A new system to evaluate the pro potential of college players
BDodgers at aol.com
BDodgers at aol.com
Tue Jun 26 15:48:27 CDT 2007
A new system to evaluate the pro potential of college players
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By John Hollinger
ESPN Insider
As an NBA analyst, few things have confounded me more than trying to evaluate
college players for the NBA draft.
I have a pretty good system to deal with Europeans, at least the ones who get
major exposure in the Euroleague (more on that later this week). And at the
other end of the spectrum, the high schoolers and random foreign teenage
7-footers have played so few competitive games that there's nothing much to
evaluate.
But in the middle lie college hoops -- close enough to the NBA game to be
ripe for evaluation, yet just different enough to have remained elusive.
Until now, that is. Today is the unveiling of a system I've developed for
evaluating college players' pro potential, one that works very well when
back-tested against previous drafts.
This is version 1.0 of a system that is likely to undergo several iterations
in future years, and it's by no means perfect -- there simply is no way to
look at a group of 20-year-olds and tell with 100 percent accuracy which ones
will be the best at age 25.
But I feel comfortable releasing it now because the results are a big
improvement on the actual drafts, and that's the important thing. While I can't make
a system that's omniscient, at least this one doesn't result in consecutive
lottery picks being spent on Jared Jeffries, Melvin Ely and Marcus Haislip,
which is what actually happened in 2002.
And on that point, this system clearly holds up. Take that 2002 draft, for
example. The best collegian from that draft is Utah Jazz forward Carlos Boozer,
who was taken with the 35th overall pick by Cleveland -- after Dajuan Wagner,
Jeffries, Ely, Haislip, Ryan Humphrey, Kareem Rush, Casey Jacobsen, Frank
Williams, John Salmons, Chris Jefferies, Dan Dickau, Roger Mason, Robert Archibald
and Vincent Yarbrough were off the board.
My formula has Boozer 34 spots higher -- at the top of the draft. In fact,
he's one of the five best college prospects to come out in the last half decade,
according to the system.
If you look below at the other charts, you'll notice the top-rated college
prospect in each draft (Boozer in '02, Carmelo Anthony in '03, Luol Deng in '04,
Chris Paul in '05, and Tyrus Thomas in '06) ended up among the few elite
players in that year's college class.
THE KEY FACTORS
So how does it work?
The difficulties of working with college basketball stats are myriad, but it
starts with getting an apples-to-apples comparison between players. The raw
stats are almost worthless on this front, because differences in both pace and
schedule strength can vary much more widely than they do in the NBA.
So obviously, I needed to adjust for this before I could go any further. The
pace adjustment was done using pace factor, as you might expect; for strength
of schedule, I used Jeff Sagarin's schedule strength ratings, which are
archived at USAToday.com for previous seasons.
>From that point, there's still one big problem -- pro success doesn't always
depend on how good you were in college. Obviously it helps, and I use PER
(Player Efficiency Rating) as one of the factors in my rating formula, but it
doesn't come close to telling the whole story.
The other six factors that are indicative of pro success are:
1. Age. Everything about the draft has to be seen through the prism of age.
This is hugely important, yet teams underestimate it almost every year.
That's why "veteran" rookies like Ely, Dickau, Rafael Araujo and Francisco
Garcia have underwhelmed at the NBA level, while the freshman stats of a player
like Chris Bosh take on new meaning when you understand his youth.
This year's draft is especially alluring on the youth front, since the NBA's
new age restrictions resulted in several coveted players going the
one-and-done route -- most notably Kevin Durant and Greg Oden.
On the other hand, Florida State's Al Thornton is walking around with a giant
neon warning sign, as he will turn 24 a little over a month into his rookie
season. He's more than a year older than LeBron James, and nearly two years
older than Darko Milicic.
Teams need to view guys like this the same way they look at a grade-school
kid who's been left back twice and dominates the lunchtime kickball game, but
for some reason a lot of clubs don't.
2. Steals. Though perhaps the most worthless stat for NBA analysis, there's
no denying that college players who get a ton of steals tend to fare much
better in the NBA than their less sticky-fingered brethren. This is the one item
that gets the most weight, actually -- it's even more important than PER!
For this year's draft, that's a big positive for Mike Conley, Jr., who picked
off more than two balls a game, and a big negative for players like Arron
Afflalo (22 all season), Nick Young (27) and Ramon Sessions (29).
