Merged: The Draft Thread For Stuff About The Draft Including Thoughts About The Draft

I love Dame but lets keep him out of the talent/draft/trade side of things. He loved Plums and probably did not want the trade to happen for Nurk AND a pick at all, now he likes it. He's great at his job, let others do theirs

 

15: OG (if his knees are ok)
20: Rabb
26: Jackson

 

More like Kersey than Clyde

 

#15 : Small Forward
#20 : Power Forward
#26 : Center

 

Must say that Anunoby looks awesome from the highlights... Like a Kawhi lite.

 

In actual game action I saw him in, he looks really stiff to me. He's like a football player trying to play basketball.

 

Just stay awsu from WABC's and guys from the Cuse.

 

I'm not much interested in anyone lower than Jonathan Isaac at # 8 and I don't think Olshey is either. I got the impression yesterday he was trying to pump up the strength of this draft more than that he really believed in it. Trade up in the draft or trade for an elite player.

 

Where is D69? RealGM?

Didn't he have some inside sources? His draft picks always panned out.

 

Anyone know the trade value (salary cap $$) of each pick?

 

He was at RealGM and then ran/Modded a site that is no longer in existence. Mostly now he does his own research and we have a ridiculously long text thread going between 6-7 of us long-timers who have known each other for years. We chat once a week about trades/drafts scenarios and players and he and a few others and I usually get together for a small Draft Party with our own info, Draft Board and the volume turned up to where you can actually hear what is going on. At BWW or whatever venue the Blazers hold the Draft, there is often so much noise you can't hear what the national Draft experts are saying.

I wish I could find the piece I did that went over all of his picks since about 2003 (I think) and how they did versus what the Blazers did. All of these were made before hand and his accuracy has been uncanny. Really only once (the Martell Webster draft) did he have a swing and miss selection. That is an inanely high hit rate.

 

So ~$4million for 3 players. Given the exorbitant salaries of much of the roster, that seems like a really good use of $$ to add talent.

 

My take is when you have a heavy top loaded Roster Salary in your top 6 rookies become very valuable for they contract value. Of course if you are a team like the Warriors and plucking proven vets for the same $$ that's better, but we aren't there yet.

15: Anunoby (Love guys who want to throw it down, screams Draymond Green mold to me)
20: Hartenstein (Raw but has an attitude similar to Nurks, drive and grit were this teams weakness imo)
26: Adebayo (Project big but has the body to work with)

 

I'm gonna come at this topic from a slightly different angle, just for the sake of discussion... There's a couple things that I haven't seen anyone account for between now and the draft:

• First: the guys that we're all talking about are being based on their perceived value (by a bunch of websites, nonetheless) 2 months prior to the actual draft. Between now and then, the culmination of the playoffs, the combine, workouts, injuries (both to prospects and to current pros), and failed tests (both of the drug and common sense varieties) will all occur. Now, obviously we can't predict who will get hurt or get arrested, but we CAN make a few projections on the first two points -- current NBA play from playoff teams and rising/falling stocks as rookie workouts happen.
  
  
• Second: while I love mock drafts as much as the next guy, at this point, they're better for overall talent evaluation than team fit. In looking at Draftexpress and NBAdraft.net's mocks, there's a COMBINED 4 big men being drafted in their top 10s. That's 4 out of 20 picks, and Lauri Markkanen accounts for 2 of those 4, with Zach Collins and Jarrett Allen both appearing once (both at 10). While I get that the PGs and wings in this draft are the top talent, I have a VERY hard time believing that the first 9 picks will actually shape out as small guys and one stretch PF. For better or worse, there WILL be a couple bigs in the lottery, and the current mocks aren't really accounting for that.

Taking all of that into consideration, here are my thoughts...

Our guys: I think Crabbe, ET, and Ezeli (yup) will all be moved for decent-good value.

• Crabbe: teams will always need guys who can knock down open jumpshots. OKC strikes me as low-hanging fruit as a team that would be interested in him. Fortunately his contract will look more and more palatable as free agent frenzies continue this offseason. I'll venture to guess we can either package him with a pick to move up (my preference) or get a younger piece and 2nd round or future 1st for him.
  
  
• ET: My immediate thought for ET is Boston. Multiple Celtics have mentioned that they miss his presence as a glue guy, and I think with that roster setup, his versatility plays really well with a lot of their players. Helps that they have young players, a bevvy of picks and a ton of cap space as well. Shot in the dark, but I'd say we can get Zizic or Yabusele (Terry Rozier would be another guy I wouldn't mind) and a future pick, maybe taking back a less-brutal contract back in the works.
  
  
• Ezeli: surprised no one has said this yet. The only reason Neil mentioned him in his press conference yesterday was to shop him, or rather, his contract. No clue who it will be, but I can all but guarantee Ezeli gets dealt for some sort of asset, be it a Euro or future or 2nd rd pick. To operate, Neil needs assets, much like we did with Varejao last year, some team will want to use Ezeli's cap # to get them closer to the salary floor and save their owner $6.5Mil.
  
  
• Meyers: seems like the team is resigned to the fact that we have no choice but to hold onto Meyers for now. He may have a modicum of trade value left (there's only so many 7-footers on this earth), but its probably not selling him at arguably his lowest possible value. With an offseason to get healthy, he may be able to rebound next year and raise his value enough to eventually be tradable.
  
  
• Mo: I wouldn't hate to see him moved, honestly. I fear that he's too passive to be a real difference maker for us. Given what we got him for, we could flip him for a nice profit, BUT, I don't see Neil doing that unless there were a no-brainer on the table.

Draft: simple philosophy -- improve the roster. I can see what Neil was trying to do with last offseason, but unfortunately things didn't work out in reality, like they could have on paper.

• I'll guess that we package Crabbe and 15 to move up. I can see it making sense for Minnesota (6), NYK (7), SAC (8,10) to all move back and add a young shooter. SOMEONE out of: Fultz, Ball, Jackson, Tatum, Monk or Collins will fall. In Neil's perfect scenario, he's able to get high enough to get Josh Jackson.
  
  
• I can also see us packaging 20, 26 and some of the other fodder mentioned above to get back into the teens. I think you're looking for 2 difference makers in this draft, so anybody from an Anunoby, Ferguson, Allen, Anigbogu, etc. could be in play.
  
  
• Last guess: I'll guess we likely have a piece or two from all of the above to take a flyer on a young big (Motley, Jeanne, Bryant, whoever).

I certainly don't think ALL of the above will happen, but I'll say that this is probably close to what Neil & co. are looking at. You've got a great young core in Dame, CJ and Nurk, solid bench pieces in Mo, Al, Noah and Bazz, and will hopefully bring back at least piece or two in a deal or two that you're pretty much forced to make. We're certainly not light-years away, but we're not there yet either...

 

No question, as vets continue to take more and more of that overall pie, rookie contracts are only going to get more valuable.

I think the reality of our situation is that we're still, at least 2 years away, so might as well accumulate assets to build around CJ/Dame/Nurk.

 

Someone really needs to beg him to join this site and bring his info here, I used to like checking his site a couple of years ago.