Bruton sees traces of the greats in Wigness
IN a five-minute conversation with NBL legend CJ Bruton about Cairns prodigy Tamuri Wigness, the Brisbane assistant coach does not hold back.
Names such as Patty Mills, Ricky Grace, Darryl McDonald, a little bit of CJ himself, and even his famous old man Cal Bruton.
Those are the people CJ sees in the developing Far North teenager.
The list features the top handful of point guards in Australia over the last few decades, and CJ thinks Wigness has a little of all of them in his game.
“He has the Ricky Grace type skills, he is the leftie, going left to the rim, but he has the Patty quickness as well,” Bruton said at the Fish Tank on Sunday afternoon following an NBL pre-season game.
“Tamuri sees the game, he makes great reads and if you give him the green light, he can go and give you a lot more.
“He has Cal senior’s strength when he first came to Australia.”
For the local kid who has trained with the Taipans for years and now somehow he is playing with their biggest rivals, it was a little unusual for Wigness on Friday and Sunday being on the away team.
“It was a bit weird, but good, coming back to Cairns and staying in a hotel in your hometown, but it is great to be back,” Wigness said.
“To play against Cairns at that level, it is good for me to play at that level and get better.
“Being in the environment and adapting to it, I am used to it now, I just have to work on my game, be consistent and keep going.”
It remains to be seen if Wigness will be under the guidance of CJ and Andrej Lemanis fulltime over the summer.
The Bullets have given Wigness the chance to be a development player in the 2019-20 NBL season, after the NBL knocked back their advances for him to be a Next Stars talent.
Or, he could head back to the COE at the Australian Institute of Sports for one more year.
“For him to be with the national coach, to develop as a point guard … he can be that guy to play for the national team in the future,” Bruton said of Wigness’ upcoming decision.
“I would love to work with him because for me, he is like Ricky Grace and Patty Mills.
“Tamuri’s strength is better than mine at my age, and I played against Ricky as a young guy. Tamuri could have that chance every day against Nathan Sobey, who is on the World Cup team.
“His smarts and understanding of the game are through the roof.”
Wigness is expected to be on the Bullets squad for the NBL Blitz, which starts today in Tasmania.
Cairns, who did not speak to the media before departing this week for the annual preseason tournament, open their Blitz campaign tonight against Adelaide before facing the NBL1 All Stars on Saturday.