Michael Ajayi Scouting Report
Fundamentally sound low-usage pieces are vital to complement team stars on winning teams. That's the intrigue with Ajayi. But what will be his role? What's the long-term potential? Find out below.
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Introduction
After winning Freshman of the Year and Most Valuable Player in the Northwest Athletic Conference West Region, Ajayi had nothing more to prove on the JUCO level. Hereafter, he earned a Division I transfer to Pepperdine, where he finished his junior year with 17.2 points per game on 46.7% shooting—earning him All-WCC honors. His well-earned move to Gonzaga is the icing on the cake after three years of high-end performances.
The challenge for Ajayi is that he’ll have to adjust to lesser usage. An NBA team won’t put the ball in his hands as much as he had in his career thus far. For reference, Ajayi’s usage was 26.1% as a junior; Graham Ike was the only starter having more usage. Thus making it likely that Ajayi will be scaling down his ball touches and shots. Therefore, the context around the types of shots he’ll have on top of his impact without the ball will be the emphasis of this scouting report.
Physical Profile
At 6-foot-7, Ajayi has a strong frame with broad shoulders. He’s weighed at 228 pounds, making it suitable for him to play as a two, three, and potentially a four when he’s continuing to fill his frame. Ajayi sets himself apart from most of his peers due to his combination of twitchiness and speed. This makes it possible for him to bully a defender with his size and strength advantage, while also being able to blow by stronger players using his athleticism.
Ajayi has good hip mobility but needs to work on his overall footwork. Another factor that gets in his way is that he’s getting carried away by his twitchiness and speed. Thus, learning how to utilize his physical tools and athleticism is a vital part of Ajayi’s development to become an NBA player. Therefore, playing winning basketball on a contender where he’s challenged to do more of the dirty work is a good context for him to be in regarding the evaluation of his draft profile.
Offense
Ajayi shot a mind-boggling 47.0% on 83 three-point attempts per game this past season. That makes it easy to label him as a good shooter. But unfortunately, that is a premature conclusion to have based on the numbers. There are areas in Ajayi’s shot process that he needs to work on to make the shooting returns more feasible at the next level. The most important context around the translation to the NBA is answering a higher pace and more ball movement.
Despite the good numbers, Ajayi shows hesitation before his jumper. Consistent and quick decision-making is an area of development, as he’s looking to attack the closeout more often than not, rather than bank on the space he has to launch the three-point shot. The first play below is a good example. Ajayi had his feet set when catching the pass, making the extra jab step unnecessary. This led to an unbalanced jumper, despite the make.
In the second play, Ajayi is ready for the catch-and-shoot sequence as he bends his knees before the catch, whereafter he simply powers up for the jumper. However, he looks to bring the ball down before coming back up for the shot. This part of his technique costs him valuable time before the release, giving the defense a better chance to contest his jumper. In a faster NBA game, that’s an area of development for Ajayi an NBA decision-maker must take into consideration as a part of his developmental plan.
A positive part of Ajayi’s jumper is that he’s fluid in his whole shooting motion, with the third and fourth possessions below being examples. He’s consistent in the way he gets to his jumper but needs to refine his technique to make it more feasible his three-point shot is translatable to a higher level of basketball. The big challenge here is Ajayi getting rid of the habit of forcing his jumpers. In the fifth play below, we see a forced push-shot from the midrange. This can be seen in how Ajayi partially dives forward before the release.
An NBA decision-maker wants to see offensive versatility from low-usage wings. That makes it a must to be a good shot-creator via closeout attacks while being able to generate paint touches and show reliable offense around the rim. For Ajayi, that’s been a struggle in his junior year. His lack of rim pressure trickles down to him being forced to take tough midrange jumpers. On top of that, the lack of efficiency at the rim also forced Ajayi to find his production as a three-point shooter.
That’s the wrong approach. A prospect’s efficiency and consistency in getting to the rim should open up the rest of the scoring package. In the NBA, teams are being bailed out if a player’s main strength is three-point shooting. Generating open looks takes time off the clock, forces teams to run specific sets to get Ajayi open and thus leads to risking the offensive rating going down.
