By my count, there are eight players coming to the NBA after spending at least a year playing overseas.  Throughout the week we are going to look at each player’s individual game one by one, to see what we can expect from them this year in the NBA.

Past Editions: Nikola Pekovic | Timofey Mozgov | Tiago Splitter | Pooh Jeter

The Chicago Bulls have held Omer Asik’s rights since the 2008 NBA Draft.  Asik was originally taken with the 36th overall pick by the Portland Trailblazers, but his rights were immediately traded to the Bulls.  Now at 24, the Chicago Bulls have finally signed the 6′11″ 230 pound (according to DraftExpress.com) Asik to a 2 year deal at about $1.7 million per year (according to the salary listed on ESPN’s trade machine).

In my opinion, Asik isn’t as NBA-ready as Pekovic, Mozgov, or Splitter but he does have some skills that could help in year one, and if he is developed properly he could become a productive member of the Bulls in year two.

Note:  In the clip, Asik is playing for Fenerbahçe Ülker and is #24 in white.

Strengths

Runs The Floor/Finds Open Spaces In Transition

Omer Asik isn’t overly athletic (even by a center’s standards), and he isn’t going to run by anyone, but Asik still is pretty good in transition.  The reason is because he seems to understand floor spacing really well, and he knows what to do when running up and down the court:

Here, Asik gets his defender on his back when running out, and once he gets that position, he doesn’t have to create separation with his man. Asik understands that, and once he gets to the lane he pauses, keeping his defender on his back, and allowing for the middle of the lane to open up. He then makes the catch and finishes.

Most centers are taught when running down the court to run straight into the paint (Asik does this very well).  However, there are two guys in the paint as Asik heads down the court, so he finds the open space behind the defense and makes himself available for the pass.

Speaking of putting your head down and running right into the paint, that is exactly what Omer Asik does here once he realizes the rebound is secure.  Despite being open, he doesn’t get the pass, but you can see how he does a good job of running right into the paint and finding the open space.

Pick And Roll

Omer Asik seems to do pretty well in the pick and roll offense, and while the defense played against it is pretty awful, Asik still shows some of the skills (like finding the open spaces when rolling) that could make him a successful pick and roll player in the NBA:

Again, the pick and roll defense here is atrocious, but what you need to look for is Asik’s timing on the roll, and in my opinion, Asik has a good knowledge when to start his roll.  In the first clip, he sees that his man has committed to show too early and there is no help underneath and Asik simply slips the screen and rolls to the basket untouched.  He makes the catch and finishes.

In the second clip, Asik hangs in to the set the screen, gets away from the contact, and rolls to the rim getting the finish at the rim.  What I like about this clip is that even though Asik turns the wrong way on the roll, the fact that he gets away from the contact allows him to get a quick roll to the basket.

Quick Post Moves

As you can see, Omer Asik isn’t the biggest center you will see.  The result is that he isn’t a guy who is going to get the ball in the post and take a few dribbles backing his man down.  He simply isn’t strong enough to do that, and he knows it, however Asik is able to excel in the post by making quick moves in the post.

Here, Asik makes the catch in the post, and after a brief hesitation to make sure there is no double team coming, he performs a quick spin move, catching his defender off guard.  After one dribble, Asik finishes with a dunk.  Asik isn’t strong enough to back down anyone, so his post game is predicated on catching defenders off guard, and using that to get to the rim.

Here, Asik does it again.  After making the catch and allowing the double team to clear, he takes one dribble towards the middle, indicating he might go with a hook over his right shoulder.  However, he quickly changes directions with a spin and goes up over his left shoulder.  The defender is caught off guard and he draws a foul.

And finally here, Asik makes the catch in pretty good position.  He takes one dribble and goes right up, knowing that if he waits to long, his defender will push him away from the rim.  He doesn’t hit the shot, but he does draw another foul.

Weaknesses

He’s Weak

At 6′11″ and 230 pounds, Omer Asik looks pretty weak out on the court, and that is when comparing him to other players in the Turkish League.  Put him in the NBA right now, and he will be tossed around like a rag doll.  Asik makes up for his lack of strength by doing some things differently than most centers (quick moves in the post for example), however, there are times on the court where Asik can’t really hide his lack of strength:

One of those times is when rebounding.  Asik’s size will allow him to get his hands on a number of balls coming off the rim, however it won’t help him when pulling down the rebound.  Here, Asik gets his hands to the ball first, but he simply gets it ripped out of his hands.

Asik’s lack of strength also hurts him when getting in position to grab a rebound.  Here, when the shot goes up, Asik is in pretty good rebounding position, however he lets a guard (A GUARD!) come down and push him under the basket where he has no chance to grab the rebound.

I showed you how Asik is good working off the ball when finding open space on the court.  However, when he tries to move through a crowed lane, his lack of strength really hurts him.  Here, Asik is just rolling to a rim when he runs into a defender.  Does the defender throw his arms out a bit?  Sure.  Enough that it should put a 6′11″ center flat on his back?  No way.  This is the type of contact that is common in the lane in the NBA.

Help Defense

Omer Asik also seems to struggle when playing help defense.  With his long wing span and his ability to move decent enough, you would think that he is a good enough help defender to get by, but he has a few bad habits that prevent this from happening.  The first is that he tends to get too flat footed:

When you are flat footed, it means you aren’t in a good athletic position, so even when you make the right decision in terms of when to come over and help, it takes you too long to react.  This gets exaggerated for big men, because they are so long that it is hard to go from a stand still to moving and helping on defense.

Conclusion

Out of all the overseas prospects I have scouting for my posts this week, Omer Asik will probably have lowest amount of production this year.  His body simply isn’t ready for the NBA game.  That doesn’t mean I think he will be a bust or that I think the Bulls made a poor decision bringing him over now.  It’s actually the opposite.

I think the Bulls made a very smart decision bringing Asik over this year.  It is obvious that he won’t be challenged in the Turkish League, and if a player doesn’t get challenged they don’t improve.  While he isn’t going to get many minutes, he will be competing against guys like Carlos Boozer every day in practice (or guys trying to make the pros in the D-League) and that will make him better.  In addition to that, he will be working under a NBA-quality strength and conditioning program and that will make him stronger.  If he can get stronger with his skill-set, that already makes him better (even before he starts adding to his game).

So while you may not see much from Omer Asik this year, I think he will be a big man to watch two years from now.