The Sliding Scales of Alex Toohey

The best version of Alex Toohey is the kind of player every NBA team wants in the 2025 NBA Draft. The worst version of him might not be an NBA player at all. Where does Toohey truly stand?

Alex Toohey entered last season as one of the more-hyped international prospects vying for a spot in the 2024 NBA Draft. Any 19-year-old playing in a professional league as competitive as the NBL is bound to turn at least a few heads, but Toohey has a particularly intriguing profile as a 6’8” forward with a beautiful jump shot. Add in the fact that he has the frame to match his height, and it’s easy to buy into the hype for the graduate of the NBA Global Academy in his hometown of Canberra, Australia.

Toohey had an up-and-down season in his first year in the NBL, but it wasn’t in the way that anyone expected. While his body held up physically through the rigors of a professional season, with Toohey starting for the Sydney Kings for most of the season, his shots just wouldn’t fall. Toohey connected on just 27.3% of his three-pointers and 69.0% of his free throws across his NBL and NBL Blitz games, which were both well below expectations.

Toohey returned to Sydney for his second season in the NBL, and he showed improvements in key areas. He was more active on defense, he improved as a finisher around the basket, and he looked much more comfortable with the ball in his hands. His shooting numbers also improved, but the look of his shots still did not match the numbers. Toohey connected on 34.0% of his threes and 73.8% of his free throws across 32 NBL and NBL Blitz games—an improvement, to be sure, but not the numbers that were expected given that his shooting was meant to be his calling card.

Toohey’s case is an odd one to make. He’s a shooter with a beautiful-looking jumper—except for the fact that his shooting versatility is limited and his hit rate on the shots he does take is not at sharpshooter-quality levels. He’s a middling athlete by NBA standards with really stiff hips, but he’s also an absolute menace in passing lanes with forward size and an NBA-ready body strength-wise.

What kind of player is Alex Toohey, really? As with all prospect evaluations, the truth almost certainly lies somewhere in the middle. There are sliding scales that come into play with Toohey’s potential NBA future. This is true for pretty much all prospects, but particularly so with Toohey: the metaphorical weights of the pluses and minuses that he offers could swing his NBA future toward boom or bust, and it’s still tricky to figure out which way the wind will blow. So… let’s dive deep and try to find out!

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Offense: Surprises for Better and for Worse

Since I covered the bad news for Toohey on offense above (he’s a shooter who doesn’t consistently hit his shots), let’s start with the good news before we circle back to the shot. Despite his middling athleticism, Toohey does a lot of his best work offensively in transition.

Toohey averages 1.193 points per possession in transition per Synergy, which is good enough to rank in the 64th percentile. The real key there, though, is his frequency. While spot-ups were his most frequent play type, he finished nearly as many possessions in transition as he did spotting up. His transition frequency ranked in the 92nd percentile, and it’s pretty easy to see why if you look at the film:

Toohey is certainly aided in transition by his ability to jump passing lanes, but we’ll get to that later. He’s quick for his size by NBL standards, even if he might not be by NBA standards, but that isn’t the main driver. Toohey always has his head up and is ready to leak out; his good handle for his size is particularly magnified in transition. His best moves with the ball in his hands are his hesis and his hit-ahead dribbles; he has a preternatural knack for creating an opening for himself by throwing the ball ahead for long dribbles to get himself out in transition and ahead of the defense quickly.

Toohey is not a power athlete by any means; however, he has decent finesse around the basket, and he gets most of his openings by throwing defenses off-kilter. In some ways, he reminds me of Caris LeVert (whom our own Nathan Grubel wrote about yesterday) in that he incorporates funky dribbling cadences to throw off opponents and create space. He’s not exactly a passing hub offensively, but he’s a good connective passer who keeps control of the ball; Toohey has a solid 1.37 assist-to-turnover ratio over his two seasons in the NBL.

In addition to his transition prowess, Toohey also reads the game at an exceptionally high level as a cutter. Long-time readers of my work know how much of a sucker I am for guys who can cut well, especially if they profile as mostly off-ball players. Toohey averaged a staggering 1.474 points per possession on cuts, which ranked in the 88th percentile per Synergy. As the NBA trends away from pure shooters, it’s more important than ever for shooters to make defenses pay for playing them too tight to keep their perimeter game in check, and Toohey does his best work offensively when he’s forced off the three-point line.

That brings us back around to the confusing nature of his shooting profile. Toohey’s middling percentage from long distance seems incongruous with how the shot looks; there aren’t many players anywhere in the world whose form is as consistent and as aesthetically pleasing as Toohey’s jumper:

On the surface, it’s easy to look at Toohey’s confidence and the shot itself and assume that it’s only a matter of time before he becomes an elite shooter. Take a peek under the hood, though, and some of the shooting concerns become magnified.

The spot-up work for Toohey is fine; he averages 0.944 points per possession on spot-ups, which ranks in the 53rd percentile per Synergy. However, as noted above regarding his cutting, players who only provide spacing in that regard are on their way out of the NBA. Even beyond the mediocre percentages, Toohey’s shooting profile lacks the versatility that NBA teams these days are looking for in their floor-spacing threats.

The least troubling of those areas in my mind is his inability to shoot off the dribble. Given that Toohey is not going to be a team’s primary (or even secondary) initiator, his lack of off-the-dribble game is less of an issue than it would be if he were, say, 6’3” and needed to play guard minutes. However, it certainly isn’t a positive. Toohey has gone just 11-of-29 on off-the-dribble shots in his first two professional seasons.

