CJ Fredrick's playmaking skills surprise coaches and teammates

John Calipari said just a few days ago that CJ Fredrick was a “special” player after an impressive all-around performance against Missouri Western State. With the regular season still just a few days away, Kentucky fans are quickly learning what the Wildcats’ head coach meant.

Fredrick came to Lexington with the reputation as an elite outside shooter; connecting on 83 of 178 (46.6 percent) 3-point attempts during two years at Iowa will do that. After transferring to UK, he sat out of all of the 2021-22 season due to a hamstring injury but was still widely viewed as the Wildcats’ top shooter coming into 2022-23.

That might actually still be the case too, although Antonio Reeves certainly has his own argument. Combining the Bahamas trip, the Blue-White Game, and the two exhibitions over the offseason, Fredrick and Reeves are shooting 12-21 (57.1%) and 24-53 (45.3%), respectively, from beyond the arc. That alone will play to Kentucky’s advantage.

But what if opposing defenses can’t just guard Fredrick (or even Reeves, for that matter) behind the arc?

During Thursday night’s final exhibition of the preseason — a 111-53 drumming of Kentucky State — Fredrick stepped into the role of primary ball handler with starting point guard Sahvir Wheeler sidelined. You might think he’d be out of his comfort zone. But it was quite the opposite — Fredrick looked like a veteran floor general.

“We did some stuff today on the fly with CJ,” Calipari said after Thursday’s win. “CJ was pretty good in pick-and-roll, wasn’t he? Again, you want to know what you find out is you play games like this and you see certain guys in a pick-and-roll are better. And the main thing with him was his pace. He wasn’t running downhill, I’m going, throw it. He was coming off and, you know, he was good.”

Fredrick finished his final exhibition performance with six total assists, which would have tied his career-high during his time with Iowa (52 total games). The 6-foot-3 sharpshooter averaged a mere 2.3 assists per outing with the Hawkeyes. But he was thrown into the fire against Kentucky State and played like a natural-born point guard.

“CJ today, he made a lot of good passes. This might have been CJ’s first time being a ball handler in the pick-and-roll,” Fredrick’s teammate, Lance Ware, said postgame. “Like I don’t remember setting ballscreens for CJ. I’ve run dribble hand-offs with CJ and ghost screens with CJ but we’re never like okay I’m gonna come set a screen for you CJ. That never happens, and then we did it today and what do we find out? He can do it.”

Ware was on the receiving end of a pair of Fredrick’s assists, both lobs out of simple screening sets. The first saw Fredrick take a pitch from a driving Jacob Toppin before the former curled up and around the right elbow and beelined for the paint. Fredrick then continued downhill with the ball and tossed a soft left-handed lob over his left shoulder for a Ware layup. The second came out of a pick-and-roll with Fredrick — this time over his right shoulder — hitting a cutting Ware for a two-handed slam.

Both of those plays weren’t something the Big Blue Nation had ever seen Fredrick attempt. I’m not sure many knew he even had those kinds of skills in his bag. Not even Ware, who earned four points off of Fredrick’s playmaking, or Calipari knew about it.

“I didn’t know either,” Ware said with a laugh. “I found that out right when you found that out. I said ‘Oh wow that was a good pass.'”

“I didn’t know C.J. was that good in pick-and-rolls. Anybody else know?” Calipari asked the media. “Then you watch the game and you go, my, he’s pretty good in pick-and-rolls.”

Had it not been for a minor injury to Wheeler in the first exhibition game on Sunday, Fredrick likely doesn’t take over the same responsibilities he did on Thursday. Injuries are never a welcome sight, but if they do have one positive effect, it’s that it allows different players to showcase their versatility and potential in other areas. That’s exactly what’s happening right now with freshman center Ugonna Onyenso and the reigning National Player of the Year, Oscar Tshiebwe.

Fredrick is experiencing a similar effect, and it’s surprising his teammates in a good way.

“I think that I personally took him for granted because he was out for so long and I didn’t know he was that good,” Ware added. “I said ‘Oh I wanna be out there with CJ.’ No knock to anybody else but CJ, I didn’t know he was that good. It’s not like he does anything spectacular, he just plays the game the right way.”