Delete/Lock...Draft talk over in JPZ's thread....

[i nasmatic i]

Originally Posted by bhzmafia14

Originally Posted by I NaSmatic I

Don't get me wrong, Devin Harris is a very good player at a good bargain but do the Grizzlies really want another shoot first, perimeter player

.

I was thinking about that. There are pros and cons to that type of deal. Harris can also get to the line better than anybody on the Grizz roster. He CAN open things up for everybody else on the team with his speed and penetration too. I don't know if it would make the team more scary if people can't focus on OJ or Gay because Harris can light it up too. Memphis would actually have a big three if they did this deal though. Then, I would try to throw Conley and picks to Minnesota for Love.

If people wouldn't mind a Mayo / Martin backcourt, they shouldn't mind a Harris / Mayo backcourt. Rubio may end up being better than Harris by the end of his rookie contract, so its kinda hard to dispute how this deal would turn out on both sides at this point. Even if Memphis get Harris, they still need frontcourt help.

Grizzlies management needs to just focus on improving the front court (PF) any way they can. I'm cool with Conley after seeing him perform theway he did the last two months of the season and I'm willing to cut some slack for Rudy.

 

[jaflash]

Brandon Jennings had a segment on Carson Daly's show last night.

This is not word for word but something along the lines of what he said when asked about the difference between Europe and NBA.

He was talking about the European leagues stating they were team-based and physical.
And how he struggled

But

then he said how the NBA is a one on one league and he will be perform much better.

 

[raptors29]

Originally Posted by manamazing55

^
I only saw Randolph in college. Sorry.


B-Wright will be very good as he continues to mature physically, if Nellie will give him some run. His wingspan is ridiculous, and he can finish

I don't think Wright is gonna be good at all. In basketball your wingspan doesn't really mean anything.

 

[weaponry expert]

...I would throw myself in front of a bus for Ricky Rubio

Easy there Dan Peterson.

 

[al3xis]

then he said how the NBA is a one on one league and he will be perform much better.

 

[jaflash]

Originally Posted by Al3xis

then he said how the NBA is a one on one league and he will be perform much better.

I was expecting a paragraph long rant stating once again how you dislike Jennings. LOL

 

[ValarMorghulis]

Originally Posted by Al3xis

then he said how the NBA is a one on one league and he will be perform much better.

seems like a perfect fit and attitude for GSWhoops

 

[bhzmafia14]

Originally Posted by Al3xis

then he said how the NBA is a one on one league and he will be perform much better.

Shows what his mindset is coming into the league.

Iverson 2.0

 

[boys noize]

Originally Posted by cleansneaksonly21

Originally Posted by Al3xis

then he said how the NBA is a one on one league and he will be perform much better.

seems like a perfect fit and attitude for GSWhoops

Brandon Jennings and DeMar Derozan are the two lottery picks I'm praying we don't take. Jonny Flynn, Stephen Curry, or Tyreke Evans please.

 

[al3xis]

Iverson showed he could mature, follow instructions and be coachable at 18 and 19. Not every mentor/coach is John Thompson, but still hid the risks andconcerns for his future.

Jennings appears to have not. and he's 1/4 the player AI was

 

[i nasmatic i]

Sound like something Stephon Marbury would say.

 

[thezephyr777]

Likeing Prestis ideas

 

[bigmike23]

Originally Posted by Al3xis

Iverson showed he could mature, follow instructions and be coachable at 18 and 19. Not every mentor/coach is John Thompson, but still hid the risks and concerns for his future.

Jennings appears to have not. and he's 1/4 the player AI was

and that didnt last long in the NBA so whats the point?

 

[al3xis]

nobody was afraid to take him #1 overall....character concerns were pretty much in the past at that point.

If Jennings just would shut up and go about things the right way, he'd probably be in the top 10 comfortably.

 

[swizzc]

Thursday, June 18
Update: T'Wolves confirm, "not trying to trade" Jefferson
Al Jefferson | Timberwolves
Earlier today, we pointed to a Boston Globe article that stated Al Jefferson and the T'Wolves No. 6 pick in the upcoming draft could be shipped to Phoenixfor for Amare Stoudemire.

Not so, according to multiple sources.

ESPN's Marc Stein tells us a source with knowledge of Minnesota's thinking insists that the deal is not being discussed. He points out that Jefferson(who is signed long term) and a top-six pick would be an incredibly high price to pay for Stoudemire, who is coming off eye surgery and could walk in freeagency in 2010.