More troubling, though, is Toohey’s lack of activity off screens. Sure, some of that is up to the offensive playbook for Toohey and the Sydney Kings; Toohey isn’t a passive off-ball player who refuses to relocate to get himself open. Still, I can’t pretend that I’m not concerned about the fact that he has taken just seven shots off screens in his two years in the NBL. It’s one thing to be a James Harden/Damian Lillard/Luka Doncic type whose three-point percentages are in the mid-30s due to an abundance of difficult off-the-dribble and off-movement triples from 30 feet and in; it’s another thing entirely to put up middling percentages as essentially a pure spot-up guy.

I would expect Alex Toohey’s three-point percentages to be higher in future seasons due to his smoothness and confidence with his shot. However, I am more worried about the lack of shooting versatility that shows up in his profile. While some of that is undoubtedly due to coaching schemes, as mentioned above, Toohey needs to have at least the off-screen shooting in his profile to be the kind of floor-spacing threat that most people anticipated he would be heading into last season.

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Defense: Off-Ball Success, On-Ball Struggles

Just like his offensive profile, Toohey’s defensive profile has some pretty clear strengths and pretty troubling problem areas—even if they might not be the issues that people would anticipate.

Let’s start with the frame. Toohey measured in at 6’8” barefoot and 223 pounds with a 6’11” wingspan at the combine, backing up the tale of the tape: he’s big enough to be a small-ball four rather than being relegated to just a wing role, which gives him more potential avenues to playing time.

In addition to his size, Toohey is a great defensive playmaker, especially in terms of anticipation in the passing lanes. He’s got good hands and can rip the ball away from inattentive ball-handlers, but he does his best work defensively by jumping and disrupting the opposing team’s rhythm and flow. Any lazy passes thrown in Toohey’s vicinity are liable to go back the other way in a hurry:

Toohey averaged 2.2 stocks per game this season (1.4 steals and 0.8 blocks) in his 23.5 minutes per game of playing time—his 3.0% steal percentage and 3.3% block percentage are both significant for a player of his stature and presumed future defensive assignments.

While Toohey’s off-ball defensive work is excellent, both in terms of effort and defensive playmaking, his on-ball defense is concerning, to say the least. While Toohey has the physical tools in terms of his frame and is more fleet of foot than some might expect, he struggles mightily to contain ball-handlers. Most of that is due to his flexibility; Toohey has some of the tightest hips of anyone in this draft class. He can stay in front of guys if he only has to backpedal, but anyone with a functional handle can turn him around in a hurry and leave him in scramble mode to try and recover.

This one play in particular encapsulates my confusion around Toohey’s future defensive profile pretty close to perfectly:

Toohey is active off-ball defensively before the ball swings to the player Toohey is defending. Toohey immediately gets blown by off the dribble, but the opposing drive is hampered by one of Toohey’s teammates. That gives Toohey himself just enough time to recover, whereupon he promptly rejects the shot. Off-ball success, on-ball struggles, defensive playmaking: that’s the whole confusing defensive skill set for Toohey, all shown on one possession.

As with the offense, I think that Toohey’s value defensively will depend almost entirely on the team construction around him. If he goes to a team like Oklahoma City with a ton of exceptional on-ball stoppers so that Toohey can cover less potent offensive threats on-ball and wreak havoc in the passing lanes, he could be a real asset. If he goes to a team that struggles to contain the ball, though, his defensive holes will only be magnified.

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Future Outlook

Toohey’s performances in his two NBA combine games were a microcosm of the confusion around his NBA case, and it presaged what might be ahead for him in terms of the 2025 NBA Draft. He came off the bench in his first game for Team Lazare and put up 15 points on 5-of-7 shooting from the field, including 3-of-5 from distance and 2-2 from the line. He started in his next game and managed only seven points on 2-of-5 shooting, missing his only triple and going 3-of-4 from the line. However, he also chipped in with six rebounds and three steals. For the teams that were in on him, there were plenty of positives to take away. However, the teams that were less sold coming into the combine could easily find fuel for their arguments.

With the withdrawal deadline for the 2025 NBA Draft rapidly approaching, it seems as if Alex Toohey will remain in the draft (though, of course, nothing is certain until that deadline has passed). There is just over a month left before the draft itself, and Toohey’s stock appears to sit in the late second-round range; he was 59th on the most recent No Ceilings BIG Board, and 52nd on our most recent Mock Draft.

The consensus view of him is mostly in line with ours. Toohey was taken 39th in Jonathan Givony and Jeremy Woo’s most recent Mock Draft for ESPN, and he finished 41st on the most recent $DRFT aggregate rankings combined by our own Corey Tulaba, with the projections ranging between 31st and 66th.

Given that draft range for Toohey, he may end up being a draft-and-stash second round selection, allowing him more time to develop in the NBL. If he does end up coming over to the NBA right away, though, his future will be more determined by his NBA fit than most prospects.

Alex Toohey has all the tools he needs to succeed at the NBA level. His ancillary offensive profile outside of his supposedly best skill is quite solid, and his defensive playmaking and size will make him a factor on that end, even though he will have his struggles on that end. His player profile might not have turned out to be the one people expected heading into last season. Still, Toohey could be a real contributor and potential second round steal if the sliding scales of his variable skill set end up weighing out in his favor.