Friday, June 27, 2008

2008 NBA Draft – Thoughts, Reaction, Analysis

So the draft started and I was still at work, checking the pick by pick on Yahoo. Rose, Beasley, Mayo…ho hum, until pick # 4 – Russell Westbrook. I immediately emailed my entire fantasy hoops league – “Westbrook @ #4? Is the draft this shallow?” Don’t get me wrong, I love his freaky athleticism, intense D, and upside…but #4? Oh well, at least it wasn’t the big overrated stiff Brook Lopez – more on him later.

I’m still at work when Memphis goes Love @ #5 – better surround him w/ athletes, but what a passer, what a smart, heady player. The Knicks go next with this year’s favorite Eurotrash star – Danilo Gallinari. So this time it’s different, huh? This guy will pan out…look at all those skills in a big man. I think I heard this about Tskitishvili, then Milicic, then Bargnani…let’s see what he does in the ‘no pressure, no distractions’ town of New York.

My Clips pick next & I’m praying they make the right choice – Jerryd Bayless – or the bold choice – Anthony Randolph. They choose neither and go with Eric Gordon, Boooooo…Milwaukee goes Joe Alexander next, a SF, after having just traded for Richard Jefferson, another SF…hmmmmm. Also, I think they made a mistake giving up on Yi so quickly to acquire Jefferson. That franchise seems to be spinning its wheels. Charlotte takes the smurf PG DJ Augustin next. Clearly the best pure PG in the draft, but even in his high-tops he’s not 6 feet. I suddenly realize we’ve gone 9 picks and Brook Lopez is still on the board – maybe these GMs are getting smarter.

Now it’s NJ’s pick with Kiki Vandeweghe at the helm. Lopez, crying in the ‘Green Room’, is the pick. The crying is utterly pathetic, and reminiscent of Cedric Benson on draft day 3 years ago. How’d that work out for the Bears? Maybe not everyone is as down on this very pedestrian, unathletic big man like myself, but New Jersey doesn’t need a big. Josh Boone developed quite nicely this year and Sean Williams showed flashes as a rookie. And don’t they need a SG?…like Jerryd Bayless, who’s amazingly still on the board? Bayless goes next to Indy, who then trades him to Portland (jeez are they stockpiling talent!!).

Finally I make it home after my buddy texts me the 11 through 17 picks on my phone, as my car radio wasn’t working. I can’t believe Phoenix took Robin Lopez (5 rebs a game last year?!!?!?!) over Marresse Speights, whom I see a bright future for. And I love Golden State collecting another freaky athlete by stealing the aforementioned Randolph @ #14. Nice job Mullin, you’ve come a long way since signing Dunleavy to a $45m deal a few summers ago. My 3 year old is sitting in mom’s car, telling me he’s driving the bus, and asking me where I want to go. I tell him New York to the NBA Draft. He says no, so I go in the house. The next interesting pick is Orlando taking Courtney Lee at #22 – I really like him, and they needed a decent SG.

By now we’ve hit that awkward time when one lonely guy is sitting in the ‘Green Room’, waiting ever so uncomfortably for his name to be called. This year it’s Darrell Arthur of nat’l champs Kansas. Finally at #27 N.O. takes him to be traded to Portland. The painful wait is over, but ESPN still needs more painful, awkward moments, so they have their reporter ask the ridiculous question of Arthur’s crying mother, and I’m quoting the reporter, “Those tears are reflective of what?” Are you kidding me? Was this lady a poetry major in college? First of all, we don’t need the emotional touchy-feely crap, we need more analysis of the pick. How does he fit in Portland? What player should the Grizzlies take with the next pick? And secondly, if you’re going to ask a stupid question, do it in a straightforward manner – ‘Why are you crying?’ I guess when it’s put that way, the stupidity of the question is more clearly exposed.

Oops, I almost forgot to mention Kiki’s 2nd pick in the first round – yep, another big man. This time it’s Ryan Anderson from Cal at #21, another complete non-athlete softy who likes to shoot jump shots and averaged a mere .5 blocks a game for his career, despite being 6’10”. So instead of adding Jerryd Bayless (or Anthony Randolph) and Courtney Lee to their roster, the Nets added two centers who will never develop into solid starters in the league…a league dominated by athletes, that more and more plays small ball. Nice job Kiki, you’ve proven that your pick of Nicolas Tskitishvili 6 years ago was no fluke.

Anyway, here are some of the other picks I really liked:

16. 76ers – Mareese Speights…I’m flabbergasted that both Lopez twins went above this guy, who’s quite athletic & looks like a solid starting PF in a couple years.

24. Sonics – Serge Ibaka…18 year old PF from Senegal, playing Europe, great athlete, could be a gem when they bring him over in a few years.