Now, the T'Wolves are also responding. According to a spokesperson, "There is absolutely no truth to this deal. In fact, David Kahn, head ofbasketball operations, called Al Jefferson this morning after seeing these reports to tell him they are not trying to trade him."

So it appears all parties will be staying put for now.

 

[swizzc]

Celtics not trading Rondo
Rajon Rondo | Celtics
The Boston Herald reports that general manager Danny Ainge didn't sound like someone who was going to trade Rajon Rondo or Kendrick Perkins to move up innext week's draft.

"I think it's unlikely," Ainge said of trading up. "It's possible, but unlikely."

A team source told the newspaper that "Rondo's not going to be traded."

 

[swizzc]

^Both from ESPN Insider

 

[bigmike23]

The truth about analytical methods is that once in a while you'll get a result that flies in the face of the conventional wisdom. When that happens, itmeans one of two things: (1) that the analytics saw something that everybody else couldn't see, or (2) that everybody else saw something the analyticscouldn't see.

And in the case of two particular players in this year's NBA draft, it will be very interesting to find out the answer.

The draft is Thursday, June 25, and now that we know who's in and who's out, it's time to unveil this year's Draft Rater -- a statisticalprojection of the top NBA prospects coming out of the college ranks.

To review for the uninitiated, the Draft Rater looks at a player's college production in a variety of metrics and a few other salient facts (such as hisheight, birth date and years of college experience), and from that projects what a player's Player Efficiency Rating will be when he reaches his peak.

The basic idea is to use the NBA's past to predict its future. The Draft Rater looks back at prospects from past drafts and then, using regressionanalysis, identifies which attributes were determinants of pro success and which weren't. My database ofcollege players goes back to 2002, which is still a bit limited, but with each year the rater is getting smarter because it has more information towork with -- not only an extra year of drafts, but an extra year of pro seasons from each of the prospects.

This year, several subtle changes helped reduce the error rate when back-tested on previous drafts. First, I ran a separate regression for each of the threeposition categories -- point guards, wings and bigs -- something that wasn't really feasible when I started doing this. But now that the pool of prospectsis large enough, this method has produced greater accuracy.

Second, instead of tying the projection to a player's third-year PER, I used a more general descriptor of what his peak value was -- allowing me tominimize the impact of fluke seasons and better adjust for some players who entered the league young and didn't max out until their fourth or fifth season.(Some of these players will perform much better than projected, but keep in mind that it's all relative. For more on why the projections seem low, see thisexplanation.)

Using those changes, I was able to reduce the standard error in the projections from last year's 4.0 to this year's 2.8. This means nothing to 98percent of you, but the number geeks in the crowd will recognize that this is still quite large -- as you might expect when you're trying to project what a19-year-old will do when he's 25. Nonetheless, it does represent a significant improvement from a year ago.

The one area where the method still appears to struggle is with one-and-done freshmen, and this speaks to a more general problem: Information is the key tomaking this thing work, and the more information we have, the better. For players who leave after their first year, the picture is often incomplete, whetherwe're using a statistical model or traditional scouting.

I bring this up because last year, in particular, was a rough one for the projection system. First, it was an unusual rookie class in general because nearlyevery player taken in the first round was at least somewhat productive; generally, a draft will have 10 to 12 impactful players and the rest will be filler,but this past season blew that standard away.

Moreover, a number of those players played only one college season, and while the rater had an accurate view of a few (such as Kevin Love and Michael Beasley), it missed the boat on some who performedextremely well (including Derrick Rose to an extent, andO.J Mayo, Anthony Randolph and Eric Gordon). Gordon is perhaps easier to understand because hewas playing hurt at Indiana and his primary skill (shooting) didn't show through statistically, but that doesn't excuse the others.

One important thing to point out is that the Draft Rater is rating "pro potential," which is sometimes different from "pro performance,"depending on the professionalism and work ethic of the player involved. In other words, the fact that Michael Sweetney and Shawne Williams rated very highly in previous seasons isn'tnecessarily a damnation of the system. Rather, their off-court habits are the type of thing every general manager has to take into account when evaluatingplayers, and something that is usually invisible when looking at their college performance.

That said, before last season the Draft Rater had performed extremely well.