3. Blocks. This is the big man counterpart to steals, basically, although
it's not quite as important.
What's more, players who generate numbers in both categories are hugely
successful as a group. Of the 13 NCAA players in the past five years to have a
"50-50" season in blocks and steals, nine are in the NBA, five were lottery picks,
and one was the MVP of the 2006 NBA Finals -- Dwyane Wade.
In this year's draft, there is one player who was a "50-50" in college. His
name? Kevin Durant.
4. Rebounds. Boards, especially offensive boards, are a good indicator of
future pro success as well.
Note that it isn't necessarily the absolute rebounds as much as the rebounds
given a player's height. Wade, for instance, has the best rebound rate in the
past five years of any player 6-4 or shorter -- a whopping 13.0 his sophomore
year. Rajon Rondo was the best under 6-2 (11.5), and Nate Robinson was the
best under six foot (8.6 his sophomore year).
The correlation isn't quite as strong with big men, oddly enough, because you
get one-dimensional types muscling in on the action (a lot of marginal
players like Reggie Evans). But big men who can rebound and show some skill in other
areas tend to fare very well in the pros.
The most notable rebound rate in this year's draft belongs to an Ohio State
player -- just not the one you think. Daequan Cook, a 6-5 freshman, put up a
whopping 12.1 mark, which is pretty incredible for a player that size.
5. 3-pointers. Those previous three items are markers for athleticism, while
these next two are markers of skill.
Despite the longer line, college 3-point shooting translates very well to the
NBA level, albeit sometimes with a year or two of adjustment needed. The key
here is to look for players who both make a ton of 3s and shoot a high
percentage.
>From recent drafts, the standout performers here are Kyle Korver and Salim
Stoudamire. Korver nailed 129 at a 48-percent clip his final year at Creighton,
while Stoudamire -- though undraftable according to pretty much every other
metric -- hit a scalding 50 percent while making 120 his last year at Arizona.
Nobody stands out quite to that extent in this year's draft.
6. Pure point ratio. I thought this might just separate the wheat from the
chaff among point guards, but it actually helps at every position.
Obviously, guards such as Deron Williams, Marcus Williams, T.J. Ford and
Steve Blake differentiate themselves by having college pure point ratings well
over 2.0, but wingmen like Andre Iguodala and Luke Walton also helped themselves
with extremely strong ratings in this category.
On the other hand, Alexander Johnson and Rafael Araujo both put up -3.4 marks
-- perhaps that should have been a warning sign.
In this year's draft, Conley's 2.45 mark stands out with an exclamation point
-- it's the fourth-best of any college player in the past six years with at
least 500 minutes played, and easily No. 1 among this year's players.
At the other end, Nick Young (-1.8) and Morris Almond (-2.9) have
disastrously bad ratings for backcourt players.
THE RED FLAGS
I use the six factors above to produce a "rating" of a player's pro
potential, but that's not the end of the story. It turns out just using the rating only
gets you about halfway there, and still leads to a lot of mistakes.
The rest of it is taken care of by what I call the four "red flags":
Short guys. We're all familiar with the great hordes of 5-11 guards who have
put up spectacular college hoops numbers only to implode upon reaching the
pros. I had to put in a system of deductions to account for this.
At the guard spot, a player got a minor deduction for being "somewhat short"
if he was a 6-3 or 6-4 shooting guard, or a 6-1 or 6-2 point guard. He got a
much larger deduction for being "very short" if he was a 6-2 or smaller
shooting guard, or a 6-0 or smaller point guard. This seemed to even out a lot of the
small-guard issues, as the best small players were able to overcome their
size, but the others weren't.
Up front, I had to put in a fairly severe deduction for short power forwards.
Simply put, if you're shorter than 6-9 and plan to play inside in the pros,
you'd better have some fairly overwhelming college stats to back you up. Those
who do sometimes succeed -- such as Paul Millsap or the pre-Orca-phase Michael
Sweetney. Those who don't pretty much always fail.
7-footers. Hey, I don't make the rules, I just play by 'em. Seven-footers in
the drafts I studied tended to greatly underperform their college stats in the
pros.
Perhaps there's an easy explanation for this: If they were that big and
hadn't already bolted for the NBA, that was perhaps the first sign something was
wrong. Additionally, they sure as heck weren't facing off against many players
their own size.
