Still a very young player, is going to be 18 on draft night and 19 until late to mid-July.
Carrington isn't a bad passer. He tends to just be serviceable most of the time with his looks, at the most he's nice with the passes he throws. In most of his matches, he's doing the right pass or a pass which isn't too impressive with an okay or good look sprinkled in like once or twice in a game (which is honestly fine by me). He's always looking to pass the ball, feels comfortable trying to create even if he doesn't do anything significant. He can have some nights where he's forcing passes or not getting the right looks/executions, which is why in slightly more than half of his games his passing creates multiple turnovers, some nights more than others... but I may be exaggerating a bit because he did finish the season with a pretty good assist/turnover ratio of 2.1 and didn't get as many turnovers as I thought he would've averaged. Still needs to improve in this aspect of his game, but I like his willingness to create and that he shows potential of being a good playmaker in some of the few noteworthy throws he gets. Although he's active as a playmaker, there are matches where he focuses more on his scoring a lot more than his playmaking, which is fine because he still ended the season averaging 4.1 assists per game which is around the expected number of assists for a PG. He doesn't personally impress me too much, but there's not a lot to complain about and his stats are nice, so I don't see why I wouldn't put this as a like.
+
Worries:
Not the worst ball handler. Doesn't seem to have much of a bag, but even if that is the case, he can still get to his spots in alright fashion... he's not always efficient at doing so and some nights he just doesn't create for himself that well through his dribbling, but he also has his games where he gets himself a couple of openings and nice looks through his ball handling. I think my biggest gripe with him in this aspect is that he needs to refine his dribbling more; he can look a bit out of control sometimes due to his high motor and he can also fail to execute his passes well due to his poor ball handling putting him in awkward positioning which limits what he can do with the ball. I actually think he could be doing more stuff with the ball, but again, he's not able to do so because of his dribbling not being refined. Even with him not being the most polished ball handler, he doesn't actually turn the ball over, but he does get close to doing so a couple of times... if he was actually losing the ball frequently, I would think of him a lot less highly, but he's not... so. There's room for improvement, and honestly, Carrington kind of perplexes me on how much I like his ball handling and how much I don't, but considering how flawed it is right now and how loose and how much it can damage his game or get close to doing so, I lean more into not putting this as a like of his game.
Carrington's shooting isn't the most ideal, but I don't think it's flawed enough for it to be considered a dislike. He looks confident when putting up a shot, whether that be a three-pointer or a mid-range, both of which he has in his bag and keeps a fair balance of attempts between each other in matches. He can have a nice number of shots which are appealing to the eye and is a solid self-creator. He has some nights where he's just in all fairness, good. My main concern with him though is he's not very consistent, and I emphasize this. He tends to be 50/50 or slightly below that, sometimes even worse, it's in half of his games where he's just subpar or mediocre. At times he can score in games in bursts, have a good stretch of makes then fall off and miss a couple shots, then heat up again and start hitting threes and middy's. Some games he can have a good half, then have a bad half after which tanks down his overall performance. I'm not just reaching or anything, his stats support he's not the most efficient player, something I'll touch on later. I still wouldn't say he's fully inconsistent though, but he has his nights where he's not that good or not consistently good. And as for what else his stats bring to light, his FT percentage is below the average for a PG, but not awful, being 78%. His 3PT percentage isn't the best and honestly a bit worrying, it's noticeably below the average for a PG being 32%, but it could be a lot worse even if isn't the greatest right now. I do think Carrington shows a lot to like, but he also shows just as much to dislike... his shot has some popping question marks and I need him to be much more consistent when shooting the ball to think more fondly of him.
