When Jeremiah Fears reclassified and to be part of Oklahoma's 2024 freshman class, few people expected the guard to play his way into the lottery. Fears was the 40th-ranked player in the 2024 ESPN 100, and was on his way to becoming one of the youngest players in college basketball for the 24-25 season. Yet Fears didn't flinch whatsoever. The freshman averaged 17.1 points, 4.1 assists, 4.1 rebounds, and 1.6 steals per game for a Sooners team that found its way into the NCAA Tournament, despite playing in the loaded SEC. Along the way, Fears turned in some massive offensive performances, emerging as one of the premier offensive engines in the nation.

Fears isn't a perfect prospect by any means. While the 18-year-old is listed at 6-foot-4, it wouldn't surprise anybody if the combine reveals he's closer to 6-foot-2. Fears also shot only 43.4% from the floor and 28.4% from three this season, and his assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.2 definitely needs to improve at the next level. No team wants a lead guard who is inefficient as a scorer and unreliable with the ball in his hands. However, context is very important when evaluating prospects. There were always going to be hiccups with a player as young as Fears playing this type of role in his first season at the NCAA level. Fears also had a weak supporting cast by SEC standards. Despite all of that, what he put on tape was mostly positive, and it isn't hard to envision him running a potent NBA offense in the near future.

As a scorer, Fears really has a little bit of everything. The young guard isn't the most explosive athlete in the world, and he definitely lacks the burst you see in some of the fastest guards in the NBA. However, Fears is still extremely good at generating paint touches. He's decisive and takes advantage of his first step, he's good at changing up his speeds, and he understands how to take advantage of every inch of space he sees. Fears is also good at putting the ball in the hole whenever he has a little room. Whether it's finishing at the basket—which he can do with either hand—or utilizing his elite touch to make floaters, he can give opponents buckets in a million different ways. It helps that he's a world-class ball handler. He has that thing on a string in a way very few others do.

Fears also doesn't seem very far away from being a lethal shooter. Sure, 28.4% from three is a miserable number. However, he shot just about 37% from deep on catch-and-shoot threes, he's an unbelievable free throw shooter, and he has great touch near the paint. Fears also shot well on mid-range jumpers. Fears just took a lot of awful shots as the focal point of the opposing team's scouting report. And you can attribute his low three-point percentage to an inability to hit threes off the dribble—often with a hand right in his face.

In terms of mechanics, there's nothing wrong with the way Fears shoots the ball. In fact, given everything we saw in college this season, you shouldn't be surprised if Fears' shot looks better the second he touches an NBA court. The extra spacing he'll see at the next level will help him quite a bit, and he'll also benefit from getting to grow into himself early on. Teams won't throw everything at him the way they did in his freshman season.

Fears is also good at setting up others. His assist-to-turnover ratio wasn't great as a freshman, and his 4.1 assists per game weren't eye-opening, but those don't tell the whole story. Fears needs to get a little sharper when it comes to decision-making, but the playmaking ability is there. He's extremely dangerous as a pick-and-roll ball handler, as he can quickly turn the corner and find something for himself, or he can make the easy read and set a teammate up with an easy shot at the rim. Fears is also good at surveying the entire floor and knowing when there's a difficult pass to be made to find a shooter farther away. Of course, those tough passes are the ones that occasionally go the other way, and he'll need to know when it's worth taking chances against the best athletes in the world. But being able to make every pass in the book is what you want in an advantage creator, and Fears has proven that he can.

If Fears just packs on some muscle and finds a good landing spot, there's not much preventing him from being an electric player. You're going to hear a lot about his defense before the draft, and that's undoubtedly going to be an issue for him at the next level. Being undersized when it comes to both height and weight is an issue at the point of attack, and it doesn't help that he doesn't have the quickest feet in the world. And while you often hear about bad on-ball defenders being good team defenders, that isn't the case with Fears. He's just a gigantic negative on that end of the floor. But some players are so good offensively that you need to live with them hurting you on the other end, as it can more than even out when you're talking about a special talent. Well, Fears is likely going to be that good. Look for some offense-hungry team to swing on him early in the lottery. He's too young and talented to last long on draft night. Players with his offensive flair, scoring chops, and feel for the game don't come around often. And at 18, it's all up from here.