Disproving the doubters

Cavaliers’ Thompson is more than meets the eye

By Jodie Valade

Cleveland Plain Dealer

Maybe you were one of the Cavaliers fans who did a double-take when Tristan Thompson’s name was called as the fourth selection in the NBA Draft. Maybe you were expecting something different; a player who doesn’t roam the paint like a handful of other big men on the rebuilding franchise, or a foreign player who has more experience and more intrigue.

Maybe you were like Samardo Samuels, the Cavaliers’ forward who played one year in high school with Thompson, and scowled his skepticism the first time the scrawny boy showed up at practice.

“Canada?” Samuels recalls saying, questioning Thompson’s homeland. And then he demanded, “Who are these little kids?” of the two Toronto natives who joined St. Benedict’s Prep in New Jersey that year.

“And then I saw he had some skills,” Samuels admitted recently. “A lot of skills. He kind of plays the same way now, but he got older and bigger.”

Now 6-foot-8 and 20 years old, Thompson spent a year at Texas as a defensive force, was named Big 12 Freshman of the Year, and got enough attention that Cavaliers GM Chris Grant claims he’s been tracking the long power forward since he was in high school. The fact that he was the fourth pick wouldn’t have been a surprise if you saw what the Cavaliers’ scouting team did: The team’s scouts salivated over Thompson’s 7-2 wingspan, his 38.5-inch vertical leap and his 2.4 blocks per game. (Though not so much over his 49-percent free-throw shooting.)

“We just love what he’s about and how he would fit into our organization,” Grant said when introducing Thompson and No. 1 pick Kyrie Irving.

“This was a very easy pick,” Grant said.

It was such an easy pick that Grant promptly made room on the squad for Thompson to grow and develop when he traded J.J. Hickson to Sacramento on Thursday. The glut of power forwards is now somewhat smaller, and Thompson’s path to a starting position is more direct.

So, maybe you were like Andrea Thompson — though probably not. Tristan’s mother predicted this back in January or February, in fact, expected it all along. That was when the Cavaliers were in the depths of their league-record 26-game losing streak, and when Andrea Thompson had a vision that her son would play in Cleveland in the next NBA season, whenever that might begin after the lockout. She credits the foresight to her strong faith in God leading her to understand what was in store for her eldest son.

When David Stern called Tristan Thompson’s name fourth, he turned to his mother and said, “Mama, you were right.” Thompson also owed the fact that he declared for this year’s draft after one season at Texas to his mother. When he wavered on his decision, she told him it was time.

“He knew it was time, but he was a little bit nervous,’” said Andrea Thompson, who speaks with the clipped, singsong accent acquired during a childhood in Jamaica. “I told him: ‘No, it is time. You are ready. You must show the whole world that you are ready.’”

Thompson grew up in Toronto playing with athletes who were older and wiser, until he outgrew them and came to the United States for high school. He spent his sophomore and part of his junior year at St. Benedict’s before proving another Canadian stereotype wrong: they’re not all laid-back and mellow.

Preparing for this moment is something Thompson has spent a lifetime doing. As a child, he would scribble inspirational words on his bathroom mirror. Each time he accomplished one of the goals, he would cross it off. He listed aspirations such as, “Be the best player in the country,” and “Get a college scholarship.”

By the time he left for college in Texas the only word left uncrossed was “motivation.”

Maybe you think the questions about whether Thompson should have been the fourth pick in the NBA Draft will motivate him even more, will inspire him more than his motivational phrases to improve his somewhat suspect outside jumper, strengthen his shaky free-throw shooting, and help him to become the starting power forward he seems destined to become for the Cavaliers.

Maybe. But maybe we’re all wrong, too.

“I’m a self-starter, a self-motivator, so the whole, ‘Going No. 4 motivation,’… I don’t look at it that way,” Thompson said. “It’s just a number.”