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People (me included) were harsh on Bennett at the begining of the season. He showed no signs of defensive intensity, no scoring ability and no kind of effort rebounding.

He has now been showing signs of being a good scorer and a good rebounder.

I'd like to know where Cavs fans would rank him in this last draft. Do you guys think he was the best player available, or at least top 3?

Top 10. No top player in this draft.

Top four along with MCW, Giannis, and Oladipo. Noel might show out, but we will have to wait to see on that one.

Top 8. He's starting to show up

He will be number one. Right now he is only top 5-10

With the way he's been playing lately, top 5.

Can't wait to see him and Thompson play on Friday.

Top 5 IMO ... he's been taking a lot of criticism some warranted and some not but he's been fighting i'm surprised he's been able to keep focus and not crumble under the pressure of being #1 which isn't his fault since there was no true #1 in the 2013 draft plus he just wasn't on people's radar so it was a big shock but if you knew all the prospects Anthony had more upside then most in the draft the potential was there so the Cavs took a risk ... time will tell if he's worth the #1 overall but people saying it's the worst #1 ever are stupid it's his 1st year too

Yeah, Bennett seemed ill prepared to be the number one pick, but his criticism has been a product of idiocy on the General Board and some notorious Cleveland haters. Had the Cavs gone with some more popular picks previous years there would have been less criticism of Bennett.

Funny thing is, other than Drummond so many of those guys have been disappointing.

There should be a whole lot of incompletes handed out to this draft class.

Basically there's no way you could even sanely include Bennett in the top-10 of the draft class without grading on a severe curve favoring his age and recent play. The fact he wasn't even selected for the Rookie-Sophmore game affirms this evaluation.

For instance, out of all the rookies who've managed to play 500 minutes or more, Bennett ranks last (19th) in PER.

Your top-5 would be Mason Plumlee, MCW, Tim Hardaway Jr, Nate Wolters, and Victor Oladpio.

It just so happens Bennett is the second youngest in the bunch, and because of that, I don't know that I'd trade him for anyone else in the draft; albeit we still have no clue how Noel is going to look in the NBA.

JonFromVA wrote:There should be a whole lot of incompletes handed out to this draft class.

This. Way too early to tell.

IMO, confidence is his biggest issue. If he ever builds that to where it needs to be, I think he will still rank in the top half of the lottery.

The reason he was not chosen for the rookie/sophomore game was strictly because he played like crap early. Had he played like the last few games he not only would have been in it, he'd have been picked very high.

TheOUTLAW wrote:The reason he was not chosen for the rookie/sophomore game was strictly because he played like crap early. Had he played like the last few games he not only would have been in it, he'd have been picked very high.

If we were going to judge the rookies just by how they've played in February or they're best 10 game period - we'd have to show the same courtesy to the other rooks.

Bennett's rookie season isn't in the books yet. He can still do a lot the rest of the season to raise his overall numbers, but he has to do it, and then we can look back and see where he ranks.

But if he got hurt and his season ended tonight, he'd easily nudge Austin Rivers down the ladder of all time lousy seasons for a lottery selection (and pretty much everybody else).

I'd take him in the 10-12 range. Among the high potential players that have been been or done nothing.

JonFromVA wrote:There should be a whole lot of incompletes handed out to this draft class.

Basically there's no way you could even sanely include Bennett in the top-10 of the draft class without grading on a severe curve favoring his age and recent play. The fact he wasn't even selected for the Rookie-Sophmore game affirms this evaluation.

For instance, out of all the rookies who've managed to play 500 minutes or more, Bennett ranks last (19th) in PER.

Your top-5 would be Mason Plumlee, MCW, Tim Hardaway Jr, Nate Wolters, and Victor Oladpio.

It just so happens Bennett is the second youngest in the bunch, and because of that, I don't know that I'd trade him for anyone else in the draft; albeit we still have no clue how Noel is going to look in the NBA.

Those might be top 5 ROY candidates but you're not really suggesting Nate Wolters would be the #4 overall pick if there was an actual redraft, are you? The draft is based on long term potential, not who teams think will have the best rookie year. Bennett goes top 5 on potential alone.

If there was a redraft, I don't know who the cavs take. They're not taking a pg. Not sure you take Oladipo--- he isn't better than waiters. What they really needed was a 3 or a 5. Noel?

Still think it should have been McLemore, Noel, or Oladipo.

That said, Bennett is putting together a solid string of good games. I ignored him pre draft b/c of Thompson.

Noel is the one I'd be terrified of. Him getting a full season to study the NBA game, work on his body, and come in with lower expectations will likely do him a ton of good long term. It helped Blake.

mup wrote:

JonFromVA wrote:There should be a whole lot of incompletes handed out to this draft class.

Basically there's no way you could even sanely include Bennett in the top-10 of the draft class without grading on a severe curve favoring his age and recent play. The fact he wasn't even selected for the Rookie-Sophmore game affirms this evaluation.

For instance, out of all the rookies who've managed to play 500 minutes or more, Bennett ranks last (19th) in PER.

Your top-5 would be Mason Plumlee, MCW, Tim Hardaway Jr, Nate Wolters, and Victor Oladpio.

It just so happens Bennett is the second youngest in the bunch, and because of that, I don't know that I'd trade him for anyone else in the draft; albeit we still have no clue how Noel is going to look in the NBA.

Those might be top 5 ROY candidates but you're not really suggesting Nate Wolters would be the #4 overall pick if there was an actual redraft, are you? The draft is based on long term potential, not who teams think will have the best rookie year. Bennett goes top 5 on potential alone.

If there was a redraft, I don't know who the cavs take. They're not taking a pg. Not sure you take Oladipo--- he isn't better than waiters. What they really needed was a 3 or a 5. Noel?

Of course the draft is based on long-term potential, but when it comes to ranking them right now - we've got actual NBA numbers to go by and that's what I did. Anything beyond that is still guess work that's going to tend to be influenced by familiarity and favoritism. Heck, I liked Noel at #1 as a long-term project, but how could you put him over anybody right now?

There was absolutely no guarantee that Bennett was going to go in the top 5 based off his potential. Some of you either haven't watched the Cavs and Bennett play this year or you are styling some serious homer shades to say Bennett is top 5 in a redraft

Only because I don't think that hardly any other players in this draft have shown anything either.

I think 6-7#

Antetokoumpo, Noel, Burke, Oladipo, Carter-Williams, only clearly higher in my board.

He is right there with Adams and McLemore, and higher than Porter, Zeller, McCollum, or Len.