Surprise! Skip Bayless Got Something Right

Want to hear the essence of a basketball dilemma? Here’s one: Skip Bayless agrees with you.

Bayless is full of bombast and he’s wrong a lot. Our favorite was when he ripped Mike Brey after he took the Notre Dame job as being “vanilla” and predicted failure. Brey has been there since 2000. Bayless seems to spout off an awful lot without thinking, perhaps for the shock value, which always registers on social media.

So agreeing with him is weird and even here, it’s with some reservation. But he has a point.

What’s he on about? Well, he says former Duke star Zion Williamson is the best young player, better even than Luka Doncic.

Here’s what he says: “All I know is when Zion Williamson is healthy, he’s the best on this list. Zion dominates in ways even Luka cannot dominate. He’s truly unstoppable in the paint. Truly unstoppable. He’s going to make 70% of his shots.”

It’s absolutely true that Williamson is unstoppable when he’s healthy. Doncic does some amazing things and, as much as anyone has in recent years, reminds us of the basketball genius of Larry Bird.

Williamson is also a highly intelligent and creative player but he plays with a body like the Hulk and nearly a 50” vertical.

If you forced us to choose, if Williamson is healthy, we’d take him because, God help us, Bayless got it right. No one can stop him when he’s 100 percent.

And here’s one more factor in his favor: if he chose to play defense like he did at Duke, he could shut Doncic down. Doncic could never shut Williamson down.