From 2002 to 2007, there were 15 players who were (a) among the first 10 collegians drafted and (b) excluded from the top 12 by the Draft Rater. In otherwords, these were the college players the Draft Rater thought were drafted too high. Of those 15, not one has played in an All-Star Game. The only two who havestarted a significant number of games over the long term have been Kirk Hinrich (who was 13th in the Draft Rater in 2003) and Charlie Villanueva.

Who were the other 13 top-10 picks not favored by the Draft Rater? Spencer Hawes, Acie Law, Fred Jones, http://insider.espn.go.com/nbadraft/draft/tracker/player?draftyear=2009&playerId=3710Melvin Ely, Marcus Haislip, Fred Jones, Jarvis Hayes, Rafael Araujo, Ike Diogu, Channing Frye, Randy Foye, J.J. Redick and Patrick O'Bryant.

In other words, when the Draft Rater has suggested avoiding a player, that's turned out to be good advice.

And the Draft Rater has also spotted some of the biggest steals in recent years:

• Carlos Boozer was the 26th collegian taken in 2002;Draft Rater had him second.

• Josh Howard was 17th in 2003; Draft Rater had himfifth.

• Danny Granger was the 13th collegian in 2005; DraftRater had him third.

• Rajon Rondo was the 16th collegian taken in 2006,but Draft Rater had him second.

• Rodney Stuckey was the 14th collegian chosen in2007; Draft Rater had him fifth.

• And last year, two players the Draft Rater had rated much higher than others did, Mario Chalmers and George Hill, had productive rookie seasons.

So, most of the time, when the Draft Rater puts a player in the top five, there's a good reason.

All of which leads us to 2009, and whom the Draft Rater likes and doesn't like.

This year, the Draft Rater is closer to the general draft consensus than usual, with two glaring exceptions that I referenced above.

Let's get to them:
[h3]The pleasant surprise: TyLawson[/h3]
There are two players who are neck-and-neck for the top spot in this year's Draft Rater. You could easily guess that one of them is Blake Griffin, but most folksnever would have guessed that the other is Lawson.

Lawson, who is coming off an electric performance leading North Carolina to the championship, grades out highly for several reasons: Though he's shortfor a point guard, his shooting numbers (47.1 percent on 3-pointers), strong assist rate and microscopic turnover ratio (9.1, first among point guardprospects) all point to him as an NBA keeper.

The Draft Rater puts Lawson slightly ahead of Griffin for first, but this doesn't mean a team should take Lawson first -- the standard error in theprojections for point guards is higher than it is for big men, which means random noise could be putting Lawson ahead just as easily as court performance. Ifthe consensus is that Griffin is the better player, I don't think Lawson's statistical record alone is strong enough evidence to refute it.Additionally, we've heard questions about Lawson's work ethic and injuries.

But the rating is emphatic enough for me to say Lawson should be at the top of the college point guard ladder, ahead of Jonny Flynn, Jrue Holiday, Jeff Teague and Co. (Ifyou're wondering about RickyRubio, I'll have more on him next week.)
[h3]The unpleasant surprise: DeMarDeRozan[/h3]
I'd be hard-pressed to name a potential high lottery pick through the years that the Draft Rater has been less excited about. I rated 90 prospects forthis draft, and DeRozan ranked 54th among them. Two of his teammates -- Daniel Hackett and Taj Gibson -- outranked him, asdid assorted other non-entities like Kevin Rogers, Chinemelu Elonu and Ben Woodside. I'll wait herewhile you Google them.

Why? Because there really isn't anything in DeRozan's statistical profile that makes you think "NBA star." He rarely took or made3-pointers and he had a strongly negative pure point rating, which are two powerful indicators for a wing player, and his numbers in other areas wereunimpressive, too. In particular, he was a bad free-throw shooter, which indicates that his outside shot might not ever be a strong suit.

Some scouts I have talked to have compared DeRozan to RudyGay in terms of being an NBA athlete but having a questionable motor, but that comparison falls flat, according to the Draft Rater: Gay was thetop-rated player in his draft class, while DeRozan is nowhere close. And while he's supposed to be a great athlete, he didn't show it on the courtoften enough: His rebound, block and steal totals were all very ordinary.

As I mentioned above, one-and-done players sometimes fool the system -- they're the youngest, least experienced guys in the pool, and, thus, a majorfactor is how much they improve post-draft rather than just how good they are pre-draft.

