Nate: <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">I haven?t spoken to Robert at all. We did talk to his father and we wanted to try to get down and see him. We tried several times. We tried to get him up for a workout and just couldn?t do it. We did our homework, we talked to a lot of people, that really felt that this guy had pretty good potential to be a pretty good center one day in this league. We felt that his skill level at this young age, he showed too much to pass him. This is a young guy that in the future should be a solid player. We?ve had a number of guys in the lottery that we couldn?t get in for various reasons. A lot of times the agents are controlling that. Agents tend to hold guys back. The fact that our scouts have seen him play several times, they are very high on him. Basically, the rest of us are going on videotapes and just conversations with other people. I talked to Tim Grgurich and he really felt that this guy would be solid, he likes to play in the paint, he likes to play with his back to the basket and he?s a tough kid. He?s 7-0 and very skillful. He really praised the kid and he?s been working with this kid for two years. I have a great deal of confidence in Coach Grg. Any young player who Coach Grg is praising like that, I believe him.</div> Jack Sikma: <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">In individual workouts you don?t see five-on-five. We see two-on-two at the most and most of the time it?s just one-on-one. You try to get a feel to what his nature is. This kid has been playing for 18 years and a number of these guys have been playing for 22 years, so if we make our decision based on a 10-minute workout with somebody else, that doesn?t make sense. He?s got to get stronger for our league and most 18-year old kids do. We talked to his AAU coach and talked to (Washington Coach) Lorenzo (Romar). He said this kid has good skills and is well advanced for his age. A number of basketball people, although he was a little bit off the radar screen, a number of basketball people liked him. He?s got a good feel for the game. A lot of times, kids get big and then have to learn how to play but it looks like Robert has been playing for a long time.</div> Rick Sund: <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">If we were going to take a high school player we wanted to take one with huge upside. I think Jay Bilas brought it out that if this kid had gone to college, this kid could have been a very early pick, either one or two, and we looked at that with a number of players. And not just the high school players, but with some of the foreign players who were young. We looked at some of the other bigs, like (Peter John) Ramos and some of the other players. I don?t think there is a whole lot of risk because he is going to be a player in this league. He?s a bona fide center, he?s definitely going to be in the league. I think the timetable is how fast is he going to develop. Is he going to be able to get some minutes next year? Is this going to be a situation where he?s going to be a summer-league player and surprise us? It?s too early to tell. But in terms of a risk I don?t think he?s a risk factor. If you were going to say who is going to be one of the top ten centers in the league, he?s going to be one. I don?t think the risk factor is too high. </div> <font size="1">Full List of quotes from McMillan, Sund, Sikma and Swift courtesy of Seattle official website.</font>
At least Swift is a legit center...can't say that about most big men in the draft. Seems like a good guy from his interview, he was just a mystery before today so I think that influenced me in not liking the pick. Maybe he is the answer to our post problems, or maybe he's just a big ugly Steve Scheffler.
I really wish the best for him, but I can't shake this nagging feeling that we won't be seeing the next Great White Hope in Robert Swift :[
