25-under-25: Jalen Williams has become an essential piece for the Thunder

Jalen Williams ranked No. 24 on The Step Back's 2023-24 25-under-25, ranking the best young players in the NBA. Check out the rest of the list here.

Almost everyone, except maybe Winston Bishop, starts a jigsaw puzzle by looking for the corner pieces. They may be the rarest pieces in the box but they’re also the easiest to identify. Those two straight edges set their position, begin shaping the structure and defining every other piece in relation to themselves.

In the puzzle of NBA team building — those are your stars, the rare players who are good enough for you to build around, the ones with attributes so distinct they demand those foundational placements.

The puzzling-to-rebuilding analogy quickly breaks down in some obvious ways but it’s an aptt way for understanding the Oklahoma City Thunder. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is a corner piece. Chet Holmgren is too. But Jalen Williams is not. He has no straight edges.

Williams is the ultimate connector. He’s the piece you stumble into, realizing that you don’t just know exactly where it goes, but that it connects several enormous sections that you’d been building in isolation.

Jalen Williams is one of the most important pieces for the Oklahoma City Thunder

The Thunder landed Williams with the No. 12 pick in the 2022 NBA Draft, a happy bit of kismet for a player who had been rising up draft boards. He was seen as a solid, high-floor prospect but not necessarily a high-ceiling swing. 

Williams was 21 heading into the draft, a three-year start from a smaller school and one without overwhelming athleticism. What he appeared to offer was versatility — physically and in his package of skills. 

The Thunder had already taken their upside swing with Chet Holmgren No. 2 and had the luxury of playing it safe(r) with Williams.

You probably know the next chapter of the story.

Williams made an immediate impact, starting 62 games and averaging 14.1 points, 4.5 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.4 steals per game on a 60.1 true shooting percentage. He made open 3-pointers, ran in transition, cut in open space and finished with a usage rate below 20 percent (the threshold for an offense where responsibility is evenly divided between all five players).

But he also showed the ability to ramp up his primacy when the situation demanded it, finishing in the 61st percentile in scoring efficiency in the pick-and-roll and 81st in isolation. He’s probably not going to morph into a James Harden-like high-level, high-volume creator. But he’s more than capable of working as a secondary creator and makes the Thunder that much more malleable in hypothetical postseason matchups. 

But what makes that offensive versatility so useful to the Thunder is the package in which it comes.

Williams is 6-foot-5, 211 pounds with a 7-foot-2 wingspan. He’s quick enough to defend guards and long and strong enough to defend some 4s. With an entrenched and outlier-sized backcourt — Josh Giddey at 6-foot-8, Gilgeous-Alexander at 6-foot-6 — his ability to effortlessly slide through four positions, at both ends of the floor, makes him absolutely essential to their rebuild. 

He unlocks legitimate five-out lineups with Chet Holmgren at the 5, and four shooters and secondary creators around him. He unlocks massive oversized pterodactyl lineups with the 7-foot wingspans of Williams and Gilgeous-Alexander surrounded by Ousmane Dieng, Jaylin Williams and Holmgren.

On a roster loaded with skill versatility in unusually sized bodies, Williams’ combination can connect everything else. 

There is almost certainly more upside in his game. He can improve his 3-point shooting percentage — both his 37.8 percent on wide-open attempts and his 33.3 percent on pull-ups could and should come up this season. He’s still learning how to use his tool — his off-the-dribble craft, his change of pace, his vision — to manipulate defenders at this level and continued experience will help.

But the biggest upside for him is probably in the Thunder continuing to build out the structure he inhabits. Better players around him will make his life easier, and vice versa. As the players around him develop, coach Mark Daigneault will get better at using the tools at his disposal to exploit advantages, and break opposing lineups.

Williams might not be a star but he’s a multi-tool. The Thunder will get better at using him to solve harder and more complicated problems and he’s as important to their playoff aspirations this season, and championship aspirations in the future, as anyone else on this roster.