Nonetheless, I'd back away from DeRozan if the 12 relatively safe guys at the top of the Draft Rater are still on the board.

Speaking of which, let's take a look at the collegians for 2009.
[h3]Rankings: The Top 12[/h3]

[h4]Top 12-Rated Collegians For 2009[/h4] [table][tr][th=""]Player[/th] [th=""]School[/th] [th=""]Draft Rater[/th] [/tr][tr][td]1. Ty Lawson[/td] [td]North Carolina[/td] [td]16.34[/td] [/tr][tr][td]2. Blake Griffin[/td] [td]Oklahoma[/td] [td]16.21[/td] [/tr][tr][td]3. Tyreke Evans[/td] [td]Memphis[/td] [td]15.02[/td] [/tr][tr][td]4. Austin Daye[/td] [td]Gonzaga[/td] [td]14.24[/td] [/tr][tr][td]5. Stephen Curry[/td] [td]Davidson[/td] [td]14.18[/td] [/tr][tr][td]6. Nick Calathes[/td] [td]Florida[/td] [td]13.66[/td] [/tr][tr][td]7. DeJuan Blair[/td] [td]Pittsburgh[/td] [td]13.56[/td] [/tr][tr][td]8. Danny Green[/td] [td]North Carolina[/td] [td]13.28[/td] [/tr][tr][td]9. Jonny Flynn[/td] [td]Syracuse[/td] [td]12.99[/td] [/tr][tr][td]10. James Harden[/td] [td]Arizona St.[/td] [td]12.97[/td] [/tr][tr][td]11. Hasheem Thabeet[/td] [td]Connecticut[/td] [td]12.90[/td] [/tr][tr][td]12. Earl Clark[/td] [td]Louisville[/td] [td]12.88[/td] [/tr][/table]

For starters, let's talk about two of the players who play multiple positions -- this matters now that we're rating players in part based onposition.

Stephen Curry graded out at 14.18 as a wing, but only 12.86 a point guard. Either way it puts him in the top dozen players, but by this rating he's amuch better prospect if he's able to defend against wings.

The difference for Earl Clark was less dramatic, but he rated slightly better as a wing than as a big man (12.14), which would have dropped him from 12th to15th.

A couple other names on here are likely to raise eyebrows:

Austin Daye may not have had a great season, but the Draft Rater looks favorably upon a 6-11 small forward who can shoot (assuming he can play the 3 in theNBA). His numbers were strongest in the categories that project best to the pros, including 42.9 percent on 3s and 2.1 blocks per game, which is why he movesall the way up to No. 4 on this list.

Nick Calathes is under contract in Greece but still will be draft-eligible, and he rates higher than the hot point guards most teams are discussing in thetop 15. Though knocked for his athleticism, he had high rates of rebounds and steals and a strong 2-point shooting percentage. Teams in luxury tax troubleshould look particularly hard at him since he can be stashed in Europe for a year or so.

Danny Green is the other surprise on this list. He's rated highly every year I've done this, so seeing him doesn't shock me anymore, buthe's received little attention nationally. Still, he's a great shooter who can defend and he rates as the third-best wing after Daye and TyrekeEvans.
[h3]Rankings: 13 To 25[/h3]

[h4]Collegians: No. 13 through 25[/h4] [table][tr][th=""]Player[/th] [th=""]School[/th] [th=""]Draft Rater[/th] [/tr][tr][td]13. Jrue Holiday[/td] [td]UCLA[/td] [td]12.73[/td] [/tr][tr][td]14. Jeff Teague[/td] [td]Wake Forest[/td] [td]12.50[/td] [/tr][tr][td]15. Gerald Henderson[/td] [td]Duke[/td] [td]12.17[/td] [/tr][tr][td]16. Paul Delaney[/td] [td]UAB[/td] [td]11.85[/td] [/tr][tr][td]17. Aaron Jackson[/td] [td]Duquesne[/td] [td]11.83[/td] [/tr][tr][td]18. Darren Collison[/td] [td]UCLA[/td] [td]11.80[/td] [/tr][tr][td]19. Terrence Williams[/td] [td]Louisville[/td] [td]11.80[/td] [/tr][tr][td]20. Leo Lyons[/td] [td]Missouri[/td] [td]11.53[/td] [/tr][tr][td]21. Eric Maynor[/td] [td]VCU[/td] [td]11.35[/td] [/tr][tr][td]22. John Bryant[/td] [td]Santa Clara[/td] [td]11.30[/td] [/tr][tr][td]23. DeMarre Carroll[/td] [td]Missouri[/td] [td]11.18[/td] [/tr][tr][td]24. Tyler Hansbrough[/td] [td]North Carolina[/td] [td]11.11[/td] [/tr][tr][td]25. Wayne Ellington[/td] [td]North Carolina[/td] [td]11.04[/td] [/tr][/table]