Having only ten dunks on the season while generating more than one hundred rim-finishing attempts is another indicator of Ajayi’s struggles to get clean open shots. The positive of the above-mentioned is that he’s thriving on being a tough shot-maker. His twitchiness combined with self-confidence as a scorer led to him creating separation off the dribble, despite bailing the defense out with his shot selection.
The area of development for Ajayi is that he’s having tunnel vision at times. passing up good passing opportunities to get to his sweet spots. In the first possession below, he could have found a wide-open teammate underneath the basket with the bounce pass but opted to go for his shot instead. Plays like these take away all the value of the good percentages he is having, as NBA decision-makers want to see the feel for the game in making the right decisions with the ball in a prospect’s hands.
We see a similar outcome in the second play, where Ajayi had the option to hit two shooters above the break with a kick-out pass after taking his man off the dribble. To make it worse, the opponents had a clear chance of running a transition offense, with Ajayi being too late to run back on defense. That’s another sign for NBA decision-makers to focus on in his senior season at Gonzaga, as upperclassmen are expected to show good habits such as immediately switching back on defense after missed shots, rather than letting their disappointment take over the body language after seeing the ball not go in.
A positive sign in Ajayi’s development is his using his pivot foot well to elevate himself to a shooting motion or create separation. In the fourth play below, he pivots his left foot while making himself smaller to potentially dive into a defender’s arms, forcing an and-one. However, his teammate in the corner was screaming for the ball but didn’t get the pass to go through. Selfishness is good at times, especially when a prospect is expected to carry the scoring load. However, in Ajayi’s case, he’ll have to settle for a complementary role for Gonzaga, thus making it non-negotiable that he has to make the pass in plays as the fourth one below.
At 63 assists to 67 turnovers, Ajayi shows a good sign of being able to play as a ball-mover. The negative assist-to-turnover ratio is irrelevant, as Ajayi’s main task is to score, and not set his teammates up. As mentioned above, he misses out on a fair share of potential assists due to his tunnel vision and strong will to get his buckets. That has to change in his days as a Zag.
Therefore, when focusing on his assists, Ajayi shows a clear sign of being able to make good decisions as a ball-mover. He doesn’t hold onto the ball long when his team is keeping the ball moving. That’s the first sign of evolving into a potential playmaker at the next level. In the first play below, he pops from his assignment to the perimeter, while fluidly moving his hips to have a 145-degree sight on the basket. He quickly sees a relocating teammate via the baseline, hitting the cutter with a simple pass for a high-quality look at the rim.
Positioning to deliver the right pass is Ajayi’s strength. In the second possession, he gets the entry pass but immediately posts up his opponent with sight on the strong side, rather than focusing on getting by his defender via the baseline. This helps Ajayi quickly locate the cutter to hit him with the timely bounce pass. An NBA decision-maker will like the composure Ajayi plays with. In the fourth possession, the offense looks to dry up, with him tracking down a teammate to deliver the entry pass. Again, he positions his body well, being able to see all four teammates whereafter he hits the cutter at the high post.
Another area where Ajayi will impact Gonzaga’s offense is his contribution to their offensive rating via hustle plays. In the fourth play, he outworks the defense to collect the offensive board, whereafter he shows composure but executes his read to hit the cutter quickly. In the fifth play, he makes sure to draw help defense before a kick-out pass. Despite the play ending in a tough midrange jumper, rather than a clean look, he gives signs of overcoming his tunnel vision while focusing on his points. That’s the swing-skill that will impact his draft value.
A lack of rim presence is one of the shortcomings in Ajayi’s profile. However, he’s partially compensating for that with his active cutting. Being the quick, twitchy athlete that he is, Pepperdine often ran sets where his scoring gravity was leveraged with his off-ball movement. Teams knew that his three-point shooting was what made him a dangerous scorer in the WCC, they were pushing toward the perimeter in a four-out styled offense the Waves often ran.
In the first play, it’s Ajayi making himself the forgotten man with the backdoor cut with Pepperdine’s focus on keeping the ball on the strong side. The second possession shows how good Ajayi’s reads are, making sure he’s always available as a recipient to bail out passes when defenses pressure the ball handler. His relocating to the area of the charity stripe led to a clean scoring opportunity after the teammate’s pass-fake, pulling the rim protector further away from the basket.
