I just posted on B/R my personal opinion on who the 20 best prospects are in the 2013 NBA Draft. And I don't have much to add. Some years I get very excited about players who are likely to drop deep into the second round, who I think in turn will become very good pros, but this year I have no such feelings. The 20 players I included in the article are the only players who really excite me, potential wise. They are, in order:
1. Nerlens Noel
2. Victor Oladipo
3. Otto Porter
4. Trey Burke
5. Ben McLemore
6. Steven Adams
7. C.J. McCollum
8. Michael Carter-Williams
9. Anthony Bennett
10. Rudy Gobert
11. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope
12. Kelly Olynyk
13. Alex Len
14. Tony Mitchell
15. Cody Zeller
16. Jeff Withey
17. Giannis Adetokunbo
18. Archie Goodwin
19. Shane Larkin
20. Lucas Nogueira
Maybe all those players will be first round picks; at worst only one or two will drop past pick #35. After these top prospects I have a hard time ranking what players I prefer. There are the solid college veterans who will probably be decent pros (like Gorgui Dieng, Nate Wolters and Reggie Bullock), unknown foreign gambles (like Dennis Schroeder, Sergey Karasev and Livio Jean-Charles) and young college gambles (like Shabazz Muhammad and Ricky Ledo.) I don't have a firm opinion on many of these players - they may be good, they may be busts - and there is not much a difference between who I think the 25th best player is in this draft compared to the 45th. I will say I like two undersized power forwards - Arsalan Kazemi and Richard Howell - as potential late second round/undrafted gems. But that's about it. It's an interesting draft, and it's been fun watching it unfold the past eight months. Enjoy tomorrow night.
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