25. Rockets – Nicolas Batum, SF…nice athlete who dropped due to heart concerns…raw, but very athletic.

34. Heat – Mario Chalmers…wasn’t this PG on the nat’l champs supposed to go around #20? Great value and fills a need.

40. Nets – Chris Douglas Roberts…Kiki stumbled into one good pick out of three.

47. Wizards – Bill Walker…very athletic SF from Kansas St. dropped due to knee concerns and attitude, but at # 47, great risk/reward pick, will likely make the team and possibly contribute soon.

One last thing – can someone please get Jay Bilas a sense of humor?

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

2008 NBA Draft

A Preview, Plus a Look Back at the Last 20 Drafts

The NBA Draft is coming up & it gives us an opportunity to evaluate past drafts and see how radically it differs from the far more popular NFL Draft. Additionally, we’ll preview the 2008 Draft to see who might go where, who’ll have the greatest long-term impact, and who might become the next Trajan Langdon/ Rafael Arajuo-type busts.

One word can explain the main difference between the NFL Draft and the NBA Draft – seasoning. NFL Draft prospects have all played college football for at least 3 years, giving them time to develop their bodies, develop their skills, and show how they handle themselves in numerous game situations. They are pretty well seasoned. For NBA Draft prospects, they often have just one year of college basketball experience, maybe just at JC, or may even be a player from Europe, playing a different type of basketball – less physical and athletically oriented. This makes the NBA Draft quite a crapshoot, as we’ll find out when we see the large number of Top 12 Busts since 1988.

In looking at the 2008 Draft, reading player bios, and seeing quotes from scouts & draft experts, I realized this was not a deep, impressive draft. Basically, I like 6 of the top 10 guys, a couple others projected for the mid-late 1st round, and one sleeper nugget. Seeing how generally unimpressive the draft was shaping up to be, it got me thinking about past drafts & how many future All-Stars & busts have been picked in the last 20 years. I studied every draft since 1988 and counted future Hall of Famers, All-Stars, and Top 12 Busts in each.

Many of the Hall of Fame numbers are educated guesses that I feel 100% positive about (Kobe, KG, Iverson, etc…), while others I was only about 90-95% sure of (Chris Webber, Zo, Paul Pierce types). Finally, it became outright projection for any draft post 2001 (Gasol? Yao? Stoudamire? Wade?). For 2006 and 2007, I didn’t even project HOFers, only All-Stars and, for 2006, Top 12 Busts. For HOFers, I counted 26 total for every draft from 1988 through 2005. This number might be construed as generous, because if a draft had 3 guys who were borderline but not quite there, I generally would count that as two (i.e., 1998 – Paul Pierce yes, Dirk…maybe, Vince…maybe, Jamison…maybe. I gave that draft 3.) Dividing 26 by 18 (the number of drafts), we get 1.44 HOFers per draft. Four drafts had none – 1988, 1989, 1991, 2000 – while only three had at least 3 – 1996, 1998, 2003. The 3 from ‘96 are automatic – Kobe, Iverson, and Nash, while the 3 from ’03 are projected to be Lebron, Wade, and Bosh. Bottom line, you can see how rare it is to draft a HOFer…2 in one draft is way above average.

Next, we have the All-Stars. The All Stars are players in each draft who had at least one All-Star caliber season, whether they made the All-Star game or not. This total came to 98 players over the 20 drafts from 1988 through 2007. The projections for 2006 were 4 – Roy (who’s already been one), Gay, Aldridge, and Rondo. For 2007, it was also 4 – Oden, Durant, Horford, and Al Thornton. Obviously, in just a couple years time the numbers from these most recent drafts might change quite dramatically. So in dividing 98 by 20, we get 4.9 players per draft capable of at least one season of putting up All Star caliber numbers. Four drafts stood out as especially deep – 1996 with 10, ’98 with 8, ’99 with 8.5 (lots of players like Andre Miller, Lamar Odom, & Jason Terry who were so close I gave them a collective .5) and 2001 with 8 again.

So as we see, each draft produces very few superstars, and as we’ll see next, produces an amazing number of Top 12 Busts – players taken in the first 12 picks who don’t pan out at all. Now if a player is drafted 11th and has 4 or 5 years of 15-20 minutes per game of semi-productive minutes, he won’t make this list. But if that same player with those same stats is a top 3
pick, then yes, he’s a Top 12 Bust. Since one year in the league is far too short a time period to determine Bust status, I only looked at 1988 through 2006. For the 2006 draft, I came up with the rather large number 5. There are actually 7 guys who look like they might end up being total busts – Andrea Bargnani, Adam Morrison, Ty Thomas, Shelden Williams, Patrick O’Bryant, Saer Sene, and JJ Redick. Of these 7, I’m assuming 5 do become Top 12 Busts. Once again, we’ll have to wait and see how it turns out.