This affects Greg Oden, Spencer Hawes and Aaron Gray in this year's draft.
Perimeter players who don't make 3s. Making fewer than 25 3-pointers in the
year before being drafted is a pretty strong negative indicator for outside
players.
Some are good enough in other areas to overcome it -- most notably Wade. Many
others fail because of it, however, as the athleticism they relied on to
dominate in college isn't nearly as singular at the pro level.
Really bad rebounders. This is a huge red flag -- if a player has an
extremely poor rebound rate for his size, it's a strong indication that his
athleticism is taxed to the limit even at the college level and he's going to be
completely overwhelmed in the pros.
This has several subsets by position, and as you can see it's kind of a
gallery of busts:
Guards with a rate below 5.0: Stoudamire and Jannero Pargo overcame this
enough to become quasi-useful; perhaps J.J. Redick will too. Others include
Dickau, Daniel Ewing, Reece Gaines, Dajuan Wagner and Roger Mason. This year's
draftees who get red-flagged on this metric are JamesOn Curry, Taurean Green and
Gabe Pruitt.
Players in the 6-5 to 6-7 range with rates below 7.5: The most notable past
failure here is Casey Jacobsen; two players from this year's draft -- Afflalo
and Javaris Crittenton -- raise a red flag here.
Players in the 6-8 to 6-9 range with rates below 8.0: Your past winners here
include Adam Morrison and Jarvis Hayes. Nobody this year qualifies.
Any inside player with a rate below 12: This is a big one -- Matt Freije,
Matt Bonner, Marcus Haislip and Rick Rickert all get tagged from past drafts on
this metric. In this year's drafts, there are two big kahunas with decidedly
poor rebound rates -- Brandan Wright (11.1) and Spencer Hawes (11.3).
Any center below 13: If Ely's age hadn't been a reason not to draft him, this
should have been. Hawes falls under this category too (I didn't double-ding
him).
THE ONE ANTI-RED FLAG
One positive, surprisingly, was if a player had a previous season that was
better than the one just before the draft.
You might think that this meant a player was "on the downswing," but actually
counting one-third the previous season and two-thirds the current one
improved the quality of the draft ratings significantly. Interestingly enough, the
opposite didn't work -- counting a previous season where a player was worse
didn't help at all.
What this tells us, apparently, is that with players this young we should
take most one-year improvements at face value.
SUMMING IT UP
After all that, we finally end up with a numerical rating for each player.
While assigning each player a single number can't possibly address all the
complexities involved in a draft (present versus future, team needs versus best
player, etc.), it does allow us to do a few neat things.
For starters, we can compare drafts between years, which allows us to see
almost immediately that this year's draft is, indeed, absolutely freaking loaded.
It has the highest-rated player of the past six years, and seven of the top
23 collegians in that stretch.
Second, we can denote differences between players much more finely than we
can by just using a ranking system. For example, the difference in the 2006
draft between the top-rated player, Tyrus Thomas, and the second-ranked collegian,
Shelden Williams, was greater than that between Williams and the No. 35
player -- which would clue you in to just draft Thomas, regardless of need. On the
other hand, the difference between Andrew Bogut and Channing Frye in the 2005
draft was only three hundredths of a point.
Best of all, the system works. Obviously, you want more than just my word, so
below are charts showing the top 12 collegians in each draft using my
formula, compared to where they actually were picked among collegians and what
players went in their place.
Yes, there are a few stinking dogs thrown in -- Vincent Yarbrough didn't
quite pan out, for instance, and the Paul Davis Era in Los Angeles is off to a
slow start.
That's OK. As I said, this is just the initial version of the system, and for
it to work, we just have to have fewer busts than in the real drafts. And as
you'll see, there are substantial fewer in the lists below.
