2014 NBA Draft Thread

Nobody wouldve thought hardaway jr would have a better rookie campaign than ben mac,

Ben mac was supposed to be a more athletic brad beal
 
Ballinsam23 said:
I thought Ben Mac was gonna have it all :smh:
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never bought into the kid, too quiet out there. he miss his first 3 shots hes done for the rest of the game. you could see that in Kansas, kid is too beta.

maybe he'll find some heart next year.
 
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captainjackson said:
wonder if teams might pass on him and let him slide, if the sixers get wiggins and end up with randle at 10.....:wow: :wow: :wow: :wow: :wow:
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More like what if the Sixers draft Wiggins then Harris at 10 then trade Thad Young and pick #33 to move back into the top 15 and grab Randle.
 
If teams are worried Randle's foot could be a lingering issue it's possible.

And if a team wants immediate results and a guy that's only 25 years old himself and will get you 16 and 9 right off the bat with the potential for more then I could see a team like the Nuggets, Wolves, Suns or Hawks wanting to trade their pick for Thad + #33.
 
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keeL252 said:
never bought into the kid, too quiet out there. he miss his first 3 shots hes done for the rest of the game. you could see that in Kansas, kid is too beta.

maybe he'll find some heart next year.
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Crazy thing is he got compared to ray allen, he look more like martell
 
Apparently GM's are really worried about how Randle's foot healed and how it could affect him down the road. He's definitely missing all of Summer League as well.

Dude really could have a rough fall on draft night.
 
****kkkkkkkkkkkkkk i was hoping a team bit on Randle and Freed LA up to get vonleh or Smart :smh: :smh: please let some dumb GM pick up mcdermott before us.
 
tyisny said:
****kkkkkkkkkkkkkk i was hoping a team bit on Randle and Freed LA up to get vonleh or Smart :smh: :smh: please let some dumb GM pick up mcdermott before us.
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lakers are 7th. one of smart, vonleh, or gordon will be there. don't know why people are panicking.
 
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NBA scouting director: Draft deep, but no guaranteed superstar

Senior director of NBA scouting operations Ryan Blake helps teams identify and evaluate talent for the draft -- a task that has kept him particularly busy this year, because the 2014 class, he says, is loaded with quality.

SI.com caught up with Blake -- whose late father, Marty, was the league's director of scouting for more than 30 years -- to discuss his general impressions of this crop, his reluctance to label anyone a surefire superstar and his potential sleepers for the June 26 draft.

SI.com: The early conversation dating to last year was that this draft looked incredibly deep, particularly in comparison to the 2013 class. Is it still as strong as the buzz suggested?

Blake: It's absolutely deep. After the 60 picks in the two rounds, teams will have players they want for the summer league whom they feel could make the team in the fall. Agents' phones are going to be ringing off the hook. The cliché about beauty being in the eye of the beholder is true here, because we have that type of quality.

SI.com: Where does this class stack up with the past three or four drafts?

Blake: It's the strongest in terms of the upside of a lot of players, the potential for players to make an immediate impact and the number of players who can play for well over five years in the NBA.

SI.com: What do you think the Cavaliers will do with the first pick? What should they do?

Blake: It's really tough to say. Of course, they're going to look hard at Joel Embiid, who can be a Serge Ibaka type. But you have to also make sure that his back is OK. With Andrew Wiggins, you have a player who could be a Harrison Barnes -- who is going to continue to develop [after averaging 9.5 points this season, his second, for the Warriors] -- or he could be a Vince Carter or Tracy McGrady type, or more. Then you have a player like Jabari Parker who is ready to play. My feeling is that it's going to be between Wiggins and Embiid. The Cavs need a perimeter threat, but they also need help next to Anderson Varejao in the frontcourt.

These players are good, but teams want a home run. You have what I call "guessability" with at least the top three guys. You want a Kevin Durant or LeBron James or Tim Duncan [at the top of the draft], but you don't have those assurances in this draft. There's potential, and they could end up being that home run, but there are also question marks.

SI.com: Embiid, Wiggins, Parker and Dante Exum have been widely viewed as the top four players, in some order, though that obviously could change. After them, there's a logjam of power forwards that includes Noah Vonleh and Julius Randle. Which do you like best?