The total number of Top 12 Busts in the 19 drafts (1988 – 2006) was 68.5. Divide this by 19 and we get 3.6 busts per draft, and this only counts the top 12 picks!! An amazing 30% of the top 12 picks ended up as total busts!! This number includes players like Chris Morris (4th in ’88), Stacy King (6th in ’89), Bo Kimble (8th in ’90), Adam Keefe (10th in ’92), Eric Montross (9th in ’94), and more recent tragedies like the aforementioned Langdon (11th in ’99), Kwame Brown (1st in ’01), Tskitishvili (5th in ’02), and Yaroslav Korolev (12th in ’05). I find it astounding that so many blunders are made at the top of the draft year after year, especially because many of the picks looked so tragic even at the time – Kimble, Langdon, Arajuo, and Luke Jackson in 2004 come to mind immediately.

So how do I see the 2008 Draft turning out? I see one potential Hall of Famer – Derrick Rose – due to his combination of athleticism, skills, and head. I see 4 or 5 other guys who could have multiple All Star seasons – Michael Beasley, OJ Mayo, Jerryd Bayless, Russell Westbrook, and Anthony Randolph. And I see a few potential Top 12 Busts – Brook Lopez, Danilo Gallinari, and Joe Alexander.

I like Brandon Rush to be a nice starting SG for a few years, but nothing amazing – a very poor man’s Rip Hamilton or Eddie Jones in his prime. I think Nicolas Batum (20 year old from France), who’s projected anywhere between 16 and 25, could be a pleasant surprise and very good player. The same can be said for Courtney Lee, who looks like this year’s version of Rodney Stuckey from last year’s draft. He’s a 6’5” SG who played at a small college (Western Kentucky) and has lots of game. Finally, I really like Lester Hudson out of Tennessee Martin. He’s a smurf combo guard who needs to improve his ball-handling, but he’s a natural shooter and scorer who had a quadruple-double in a game this season. He’s projected to be a 2nd rounder, but I think many teams picking in the latter half of round 1 will regret bypassing him.

The rest of these guys seem to have a lot of warts, strengths offset by glaring weaknesses; but of course, a few of them will probably overcome those weaknesses and become solid players for many years in the league. Who will those players be? Check with me in 5 years…I’m certainly not sure, and neither are most of the well paid GM’s, scouts, and coaches who have been studying these players for the last 12 months.

Monday, June 16, 2008

Tiger vs. KG

Let’s face it, some sports weekends are a lot bigger than others, and Father’s Day weekend 2008 was a Big sports weekend. It featured the U.S. Open with Tiger in contention (a whole different story than with Tiger out of the picture), as well as a potential series clinching Game 5 of the NBA Finals in Los Angeles. Both these events featured superstar, Hall of Fame athletes playing in their sports most crucial moments – Tiger at a Slam and Kevin Garnett going for that elusive championship ring in his 13th season. Looking at how these two athletes performed offers a striking contrast.

First Tiger. We already knew he was one of the all-time clutch performers with nerves of steel and super-human powers of concentration. But Sunday on the 18th, he took it to a new level. First of all, he again sprayed his drive, a recurring theme throughout the tournament for him, due likely to his long layoff after knee surgery, as well as possible pain within that knee during his swing. After hitting his 2nd shot into the rough, he knew he had to get up and down from there to force a playoff. A stellar shot left him with a 12 foot putt, which he then drained, giving us 18 more holes of potential magnificence to watch on Monday. Once again, Tiger came through in the clutch.

Now for KG. Sadly, comparing KG in the clutch to Tiger is like doing a Car & Driver road test on a Yugo vs. Porche – there’s no comparison. Kevin Garnett has been absolutely awful in the crucial moments of the Finals, including multiple times Sunday night. For the series, he is averaging just 16.6 points on pathetic 40.2% shooting with just 1 block shot per game, only 3.6 free throw attempts per game, and 3.2 turnovers. In the 4th quarter Sunday, he had a terrible turnover on one possession, then with a chance to tie the game at 95 all, he missed BOTH free throws. Finally, after that, he missed an easy offensive rebound tip in attempt. It was half sad, half comical how clearly tight he was in this game. And in the crucial game 7 against Cleveland earlier in the playoffs he went 5-13 for just 13 points while teammate Paul Pierce carried the Celtics to the win. Celtics fans have to be a little nervous, knowing that they really don’t have a big 3 in this series; it’s the Big 1 (Pierce), alongside the inconsistent Ray Allen and the always-ready-to-choke KG.