because I was hoping a few players people weren’t hyping up before the season would pop and suddenly this class would look better.
He's not looking healed to me. Starting to worry Castle has some meniscus condition. We have been down that road already.
Dillingham and Cody Williams are a couple examples. Honestly, it wouldn't surprise me if our GS pick turns out better than our own.
Not sure he's been brought up, but Adou Thiero is another really intriguing Kentucky guy... Very fluid and explosive for a guy his size. Big growth spurt this year. Grew up as a guard so he has feel, handle and court sense for a guy his size (6'8" 222lbs). Long and powerful strides attacking closeouts. Has the bend to get low on drives. Shot looks very workable. Statistical indicators look solid on albeit small sample. His biggest issue right now is probably conditioning. He's put on a ton of weight the last year and half and Cal only seems comfortable using him 5 min or less spurts right now. Seems to nicely project into a small role as a power wing with some ball skills that can both be a shooter and drive closeouts. High level finisher, draws a ton of fouls but also does a decent job seeing the next pass if defenses rotates...has the athleticism and foundational skills to develop into something more than a low usage guy down the road too imo. His numbers don't really pop right now, but I think there's a good chance he comes out if he continues to improve through conference play.
Has there ever been a draft projected to be crappy that actually turned out to be good? I'm not sure how seriously to take those projections, given how no one really knows how good any individual prospect will turn out to be.
Nets’ GM thought that the ‘12 draft was a three player draft it was considered not great outside of AD. Even though there were notable misses, I think they have way more productive players than anyone would think. Dame, AD, and Green are sure-fire HOFs. Middleton and Beal are likely HOFs. Drummond was a multiple time AS. Barnes, Crowder, Ross, and Barton were all productive as NBA players. Sacre was a pretty funny meme for a few seasons.
Watching Grant in the three games shows the importance of his skillset on our team. Outside of the 3pt shooting, his ability to be a great secondary/tertiary scorer that defenders have to pay attention to. Portland was starting to figure something out by having Ant bring the ball up, but letting Grant run the PnR with DA will Ant runs to the open corner. Grant was automatic going to the basket, and Ant had a wide open 3 that he swished on one possession (and another decent look that he missed if I remember correctly?). I feel pretty convinced that Buzelis will be a Blazer if he’s available to us. Barring something out of his control like the wrong situation, Buzelis should be a much better player, with a similar body type. Grant is a little bit like Ant, in that he didn’t really show signs of being a productive player until around 23-25. I think Buzelis will take much less time to become a productive player.
Man, Ant’s development in his playmaking is starting to look on par with Booker/Fox in their first few years. Ant is going to get so much better at that part of the game as time goes on. Shae has had stretches of really makes me think he’ll be a 5+apg kind of guy. Scoot is still figuring it out, but looks like he’s a good distributor. Not entirely sure about Scoot, but Ant and Shae can both play off the ball. Buzelis’s playmaking would instantly help this team. If Buzelis fits in next year as seamless as Murray does this year, he might eventually start by the end of next season. Williams looks like he could become a playmaker. Castle is a playmaker at SF.
I'm sold on Yves Missi after watching the Duke game. Bumping him into my mock lottery. Unless Clingan is available with our GS pick, as of now, Missi is my preferred choice. Bradshaw does have a bit more upside on offense, but still looking for that consistency.
Yeah, I'm keeping an eye on him too. Waiting until the end of the season to fully declare what big men are best. But Missi has potential to be a good Robert Williams III replacement. Currently meets my freshman center stat threshhold prediction, too. Honestly, they say it's a 'weak draft' but the more prospects I'm seeing, the more I don't think so, at all. Probably no bonafide superstars like in the last two drafts but it should have several All-Stars and quality players all around. Ideally, Portland should get Cody Williams+Matas Buzelis and with a Brodgon/Grant trade, either Clingan or Missi. That would practically set Portland up at all five positions while providing much needed depth, defense, rebounding, extra playmaking/ballhandling, and shooting - which have been Portland's weaknesses for many years now. The only thing needed after would be for the players to gain experience and to reach 23-25+ years of age, when they're able to become more consistent players. In theory, we'd be looking at 2026 to become what the current Thunder are.
I haven’t gotten to watch Missi but I’ve seen his name. Honestly, there are so many bigs in this draft that as long as multiple of them play their role well, a good one will probably still slip to the 2nd. I’ll just trust Schmitz on this one. Buzelis and Williams…stop it man you’re making me horny. I pretty much agree with mostly what you said, with maybe a little differing view. I agree, we do need to trade Brogdon. I don’t know if you could get any young player of value for him. Grant, if we could trade him for good value sure. Buzelis seems like he’s definitely a Schmitz kind of guy. I’d really love to see him start at SF along side Grant at PF. It definitely isn’t something I NEED to see, but if there isn’t good value coming back for Grant, I don’t mind him still being here until next deadline.
Yeah that's not helping us win any games but it may help that draft position. I honestly can't wait until we can stop talking about draft position but being realistic this season that is what we have to be aiming for.
Yeah, not sure about GLI prospects. I would argue that players get better developed in college or Euro leagues. We have enough data that suggests they're not properly prepared for the NBA on arrival.
I like Cody Williams. I'm big on scoring efficiency. He's also got the size, and the game seems natural to him. With the GS pick, I like Zach Edey. It might seem weird to get a Mark Eaton sized player in today's NBA, but he can most teams aren't getting guys who can match up with someone of his size. He's dominating in college, and he's going to have 4 years under his belt, not be some "project". We need to start looking for a replacment for Ayton. Or maybe even play Ayton at PF for a while and Grant at SF.
