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The Rudy Gay trade

1/31/2013

Most of you can guess my feelings about yesterday's big three team trade, and I want to keep it brief.

Detroit, first of all, did great to dump Tayshaun Prince's contract. They owed him over $15 million in the two seasons following this one, and Jose Calderon is only on the books through the end of this year. So this was a great, no-brainer move by the Pistons. Plus, Calderon is pretty good.

Memphis, meanwhile, had to do this trade. People who think the Grizzlies are blowing up the team because of their recent transactions don't know what the hell they are talking about. Rudy Gay was their 4th best player (maybe) - and having a worse year than Ed Davis, one of the players the Grizzlies got in return.

Gay is one of the most overpaid players in the league, and the Grizzlies are lucky they were able to dump him and only take on Prince's somewhat lousy contract in return. Memphis will not get any worse from this trade; if anything they might be a little better. They were a fringe contender before, and they still are. The main components are still intact for them - Marc Gasol, Zach Randolph and Mike Conley.

Toronto, obviously, got the short end of the stick. Bryan Colangelo is keeping his competition up with Ernie Grunfeld for worst head executive in the league. Gay is paid like a perennial All-Star, and has never posted a PER above 18. His WS/48 has never been higher than .123. And he's a mediocre defender. Even if he improves, he is vastly overpaid.

This is a completely unjustifiable deal by the Raptors, and at this point we should not be surprised. Toronto management has no idea how to build a successful team. Colangelo has made it a custom to overpay - often wildly overpay - good but not great players. They have a big payroll and no stars. They are, in short, pathetic. This Gay deal puts them back another few years, unless something miraculous happens.

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Nerlens Noel will be picked first in June

1/30/2013

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I have been saying for most of the college basketball season that Nerlens Noel is the best prospect in the 2013 NBA Draft. My feelings have only grown stronger as the season has moved along. I wrote a short piece for BR today on why Noel has to go #1, barring a big surprise.

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Can any upperclassmen from the 2013 NBA Draft become stars?

1/28/2013

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Last time we looked at top sophomores in the upcoming 2013 NBA Draft that could potentially turn into great pro players. Are there any juniors and seniors that realistically could become dominant pros?

The short answer, not surprisingly, is probably not. The best NBA prospects usually leave college following their freshman or sophomore year, so upperclassmen are less likely to become big stars in the NBA. This certainly is the case for the 2013 Draft. While there will probably be many juniors and seniors picked who go on to have productive NBA careers, it seems unlikely any upperclassman from this draft will turn into a dominant All-Star.

This site is all about the uncertainty of projections - and you never know, if everything adds up an upperclassman could be a far better pro than any of us foresaw. But we should obviously not have such high hopes if we are to be realistic. No juniors or seniors seem vastly superior to their projected draft position. This is not like 2011, for example, when Kenneth Faried fell in the draft even though many people thought he was going to be an excellent pro.

The upperclassman most likely to exceed expectations is probably Lehigh guard C.J. McCollum. Maybe out for the rest of the season with an injury, McCollum has obvious pro skills and a tremendous feel for the game. McCollum also seems to be a better passer than his stats indicate, and could develop into a superb NBA point guard if everything clicks. That said, he is hardly a surefire top prospect - McCollum could flounder in the pros just as easily as he could succeed. Nonetheless, he appears to be the most impressive upperclassman, and maybe the only one who could get picked in the top ten.

After McCollum, the chances of finding an upperclassman with legit star potential seem pretty slim. I like Jeff Withey and Victor Oladipo, but even if they exceed expectations they seem unlikely to ever be All-Stars. There are many other interesting upperclassmen that will be available, but no particular one stands out.

Projected first round upperclassmen I have not mentioned - like Jamaal Franklin, Mason Plumlee and Kelly Olynyck - will get considerable hype as the draft approaches. But every junior and senior in the 2013 Draft has to be considered a long shot to ever become truly dominant in the NBA. There will probably be some good upperclassmen, but no great ones.

All this is pretty obvious, but I thought it warranted mentioning. We need to keep things in perspective: The 2013 NBA Draft will mainly be about the freshman and sophomores. This shouldn't come as a surprise.

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Can any sophomore prospects in the 2013 NBA Draft become stars?

1/18/2013

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Like I mentioned last week, it appears many of the top prospects in the upcoming draft will be freshman. While I think it is still too early to rank the best freshman prospects in order (with the exception of Nerlens Noel, who seems to be the best prospect of the entire draft), the sophomores are another story. There are several good sophomore prospects who will probably declare for the draft, and there is a chance a few of them will eventually become All-Stars in the NBA. Much can change in the coming months, but most of the top sophomores we have seen enough to get a feel for their game, and their possible NBA potential.

So here is my present rankings of the best sophomore prospects in the country, in preferential order. A few caveats: I am focusing on players who have a reasonable chance of being selected in the top 10 in the 2013 Draft. As my recent draft review made clear, star players are very likely to be selected within the first ten picks of a given draft, so that's where I focus most of my energy. We are trying to find potential All-Stars. The other thing to know is I will be listing one freshman on this list, because he was redshirted last year.

