Notes on Jackson Makoi

Kuzey Kılıç
7 min readDec 1, 2020

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I’m Kuzey, 19. I’ve been writing about basketball since I was 9. I have been working in Eurosport Turkey for the last 1,5 years. I have written on various sites and magazines before. I’ve been working as a freelance scout for three years. I worked as a consultant. I have interviewed dozens of prospects such as Theo Maledon, Deni Avdija, Henri Drell, Aleksej Pokusevski, Arturs Kurucs, Yves Pons, and dozens of notable basketball people such as Luis Scola, Xavi Pascual, Jonathan Givony, Dimitris Itoudis, Sasa Obradovic, Joan Plaza, Sarunas Jasikevicius, Derrick Williams. I write an article every day. I live in Turkey, I go to all the Euroleague and Youth League games. My main areas are all of age group in Africa and from U12 to U20 European and NCAA. Anyway, don’t forget to follow me on Twitter and feel free to DM!

AFRICAN PROJECT

It’s qualifiers time in FIBA ​​tournaments for every continent! One of the prospects that caught my attention in these qualifiers was Jackson Makoi. So, all those brief notes are based on his performance in two matches.

Jackson Makoi / Anyiarbany Makoi

  • Born on 3 July 2000, in South Sudan and raised in South Sudan.
  • Measured 6-foot-4 with a well developed, and still developing, frame.
  • Has been playing basketball for five years old. Started to play basketball thanks to his brothers. He would just mirror everything they did, and that started with playing with the ball. So his brothers are basketball players.
  • He has a good bond with his family and friends. He does everything for the people he loves. Has huge emotions to his mother.
  • Has good off the court life per sources, has not bad habit per sources.
  • He has made his decision to play for Daytona State next year. will be Falcon.
  • Played for Victory Rock Prep Basketball/Pharaohs Basketball and had The Grind Session World Championship.
  • Played for Longhorns.
  • Sources defined him as a hard-worker, cheerful, and believer basketball player.
  • He played at 2020 AfroBasket Qualifiers for South Sudan, where Luol Deng is the head coach as a guard.
  • My projection for him: Basketball Champions League & EuroCup. For the NBA or higher European competitions, has to be a better defender and shooter in my opinion.

Stats from 26, 28, and 29 November

vs. Nigeria: 22 minutes, eight points (3/6 2PTS, 2/5 FT), two rebounds, three assists, two TOs, two steals, minus seven, 7 PER.

vs. Mali: 21 minutes, 10 points (5/8 2PTS, 0/1 3PTS), six rebounds (two offensive), five assists, one personal foul, three TOs, plus five, 14 PER.

vs. Rwanda: 22 minutes, eight points (2/11 2PTS, 0/1 3PTS, 4/10 FT), four rebounds (one offensive), three assists, two personal fouls, four TOs, plus 10, -5 PER.

Physical Tools & Athleticism

Pluses

  • African prospects who play as guards or small forward often lack strength in their bodies. However, Makoi possesses average strength, excellent flexibility, and decent width overall. He has not the best physical tools in the world but has requisite tools.
  • Has a maximum plus three wingspan, eye-test, ideal for his position. The best thing here is he knows how to use his wingspan both on the offensive end and on the defensive end. On the offensive end, he creates a shield around the ball with his arms and hands. On the defensive end. Tries to limit his opponent’s misdirection or weak-side pass options while he gives the main weight to both his feet and his hands towards the offense’s strong side.
  • Despite not having perfect strength and agility, can maintain the strength and speed until the end of the game.
  • Although he loses coordination when he finishes with through to contact, he shows his body balance and coordination when he cuts in the weak-side or attacks the basket on the open floor.
  • Can jump off of one foot and two-feet very well. The best thing here he can jump after hop. That’s a critical thing. Because by doing it, he can exploit the rim protectors, like biting them with pump fakes.
  • Decent laterally but has room to improve.
  • Knows how to use his physical tools (both good things and bad things) to draw the foul thanks to his BBIQ.

