Eujen Persh

Strengths: Not your typical PF, Persh is an unorthodox PF who plays hard and nitty-gritty to the bone. He treats the game like his life depends upon it, and his motor is always on hustling with the best of them. Persh is a very accomplished defender, one with a quick learning curve on defense, always adapting to what the opposition has to throw on him. He's an extremely good help defender and rotation defender who takes advantage of having the luxury (and the 6'10" wingspan long arms) to block shots off of rotations. He has really good lateral quickness for a PF, comparable to many wing guards even, and it shows primarily on the defensive end. In his weak conference he's currently mustering up 5.8 blocks per game, especially intriguing for his height, and his coordination, quickness, timing and reflex combination could make this translate to the NBA. He thrives off the rotation defense, always looking to intercept the pass with his reflexes (gets 2.5 spg) and he knows how to pickpocket even the smaller guard for steals and hustle for loose balls. He's extremely active off-the-ball for a PF always looking to wreak havoc. He plays to his strengths on defense against smaller players and knows how to take advantage of their miscues. This same tenacity also helps him gobble up rebounds at a good rate at the college level (9.7 rpg), but it is harder to see this translating to the NBA level where bigs are going to be evident where the ball lands.

Weaknesses: Offensive game. Persh's current offensive game is currently limited to those based off of his offensive rebounds or putbacks, or dunks near the basket. He overpowers his defenders way too much in the college level, making rash decisions offensively in the process leading to offensive fouls, turnovers, etc. His balance is merely average offensively, he tends to get pushed off the block making a post move, which too is very undeveloped. He can be a bit mechanical offensively at times, not looking fluid and sometimes looking lost especially around the perimeter. He chucks up bricks from the perimeter--it's rare to even see him stick in a jumper. Persh's height is severely going to limit him at the next level although his quickness, tenacity and reflexes make up for it some. He's not the strongest player either, lacking in the muscle mass and upper body area. His man-to-man defense seems rather poor, but his team plays a lot of zone to hide that deficiency. He gets overpowered by stronger players often and it's evident that he prefers playing the slashers and jumpshooters on defense. He also plays in a weak conference as well.

Notes: Persh has that rare ability to change a game and has that unique quality of being a big man able to guard wings and guards at a very efficient rate off of rotations. He makes his living scrapping, stealing and blocking ill-advised shots amidst others. All of the other aspects of his game need refinement, however, and that could severely limit him as an NBA prospect.