Blake: We don't have five positions in the NBA -- we have 13 to 17 positions, or roles within a traditional position. That's important to understand because the media, and scouts as well, sort of classify five positions. Do you consider Parker a small forward or power forward? Is Exum a point guard or an off-guard? Is Marcus Smart a point guard? What is a true point? Is Victor Oladipo a point guard? Orlando played him there as a rookie this season.

Vonleh is a heck of a lot different from Randle, a Zach Randolph type who will be powering inside. Will Randle be able to improve his jumper and develop his right hand? A team might think that Vonleh is better than Randle or has more upside. But if that team already has a player who does similar things as Vonleh, does it still take Vonleh? That's what makes this draft, with its depth and options, so interesting.

SI.com: What makes Exum such an intriguing prospect?

Blake: So much potential, so much athleticism. He's versatile as a long, quick guard who can get inside, play in the half-court, push the ball and pass. Now, he hasn't played against the college level for an extended period of time, and he's just been working out rather than playing games since last fall. When he came to the combine, he hadn't played for months and didn't even do drills beyond athletic testing.

A few years ago, Enes Kanter -- who sat out his one season at Kentucky -- wanted teams to know he wasn't afraid, and he worked out at the combine. The decision helped him -- and the teams interested in him, because it gave them more information. [The Jazz drafted Kanter third in 2011.] There are teams that won't have enough goods on Exum, and sometimes you can't just go, "What if?" They'll want to make a 100 percent [informed] decision.

SI.com: On the topic of international players: There's been a lot of talk about whether Croatia's Dario Saric will stay in the draft or withdraw by the June 16 deadline. What are your thoughts on Saric?

Blake: If we're talking about just his performance, Saric's stock is high. He's been playing that well. He led his team to the Adriatic League championship against big teams. He's a very skilled wing for that size [Saric is generally listed at 6-foot-10, 223 pounds], he handles the ball well, he can pass, he rebounds, he shoots the ball pretty well, he's confident. He's also been playing with professionalism.

Saric reportedly has an agreement with [Turkish club] Anadolu Efes. His dad has already said he's not coming to play in the NBA next season. He probably has a huge buyout, and NBA teams can put in only $500,000. Say his buyout is $1 million or more -- if he stayed in the draft, he'd have an invoice he'd have to pay mostly himself. What does it tell you that he's not even coming over for workouts? I expect him to pull his name out of the draft. However, if he keeps his name in, one of the seven teams with multiple first-round picks will pick him.

SI.com: Has there been a shift toward the use of analytics in the draft process and player evaluations?

Blake: Advanced analytics help us in many realms of basketball: acquisitions, tendency scouting and, of course, draft preparation. Some of those advanced analytics solidify the eye test, and other data might raise questions that challenge the eye test. A lot of those things help not just with your first-round picks, but also with your second-round picks and undrafted players.

SI.com: Which players do you like who haven't been as hyped entering the draft?

Blake: UConn's Shabazz Napier: He's a leader. Everybody has strengths and weaknesses, but you want a guy who is going to play to win and has the skill set and basketball mind. He can be that player.

Louisiana-Lafayette's Elfrid Payton: He can be sort of your Rajon Rondo type. Great defender. He doesn't shoot well, but he changes the game on offense and defense.

Michigan State's Adreian Payne: A lot of people have been asking me about how he's older [23] for a rookie. Well, what does that mean? We have 35-year-old rookies [Pablo Prigioni joined the Knicks at that age in 2012]. Not every pick is going to be a franchise player. You can get a guy who is going to contribute for a number of years at an economical rate.

Kentucky's James Young: He shot only 35 percent from beyond the arc, but he has the potential to be better. He also does little things to make his teammates better.
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http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/nb...yan-blake-joel-embiid-dante-exum-dario-saric/
 
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Hinkie shouldn't be married only to Wiggins. #3 and Thad for #1 isn't overly costly, but I don't like the idea of passing Embiid to pair with Noel. Two defensively-minded front court players, but I imagine one or the other would develop some sort of offensive skill if not a midrange game.
 
Ford:
Ranking draft prospects by tiers

If there is one idea that rings true in virtually every draft it is this: Using the word "consensus" around the NBA draft is a bit of a joke.

Occasionally, a prospect emerges who is so clearly better than anyone else in the draft -- see Anthony Davis in 2012, Blake Griffin in 2009, LeBron James in 2003, Yao Ming in 2002, Tim Duncan in 1997, Shaquille O'Neal in 1992 -- but more often than not, choosing who to draft, even at the top, can be a conflict-ridden enterprise.