The third possession shows Ajayi quickly reacting to a teammate in trouble again. After being doubled on the post-up, the look for a bail-out pass got started, whereafter Ajayi smoothly relocated between the defenders packing the paint for the easy finish. Communication with teammates is the key element in getting clean looks after cuts. His subtle hint before popping to the rim on the fourth play is an example.
Despite his cutting being mostly basic reads powered by good communication, Ajayi has to show that he has that in his arsenal. Getting clean looks as an active cutter is the main ingredient in successfully scaling down his offense with fewer ball touches—the main status in solidifying Ajayi’s NBA potential.
Defense
Defensively, Ajayi has many hurdles to overcome to be an average defender on the NBA level. He’s often losing the positioning battle, especially in pick-and-roll coverages. The main reason is the lack of good positioning and ball-watching. In the first two plays, he’s positioning his pivot foot and stance close to the perimeter, instead of keeping his assignment under control by having both feet away from the three-point line. In both possessions, this leads to clean cuts to the rim with no defenders to be seen on both lay-up finishes.
There is potential to serve as a pick-and-roll defender against both ball handlers with his speed and twitchiness and roll men with his strong upper body and strength. But without proper positioning, he’ll have a target on his back, while being a clear threat to a team’s defensive rating. The third possession shows a bad outcome, but a promising process. He looks to lose the ball handler, to quickly recover by bouncing off the screener. However, his positioning is yet again closer to the perimeter than his opponent, again opening the room to simply cut to the rim for the finish.
Where Ajayi stands out as a communicator and a cutter, it’s not the same in his pick-and-roll defense. In the fourth play below, he does well to tag the screener, while pivoting his left foot toward the ball hander, signing that he’s going to switch. But instead of switching, he follows the rolling big man, with a wide-open three being a result of a lack of communication. This play in particular is an area of development for NBA decision-makers to watch during his senior year at Gonzaga. Purely looking at his physical tools the combination of quick hands and twitchiness led to the steal in the fifth play below, but as of today’s that play is more of an outlier than consistent things to expect.
When defending against cutters, Ajayi often struggles with his positioning. The pace of the game and ball movement are other struggles that he has to work on to solidify his status as an NBA defender. In the first play below, he does well to stop the dribble penetration from the ball handler but is too late to switch to the big man waiting in the dunker’s spot.
In the second play, Ajayi was too busy with coaching his teammates in the defensive possession, leading to him getting backdoored. For that play, it wasn’t a big deal if it weren’t for the ball-watching. However, an NBA decision-maker must put these areas of development into the right context. Ajayi has climbed the ladder from the JUCO reigns to a Pepperdine team that is struggling to get to a winning record. With his number being called for the production side of the offensive game, he’s often forced to coach his teammates on defense. He’s taking his role as a leader seriously and that earns him much credit. Although it doesn’t lead to positive defense, Coach Few’s system and high focus on fundamentals will make that part of his game an interesting but vital part of his development to be able to play on an NBA Floor.
He’s able to make the right reads but struggles with it consistently. In the third possession below, Ajayi sees his teammate taking over the big man waiting in the low post. Instead of launching out for the closeout, he knows that the assignment via the post-up will lead to a favorable mismatch for their opponents. Therefore, he carefully closes out, enough to where he can use his length to intercept the entry pass and come up with the transition offense. In the fourth play, he again uses his good length to intercept the bounce pass to the cutter, after quickly moving his hips so fluidly to make a 270-degree spin while intercepting the ball. The hand-eye coordination in that play is another example of the excellent physical tools that should intrigue an NBA decision-maker.
When defending against closeout-attackers, Ajayi shows decent to good defensive footwork. He’s good at using his pivot foot to maintain balance but often looks a tad too slow in his first step when moving laterally. His excellent second step and overall speed compensate for the first step, but with the right footwork, that should improve on an NBA floor. In the first possession, Ajayi strongly pivoted his right foot, while bending toward the right, which helped him to power up for the lateral movement. Combined with his excellent frame and strength, he successfully kept the ball handler in front of him.
