NBA prospects come in all shapes, sizes, and athletic ability, so if you’re not Victor Wembanyama or LeBron’s kid, you are being compared to those with similar profiles. When comparing apples to apples, the NBA’s main categories are shooting, defensive ability, and basketball IQ. Roddy checks the latter two boxes, and only sympathetic evaluators will consider his shooting.
While he works on the latter for the future, what he brings this year to Michigan basketball is an elite defender who is switchable one through three, whose instincts and long arms make getting by him and/or getting a shot off very difficult. He leads the team with 10 steals (Yaxel is second with 9) and is fourth in blocks (I think you know who the first three are).
What Roddy brings to the table is his IQ. Invariably, he makes the right reads when he’s on defense and offense, with or without the ball. Against Gonzaga, his impact was felt early when it was, more or less, still a game. Roddy got on the floor at 15:56, and the score was 13-5, Michigan. He gets the ball on the inbounds at the top of the key from Morez Johnson, squares up the Zags’ Emmanuel Innocenti and goes right by him to the rim, where Roddy is fouled by Braden Huff for an and-1.
A couple possessions later, he schools Innocenti again for a layup on a right-wing clear-out, where he bodies Innocenti a couple times, then spins left for another layup. A few plays after that, against the Zag zone, Roddy slips into the lane where LJ Cason finds him with a bounce pass, and Roddy does a bounce pass of his own to a cutting Cason, who dumps it to Mara who gets fouled, who misses both free throws. Roddy leaves the floor at 11:34 with the score 27-14.
An excellent example of his defense is at 7:38 in the first half. Roddy is on Zag guard Adam Miller, who feeds Huff in the post and Miller sets up beyond the three-point line. Sure, Huff has Mara on him and was obviously loath to shoot because the chance it'll be blocked is so likely, Vegas oddsmakers wouldn’t take that bet. But here’s where Roddy showcases his defense. Stopping threes is an NBA must, so doubling off a shooter behind the three-point line is a no-no. But Roddy harasses Huff while his long arms obscures Miller, who adjusts his positioning for an easier passing lane for Huff, who passes it out (much to his relief). Miller is a step beyond the arc and Roddy’s there to contest, and the shot clunks off the rim.
As said earlier, Roddy’s move to Michigan basketball was the right one, and he’ll reap the rewards if this season continues as it has been. Two stats that the NBA evaluators can point to see if Roddy is a fit are his strong Player Efficiency Rating (PER) at 21.2 and Offensive Rating at 132.3 after the Gonzaga game. These ratings are an amalgamation of his 11.7 PPG, a high 53.2% FG% (shooting 25-47 in his first six games), excellent 83.3% FT%, and contributing with 3.5 RPG, 2.0 APG, and 1.5 SPG, while averaging almost 24 mins/game.
Roddy Gayle is a highly efficient two-way player for the Wolverines early in the 2025-26 season. He’ll likely be the same in the middle and end of the season too.