Alex Len, Maryland
Despite being in the top 5 of most mock drafts, the 19 year old Len appears somewhat underrated. As a legit seven footer with good athleticism, he has been a forceful presence for Maryland all season. Playing on a team that often has trouble feeding him the ball, Len has done a decent job offensively, and clearly has the skills to grow in that area. Defensively he has been impressive, both on the boards and in blocking shots. Maryland's schedule has been easy, and it will be telling if Len can continue his impressive statistical production against more difficult competition. If he can raise his game against stiffer competition, he probably deserves to be picked in the top 3.

Ben McLemore, Kansas
A redshirt freshman who turns 20 next month, McLemore seems better classified as a sophomore for our purposes. No player has seen his stock rise as much over the last six weeks. The Ray Allen comparisons at present seem a little bit overboard, but McLemore seems a safe bet to become a very solid pro. His upside is debatable - there is certainly the chance that other guards in this draft will have better careers. But currently McLemore seems like one of the safer picks of 2013, and if things continue to go as they have, he may well deserve to be picked second behind Noel in June.

Otto Porter, Georgetown
The all around game of Porter is impressive, and it does not take much of a leap in faith to believe he could mature into a player similar to Andre Iguodala or Paul George. Porter plays in a system at Georgetown that can mask the full NBA potential of a player, which means he actually might be better than advertised once he reaches the next level. Obviously, the opposite is a distinct possibility as well.

Michael Carter-Williams, Syracuse
A very tall and lanky point guard at 6'5'', Carter-Williams is an intriguing prospect with a pro potential that seems hard to project. His ability to break down defenses and set teammates up is exceptional, and legitimately reminiscent of Jason Kidd. But Kidd, once a very poor shooter, never had trouble shooting the ball in college the way Carter-Williams has. Carter-Williams' passing and defensive abilities are enough to keep him in the lottery discussion no matter how he shoots, but it casts a shadow of doubt over how effective he could be as a point guard in the NBA.

Cody Zeller, Indiana
It is easy to like Zeller, but hard to love him. You have to love a prospect's potential to draft him in the top 3, which is where many mocks still have Zeller. Ed Weiland recently made a compelling case for why there is little to suggest Zeller will be a star. He is good offensively, and clearly has some skills, but not much indicates he would be dominant at the next level. At this point he is probably an overrated prospect.

Tony Mitchell, North Texas
After a stellar freshman season, Mitchell has simply not been as good as a sophomore. On Thursday, he did not even score a point in 32 minutes against Florida International. I am hesitant to dramatically downgrade a talented player who follows an excellent season with only a good one, but it's not a promising sign that Mitchell's numbers are down across the board. He still is an interesting prospect with possible star potential, but the future does not look as bright as it did a few months ago.

Trey Burke, Michigan
Burke is the point guard for one of the better teams in the country, and has put up good numbers in the process. Given how difficult it can sometimes be to project a point guard's pro potential, there is a chance Burke is a better prospect than many currently think.

B.J. Young, Arkansas
More of a combo guard than Burke, Young has the athleticism to potentially make a sizable impact at the next level, although it seems less likely to happen than with most of the players on this list.

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Gauging the top freshman prospects

1/12/2013

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Not surprisingly most of the top prospects in the upcoming NBA Draft are freshman. Personally, I think Nerlens Noel appears to be the top prospect in the entire draft, and Shabazz Muhammad seems overrated, but at this point I am more interested in looking at the freshman class as a whole, and not individual players.

As we know, freshman prospects are the hardest collegians to gauge for a wide variety of reasons; what I said in regards to the class of 2012 is relevant with this new group of freshman as well. These inexperienced and very young players are tough to peg, and their performances, both good and bad, are often blown out of proportion given the circumstances.

Freshmen phenoms are adjusting to much more than just basketball. They are teenagers living in a completely new setting, and it makes me more wary of judging them by their single season of college basketball. But that one season is pretty much all we have of substance, so we need to do the best we can with the limited info we receive.

Last year's class is a good example of how hard it can be to correctly identify a freshman's potential. While Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist were correctly considered two of the best freshman prospects in the country, NBA teams badly miscalculated on freshman players like Andre Drummond (drafted way too late) and Austin Rivers (picked way too early.) There is always a lot of smoke swirling around "one and done" players, and it's harder to separate the truth from the fiction concerning their pro potential.

The peaks and valleys in a top freshman prospect's perceived value seem more stark than with upperclassmen prospects. We just do not have enough time to accurately get a bead on a lot of these kids, and we judge them too quickly. They often rise and fall based on a single game, which is a stupid way to try to analyze a 19 year old prospect who is not anything close to being mature as a basketball player.

So it is hard to figure out which heralded freshman in 2013 are truly superior prospects (the jury is still out even on Noel.) There is no one player clearly as dominating as Anthony Davis, but there are apparently quite a few freshman who have All-Star potential. We just can't agree on who those few are. In two extreme examples, both Kentucky and UCLA rely almost entirely on star freshman to lead them. It can be hard to glean much as an NBA scout given a situation as muddled as that.

It will be interesting to see if any star freshman really elevate their game over the next few months, but it may not happen. The rest of the college season will inevitably supply us with more information in regards to the best freshman, but ultimately we will have to decide if that information is truly useful, or only misleading. With very young prospects it can be hard to know.

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NBA Focus

The Rudy Gay trade

Nerlens Noel will be picked first in June

Can any upperclassmen from the 2013 NBA Draft become stars?

Can any sophomore prospects in the 2013 NBA Draft become stars?

Gauging the top freshman prospects

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