Carrington isn't the worst defensive player, he shows a lot of promise, and he already does some things good, but he's very flawed and I can't refer to him as a good defensive player yet. Arguably, but in my opinion, undoubtedly the biggest issue with Carrington defensively is his off-ball defense. He's just bad when he's off-ball. He lacks awareness of his man even when scanning the entire court, giving his opponent a chance to move around and get the ball to score, and Carrington doesn't see his guy already moved and has the ball until it's too late and they already have a shot up or there at a point where Carrington can't recover and has to let his teammates play help defense and take over for him. When he does try to recover, a big issue of his is that he struggles to fight against screens, often being unsuccessful to go under or over a guy and failing to keep up. This is not a one-time thing; he consistently struggles to battle screens. He does play help defense a fine amount, but I don't think he really makes much of an impact when trapping or picking up a guy off-ball + he could be rotating way more often and closing out more off-ball. Sometimes he gets saved off-ball and some of his mistakes aren't taken advantage of, but most of the time, that's not the case. He gets blown by more than he should off-ball, and while it also happens sometimes on-ball, it's a lot less because Carrington is a completely different defensive player guarding 1-on-1. On-ball he's good, not great, but there's a still a lot to like and he does a pretty job of guarding his man face-to-face. He uses his speed (which may just be his motor) to keep up with his opponent's movements, he does a good job of preventing drives or at least stopping players from scoring/making it tougher for them to really do anything. He has a nice perimeter press which isn't always consistent (again, he can get blown by... but it's not frequent he does), but it works fine most of the time. I don't mind his close-outs on-ball and even off-ball, but he just doesn't close out on people anywhere near as much to where I can make an opinion as to whether I dislike his close-outs or not, but right now, he's like 50/50 it seems like, mostly fine, but I do remember him still getting scored on nearly the same amount of times as I saw him put a hand up and not get scored on. Carrington doesn't look like an amazing defensive player because he gets scored on a lot, but I think he's there most of the time, putting in some effort, he just gets unlucky. Talking about effort, I like how Carrington gives effort defensively. It's mostly visible on-ball, but even off-ball he does try even if he's not good. I do think while the effort is there, it's mostly his motor and that sometimes he could be more engaged, again, he's not really paying attention off-ball and just watching the ball, not reading the entire floor and seeing what's going (his lack of awareness might just be his age though, he is still very young). And when I mean he could be more engaged, I really mean it, Carrington is a lot more unactive defensively than he should be. He can go halves without playing defense, and he can go games where he has no impact at all. While that might just be some poor film portraying him differently than what he actually is, even on the good film I did watch you could see there are large periods of time where he was ghosting defensively and did little to nothing for his team. While still talking about his energy and his activeness, I think at times he can be a little out of control, nearly fouling people trying to do too much. Fouling is also a worry with him, I think he has some plays which he fouls at bad moments or has some dumb things go on and not get called on, being saved by the ref, and with that being said, he's still averaging too many fouls, with 2.4 calls per game. Carrington has no impact anywhere near the paint (as seen through his 0.2 blocks per game), but a guard isn't expected to have any impact in the paint, so this isn't an issue at all, just something he's missing out on. Doesn't get many steals (only averaged 0.6 per game), doesn't seem to have pesky hands, he does attempt to poke the ball out sometimes but he's rarely successful... if he does get a steal, most of the time he didn't force it, he just picked it up. Again, I don't think Carrington is bad defensively, he does a little something here and there, but he's bad off-ball and could be a lot more active, and still has a lot more issues which accompany him defensively. Still pretty raw but that should be expected from someone his age and it's not like he's completely unpolished anyways.
Carrington never showed any crazy athletic feats on film. He showed very little glimpses of any type of vertical in most of his games, and what he would show would be the SMALLEST FLASHES EVER only visible when doing actions like trying to block the ball or getting a rebound, far from enough to make me think he could jump out the gym. He did show a lot more glimpses of quickness and twitchiness, but that could be credited to his motor being high making him look faster than he actually is + he wasn't always showing that speed + that speed of his isn't channeled in a way to where it's completely refined (not out of control though, just not the best). This is not to say Carrington looked unathletic, because that's not the case, he just looked average, a statement his combine performances support. His speed testing results painted him out with average speed, maybe slightly below that, and his vertical tests were actually solid and SLIGHTLY above average. Nothing too impressive, but not bad... just an average athlete who doesn't show his athleticism too much in games.