Minuses

  • No strength on triceps.
  • Fingers are weak and this is the reason why he is not a good ballhandler. When he drives to the basket, cannot balance the ball’s bounce due to lack of finger sensitivity and makes TO.
  • Has a lot of significant room to improve on the lower body to gain strength and agility.
  • Has not good hip mobility. Does not have enough hip mobility to do quick and timed slides in PnRs and defend the ballhandler.
  • Does not enough eye-hand coordination on the defensive end. Easy to dislodge him in isolation situations.
  • Not good vertically. Although he shows impressive leaping in the layups occasionally, he does not have a good enough vertical pop to find the ideal angle in tight spaces.
  • Cannot change direction both on the ground and in the air. I think it is a very critical room to improve because Makoi is a player who is oriented to score points as a handler in PnRs or as a primary attacker in ISO situations. So if he improves his change direction ability and adds a few tricks he can be a much more effective scorer.

Offensive Summary

  • When I think of African prospects, I usually think of power forwards or bigs. Thierno Mamadou Sylla, Joshua Ojianwuna, Dick Rutatika Sano, Ugonna Onyenso, etc. Many prospects with significant potential play as PF or C; Pape Sow, El Hadji Ngom and Emmanuel Adeola are an exception. And so is Makoi. Because he has excellent BBIQ and vision for the game. For example, when the defense makes pesky defense, Makoi turns his hips to the defender to protect the ball. Then, he lowers his stance to avoid the defender’s quick move, uses his strong first step and fluid athleticism and goes to the basket. If he can add more muscled and some tricky touches (like inside hand finishing, smoother), he can be a glorious finisher, because he knows how he should prepare his position which is very important for all basketball players.
  • While he does miss some easy layups/runners/floaters he should finish, JM shows nice soft touch around the basket. Also, does a good job avoiding the shot blockers.
  • Mostly finishes with his right hand but his left hand is not too bad.
  • Can jump off of one foot when he not close to the basket and can finish the position over the rim protector.
  • Cannot define him as a tight spaces finisher but has shown flashes where he did an excellent job through to contact. However, inconsistent.
  • Has tricky move like host and snake in pick-and-roll situations. Also, does a good job to change his speed to create separation. However, I don’t think he is a good handler. But not because lack of fundamental things, because he has not enough physical tools to protect the ball as I mentioned above. Also, sometimes can be too careless when the ball in his hands. Watches the under-basket rotation too much, has to focus on his zone more in my opinion.
  • How much he can develop as a passer will be one of the important steps in his career projection. He is not a bad passer overall, occasionally shows drive-and-dish flashes thanks to his change of speed and ability to pull the defense on himself. Also, does decent jobs on cross, skip, chest, bounce, reacts showed passes but just not consistent. If he becomes a little more active as a passer, he can be a more efficient player.
  • Smart pick-and-roll player on the offensive end. Can split the defense and go to the basket.
  • Bad shooter. A little bit above the head release. Good bends but has not any good alignment in the whole body. Inconsistent elbow points, bad wrist movement, has a good and soft touch in the air but all other minuses make a huge impact negatively on his shot. Can he improve as a shooter? Why not. However, bad shooter right now, very bad.
  • Cannot define him as a force the game player but sometimes gives bad decisions, especially when he attacks the basket as you can see in his latest game at that FIBA tournament. However, overall, he is an unselfish, aware and team player.

Defensive Summary

  • Not too many things here. Smart defender but has not enough defensive fundamentals to make an impact on the court as a defender.
  • Does a good job to close the offense’s angle with his hands, lateral movements, etc. However, easy to pass him when drives to the basket. Lack of a degree of burst, linear movement and physical tools limit him as a ballhandler defender overall.
  • Energetic in passing lanes and sometimes shows good anticipation but inconsistent.
  • It is not easy to bite him with pump fakes, burst fakes, etc. but what is not good is that when the offense realizes that it is not easy to bite Makoi, the offense directly uses bursts and attacks the basket or shoots without waiting if he is a sharpshooter. So it is like a gamble.
  • Sum, has a lot of room to improve as a defender.

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