This part of the list is an interesting mishmash of potential sleepers and potential busts. In general, players in this range have some kind of NBA careerbut can always count on getting some quality time with the family during All-Star Weekend.

We're awash in point guards in this draft and the six of the top nine names in this section play the position. The lesson is this: If you're in themarket for a point guard, one will fall to you and they're more or less the same after the first couple.

Down at No. 13, Holiday is a bit of a surprise -- given that he's projected to go higher -- but he has the two characteristics that produce the greatesterror rate in the Draft Rater: he's a point guard and he's played only one year. In other words, his real value might be much higher or much lower, andsince the consensus is much higher, it wouldn't bother me to use a top-8 pick on him.

Delaney and Jackson are second-round sleepers at the point, but since projections for point guards are a bit more volatile, perhaps they shouldn'treally be this high. The other "who's he?" on the list, Bryant, is a 6-11, 275-pound center from Santa Clara who could have a fine 10-year careeras a third center in the Greg Kite/http://insider.espn.go.com/nbadraft/draft/tracker/player?draftyear=2009&playerId=18127Aaron Gray mold.
[h3]Rankings: Potential Disappointments[/h3]

[h4]Collegians: Other Notables[/h4] [table][tr][th=""]Player[/th] [th=""]School[/th] [th=""]Draft Rater[/th] [/tr][tr][td]26. Jordan Hill[/td] [td]Arizona[/td] [td]10.97[/td] [/tr][tr][td]28. B.J. Mullens[/td] [td]Ohio State[/td] [td]10.81[/td] [/tr][tr][td]30. James Johnson[/td] [td]Wake Forest[/td] [td]10.63[/td] [/tr][tr][td]31. Chase Budinger[/td] [td]Arizona[/td] [td]10.51[/td] [/tr][tr][td]45. Derrick Brown[/td] [td]Xavier[/td] [td]9.55[/td] [/tr][tr][td]48. DaJuan Summers[/td] [td]Georgetown[/td] [td]9.38[/td] [/tr][tr][td]51. Jodie Meeks[/td] [td]Kentucky[/td] [td]9.35[/td] [/tr][tr][td]52. Sam Young[/td] [td]Pitt[/td] [td]9.34[/td] [/tr][tr][td]54. DeMar DeRozan[/td] [td]USC[/td] [td]9.26[/td] [/tr][tr][td]62. Toney Douglas[/td] [td]Florida St.[/td] [td]8.56[/td] [/tr][tr][td]68. Patrick Mills[/td] [td]St. Mary's[/td] [td]8.36[/td] [/tr][tr][td]83. Jack McClinton[/td] [td]Miami[/td] [td]6.64[/td] [/tr][/table]

And here's where we get the players the Draft Rater is down on.

Several potential first-round picks don't pass muster here, with short, shoot-first combo guards in particular bearing the brunt of the DraftRater's wrath -- Jack McClinton, Patrick Mills and Toney Douglas were the three lowest-rated "name" prospects, and Jodie Meeks didn't fare awhole lot better.

The other big surprise down here is Jordan Hill, who could go as high as No. 4 but rates 26th in the Draft Rater. Hill had solid rebounding and scoringnumbers, but his percentages weren't off the charts and his poor assist and turnover numbers were a red flag. Though one might think that ball-handlingcategories wouldn't matter for a power forward, apparently they do -- pure point rating (a measure of how a player passes and handles the ball) is a prettystrong success indicator for frontcourt players, and only four prospects rated worse than Hill.

One of those players was Mullens, who was the absolute worst at -2.85. Everyone concedes he's a project, so perhaps it's not such a big surprise tosee him down this low. But the Draft Rater is saying that maybe even the middle of the first round is too high to be taking the risk on him.

