INDEPENDENCE, Ohio (92.3 The Fan) – After holding up his new No. 24 jersey, first-round pick Jaylon Tyson offered a quick reminder for Cavs fans.
“Hey, jersey is going on sale tomorrow,” Tyson said.
With his family seated a few feet from him, Tyson, selected 20 th overall in the 2024 NBA Draft Wednesday night, showed off his playful personality during a 22-minute introductory press conference Thursday afternoon.
For the Cavs, Tyson checked all the boxes. Where that lands him as far as a role this upcoming season remains to be seen.
“The thing that I know unequivocally is we can throw him on an NBA floor tomorrow,” president of basketball operations Koby Altman said. “Physically he can compete and his skillset, he can play right away.
“I'll be doing a disservice to say, look, day one, he's going to be in the rotation… It's not like tomorrow he has to contribute, which is nice. It gives him a little relief, but at the same time, I know the kind of person he is. He's going to push guys in front of him. He's going to have some minutes.”
Tyson is confident he’ll be able to make his mark sooner rather than later in helping the Cavs get to the next level.
“I want to win championship,” Tyson said. “Honestly. I want ring first year… So the role piece, I just want to be a part of a winning culture. That's what I want to do. Obviously I want to play, but I know that takes time and obviously throughout the course I understand it takes time to be able to do that.”
On the offensive end the Cavs love what Tyson can bring them as a wing player but the rookie from Cal found a box he wants to check this year.
“I want to be an all-defensive player for rookie year,” Tyson said. “That's my goal. If I do that, now you're talking about every box being checked right there. That's every box, right? That's the biggest thing I'm going to work on. I'm going to work my tail off to be able to accomplish that goal because when I have goals I'm looking to set. I'm not just setting them just to try to find a goal. I'm actually trying to hit these goals.”
It's easy to see how and why Tyson blew Altman and the Cavs away during his visit and workout that saw him overcome a sore back he got courtesy of a cross country flight into town.
“I knew I wasn't going to sit out,” Tyson said. “There's no way I'm going to sit out. I want to play. I'm a competitor. All I needed, I told him to put a hot pack on it, make it hot, I'll be straight. But yeah, I wanted to make a great impression. This is a great organization, a winning organization. So I was going to play and I wanted to show that I'm a winner.”
After bouncing from Texas to Texas Tech, Tyson found himself at Cal playing under former NBA big man Mark Madsen during his junior season. He shot .465 from the field while averaging 19.6 points, 6.8 rebounds, 3.5 assists per game for the Golden Bears last season.
Tyson was an All-Pac-12 first team selection and he ranked third in conference scoring and seventh in rebounding last season. He was the first Cal player since 1997 to score 20 or more points in six consecutive games.
“I had to grow as a man. I had to grow as a human being, grow as a basketball player,” Tyson said of his college travels. “And I feel like that's what put me in position today. Those three schools that I've been to, I've learned a lot from every single school I've been to, right? It's going to prepare me for this level that I'm encountering on, but I don't look back at it as a negative. And I don't want y'all to look at it as a negative.”
Altman and the Cavs did not view it as a negative.
With limited draft capital going forward the next five years, Altman was convinced Tyson was too good to pass up.
“We could have moved back, we could have moved out, we could have, there's a lot of different options at that 20 spot,” Altman said. “It was valuable and we said, no, we want to pick someone that we want to grow with that's going to be here with us for a while. And so we want to afford him that runway, but he's going to compete right away.”
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