June 23, 2023
The Sixers are adding Arkansas guard Ricky Council IV, NC State guard Terquavion Smith, and Arizona big man Azuolas Tubelis on two-way contracts, PhillyVoice has learned on Thursday evening. They will also bring in Arizona State forward Marcus Bagley on an Exhibit 10 contract, a source told PhillyVoice following the NBA Draft.
Council could be considered the "headliner" among the group, having been mocked around the mid-40s by many of the leading experts on the NBA Draft heading into the evening. His calling card entering the NBA is his physical tools — Council's a 6'5" guard with a standing reach of 8'7", and he combines that size with explosive athleticism. Scouts note that his explosion off of one foot is significant, which tends to be a separator between a "standard NBA athlete" and an "excellent NBA athlete." Council has flashed upside as a driver, and to work around a jump shot that is a work in progress, he has shown good instincts as an off-ball player, cutting and exploiting space to attack gaps in defenses. But in three years at Wichita State and Arkansas, he never quite found the range from deep, and his NBA career will likely hinge on improving that shot (and his shot selection will need to be improved). Good free-throw numbers in his last two seasons in school are a welcome sign.
(The most fun fact about Council is that the "IV" does not refer to multiple generations of men named Ricky Council — Ricky Council IV has a father, Ricky Council, and two brothers, Ricky Council II and Ricky Council III. The oldest brother played for UMBC and Providence, while the middle Ricky played at a smaller school in Oklahoma.)
Smith does not have the same explosive athleticism as Council but gets his work done using agility and a solid first step to beat opposing defenders. There's shooting upside to be tapped into if you look purely at his catch-and-shoot numbers, with Smith comfortable in a high-volume role from deep. While his comfort and confidence as a pull-up shooter didn't match the results last season, the craft is there and he has an advanced ability to hit stepback jumpers for an undrafted prospect. His concerns come down mostly to size and strength. Smith is skinny and not necessarily long enough to overcome that, and has struggled to finish at the rim as a result. Smith will have to prove he can play through more aggressive coverages and show real value as a pull-up shooter in order to justify a combo guard role in the league.
Tubelis is in a different vein than the other two-way players here as a big man, noted by scouts as having soft hands, a good motor on the break, and the touch to finish at the basket consistently. He will have significant defensive questions to answer at the pro level due in part to his size, with Tubelis measuring a shade under 6'9" and not having a firm calling card on the defensive end. If he can't find a way to protect the rim or consistently space the floor, he'll have a hard time getting minutes on an NBA floor, though his offensive production/skill set was good enough to warrant taking a flier on him. The Sixers had Tubelis in the building recently as part of a series of workouts they did for potential undrafted players/late second-round targets, a source told PhillyVoice, so they clearly liked what they saw between his tape at Arizona and what they learned when he visited.
Finally, there's Bagley, the younger brother of Pistons hybrid big man Marvin Bagley III. Spending three years at Arizona State, Bagley made headlines at the fall when he claimed he was suspended for comments made to Sun Devils coach Bobby Hurley following a game against Northern Arizona. Bagley is a relative unknown thanks to his unique college circumstances. He played in a combined five games across his last two years at ASU and just 17 total games in three college seasons, making his numbers hard to make heads or tails of during that time period.
The NBA previously only allowed teams to carry two two-way players, but the league's new CBA will allow teams to carry up to three two-way players simultaneously. We'll see if Philadelphia can reap the rewards of that change.
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