NBA Sunday: Tristan Thompson is Enjoying Proving His Critics Wrong

With his palms sweating and his heart beating fast, on draft night, the Canadian prospect knew that there was a high likelihood that he would be the highest drafted player in his country’s history.

Weeks earlier, when the Cleveland Cavaliers called him in for a second workout, Tristan Thompson began imagining what life would be like joining the Cavaliers, reuniting with a former teammate and mentor in Samardo Samuels and likely playing alongside Kyrie Irving, who was poised to be selected first overall.

“It definitely showed that they had interest in myself so, after that, I felt anything was possible,” Thompson said on the night in 2011 when the Cavaliers selected him with the fourth overall pick.

“This is a great environment and it’s a franchise that wants to win and I’m so happy and fortunate to be selected by the Cleveland Cavaliers.”

Hours later, when Thompson showed up at Kemba Walker’s draft party at a lower Manhattan nightclub, many media members on the red carpet were still uncertain as to who the Canadian prospect was.

Many who did know Thompson had him projected as a mid-to-late first-rounder. Now, four years later, as Thompson has emerged as a key player for the 2015 Eastern Conference Champions, he has not forgotten those doubters.

It is four years later and Thompson, basking in all of his glory, has a small cloud of media hovering around him. It is the NBA Finals, and he is happy to not only be here, but to be one of the primary reasons why the Cavaliers have arrived to this point.

“I have come a long way,” Thompson said at the Quicken Loans Arena. “I wish I could pull up all you guys’ tweets back when I got drafted,” he added with a chuckle. “I wonder how much of you guys are eating your words now.”

The simple answer to that, would be plenty.

Thompson was quick to correct one of the media members around him who incorrectly stated that he was selected with the third overall pick of the 2011 draft.

“I was fourth,” he said with a smile. “Utah had third, they took Enes Kanter. It was definitely a good accomplishment, especially with me entering the draft, people thought I was going late first round. I don’t know if they watched the workouts or if they watched something else. That was a great accomplishment but that was four years ago, now I’m trying to win the big prize.”

Clearly, though, Thompson has used the naysayers and doubters as motivation. Assistant coach Tyronn Lue has worked with Thompson tirelessly over the course of the season and spoke with Basketball Insiders about the 24-year-old.

“The way he plays, you could tell that,” Lue said when asked whether Thompson feels he has something to prove.

“I mean everybody uses that as motivation. When a guy you think you should have went ahead of gets picked before you, or they skip over you and say you’re not as good as they are, people use that as fuel and he’s being doing it and doing it well,” Lue said, in obvious reference to the fact that Thompson mentioned Kanter by name, unprompted.

“Just the positions LeBron is putting him in, he’s been able to take on his role. Last year, they were throwing him the ball and posting him up and this year, it’s, ‘Man, we need you to be a rim roller, rim protector, offensive rebounder, defensive rebounder and play defense,’ and he bought into that role and has been great.”

As these Cavaliers have come mightily close to walking away with a wildly improbable NBA championship, they have done so not in spite of Thompson, but in large part because of him.

Four years after being drafted, Thompson is still smiling. And for those that doubted his ability to be a championship-caliber contributor, he is enjoying the last laugh.

* * * * *

Over the course of his NBA career thus far, Thompson has mostly fulfilled the expectations that were had for him. As he still works to develop his offensive versatility, shooting and free throws, he is as agile and nimble a big man the league has seen in quite some time. Defensively, he is a stalwart who is capable of banging with bigger bodies on the interior and staying in front of smaller guards on the perimeter.

One of the underrated talents of a big man in today’s pick-and-roll and motion-based offensive system league is the ability to appropriately time cuts. Good hands—marked by being able to catch laser beam passes while moving toward the basket—is a necessity.

A confluence of events have given Thompson the opportunity to not only prove that he is the kind of power forward that can excel with a point guard that can create him shots, but one who can be a starter and a heavy contributor on a championship contender.

Yes, Thompson is laughing heartily at those that doubted him. And for those that thought he was crazy for reportedly turning down a four-year, $52 million extension offer from the Cavaliers, Thompson now looks brilliant.

This summer, as the NBA looks toward salary cap spikes that will occur over the next few years, Thompson is a player who has tremendously improved his free agency stock, just like he did his draft stock four years ago.

Personally, I always saw potential in Thompson. During his first two years in the league, he showed flashes of brilliance, even if marked by inconsistency and a sometime lack of focus.

It was in Toronto, though, in August 2013, when his potential could no longer be hidden.