This year is no exception. We are two weeks away from the draft, and there are still major debates running internally within every front office in the league. If teams can't agree, internally, on the order of draft prospects, how can we create a "consensus" ranking?

As hard as it is for NBA draftniks to believe, there is very little agreement within teams, let alone between them, on draft night.

Last year's lack of consensus centered on the weaknesses of the draft. The Cleveland Cavaliers were deciding between six players a week before the draft, and they finally decided to take Anthony Bennett on the day of the event. There was a feeling that you couldn't go right no matter who you chose in last year's draft.

This year, the opposite is true. With so many elite prospects to choose from, it's a wealth of prospects that seems to be throwing execs and scouts for a loop.

"I'm not sure you can go wrong," one NBA exec whose team is selecting in the top 5 said. "Wiggins, Embiid and Parker. I think they're all going to have great careers. I don't see how any of them fail if they can stay healthy."

So, with no clear consensus, who do you choose to draft?

NBA teams watch prospects play thousands of hours of games. They go to practice. Go to camps. Hire guys from MIT to create statistical solutions. Work out players, give them psychological tests, do background checks and conduct personal interviews. And still, there is very little consensus.

Factor in the debate between taking the "best player available" versus "team needs" and the situation muddies itself further.

To make sense of all this, the past few years I've chronicled a draft ranking system employed by several teams called the tier system. In the tier system, teams group players, based on overall talent, into tiers. Then, the teams rank the players in each tier based on team need. This system allows teams to draft not only the best player available, but also the player who best fits a team's individual needs.

A more detailed explanation of how the tier system works can be found here.

So what do the tiers look like this year? After talking to several general managers and scouts whose teams employ this system, here is how things are shaping up. Note that players are listed alphabetically in each tier.

Tier 1

Joel Embiid
Jabari Parker
Andrew Wiggins

Last year, we didn't have any player in this category. This category is usually reserved for guys who are sure-fire All-Stars or "franchise" players. Since 2009, only Griffin, John Wall and Davis have been ranked in this slot. This year, there are three players in Tier 1 -- as many as there have been in the last five years combined. All of them received Tier 1 votes from every GM, exec and scout I surveyed. So if there is any consensus out there, it's that there are three really great prizes in this year's draft.
\Tier 2


Dante Exum
Aaron Gordon
Julius Randle
Dario Saric
Marcus Smart
Noah Vonleh

Last year, Tier 2 also was empty for the first time since I've been doing this column. That should tell you something about how poorly regarded last year's class was. Tier 2 is reserved for players who are projected as potential All-Stars by scouts. They are typical high lottery picks in a normal draft. In 2012, Bradley Beal, Harrison Barnes, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist all got the nod as Tier 2 players. In 2011, Kyrie Irving and Derrick Williams were in this tier. This year, six players are here, which is a high number (as is the case with having three players in Tier 1). Two of these players -- Exum and Vonleh -- even got a couple of votes for Tier 1.

This is where the strength of the draft really shines, in my opinion. This means that NBA GMs, scouts and execs believe that there could be as many as nine potential All-Stars in the draft class, with three of them being franchise players. You have to go back more than a decade -- to the 2003 draft, where eight players ended up making an All-Star team -- to get a draft that loaded. While none of the players on the list are LeBron James-type players, there is incredible value here.

Tier 3

Gary Harris
Doug McDermott
Nik Stauskas

In 2013, we put the top six players in the draft in Tier 3: Nerlens Noel, Anthony Bennett, Ben McLemore, Alex Len, Victor Oladipo and Otto Porter. That means that all nine guys listed in Tier 1 or Tier 2 would have been drafted ahead of the top six players in 2013.

This tier is usually reserved for players who are projected as NBA starters in their careers. This year, this tier is a little on the small side. While there were a number of votes for various players for this tier, these were the only three who had a consensus. None of the Tier 3 players were voted on for Tier 2 status, and none of them were voted for Tier 4; that makes things pretty clean. All three should be gone before the lottery is through, with McDermott, especially, looking like a lock for the Top 10.

