCelt wrote:Watching Oregon play the last 4 years I in no way saw this coming. Not even close.

Not sure anyone saw this coming... I don't really follow college ball, but I glanced at Pritchard's college stats, and everything improved his last year. Massively improved. Regarding both conventional and advanced stats, Pritchard jumped from barely noticeable to eye-popping. Seems like some sort of light turned on for him after his junior year. I wonder if he had already been written off such that the talent evaluators didn't quite notice his emergence. Leave it to Danny to be the guy thinking out of the box.

It looks like at least one scouting agency saw the potential of Payton. Check out this prescient report from "peachtreehoops" - I bolded a couple of interesting predictions:


Payton Pritchard spent four years at the University of Oregon helping to power good offensive teams that performed at an even higher level during the 2019-20 season. He is a gifted shooter that increasingly added range across his collegiate career. With that in mind, Pritchard appears poised to enter the NBA as a player that can confidently shooter a full step behind the three-point line.

It was Pritchard’s progress as a pick-and-roll creator that helped lift the Ducks into the offensive stratosphere last year. Opposing defenses were not able to speed him up and Pritchard’s sometimes deliberate tendency as a passer fit perfectly into the NCAA setting.

He demonstrates excellent patience and awareness operating as a creator in the offensive half court. Despite his uncommon level of confidence as a shooter, he consistently makes the right play when running the offense. A test will come for Pritchard when NBA defenses force him to play at a much quicker pace.

He is an outstanding hit-ahead passer in the open court and this skills offers some reason for optimism that he can function at a faster pace in tighter space in the half court. Rim running big men will love playing with him. In this area, he may not be quite at the level of Trae Young or Lonzo Ball, for example, but he’s not far off.

Early in his professional career, Pritchard is likely to spend as much time off of the ball as he will on it. This should not be of concern as he is very reliable in catch and shoot situations.

Pritchard graded as an average finisher near the rim as a collegiate player, which does not bode well in term of projecting to grow into being a relatively high usage player at the next level, even if he plays predominantly on second units. As Pritchard built experience against NCAA competition, he learned to become a more physical player on drives and to create useful angles when attacking the basket. It is hard to imagine that translating seamlessly as he steps up to the NBA level.

He is a reasonably secure ball handler, but improvement in this area may be the key to Pritchard being able to play at a faster pace in tighter space. Pritchard made a significant amount of progress in this area in four years at Eugene, but he will need to continue this development as he prepares to encounter defenders that are consistently both bigger and quicker than him.

As his ball handling skills have progressed, Pritchard has developed n outstanding ability to use his dribble package to get defenders off balance which could help him deal with larger defenders as he moves up to the professional level.

His best NBA fit may be playing next to a bigger lead guard (like Russell Westbrook) or a high usage wing creator (such as Jayson Tatum). In fact, the versatility he offers as an offensive player should make it fairly easy to work him into varying roles on that end as he earns playing time.

As a defender, he is surprisingly strong for a player listed at 6’2 and 190 pounds. It is not easy to move him off of a spot, but taller players have had little trouble shooting over him.


When not on top of his responsibility , he simply lacks the size and athleticism to recover on plays. As such, he’s going to have to make a lot of progress in his individual execution when operating in defensive schemes.

Pritchard created few defensive “events” (i.e. steals and blocks) across his college career. With that, there should be no expectation that he develops the ability to move the needle in that area as he seeks to work his way into an NBA rotation.

He’s going to have to develop an ability to be a resourceful defender despite his lack of raw tools. The keys will be recognition, awareness and an ability to communicate at a high level. When considering how nuanced his play on the offensive end, it doesn’t seem too far fetched that he can grow into a functional defensive player.

Every team, it seems, is looking to add shooting and offensive creation. Given that Pritchard easily checks both of those boxes, it seems obvious he’s going to get a serious opportunity to play his way into an NBA rotation.

In most cases, he is projected to be and early to mid second round pick, in the same range as many other college guards. It wouldn’t be shocking, however, to see a team take a shot on Pritchard at the very end of the first round when the draft finally arrives in November.

Shamrock1000 wrote:

NYCelt wrote:Watching Oregon play the last 4 years I in no way saw this coming. Not even close.

Not sure anyone saw this coming... I don't really follow college ball, but I glanced at Pritchard's college stats, and everything  improved his last year. Massively improved. Regarding both conventional and advanced stats, Pritchard jumped from barely noticeable to eye-popping. Seems like some sort of light turned on for him after his junior year. I wonder if he had already been written off such that the talent evaluators didn't quite notice his emergence. Leave it to Danny to be the guy thinking out of the box.

Shamrock,

I attributed a lot of Pritchard's improved Sr year numbers to the continued weakening of the PAC 12. Also a stronger Oregon front-court to work with. Obviously there was more to it than I thought.

Regards