Jeremy Sochan

Bio

Jeremy Sochan was the highest-drafted England-raised player of the modern era when San Antonio took him 9th overall in 2022. San Antonio waived him on February 11, 2026 after his role diminished under a new head coach; he signed with the New York Knicks weeks later and picked up an NBA Championship ring when New York won the 2026 Finals. On August 2, 2026 he signed a one-year, non-guaranteed deal with the Portland Trail Blazers, entering training camp fighting for a roster spot. He's not a British citizen — he's a dual US/Polish citizen via his mother, and represents Poland internationally — but every year of his basketball development happened in England.

Beginner Story

Sochan first picked up a basketball playing for MK Trojans in Milton Keynes before moving, at 15, to Southampton to attend Itchen College and play for the Solent Kestrels development system. He didn't attend Oak Hill Academy, a detail widely misreported — he moved to the US in 2019 for La Lumiere School in Indiana, then, when COVID-19 suspended the American scholastic season in 2020, relocated again to Germany to play professionally for OrangeAcademy in the ProB league while protecting his NCAA amateur status. One season at Baylor (Big 12 Sixth Man of the Year) later, San Antonio took him 9th overall. His route — an ordinary local club to a top-10 pick, via three different countries' junior systems — is held up in England as proof that the path doesn't have to be conventional to end somewhere real. Being waived by his draft team four years later, and having to re-earn a roster spot from nothing, is now just as much a part of that story as the draft night was.

Videos & Interviews

What People Are Saying

• Jeremy Sochan, a 'citizen of the world,' sets course for the NBA — Basketball News
• The wonderful world of Jeremy Sochan — CBS Sports
• Jeremy Sochan signs with Portland Trail Blazers on one-year deal — NBC Sports