Pitt's Sam Young also graded out extremely poorly. He had the worst pure point rating of any wing player, and the other thing that hurt him is thathe's one of the oldest prospects in the pool. How old? He's 19 days older than six-year vet Darko Milicic and a full half-decade older than JrueHoliday.

John Hollinger writes for ESPN Insider. To e-mail him, clickhere.

 

[eyes of hazel]

Originally Posted by Al3xis

If Jennings just would shut up and go about things the right way, he'd probably be in the top 10 comfortably.

Basically.

In the matter of a few days, I'm tired of hearing him already.

He'll be using the media to bash his coach/teammates sooner than later. I just see it coming.

 

[jpzx]

Anyone actually put any stock into that draft rater thing?

They pointed out a lot of areas where they rated someone higher and it ended up being right but I'm guessing there's just as many that they got wrongthat they conveniently left out of the article.

 

[bigmike23]

POSTED: June 18 -- 1:28 p.m. ET

Rubio​

• Everyone in Sacramento was a little bummed out about the Ricky Rubio visit. Rubio flew into town on Tuesday, had dinner and interviews with the frontoffice and even chatted with the media. However, he came down with a fever and sore throat Tuesday night and wasn't able to work out for the teamWednesday. He was so ill that he didn't even get a chance to sit down with the Maloof family, which owns the Kings.

He was going to try to make a go of it Thursday morning, but he woke up still not feeling well and ended up flying back to L.A.

At this point, Rubio's schedule is up in the air. He'll try to get well and then decide which teams to visit. Another visit with Sacramento is stillpossible.

One Kings source reiterated that the organization still has doubts about Rubio, and the visit did little to alleviate them. However, there is a split in thecamps in Sacramento, with some pushing for Rubio or, if he's gone, Jrue Holiday. Others are pushing Jonny Flynn and/or Tyreke Evans.

Plus, still more prospects are on their way to Sacramento for workouts. DeMar DeRozan will be in on Saturday. And Stephen Curry and Evans will be in townSunday. This will be the second visit for Evans, whose first visit wasn't terrific, as we reported.

As it stands right now, it sounds as though Flynn is the leader on the Kings' board.



• There obviously has been a lot of talk about what the Suns will do this summer. In the past few weeks, rumors of a Shaquille O'Neal-to-Cleveland dealand an Amare Stoudemire-to-Washington deal have re-emerged. On Wednesday evening, the latest rumor had the Suns dealing Stoudemire to Minnesota for AlJefferson and the No. 6 pick.

The first two deals were discussed at the February trade deadline, but talks this time around may be premature -- Suns sources say neither deal is hot atthe moment. And the one with Minnesota is totally bogus, I'm told. A Suns source says that the team has had zero conversations about it.

Still, rumors are coming out of Phoenix for a reason. The big question continues to be: Where are the Suns headed? Are they still trying to be achampionship contender? Or are they blowing things up, cutting costs and rebuilding from scratch?

Trading Shaq or Stoudemire doesn't make much sense in the former scenario. Lose either guy, and the Suns are less likely to be a serious contender.Although the Suns seem way more inclined to move Shaq and keep Stoudemire, a Suns source conceded that both players could be moved, and it could correspond tomoving up in this year's draft.

If that's the case, here's a theory (and that's all it is, folks, a theory): What if you combined the two most prominent Suns trade rumors intoa mega three-way deal?

It would look like this:

The Suns send Shaquille O'Neal to Cleveland and Amare Stoudemire to Washington.

The Cavs send Ben Wallace and Sasha Pavlovic to Phoenix and Zydrunas Ilgauskas to Washington.

The Wizards send the No. 5 pick, Etan Thomas, Mike James and JaVale McGee to Phoenix and Antawn Jamison to Cleveland.

Call me crazy ... but isn't this the ideal deal for all three teams?

The Suns would lose a lot of talent in the deal and basically would be blowing up the team. However, if they think they'll lose Stoudemire next summeranyway and don't believe they have a real shot of winning a title next season, why not get something for Stoudemire now and jump-start the rebuildingprocess?

In this deal, they would pick up the No. 5 pick and McGee, a talented 7-footer who would be a good fit in Phoenix. More importantly for them, they wouldsave a ton of cash next season. Pavlovic's salary is only partially guaranteed. Wallace likely can be bought out for less than he's owed. And the Sunsare taking back less money in the deal to begin with. When you factor in the reduction in luxury taxes and consider that they may save enough to perhaps ekebelow the dreaded luxury-tax line ... could owner Robert Sarver really pass on saving potentially $12-14 million in salary and penalties next season?