In the second play, Ajayi pivoted his left foot too far out, while having to power with his right leg to keep the ball handler in front of him. While he was close to 270 degrees from his opponent, that was an uphill battle to get the stop. Therefore, positioning remains one of the main areas of development in Ajayi’s defensive profile. An NBA decision-maker can test the feasibility of improvement for his positioning and footwork with the third and fourth plays below, where Ajayi solidly shows good preparation in his closeouts and with the last step to match. The quickness and strength aren’t the issue, as the right positioning makes it a favorable battle for Ajayi to win when opponents attack his closeouts.
When defending against spot-up shooters, Ajayi is often caught overhelping on defense. Whether it’s him having two feet inside the paint or simply being too early in rotations or help-defense settings, it leads to offenses being bailed out with wide-open passing opportunities to the perimeter. On better-spaced NBA floors, that makes him vulnerable to hurt a team’s defensive rating due to him potentially giving up too many open threes due to him deferring to help defense too often and too quickly.
In the first play, he’s having two feet far inside the paint, while watching the incoming scorer and biting on the fake. This led to an easy outside pass, with no Pepperdine defender in sight to take over his assignment. In the second possession, his team again crowds the paint, but Ajayi responds to the paint touch by relocating closer to the rim, purely on instincts. Although there’s nothing wrong with that, the lack of court vision to see a wide-open shooter above the break is what simply hurts his chances to solidify his status as an NBA prospect at this point.
The third and fourth plays give glimpses of hope. In both sequences, the ask for the NBA to respond to fast transition play or dribble penetration has led to Ajayi making the right decisions. In the third play he coaches his teammates while keeping his assignment neutralized near the elbows, whereas in the fourth play, he double-checks to see if he has one foot outside of the paint, but is too late with his closeout to the far corner. Both processes where mistakes are acceptable for a losing Pepperdine team, but can potentially be the difference between winning and losing on a title-contending Gonzaga squad. With his status as an upperclassman, Ajayi has no choice but to improve his off-ball defense, specifically by improving his positioning and lessening the early help defense.
NBA Draft Projection
For an NBA decision-maker, here are the above-mentioned areas summarized:
Strengths
Excellent physical tools and athleticism. Ajayi’s twitchiness and speed combined with his upper-body strength make him an intriguing developmental piece for NBA teams.
Thrives on making tough shots. The numbers speak for themselves, with the context of him being a lethal midrange scorer, and less of a three-point shooter despite the 47% over his junior year. The process of his jumper is not feasible in the long-term, as the time lost on powering up for the shot and hesitation before shooting will make it easier to defend in the NBA.
Areas of development
Often overhelps on defense while struggling to position himself properly. This leads to offenses being bailed out with kick-out passes to wide-open shooters, while the team defense is working on keeping scorers away from the basket. A bad team context is a part of the reason, but a consistent lack of defensive reads is what Ajayi needs to work on in his senior year.
A lack of paint touches as a self-creating scorer will make Ajayi an easy target for opposing scouting departments. He struggles to find clean looks at the rim when not serving as a cutter. This puts a cap on his long-term potential as a scorer.
Has tunnel vision when creating his offense. Despite being able to serve as a ball-mover when not the vocal point of the offense, Ajayi often misses clear passing opportunities in live-dribble settings. This makes it an uphill battle for NBA decision-makers to utilize his physical tools to help him evolve into a self-creating wing scorer.
Based on the above-mentioned strengths and areas of development alongside the details in this scouting report, I project Michael Ajayi to be a late second-round pick in the 2025 NBA Draft. The team success of Gonzaga and the role he’ll have in a winning season will be potential draft-stock-boosters.
With his status as an upperclassman, his agency will likely be more willing to accept a shorter-term deal to cash in earlier than a rookie-scaled contract. The amount of freshman talent in this class increases the pressure on improving quickly in his areas of development to maintain in the race of being a top-60 prospect on draft night.
For now, I am giving a discount of 25% for life, which makes it $3.75 a month for in-depth scouting reports and other various types of content I am working on. My track record so far is having over 300K+ words written on more than 80 scouting reports for the 2024 NBA Draft. I am going to exceed that for this year’s class!