Let's look at how the past five drafts play out:
COMPARISON TO RECENT DRAFTS
2002 Draft: Top 12 rated players NO. PLAYER SCHOOL SCORE PICKED* ACTUAL
ORDER* 1. Carlos Boozer Duke 711.0 26 Jay Williams 2. Drew Gooden Kansas 678.6
3 Mike Dunleavy Jr.
3. Chris Wilcox Maryland 608.6 5 Drew Gooden 4. Curtis Borchardt Stanford
598.1 12 Dajuan Wagner 5. Mike Dunleavy Jr. Duke 561.0 2 Chris Wilcox 6. Jay
Williams Duke 515.0 1 Caron Butler 7. Jared Jeffries Indiana 503.3 7 Jared
Jeffries 8. Udonis Haslem Florida 498.9 Undrafted Melvin Ely 9. Vincent
Yarbrough Tennessee 498.5 24 Marcus Haislip 10. Caron Butler UConn 495.0 6 Fred
Jones 11. Tayshaun Prince Kentucky 480.1 16 Juan Dixon 12. Casey Jacobsen
Stanford 471.5 15 Curtis Borchardt
* among collegians only
As I mentioned before, Boozer went 35th in the real draft, but he's at the
top of the list in this one. Haslem went completely undrafted but is the No. 8
collegian here, while Prince -- considered something of a reach at the time --
also moves up. Borchardt is a good example of how traditional scouting can
complement this kind of system -- everyone avoided him because of a history of
foot problems, and sure enough he kept having foot problems.
Notables: Fred Jones (428.9, 19th); Juan Dixon (390.6, 25th); Jannero Pargo
(377.6, 30th); John Salmons (360.1); Matt Barnes (352.0); Dan Gadzuric (285.5);
Darius Songaila (249.3); Dan Dickau (215.0)
____________________________________
2003 Draft: Top 12 rated players NO. PLAYER SCHOOL SCORE PICKED* ACTUAL
ORDER* 1. Carmelo Anthony Syracuse 781.3 1 Carmelo Anthony 2. Mike Sweetney
Georgetown 702.8 7 Chris Bosh
3. Chris Bosh Georgia Tech 688.4 2 Dwyane Wade 4. Dwyane Wade Marquette
600.4 3 Chris Kaman 5. Nick Collison Kansas 553.40 9 Kirk Hinrich 6. T.J. Ford
Texas 549.5 6 T.J. Ford 7. Kirk Hinrich Kansas 503.97 5 Michael Sweetney 8.
Josh Howard Georgia Tech 501.4 17 Jarvis Hayes 9. Kyle Korver Creighton
499.73 31 Nick Collison 10. David West Xavier 494.7 14 Marcus Banks 11. Troy Bell
Boston College 481.5 13 Luke Ridnour 12. Jarvis Hayes Georgia 478.9 8 Reece
Gaines
* among collegians only
It's tough to improve on the 2003 draft, but the system didn't screw it up
either. Sweetney is the one brow-raiser -- he was an absolute monster in college
(hard to believe the guy we see now averaged nearly two steals a game at
Georgetown) and had a rookie PER on par with that of Wade and Bosh before he
started losing the battle of the bulge. Korver, West and Howard were later picks
(Korver going in round 2) who moved way up on this list, ahead of busts Troy
Bell and Jarvis Hayes.
Notables: Marquis Daniels (474.3, 13th); Marcus Banks (472.3, 15th); Chris
Kaman (462.7, 16th) Matt Carroll (447.5, 18th); Quinton Ross (443.5, 19th); Luke
Ridnour (442.3, 20th); Matt Bonner (440.4, 21st); Maurice Williams (428.5,
23rd); Luke Walton (420.2, 25th); Keith Bogans (362.8); Steve Blake (361.8);
Dahntay Jones (358.7); Brian Cook (349.9); Jason Kapono (337.2); James Jones
(333.1)
____________________________________
2004 Draft: Top 12 rated players NO. PLAYER SCHOOL SCORE PICKED* ACTUAL
ORDER* 1. Luol Deng Duke 650.7 5 Emeka Okafor 2. Delonte West Saint Joseph's
626.9 12 Ben Gordon 3. Devin Harris Wisconsin 614.6 3 Devin Harris 4. Emeka
Okafor Connecticut 579.4 1 Josh Childress 5. Luke Jackson Oregon 558.5 8 Luol
Deng 6. Josh Childress Stanford 530.0 4 Rafael Araujo 7. Ben Gordon
Connecticut 529.1 2 Andre Iguodala 8. Kris Humphries Minnesota 527.6 9 Luke Jackson
9. Jameer Nelson Saint Joseph's 522.2 11 Kris Humphries 10. Kevin Martin
Western Carolina 517.7 14 Kirk Snyder 11. Andre Iguodala Arizona 509.50 7 Jameer
Nelson 12. Andre Emmett Texas Tech 472.3 18 Delonte West
* among collegians only
Okafor was the top-rated collegian in the eyes of most, but the numbers here
said to go with Deng, who has paid dividends as the fifth-drafted collegian
for Chicago. Kevin Martin and Delonte West move way up, while you can see the
large difference in score between the solid 11th-rated collegian (Andre
Iguodala) and the woofer at No. 12 (Andre Emmett). Generally things start getting
dicey once the scores dip under 500.