The Wizards essentially would replace Antawn Jamison, a couple of role players (Thomas and James) and two prospects (McGee and the No. 5 pick) withStoudemire and Ilgauskas. Yes, Jamison is very important to the Wizards, but he'd be replaced by Stoudemire. And Ilgauskas would give them a legit big manin the middle. Suddenly, they would look like contenders for the Eastern Conference crown. And if things don't work out, they would have cap room in 2010when Ilgauskas, Stoudemire and Brendan Haywood all come off the books.

And the Cavs? They'd get Shaq, whom they apparently like. And Antawn Jamison, who would give them an athletic scoring 4 who can do what the Cavs bigscouldn't in the playoffs -- guard someone on the wing.

I'm not saying this will happen. Again, I'm just putting together two deals that have been buzzing for a while. But the deals would give all threeteams clearer direction.

---

POSTED: June 17 -- 8:32 p.m. ET

Lawson​

Chad Ford: One of the challenges that teams in the late lottery to mid first round are facing is trying to get a good handle on who will bethere starting from pick No. 11.

I think we have a good idea of who, roughly, the top 10 picks will be (or as I laid it out in my article today, thetop 3 tiers). In some order they go:

Blake Griffin(obviously No. 1)
Ricky Rubio (2 to 6)
Hasheem Thabeet (2 to 6)
James Harden (2 to 5)
Jordan Hill (5 to 10)
Stephen Curry (3 to

Tyreke Evans (4 to 9)
Jrue Holiday (4 to 10)
Jonny Flynn (4 to 10)
DeMar DeRozan (3 to9)

But, even that list isn't set in stone. After publishing the Tiers story this morning, I got some interesting feedback from several NBA scouts andexecutives. A couple of players out of Tier 4 threaten to crash the top-10 party. Who are they?

North Carolina's TyLawson has taken some abuse during the draft workout process, but it sounds as though teams are starting to come around. Lawson was, withoutquestion, the most productive point guard in the draft. Teams are skeptical because of his size and his style of play. But he's been great in severalrecent workouts according to sources and apparently is in the mix with the Knicks at No. 8 if guys like Curry and Hill are off the board. Lawson also is stillon the board at No. 10 to Milwaukee and the Pacers at No. 13 and the Sixers at No. 17 are also giving him a serious look. If Lawson ends up crashing the top10, that would probably push either Holiday or Flynn out.

Louisville's TerrenceWilliams is another player who is a potential lottery crasher. The Warriors have been high on Williams all year and will seriously consider him atNo. 7. And Williams also seems to have seriously moved into the mix with the Nets at No. 11 and the Bobcats at No. 12. In fact, sources say that Williams hasbeen invited back to Charlotte for a second time. One league source says that he's leapfrogged Duke's Gerald Henderson on LarryBrown's board.

The final guy to watch is Henderson, who is getting a serious look in New York, Toronto and Charlotte. In each case I think there are players ahead of himon each team's draft boards, but under certain scenarios I think he could go 8 to 12. However, if DeMar DeRozan is on the board at No. 9, I think he'sgoing ahead of Henderson in Toronto. And, if the source on Williams is to be believed, it's possible that Henderson could slide out of the lottery

 

[al3xis]

Mo
Delonte
LeBron
Antwan
Shaq

= NBA Title

 

[osh kosh bosh]

Originally Posted by Bigmike23


The truth about analytical methods is that once in a while you'll get a result that flies in the face of the conventional wisdom. When that happens, it means one of two things: (1) that the analytics saw something that everybody else couldn't see, or (2) that everybody else saw something the analytics couldn't see.

John Hollinger writes for ESPN Insider. To e-mail him, click here.

Interesting stuff, I've heard the Spurs imploy a system similar to this for rating international prospects. But like he mentioned in the piece, this typeof stuff is good for establishing tiers, finding the players that have the tools to fit your system holds greater importance.

It's a step in the right direction though.

 

[eyes of hazel]

The theory of the Wiz/Cavs/Suns 3-way deal works $$$ wise.

Nuts!

 

[doublejs07]

Man...it would suck to lose a guy like McGee, but that deal is too good to pass up. Just think about all the cap space the Wizards will have in 2010 with someof those contracts off the books