UNLV Rebels’ Royce Hamm Jr. poses in Mendenhall Center on UNLV campus Tuesday, June 15, 2021. The 6-foot-9 forward is a transfer from Texas.
Sunday, June 27, 2021 | 2 a.m.
The UNLV basketball program has undergone a tremendous overhaul since the end of last season (maybe you’ve heard?), and the frontcourt figures to be especially unrecognizable in 2021-22.
The team returns just one frontcourt player — second-year forward Reece Brown — and will otherwise be made up entirely of incoming transfers.
One of those newcomers is former Texas big man Royce Hamm, and there’s reason to believe he could be a significant contributor for head coach Kevin Kruger. Hamm is a talented player — though he started just eight games and logged only 9.0 minutes per contest during his four years at Texas, he is a former 4-star, Top-100 recruit.
So how might Hamm fit into UNLV’s wide-open frontcourt rotation? The first thing that stands out when watching his play from last year is his commitment to rebounding. Hamm is big enough to bang under the basket (6-foot-9, 225 pounds), but he goes the extra mile and demonstrates an attention to detail when a shot goes up.
Not content to own his own space, Hamm pretty much always finds an opponent to box out, even if it’s not his man. That allows his teammates to grab rebounds easily, even if it doesn’t pad Hamm’s stats. And Hamm is mobile enough to chase rebounds that carom outside his area:
Hamm posted a rebound rate of 15.8% last year, a better mark than any UNLV player except seldom-used and since-departed forward Edoardo Del Cadia (18.0%).
I didn’t see much in the way of rim protection from Hamm in the games I watched, as he appeared to be more of a positioning-based defender than someone who was looking to alter shots. That may have been a sample size issue, however, as his career block rate (4.8%) compares favorably to Mbacke Diong’s block rate last year (4.7%).
But when I watched Texas games, Hamm went for verticality more than blocks:
Hamm is a pretty stout post defender. He is patient, strong enough to hold his ground and doesn’t go for many shot fakes, which forces his opponents to settle for difficult turnaround attempts:
Unfortunately, post defense is not at a premium in today’s game, as fewer and fewer teams throw the ball down to the low block to let their big men operate with their back to the basket. Nowadays, big men are asked to defend on the perimeter, out in space, and Hamm had some issues in that regard last year.
In the games I watched, Hamm struggled to contain dribblers. Whether he got switched onto a smaller player out beyond the arc, or a big man faced up against him, Hamm didn’t show an ability to stay in front of his matchup:
As you can see in that video, Hamm was often out of position and forced to reach and grab. That’s a big reason why his foul rate skyrocketed last year; after averaging between 4.0 and 7.2 personals per 40 minutes in his first three seasons, Hamm committed 11.1 fouls per 40 last year.
A lot of his fouls were avoidable:
Of course, some of Hamm’s fouling issues could be written off due to his role. As a reserve big man, he may have been asked to sacrifice fouls — when in doubt, hack — since the Texas coaching staff wasn’t planning to play him more than a handful of minutes on any given night.
Offensively, Hamm didn’t figure into the Texas game plan. His touches were few and far between — he made just 19 field goals on the season — but he did acquit himself nicely by converting 52.8% of his shots:
Hamm’s offensive skills appear to be limited to finishing off plays under the basket. His shooting numbers are not good, as he’s a career 59.2% from the free-throw line and 1-of-12 from 3-point range.
Here’s his one 3-point make:
All considered, Hamm kind of fits the bill as a traditional big man. He’s a good rebounder and reliable post defender, and if you dump the ball to him in the paint he can usually find enough daylight to score it. But the non-traditional aspects of the position — extending out to defend on the perimeter, providing spacing on offense — are not among his strengths.
There are probably matchups where Hamm will be very useful for UNLV, and he could potentially thrive in a defensive scheme where he plays center and is asked to patrol the paint while the team puts a mobile power forward next to him to complement his weaknesses.
Mike Grimala can be reached at 702-948-7844 or [email protected]. Follow Mike on Twitter at twitter.com/mikegrimala.