Notables: Kirk Snyder (464.5, 14th); Chris Duhon (454.3, 15th); David
Harrison (432.0, 21st) Tony Allen (377.0, 27th); Royal Ivey (341.8)
____________________________________
2005 Draft: Top 12 rated players NO. PLAYER SCHOOL SCORE PICKED* ACTUAL
ORDER* 1. Chris Paul Wake Forest 705.9 4 Andrew Bogut 2. Marvin Williams North
Carolina 697.6 2 Marvin Williams 3. Sean May North Carolina 690.4 9 Deron
Williams 4. Rashad McCants North Carolina 639.4 10 Chris Paul 5. Andrew Bogut
Utah 579.7 1 Raymond Felton 6. Channing Frye Arizona 579.7 7 Charlie
Villanueva 7. Raymond Felton North Carolina 562.1 5 Channing Frye 8. Chris Taft
Pittsburgh 559.7 30 Ike Diogu 9. Danny Granger New Mexico 554.4 13 Sean May 10.
Nate Robinson Washington 538.0 16 Rashad McCants 11. Deron Williams Illinois
523.73 3 Antoine Wright 12. Jarrett Jack Georgia Tech 523.3 17 Joey Graham
* among collegians only
We're still evaluating the 2005 draft, but it's pretty obvious that Paul was
the top collegian from that group and should have gone ahead of the likes of
Bogut and both Deron and Marvin Williams. If you're looking for Charlie
Villanueva, he was 13th. You can also tell that this was a pretty strong group, as
scores were still well over 500 even at the 12th position.
Notables: Charlie Villanueva (521.9, 13th); David Lee (482.7, 19th); Kelenna
Azubuike (454.2, 25th) Salim Stoudamire (449.4, 26th); Francisco Garcia
(448.8, 27th); Daniel Ewing (446.3, 28th); Chuck Hayes (443.9, 30th); Ronny Turiaf
(442.7); Ryan Gomes (430.9); Hakim Warrick (427.8); Luther Head (419.7) Ike
Diogu (402.5); Antoine Wright (387.8); Joey Graham (353.8); Jason Maxiell
(342.5); Linas Kleiza (308.4)
____________________________________
2006 Draft: Top 12 rated players NO. PLAYER SCHOOL SCORE PICKED* ACTUAL
ORDER* 1. Tyrus Thomas LSU 756.8 3 LaMarcus Aldridge 2. Shelden Williams Duke
583.1 4 Adam Morrison 3. Brandon Roy Washington 557.6 5 Tyrus Thomas 4.
Ronnie Brewer Arkansas 555.8 11 Shelden Williams 5. Rudy Gay Connecticut 552.1 7
Brandon Roy 6. Patrick O'Bryant Bradley 551.9 8 Randy Foye 7. Paul Davis
Michigan State 546.6 28 Rudy Gay 8. Kyle Lowry Villanova 538.6 20 Patrick
O'Bryant 9. Rajon Rondo Kentucky 534.5 17 J.J. Redick 10. LaMarcus Aldridge
Western Carolina 524.3 1 Hilton Armstrong 11. Quincy Douby Rutgers 516.8 15 Ronnie
Brewer 12. Marcus Williams Connecticut 512.1 18 Cedric Simmons
* among collegians only
Thomas was head-and-shoulders above the crowd by my method, while
second-rounder Davis is a lottery pick by the same reckoning; we'll see if it works out
that way in real life. College stars Adam Morrison and J.J. Redick are nowhere
to be found, both red-flagged by horrid rebound rates, among other woes.
