Ulrich Chomche Scouting Report
The youngest draft-eligible prospect of this class has the potential to be a two-way center in the future. How much time does he need? What will be his projected NBA role? Find out more below.
Ulrich Chomche is the youngest eligible prospect for the 2024 NBA Draft. Being born on 30 December, he doesn’t turn 19 until after the NBA’s Play-In Tournament. For teams that would like to swing for the fences and invest a few years in a player’s development, Chomche’s profile should be intriguing.
Physical Profile
At 6’11”, Chomche is a tremendous athlete and one of the most mobile bigs in recent years. With his quick feet, he can guard on the perimeter, combined with his vertical pop, which will help him defend closer to the rim.
At 220 pounds, he can still bulk up and add muscle. However, the urgency will depend on his NBA role, which will be mentioned later on in the scouting report. With fluid hips and lateral quickness, Chomche can make any adjustment on defense and potentially be able to guard every position at the NBA level.
On the open floor is where his athleticism pops out the most. The combination of quickness and fluidity is one the best I have scouted so far in my career. There is no official wingspan measurement available, however, when evaluating his film, 7’3” looked to be the most accurate.
Defense
The first thing that stood out when evaluating his film is the lack of confidence as a pick-and-roll defender. Chomche gambles too much and struggles to read the offense and decide which coverage to apply.
In the first of the two plays below, Chomche decides to step forward at the moment the ball handler makes his move. The defensive footwork is still lacking, leading to him neither efficiently going over the screen, nor playing drop coverage.
The second play shows tagging the screener, while his team goes for the ICE. What stood out is that despite losing his balance, his recovery was quick, resulting in a solid contest of the jumper.
On pick-and-roll sets where the ball handler hits the roller, Chomche shows consistency in the errors he makes in his coverage. The first thing that stood out is that he tends to jump without the need for it. A part of it is the lack of experience, but his feel for the game not being on a pro level is something to consider for NBA decision-makers.
In the first of two plays below, Chomche again steps forward at the moment the ball handler utilizes the screen, which leads to him losing ground to the roller, whereafter he still quickly recovers, followed by changing sides with his fluid hips and quick first jump, which were impressing, despite him falling for the obvious pump-fake.
In the second play, Chomche decides to go over the screen, without the opponent having the spot-up shooters set up and about to run horns. His attack didn’t impress the ball handler, who utilized the driving lane to collapse the defense. The jump upon the drop-off wasn’t necessary and led to Chomche not being able to contest the roll man who finishes for the easy two.
Guarding the pick-and-roll as a center will be one of the more important duties of Chomche at the next level. His feel for the game on that end needs to improve together with his tendency to jump before the play-finisher has the ball in his hands.
However, it’s imminent that he’ll improve in the future with his decision-making. Because he’s already able to recover so quickly after a mistake, the idea of his defensive impact with him knowing what he’s doing would be a scary thought for his opponents.
The two plays below show how his mobility can be a game-changer for an NBA team’s defense. Within the first play, he gets beat by the drop-off bounce pass, with a tremendous recovery by quickly switching sides and almost getting the block without fouling, with his help defense on the second play being timely, where he again gets called with the foul after making his lightning-quick recovery.
With more reps and experience, Chomche has the potential to be a defense-anchoring big man later on in his career. What makes him a special prospect is his ability to combine this with guarding in space against quicker ball handlers.
The issue Chomche has is that his decision-making blocks him from being able to play at the next level in the short term. Although he shows promising flashes, the consistency is something that he isn’t able to show yet.
Chomche needs to learn that he shouldn’t fear the explosiveness of the quicker ball handler. It should be the contrary: he should challenge ball handlers to beat him off the dribble. The play below is a good example. Chomche shows good positioning and timely closes out on the side pass to the top of the key, and places his pivot foot aggressively to take on the challenge in the point-of-attack.
