Sion James 2025 NBA Draft Profile

Sion James 2025 NBA Draft Profile

We are just over one week away from the 2025 NBA Draft! Today, we will be previewing Duke guard Sion James, who specialized as a 3-and-D guard on this year’s loaded Duke team! Let’s jump right into it!

Height (no shoes): 6’4.5 (6’6.5 wingspan, 8’4 standing reach)

Weight: 217.6 lbs

Draft Age: 22.5

Position: Guard

As a three-star recruit out of Lanier High School in Buford, Ga., James signed with Tulane over offers from Ole Miss, Georgia, Yale, James Madison and Appalachain State, according to 247sports.com. He spent his first four seasons there, leading the AAC in minutes in each of his final two seasons.

He broke out as a senior, averaging 14.0 points, 5.4 rebounds, 2.7 assists and 1.6 steals per game on 54.1/38.1/68.3 shooting splits. He transferred to Duke for his fifth-and-final season, playing a minimized, yet important role alongside Cooper Flagg, Khaman Maluach, Kon Knueppel and Tyrese Proctor.

Let’s dive into his profile!

Strengths:

Sion James is built like a linebacker. He’s a basketball player in a football player’s body. The 6-foot-5 guard did a good job leveraging his strength on his drives. He was very decisive when he wanted to get downhill, doing a good job creating angles for himself and generating separation with his physical frame.

James’ long-range shooting improved dramatically over his final two seasons. He canned 39.4 percent from 3-point range on 2.7 triple tries per game, allocating for 37.2 percent of his shot diet. Flagg, Knueppel, Proctor and Maluach attracted so much gravity that James had a ton of wide open 3s. His mechanics aren’t perfect (we’ll touch on that below), but he did a good job capitalizing on open spot-up looks.

He didn’t need the ball in his hands to be impactful. Off-ball, he was an excellent cutter; he did a good job flowing into stampete cuts above-the-break and knew how to operate the short corners as an outlet. All of Duke’s guards were good connective passers, including James, who had a 3.5 assist-to-turnover ratio. Duke’s offense was well-spaced, so he never had a big problem driving-and-kicking and locating open shooters on the perimeter.

James functioned well as an inbounds passer and, at times, initiated Duke’s offense. I don’t think that will be his role at the next level, but he didn’t make too many mistakes as a connective playmaker.

Defensively, he was always up in the grill of opposing ballhandlers. He’d pick up 94 feet and would not make life easy for opposing guards. He’s not overly disruptive, but the effort was always there; he’s a bulldog, even though I didn’t always love his screen navigation or quickness.

Weaknesses:

James was a below-average finisher in the halfcourt. According to Databallr, he shot 54.4 percent at the rim in the halfcourt. I have questions about how he will finish around the rim against NBA-caliber bigs because he lacks explosion and verticality; he’s a below-the-rim finisher, even though he has no problem muscling his way through rim protectors.

While he improved as a 3-point shooter in his final two seasons, that will need to translate for him to be a functional role player. His form is a little wonky; his elbow sticks out, raises the ball in between his eyes and has an awkward follow through. His touch gradually improved, but he’s going to need to prove that’s translatable.

Sion James is a very active defender but will get blown by and doesn’t have excellent recovery speed. He sinks into his helps well but doesn’t have great foot speed and his lack of length could prohibit him from being disruptive against NBA-caliber guards. I don’t think he’ll be super switchable, though I could see him being a nightmare for smaller 3s and 4s to post up because of his strength and center of gravity.

Projection: Mid Second Round

James was never a high-usage player, so he’ll best carve out a role as a glue guy who can be a pain in the rear defensively. He’ll have to continue making 3s efficiently while being a high-level connector in the halfcourt, which isn’t out of the realm of possibility. I don’t have much of a problem throwing a dart on James, but don’t be surprised if he doesn’t fill up the stat sheet.

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