Notables: Randy Foye (502.3, 13th); J.J. Redick (479.6, 18th); Rodney Carney
(469.4, 19th); Adam Morrison (466.3, 20th); Renaldo Balkman (458.3, 23rd);
Daniel Gibson (456.3, 25th); Jordan Farmar (450.0, 27th); Paul Millsap (440.0);
Josh Boone (414.8); Craig Smith (377.8); Hilton Armstrong (304.6)
____________________________________
Overall, the system picked out several players who were drafted much, much
later and turned into NBA stars. Better yet, it didn't miss out on a single
important player. Looking at the past five drafts, the most prominent players
taken among the top 12 collegians in their draft who weren't in the top 12 in my
system were Randy Foye, who ranked 13th in 2006; Villanueva, who ranked 13th in
2005; and Chris Kaman, who ranked 16th in 2003. Compared to real life -- a
system that passed on Carlos Boozer, Udonis Haslem, Tayshaun Prince, David West,
Josh Howard, Kevin Martin, Delonte West, and Danny Granger, among others --
I'll take these results in a heartbeat.
And it's not just the players who were picked that matters, but the ones who
weren't. By my count, six of the biggest dogs of the past five drafts --
Dajuan Wagner, Melvin Ely, Marcus Haislip, Reece Gaines, Rafael Araujo, Antoine
Wright -- would have landed well outside the top 12 collegians using this method.
You can raise that number to 10 if Adam Morrison, J.J. Redick, Hilton
Armstrong and Cedric Simmons don't turn the corner.
LOOKING AT THE 2007 DRAFT
My apologies for the lengthy prelude, since at least half of you probably
just scrolled straight down to this part, but I had to point out how well this
thing works when used on past drafts if I'm going to have you believe it has
some relevance for this one.
But without further ado, it's time to introduce the top prospects from this
year's draft -- as well as the hot prospects who surprisingly didn't make the
cut.
The raw info is in the chart, but here's how it breaks down:
2007 Draft: Top 30 rated collegians, plus other notables NO. PLAYER SCHOOL
SCORE FORD'S TOP 100 1. Kevin Durant Texas 870.7 2 2. Greg Oden Ohio State
667.9 1 3. Mike Conley Jr. Ohio State 637.9 7 4. Thaddeus Young Georgia Tech
604.2 14 5. Brandan Wright North Carolina 601.4 8 6. Al Horford Florida 601.0
3 7. Nick Fazekas Nevada 594.3 35 8. Josh McRoberts Duke 566.7 26 9.
Rodney Stuckey E. Washington 557.7 16 10. Jared Dudley Boston College 542.6 31
11. Joakim Noah Florida 528.6 9 12. Glen Davis LSU 521.0 25 13. Sean Williams
Boston College 511.3 20 14. Jeff Green Georgetown 505.5 6 15. Kyle Visser
Wake Forest 503.5 57 16. Herbert Hill Providence 503.0 49 17. Javaris
Crittenton Georgia Tech 492.2 18 18. Wilson Chandler DePaul 483.1 30 19. Julian
Wright Kansas 481.4 11 20. Daequan Cook Ohio State 470.0 27 21. D.J. Strawberry
Maryland 465.5 52 22. Jason Smith Colorado State 464.9 17 23. Alando Tucker
Wisconsin 464.3 41 24. Corey Brewer Florida 462.4 5 25. Al Thornton Florida
State 447.8 10 26. Marcus Williams Arizona 445.8 33 27. Acie Law Texas A&M
445.2 15 28. Aaron Gray Pittsburgh 440.5 38 29. Zabian Dowdell Virginia Tech
438.2 34 30. Spencer Hawes Washington 433.9 12 Other notables
Morris Almond Rice 425.6 22 Derrick Byars Vanderbilt 421.9 28 Gabe Pruitt
USC 421.0 21 Nick Young USC 383.8 13 Taurean Green Florida 350.4 39
Arron Afflalo UCLA 336.1 32 Ramon Sessions Nevada 334.7 37
And based on the chart, let's close with some important conclusions heading
into Thursday's big shindig:
Kevin Durant is the best talent to come out of the college ranks in the last
half decade. As we've learned, this doesn't necessarily mean he'll become the
best player. But his 870.7 score blows the previous best -- Carmelo Anthony's
781.3 in 2003 -- right out of the water. If there's one thing that makes me
reconsider the Oden vs. Durant question after I thought it had been settled,
this is it. I mean, how can you pass on this guy when his numbers are this
overwhelming?
