Jaylon Tyson 2024 NBA Draft Profile
We are continuing our 2024 NBA Draft profile series with Cal guard Jaylon Tyson, a dynamic scoring wing who played at three Division-I programs in three years. Let’s hop into it!
Height: 6’5.5″ (6’8″ wingspan, 8’6.50″ standing reach)
Weight: 218.2 lbs
Draft age: 21.6
Position: Wing
Tyson, from John Paul II High School out of Piano, Texas, was a top-40 player in the 2021 recruiting class, according to 247Sports. He originally joined Texas over Creighton, Houston, Texas Tech and Oklahoma, among others.
He played only 55 total minutes as a freshman before transferring in-state to play under Mark Adams at Texas Tech. Though Tyson was allegedly racially discriminated against by Adams, who allegedly called him a “slave” and claimed that Adams said he was his “master.” These allegations ultimately led to Adams resigning from the position in April of 2023.
Tyson then transferred to Cal under first-year Golden Bears head coach Mark Madsen, where his eligibility wasn’t originally accepted by the NCAA. That quickly changed, leading to Tyson making All-Pac-12 honors in a big-time role. He tallied 19.6 points on 50.9/36.0/79.6 shooting splits, in addition to 6.8 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.2 steals in 34.3 minutes per game.
Let’s dive into some of his strengths and weaknesses, shall we?
Strengths:
Tyson is one of the most underrated scorers in this class.
At 6-foot-7, he showcased the ability to get to the rim and finish through contact against bigger defenders. He took 44 percent of his shot attempts at the rim on non-dunk attempts, converting at a 57.6 percent clip, according to Barttorvik.
Tyson is a strong player with good upper-body and core strength for his size; he did a good job leveraging that strength to get to his spots inside the paint and finishing through bigger contact. When he wasn’t facing that physicality, he was crafty with the array of dribble moves and change-of-direction when getting to and converting at the cup.
He would do his best to get defenders off-balance and either rise up with his quick release or blow by them to create an advantage. Though I loved the flashes of his footwork when he got into the lane, leveraging it into more advantageous opportunities as a shot-maker.
He was silky smooth with the rock in his hands.
Tyson was quite effective from beyond the arc too. He shot 36.0 percent from beyond the arc, but shot 37 percent from 3-point range on catch-and-shoot 3s, 39.3 percent on unguarded 3s and nearly 35 percent on guarded 3s, according to Synergy.
He carried a pretty heavy creation burden offensively at Cal relative to his other two collegiate seasons. He had a 30.1 usage rate as a junior–only two other rotation players on his team had a usage rate above 20 percent. For perspective, here’s a list of NBA players who had a 29-31 percent usage rate in 2023-24:
- De’Aaron Fox (31.0)
- Cade Cunningham (30.8)
- Trae Young (30.5)
- Jayson Tatum (30.2)
- Devin Booker (29.8)
- Paolo Banchero (29.7)
- Zion Williamson (29.7)
- LeBron James (29.2)
He wasn’t always the perfect playmaker, but the 6-foot-7 wing made good reads. He showed he was capable of finding and hitting rollers, cutters and shooters from beyond the arc. I walked away from his tape frequently believing that he didn’t make many–if any–super detrimental decisions with the ball in his hands.
Weaknesses:
Tyson was decent laterally, but had occasional defensive lapses with blow-bys. I do appreciate his defensive competitiveness, however; for how much of a creation burden he had offensively, I believe he showed more defensive upside than he was getting credit for.
Tyson was a little chaotic with his playmaking at times as well. There were times when he tried to either thread the needle or dribble too much into traffic inside-the-arc, which occasionally led to turnovers.
He doesn’t have an explosive first step, though I do think he will be functionally athletic at the next level with his change of pace and his knowledge of angles. I’m not worried too much about that in the right system.
Projection: Picks No. 15-25 in 1st round
I’m a fan of Tyson. He may have played the position at Cal, but I don’t project him to be a pure point guard–though I see him more as a secondary playmaker with a two-way upside at the NBA level. If you’re a team looking for any sort of creation, he could fit in well right away. Teams that I could (blindly) see going for him include: Miami, Orlando, Phoenix and Milwaukee, among others.
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