However, he loses his balance on the first hesitation move, allowing the ball-handler enough separation to launch the pull-up three in his face. With his long arms, he still contests quite well, but an athlete with his foot speed and lateral quickness shouldn’t get beat by hesitation moves.
In games with FIBA rules, it’s less common that we see switch-heavy schemes that lead to positional mismatches such as big men guarding guards. This is due to the defensive three-second rule being non-existent and it’s not lucrative for big men to move too far away from the painted area on their defensive duties, with the sample size in the film being limited.
Therefore, Chomce’s ability to guard the perimeter should be something we see more when he’s changing scenery. There have been rumors that several high-major D1 schools are interested in recruiting him as a part of the 2024 class, while the G League route looks like another path for him to consider.
Upon further focus on his defensive profile, his guarding post-ups are something we’ll likely see at the next level. What stood out is that his upper-body strength still needs some improvement if he wants to handle bulky big men with more comfort.
In the first play of two, Chomche shows he still needs to develop his defensive footwork, he saw the gather as the first step, leading to him already anticipating the finish one step too early. A small detail with the 18-year-old got beat on experience, but this should show NBA decision-makers that his feel for the game needs to improve.
Where the second play shows flashes of him being able to improve his basketball IQ. His opponent gets the offensive boards after Chomche’s block, and he immediately positions himself for the low-post defense. He uses his body well to handle the bump and contests the shot perfectly, with a good box-out to finish the play.
Chomche has ways to go on defense, but a future role as a defense-anchoring center at the NBA level is something he should be working towards. The combination of him utilizing his tremendous athleticism to his advantage is something that Chomche still has to learn.
While playing in Africa, Chomche is facing plus-athletes on the regular. But the level of play isn’t on a high enough level to be confident that it will translate early on when he moves to the United States. Therefore, the move to the United States looks like the most logical move for him to play the brand of basketball where he’s able to show his complete defensive potential, with guarding the perimeter being the most important one.
If everything clicks, Chomche has the potential to be one of the best defenders among big men in the NBA.
Offense
At the NBA level, Chomche’s early role will be to serve as a rim runner and play finisher in a low-usage role. His primary job will be to set hard screens in pick-and-roll actions and off-ball screening. Whereafter he can grow into a floor-stretching five that can generate open looks for himself on the perimeter.
What stood out when watching his film is that he’s making himself the forgotten man on offense. In a system where the ball handler attacks the rim to collapse the defense, Chomche is usually the target in drop-offs at the rim, both via the air and ground.
The two plays are an example of what to expect in his early NBA career, with Chomche knowing how to finish consistently, whether it’s with two hands for safety or a tip that banks off the glass. He doesn’t look for highlight-worthy dunks, as his game is focused more on the substance, rather than flash, despite his athleticism opening a pathway to be an impressive dunker.
In time, when Chomche can consistently shoot the three, he’ll be more dangerous when attacking closeouts. At this stage of his career, he’s not getting the respect for his jumper, where it’s tougher for him to create separation off the dribble to find self-created looks at the rim.
In the two plays below, his great first step and long dribbles lead to him getting to the rim with ease. However, the touch isn’t good enough to be a consistent finisher yet. Combined with his lack of composure in his attempts, it’s a challenge for him to consistently improve.
In the last three seasons, he’s averaging 36% at the rim on 42 attempts. Despite the bad numbers, the long-term potential is there after seeing how fluid he moves. With a few years of NBA development, there’s a consistent rim-finisher off-the-dribble possible.
With Chomche being an extremely raw prospect, NBA franchises will look at the most common outcomes and base their decision on drafting him or not. The most crucial factor of his development is to shoot a consistent three-ball.
In the last three seasons, he’s shooting 3-for-15 in 51 games. With such a limited sample size, the development of his three-point jumper is based on the consistency of the process of him getting to his spots and the jumper itself.
Chomche is a willing shooter, but he’s barely being put in the situation to run plays where he’s the one launching the shot on the perimeter. Two things that are to be said is that his processing speed needs to improve. When catching the pass, he’s taking too much time to decide to either make the pass or shoot.