In August 2013, Thompson and the Canadian National Basketball team had scheduled a few friendly matches with the Jamaican National Basketball team. For the first time in its basketball history, Jamaica qualified for the FIBA Americas tournament to be played in Venezuela later that summer. The federations agreed to compete in two friendly matches in Toronto in the weeks prior to the tournament’s commencement.

Thompson, a first-generation Canadian by way of Jamaican parents, had grown close to a number of members of the Jamaican team, including its star player Samardo Samuels.

Samuels and Thompson had become close friends after playing high school basketball together for a year, and it was Samuels that put Thompson and I in the same room in Toronto before the Jamaican team played the Canadian team in the second of their two friendly match ups.

I had seen Thompson sporadically over the course of his first two seasons in the league, but never with his hair down. The three of us chatted casually, about basketball, about the city of Toronto and about life. Thompson seemed fuller and more dense than I’d remembered. Clearly the same person, though, he was as jovial as he was on the night of the 2011 draft and his smile still beamed brightly.

The Canadians had managed to topple the Jamaicans in the first exhibition game, 81-72.

Jamaica’s assistant head coach, Richard Pollack, decided to push the tempo in the second match. His team controlled the tempo in the game’s first half and were led by guards Akeem Scott and Weyinmi Rose. Jamaican’s platoon of big men included Adrian Uter, Patrick Ewing, Jr. and the aforementioned Samuels.

It was behind Thompson’s reinvigorated effort and spirit that the Canadian team managed to erase what was a 10-point deficit in the game’s second half to escape Toronto’s Mattamy Athletic Center with a 77-72 victory.

In the game’s second half, Thompson often took the challenge of guarding Scott and Rose out on the perimeter, and neither of the athletic guards could beat him off of the dribble. Thompson banged down low with Samuels and Uter and single-handedly turned the game for his Canadian team. He grabbed offensive rebounds, seemingly at will, and was clearly the best big man in the arena.

Certainly, international basketball is a level below the NBA in terms of competition level, but of all big men attributes, lateral quickness and defensive instincts—both of which Thompson showed—are easily transferrable. I remembered being impressed with Thompson before that performance, but even more so after.

I remember walking away thinking that if Thompson’s athleticism improved to the point where he could stay in front of NBA guards and bang against NBA big men for 40-plus minutes, he could find himself being a solid, 12-year professional.

Now, he is on the cusp.

* * * * *

Another year would pass and eventually, LeBron James and Kevin Love both find themselves as members of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Overnight, things had changed for Thompson—his role, his minutes and the expectations thrust upon both him and his team.

But through it all, the one thing that never changed were his expectations of himself.

One could certainly argue that it is Thompson who has become the second most important player for the Cavaliers over the course of a playoff run that will ultimately be remembered as one that improbably yielded an Eastern Conference Championship. Yes, they have achieved highly, despite the loss of Love and Irving operating at far less than 100 percent.

Through it all, though, Thompson has maintained his professionalism and worked tirelessly with assistant coaches James Posey and Lue. It is Lue who has emerged as Thompson’s biggest advocate, even as the power forward approaches his free agency.

“He’s very important to us,” Lue told Basketball Insiders. “I don’t get involved with the upper management stuff, but I would love to have him back. You’ve got to have him back, so hopefully, we can get that deal done.”

In Thompson, Lue sees a versatile big man who has the ability to impact both ends of the basketball court.

“His strengths are offensive rebounding,” Lue said before continuing to extoll the virtues of the 24-year-old. “He’s a great defender because in pick-and-rolls, you could do a lot of things with him. You could show with him, you could blitz with him, you could ice with him, you could switch. Defensively, he could give you everything you want on the defensive end as far as pick and roll situations.”

And after pausing and thinking about it for a moment, Lue revealed what he thought was most impressive about the Canadian.

“The thing that he doesn’t get credit for is his motor; he could play two games, back-to-back, all 48 minutes,” he said. “He plays with the same intensity, plays hard, never gets tired, very durable, he never misses games and that’s a unique thing these days in the NBA, so I love him.”

And rest assured. Now, so does the city of Cleveland.

* * * * *

Four short years ago, Tristan Thompson became a hero for Canadian basketball. Two short years ago, he became a standout performer for the Canadian National Basketball team. This year, he has become a lynchpin for a championship contender.

Despite his ups and downs, Thompson is still zealous. He still works tirelessly and has learned how to be an effective contributor on both ends of an NBA floor.

As he prepares for restricted free agency this summer, he will eventually be laughing all the way to the bank. And as he recalls and reconsiders those that doubted that he would ever be instrumental in helping his team reach these kinds of heights, Thompson will do something else.

He will smile and nod, just like he did in 2011. Because he knows, certainly, that it is he who is laughing last.