Who is the Kaleidoscopic basketball savant from Milton Keynes, ready to take the NBA by storm

The relationship between the United States and England is a perplexing one. The two nations remain intertwined with one another, but both insist on being disassociated. Yet this affiliation is seemingly harder to ignore, cultures, music and importantly sports share an audience and influence on both shores.

Christian Pulisic is a footballing icon across the pond – supercharging a country of 330 million to believe the second coming of Robben has arrived. More and more Americans have infiltrated the World’s most popular sport intensifying the US’s claim for supremacy, so England what’s your counter?

Introducing the idiosyncratic San Antonio Spurs forward, Jeremy Sochan.

The self-anointed “citizen of the world” fully understands that he is “no normal 19-year-old”. Standing at a colossal 6 feet 9 inches, drafted in the 2022 NBA draft, and determined to look as loud as possible on the court Sochan is filled to the brim with basketballing talent. Noah Magaro-George, editor-in-chief for AirAlamo in San Antonio described him as “a switchable defensive specialist with connective passer as a jumbo playmaker who can assume some secondary ball handling reps”.

The moniker he gave himself stands true, as the story of the Guymon, Oklahoma-born Polish man spans multiple countries.

Though England’s victory isn’t immediately apparent, the country’s played a vital role in the moulding of Sochan. He derives from deep basketballing roots with his late father Ryan Williams, an African American who played Division II collegiate basketball at Panhandle State, Oklahoma. At the same college Ryan met Aneta Sochan, a talented Polish basketball player who moved to the US to pursue a career. She was a point guard in the mould of John Stockton, obsessed with feeding her pairs – she became Jeremy’s first coach. His father slowly filtered away from the pair, with Aneta deciding to take a 7-year-old Jeremy and migrate to the allusive haven of Milton Keynes in England.

It’s there where surprisingly Sochan began to unearth his love for basketball, this, however, didn’t prevent him from playing the UK’s most popular sport of football which due to his ungodly size forced him between the sticks as a goalkeeper. An unfortunate outcome that he attributes to his absurd hand-eye coordination. Eventually, Sochan and his family transitioned to the south coast, settling in Southampton, where his basketball career was put into hyperdrive.

He arrived at Itchen College around the age of 15, it was here where Sochans skills began to transcend from extremely good to a potential NBA draftee. “I describe Jeremy as someone mature beyond his years, something I’d attribute to the great support network around him,” his former basketball coach Jack O’Keeffe at Itchen had to say about him.

“His skill level was far beyond his years; he was 15 when he came to us, and we played in the U19 distinction and he was undeniably the best player in that division. I saw film of him at an England National camp as he was involved with them and just from that you could tell he was a special player.”

At the time Sochan was 6ft7, and he discussed regularly with his coaches what the next step of his journey was and if the NBA was even a viable dream. Only seven British-born or raised players have ever broken through that wall and seen their name called by the Commissioner. Sochan and his support network had to devise a plan that put him in the best possible place to succeed and expose his talents to the world.

“The dream for Sochan was always the NBA but we all understood it was perhaps two or three steps ahead in levels, so we had to help decide what that next step was which was to go to high school back in America and put himself on a national stage for scouts.”

Sochan returned to prep school powerhouse La Lumiere in Indiana where his play there as well as another cross-national switch to play at Orange Academy in Germany attributed to an 80th rank and four-star prospect grade on the ESPN 100, an amalgamation of the best 100 high school athletes in the nation.

In February 2021, Sochan made a huge decision, given his US citizenship as the country of his birth and the extensive period of his life spent in the UK, Sochan decided against the two powerhouses and elected to represent his mother’s country of birth, Poland, in the process becoming their youngest ever player at the tender age of 17.

It was college decision time for Sochan, who decided to take his talents to NCAA champions Baylor University, a major program capable of progressing his skills and giving him the necessary exposure from the NBA.

This is where the idiosyncrasies of Sochan’s play on the court and off began to positively beguile the eyes of NBA scouts. He was a chameleon, a shape-shifting four with hair colour alternating almost nightly. He made his name as a switchable defensive anchor capable of defending every position on the court, He was also blessed with the ability to handle the ball like a guard and though he was inefficient shooting the deep ball in college converting at a 30% clip and 59% from the free throw line, scouts made note of his consistent mechanics and work ethic.

“His expressive nature is something that’s blossomed over the years, Jeremy was always heavily invested in fashion and art and it kind of accelerated ever since his move back to America, he was always open and provided the energy and life in a room.”

Sochan’s draft stock continued to rise, as his archetype of player was greatly appreciated by NBA teams as it was seen to be conducive to winning basketball. This led the San Antonio Spurs to take him with the 9th pick. It’s an organisation with a rich history of developing foreign players with Hall of Fame coach Greg Popovich who remains Sochan’s coach – hugely influential. The last Spurs championship campaign in 2014 had an unprecedented 10 international players on its roster headlined by Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginóbili.

Coach O’Keefe is confident of Sochan’s continued development and believes that with his potential he can one day be a championship-winning player, “Now that he’s there I know the sky’s the limit which I know is cliché saying but he’s a consummate professional and he’s proven that he’s one of the best rookies in his class.”

I travelled down to the NBA standard courts in Clapham, hoping to gain a sense of appreciation the London basketball community has for Sochan, NBA player jerseys populated the court as an intense 5v5 game was ongoing. There was Curry, KD, LeBron, and Doncic but no Sochan adorned on the backs of any of them. I joined the match for a while before sundown called game.

I sat down with Ahmed and Ismail two of the players from the match asked them if they had any understanding of the name: Jeremy Sochan. Ahmed was none the wiser hitting back at me with a stark “Who!”. However, Ismail was aware, citing the surprise he felt when watching the 2022 NBA draft and hearing the stern English accent coming from Sochan during an interview.

“I was kinda proud to be fair, it’s nice to finally have some representation in the league, and his hair is damn cool.”

Sochan’s story is one to be proud of, and one which I expect to grow in prominence over this side of the pond, as he becomes the star everyone expects him to be.

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