And similar to his athleticism, Carrington's height is also average with him being a 6'4 PG... which is actually fine for a PG, but below the average for a SG. Not that bad of a height but also maybe not ideal? Would be nice if he was a bit taller. His overall frame is just whatever, he's like the average weight for a PG and slightly below the average for a SG, similar to his height. Just average.
Carrington isn't the best rebounder but I wouldn't say he's fully bad. It seemed like he got rebounds at a low volume on film, but he actually got a pretty good number of boards with him averaging 5.2 per game and excelling primarily with defensive rebounds in which he averaged 4.7 per game. Before looking at his stats, I had his rebounding ability as a dislike in this report, mostly because of his efforts. His efforts weren't awful, but it was just running to the glass and trying to get a board before someone else, he didn't utilize his body to box-out or anything, he used his speed to get the ball when it was coming down before someone else... which is fine?... but he could've been fighting for the ball much more. The only time I saw him box-out he looked small, hopeless, and had NO SUCCESS at getting possession, was kind of embarrassing and I even felt a little bad for him. Not sure if he's big enough to even box-out or fight down low for a board, but maybe a guard isn't expected to do that. I do like how when he does get a board it can be at times through contact, but my issue with that is that 1. the contact tends to be minimal, there were a few times where he got the ball through tougher situations I guess, but it doesn't sell me on how much contact he goes through on the regular and how much effort he puts into getting a board, and 2. half of his rebounds tend to be free from open lanes in which he's kind of expected to get them, if not then there's a problem. Not a bad rebounder but he's more like mediocre. It was hard to see him get any rebounds on film, there are multiple games where he didn't even attempt to get a board so him averaging a good number of rebounds for a PG is a little surprising and makes me a little confused on how good of a rebounder he actually is.
Carrington is at the brink of getting too many turnovers per game with 1.9, but his assist/turnover ratio is pretty good even with that many turnovers, so I'm fine giving him some lenience with his turnovers. Still needs to take better care of the ball though. Seemed like he should've been averaging more TO's than 1.9 on film...
Still kind of a raw prospect, which isn't surprising considering he's 18. At times he can be trying to do too much too fast, his motor is high, but he needs to learn how to control it a bit more, which isn't to say that he's out of control, but he's not refined (feel like I've said this a lot already). His defense especially off-ball still needs some work and his offensive game in general needs some tweaking, just to list two examples. Might be a slight project, he's not going to take forever to develop in my opinion, but he's going to be, again, a bit raw at first. Should acclimate himself sooner than others though.
+
Dislikes:
Arguably my biggest issue with Carrington is his ability to finish at the rim. He relies on his mid-range too much at times as a way to not have to finish at the hoop. He drives, settles for the middy, or he drives, and passes the ball out. In the few times where he actually tries to score at the basket (low volume, not really looking to score in the paint, averages like 3 drives a game), he's probably missing or getting his shot blocked. At times he shows he can still finish at the rim, but half of his made buckets were free and uncontested, and the other half were tough makes through contact which you could even argue were lucky (I think he did will himself to score though in those makes, but low volume while doing that isn't very impressive). He does get fouled a lot it seems like when driving to the hoop, but that shouldn't be an excuse to only try to get to the rim 3 times per game. Definitely not awful, even if he misses shots a lot more than he makes them, AND if he gets stopped more than he probably should be, he just HAS to look to score more in the paint and be more successful when he does do so. Even a floater or something would be nice to see more often. He goes nights where he doesn't have any sort of offensive presence near the rim, something that shouldn't be happening in my opinion.
Very rarely moves off the ball. Saw him cut in all the games I watched twice, once to score, the other time to reposition himself in the perimeter, which is what his very small off-ball movement is, just repositioning. He'll sprint on the perimeter to get himself the ball, and that is the most he'll do. Doesn't move well off the ball. If he wants to do something "crazy" he'll fake a cut to get the ball again on the perimeter. Again, not good.
Briefly mentioned it before, but Carrington isn't the most efficient player. He was only 41% from the field, which could've been a lot worse, but isn't the greatest and nearing bad territory while being below the average for a PG by a noticeable amount. He's a very inefficient scorer and his shooting efficiency isn't bad, but it's just alright and nothing too crazy.