Another area of development is setting his feet, which takes a tad too long. With his athletic profile and quick feet, that’s not an issue to develop in the long run. When evaluating his profile, the team context was mostly a deciding factor combined with him being uncomfortable at times to play in a way that he isn’t used to.
As a passer, things get interesting for Chomche. Despite his young age, he shows confidence with the ball in his hands when making the extra pass. What stood out is that he uses his big body to position himself in post-up mode and uses fakes to make the defense react. The passes themselves aren’t dump-offs, and Chomche looks to pass the ball to where the player needs to be.
In the long run, Chomche doesn’t project to be a great passer, but he’ll be a consistent and reliable ball-mover if everything clicks. Chomche can create advantages by using his physical gifts and leveraging them to make plays for others. However, thus far his assists are an outcome of his executing simple reads, instead of taking risks or making live-dribble passes.
A stock-riser of his profile is that he keeps his composure after making a winning play, and his decision-making after taking one or two seconds is consistent throughout the last few seasons, with the second play of the clip below being an example.
One area that caused a major disappointment is his ability to screen. When evaluating his profile, the difference in his screening ability at 18 hasn’t gotten better compared to two years ago. Chomche is consistently getting whistles for moving screens, with his technique being the issue.
The play below is a good example, instead of the hand-off followed by moving to screen, Chomche should recognize plays like these and move first and then hand the ball off to the ball handler. In the long run, he must improve as a screener to fulfill his potential.
Something that’ll keep Chomche on an NBA floor is his motor and activity on the glass. Despite him being an 18-year-old, he’s already gaining advantages in offensive box-outs with his positioning. That’s clear the NBA Academy has focused on developing.
What he has shown consistently is that uses his arms very well to avoid his opponent locking him on his back. By keeping his movement, he already knows how to force his will in box-outs, with good things as a result. With 1.5 offensive rebounds in twelve minutes in the last two seasons, his activity is already rewarding.
Another plus is that he keeps enough distance to not get lured into trying to rebound over the back. This is a must-have for NBA bigs, but with Chomche’s ability to avoid getting stuck in box-outs, he still can box out the ball without making too much physical contact.
NBA Draft Projection
By drafting Chomche, an NBA franchise is swinging for the fences in terms of developing a clear and scalable NBA role for one of the best athletes among big men in the last few draft cycles.
He’s still very raw and outside of playing as a rim-running energy big that gets his production as a play-finisher, there isn’t much possible yet. In terms of his feel for the game, Chomche needs to play consistent and long minutes, which isn’t the case this season.
This doesn’t take anything away from the flashes he has already shown. If everything clicks, Chomche can be a game-changer on the defensive end, with enough offensive possibilities to be an above-average player on that end.
Specifically, his light feet, tremendous leaping ability, and lateral quickness make it likely that he’ll guard every position in a later stage of his career. What stood out is that even if he makes mistakes in his reads, he’s quick to recover them. If an NBA team manages to minimize those mistakes, Chomche has the tools to be one of the best defenders among big men in the NBA.
On the offensive end, his ability to screen must improve if he wants to reach his potential. The three-ball looks promising but needs work in terms of quicker decision-making to either pass or shoot. He doesn’t handle the ball yet to create his plays off the dribble, therefore his ability to create something in the post is holding the most value currently to determine where he gets his offensive production.
Chomche needs to play consistent minutes. However, I don’t think that playing college basketball is a good bet to make. His lack of a good feel for the game will make it hard to adapt early on, which will lead to him being either a three or four-year player, and that is a loss for the potential he holds at the NBA level.
An athlete of Chomche’s caliber needs to move to the NBA right away and play G League basketball for two years to slowly adapt to the higher-paced game and embrace the role his franchise will give him. Despite him being so raw, I do not doubt that an NBA team that’s not in a rush to play him, will take on the challenge of developing him and draft him in the latter stages of the first round.