Oden isn't the only no-brainer on his college team. It might surprise some to
see Conley rated so close to Oden on this list. No doubt that's partly
because Oden played all year with a bad wrist (again, an example of where scouting
can augment what's being done with numbers). But among point guards in the last
six drafts, only Chris Paul rated higher than Conley. Suddenly it doesn't
seem so silly for the Hawks to take him at No. 3, especially given their glaring
need at that spot.
Four players are in a virtual dead heat for the No. 4 spot: Despite the red
flag on his rebounding, Brandan Wright is in the mix here, along with Al
Horford, Nick Fazekas and Thaddeus Young. Those last two names will probably
surprise a few folks, since Wright and Horford have been the names we've been hearing
the most. But Fazekas' numbers have been consistently outstanding --
particularly on the glass -- which makes him seem like Nick Collison with a jump shot.
Meanwhile Young fared very well for a player his age, though one wishes his
athletic markers were better.
Jeff Green and Julian Wright don't rate as lottery picks. Though players with
a score in the 500 range are usually first-round quality and sometimes become
very good, there are far better options to be had in this draft. Wright is a
very poor shooter for his size, while Green's athletic markers were
surprisingly average.
Rodney Stuckey looks like the real deal. The unheralded guard from Eastern
Washington actually had even better numbers in 2005-06 and rates as one of the
10 best players in this draft. Fans also might be surprised to see Duke
punching bag Josh McRoberts so high, but he had the assist ratio of a point guard and
fairly high rates of blocks and steals. Boston College's Jared Dudley
finishes out the top 10 -- it's a bit troubling that he blocked only 10 shots all
year, but he shot well from distance and has strong previous seasons helping him
out.
Corey Brewer rates way lower than most people would imagine. Brewer's rating
of 462.4 makes him a marginal first-rounder, and that's only because of the
paucity of Euros in this year's draft. Since this pretty much flies in the face
of conventional wisdom, which has Brewer rated as a top-five or at worst
top-10 pick, I have to point out that his numbers don't match the general consensus
on his athleticism.
Brewer's 8.5 rebound rate teetered on red-flag territory, and he blocked only
15 shots all season, which is quite low for a 6-9 NBA hopeful. Additionally,
his ballhandling is a concern -- his -0.74 pure point ratio was pretty poor
for a perimeter player. Brewer brings his share of positives too, but I'm not
sure teams will get what they think they're getting if they take him high in the
lottery.
Acie Law and Spencer Hawes are best to be avoided. Both are viewed as
late-lottery picks, but they look like solid second-rounders from here. Hawes has an
unimpressive rebound rate, which is a huge red flag considering he was bigger
than everyone he played against. And for all the talk of his great post
skills, he had a run-of-the-mill 55.0 true shooting percentage and didn't even have
the best PER on his mediocre team (that belonged to Jon Brockman). A lot of
folks think he can become a quality pro post player; based on his numbers, I
just don't see it.
As for Law, his athleticism is a major question mark. He had 39 steals and
one block, a pittance for a 6-3 guard. His 5.3 rebound rate is another poor
indicator, while his age (22) only adds to the list of negatives. Additionally,
Law's pure point ratio was only average, and he doesn't seem to be nearly
dangerous enough a scorer to make up for it.
The two USC guys look like total busts. There have been players to make the
NBA with scores lower than that of Gabe Pruitt and Nick Young, and a couple of
them even turned out to be halfway decent. But many more of the players who
scored that low had disappointing pro careers, so clearly this is not the way to
bet.
Truth be told, Pruitt and Young both have major red flags to overcome.
Pruitt's rebound rate of 4.9 is shockingly bad for a 6-4 guard alleged to have
above-par athleticism, and he just didn't do much of anything else to set him apart
from the countless other guards trying to play their way into the league.
Young is an even deeper mystery. If this guy's such a good athlete, how'd he
have only 27 steals and 10 blocks this past season? As I mentioned above, his
pure point ratio is hold-your-nose awful for a guard, his rebound rate is only
OK, and it's not like he put up these numbers against stellar competition.
Why exactly are we supposed to be excited about this guy?
Actually, this formula doesn't seem to be kind to players from L.A. Arron
Afflalo rated even worse than the two Trojans; Afflalo, Nevada guard Ramon
Sessions, and Florida guard Taurean Green are fringe first-rounders who are best to
be avoided.
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