Tier 4

Tyler Ennis
Rodney Hood
Zach LaVine
Jusuf Nurkic
Elfrid Payton
Adreian Payne
Kristaps Porzingis
James Young

Tier 4 typically includes late lottery picks to mid-first-round selections in a normal draft, or selections 10 through 20. These players project as either starters or top-tier rotation players.

Payton and Young got a small number of votes for Tier 3. Nurkic got a Tier 3 vote, as well. But the majority of teams had them ranked in Tier 4. Ennis and Payne were ranked as Tier 4 by every team I spoke with. LaVine, Hood, Nurkic and Porzingis had some Tier 5 votes, but the majority of their votes were in Tier 4.

Tier 5

Jordan Adams
Kyle Anderson
Clint Capela
Jordan Clarkson
Spencer Dinwiddie
Cleanthony Early
Jerami Grant
P.J. Hairston
Joe Harris
Artem Klimenko
K.J. McDaniels
Mitch McGary
Vasilije Micic
Shabazz Napier
Glenn Robinson III
Walter Tavares
Jarnell Stokes
T.J. Warren
C.J. Wilcox
Patric Young

This next group is a very large Tier 5, and it shows off the depth of the draft this year; the difference between the 20th pick in the draft and the 40th pick isn't particularly large.

There are a whopping 20 players in this group. At least 10 of these players won't hear their names called in the first round. This area of the draft is typically reserved for rotation players. These are players who are unlikely to start for good teams but could play a significant role coming off the bench for a team. A few teams had Anderson, Capela, Early, Hairston, Napier and Warren in Tier 4, but not quite enough for them to make the cut.

Tier 6

Thanasis Antetokounmpo
Bogdan Bogdanovic
Deonte Burton
Jahii Carson
Semaj Christon
DeAndre Daniels
C.J. Fair
Alessandro Gentile
Nick Johnson
Nikola Jokic
Rasmus Larsen
James Michael McAdoo
Jordan McRae
Johnny O'Bryant
Russ Smith

This tier has players who were listed as top-60 prospects by the majority of the teams I spoke with. Of the group, only Christon, Jokic and O'Bryant got some Tier 5 votes.

Like every draft system, the tier system isn't perfect. But the teams that run it have found success with it. It has allowed them to get help through the draft without overreaching. Compared to traditional top-30 lists or mock drafts, it seems like a much more precise tool of gauging which players a team should draft.
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ChampCruThik said:
With you. Not sure how much better Stauskas and Harris are than Hood.
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I think there is a pretty clear gap, Stauskas performed better than Hood while being younger, is a really good passer, has a really good feel for making plays in screen and roll, which is important, if you look at the finals this year how great the defenses are, the first option on a play doesn't work, and having a wing that can create out of a random side pick and roll in mid shot clock scenarios could be really valuable.

Hood just profiles to me as a Marco Belineli type a low turnover 3 point shooter, with average ball handling skills.

and Doug I just think his shooting and shot creation is on a different level, and if you put him on a team with MKG, where MKG can take the most difficult match up at 3/4 on defense to allow McDermott to be a match up nightmare on the other end.
 
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Like i said a few pages back, Hood won't be anything more than a 6'8 spot up shooter. Which isn't terrible per say, but on the lower rung compared to what Harris, Stauskas and McDermott (I guess?) can/could offer.
 
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I'm picking Dougie before Hood because he's better at everything on offense and they both ain't giving you much defense though Hood is better athletically.


Not as high on Harris as I used to be, would take Nik over him no question.
 
Hood a top 5 offensive player in this draft but only a spot up shooter :lol: hes gonna prove alot of people wrong, that boy can score MULTIPLE ways
 
I think Hood's game is much better suited for the NBA.

I seriously love this draft, I dont think there's gonna be 1 bust in the top 20 picks. Couple great players, handul of real good players, and about a dozen of OK role players.
 
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yall really think Doug game is gonna translate into the NBA?...dude is gonna be Wally at best. He better work on the stand still J bc thats all he'll get off in the league. when he played for the USA team he straight up struggled against cats his size or bigger with a little agility, and he couldnt get a shot off in the key. Luke, Trell, Payton and homie from Colorado were easily the best players on that team.

idk what Duke games yall were watching last year but Hood is gonna put in work in the league next year(next saying hes gonna avg major pts, but he will be in the rotation where ever he gets drafted). kid can slash, finish around and above the rim and knock down the J with ease plus i think he will get better on the D side.
 
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