After a busy summer on the scouting trail, it's time to refresh our 2019 mock draft.
I attended the FIBA U17 World Championship and FIBA Europe U18 Championships, as well as the Nike Basketball Academy, to watch as many NBA prospects as possible. Mike Schmitz was at the FIBA U20 European Championship and U16 European Championship, as well as the Steph Curry Camp, the CP3 Camp and Basketball Without Borders Europe events.
Between the two of us, we covered quite a bit of ground and saw thousands of players, some of whom will be picked in 2019, 2020 and beyond.
Here's what has changed and what we've learned since our most recent update in June:
Biggest risers, fallers and developments
• R.J. Barrett played in two games with the Canadian senior national team as part of their FIBA World Cup qualifiers, scoring 27 points on 18 shots in 45 minutes. He started alongside four NBA players -- Cory Joseph, Dillon Brooks, Kelly Olynyk and Dwight Powell -- and did not look out of place one bit.
•While the competition against the Virgin Islands and Dominican Republic left something to be desired, it is still extremely rare to see a player just weeks removed from his 18th birthday step onto the floor with professionals in their 20s and 30s at the FIBA level and more than hold his own.
•Barrett's ability to play a more confined role alongside older and more established NBA players -- passing ahead unselfishly, cutting intelligently off the ball and playing strong defense -- was even more evident in this setting than it was at the high school level at times. He has such an alpha dog mentality and has basically never not been the best player on the court in any setting we've seen, making for an interesting contrast at the senior level. Still, his scoring instincts, aggressiveness in the open court and willingness to embrace contact driving down the lane consistently shined through.
•Barrett's outside shot remains a point of interest, as he's a career 31 percent 3-point shooter and went 0-6 from beyond the arc in two games. You could clearly tell that he has put significant time into this part of his game, and even though he shot just 6-of-21 from 3 in Duke's three exhibition games in Canada, his stroke is looking much more compact these days, and his willingness to hoist up outside shots surely seems to be correlated with his improved ability to knock them down.
•Barrett hasn't done anything to detract from the notion that he is the No. 1 prospect in the 2019 draft class since being anointed as such in the fall of 2017. There is still a lot of time for contenders to emerge, and that will start early. Barrett and Duke's matchup with Kentucky on Nov. 6 in Indianapolis at the State Farm Champions Classic has to be considered one of the most intriguing preseason matchups we've had in some time.
• Barrett's teammate, Zion Williamson, drew the bulk of the headlines from Duke's exhibition tour, despite the fact that Barrett led the team in scoring at 31 points per game. That is to be expected considering the viral nature of Williamson's game, which lends itself to incredible highlights due to his freakish combination of power and explosiveness, especially considering that he stands 6-foot-7 and is listed at 285 pounds.
•But Williamson is more than a dunker, as he demonstrated on a number of occasions in Canada, with some extremely impressive drives, passes and defensive possessions demonstrating body control, feel and skill that are just as rare from a player with his dimensions as the ridiculous dunks. He moves up from No. 7 to No. 3 in this mock.
•We will be talking a lot more about Williamson as the season moves on, but it's safe to say that he will be one of the most hotly debated prospects in this class. Plenty of NBA executives have told us that they are far from sold on him, and it will take a lot more than pulverizing overmatched Canadian university competition to convince them, though his 3-9 shooting from deep did raise some eyebrows, given that he has been mostly considered a non-shooter to this point.
•Thankfully, Duke has an intriguing nonconference schedule that will put Williamson front and center against some strong competition, starting with Kentucky and continuing with the Maui Invitational on Nov. 19.
• Kentucky also went abroad for a series of games in the Bahamas in which they matched up with Serbian pro team Mega Bemax, which has had nine players drafted in the past four years. The Adriatic League team looked overmatched physically from the opening tip and were essentially steamrollered by John Calipari's squad, who not only played their trademark outstanding defense but also appear to have some outside shooting on their roster, which is a welcome change from years past.
•Freshman wing Keldon Johnson set the tone early for Kentucky with his hustle and tenacity defensively, fighting over screens, getting in a deep stance and putting tremendous pride in shutting down his matchup. Offensively, he made a couple of 3-pointers, caught a couple of lobs in the open court and was a handful getting downhill off dribble handoffs. Johnson looked every bit the lottery pick he was billed as coming in and appears to be on the verge of a breakout season.
•While there was a lot of encouraging things to take away from the performances of all of Kentucky's prospects in the Bahamas -- particularly Nick Richards, Tyler Herro, Quade Green and Ashton Hagans -- the one player on the roster who looks likely to emerge is sophomore P.J. Washington, who withdrew from last year's draft. Washington looks to be in much better shape and was competing with higher intensity than we saw from him for most of last season. He had some very impressive moments rotating for blocks inside and outside the arc with excellent timing. If he can indeed continue to protect the rim, switch out onto guards on pick-and-rolls and hold his own on the defensive glass, he'll make a strong case for himself as a versatile, small-ball big man. The fact that he was able to step out and make a corner 3-pointer was very encouraging, but the huge quantity of free throws he bricked in this contest showed that his stroke likely needs a lot of work.
• Eric Paschall's explosion at the Nike Basketball Academy earlier this month earned him a boost to the No. 20 spot in this mock draft, and it showed that defending champions Villanova will be a team to watch, despite losing four players to the draft. We chronicled his performance in detail here.
• Ja Morant broke out in a major way at Chris Paul's Elite Guard Camp in Winston-Salem and earned himself a spot at No. 19 in this mock. Murray State will be followed closely by NBA scouts this winter, particularly in a Nov. 26 matchup at Alabama, which will likely be crowded with executives. Mike Schmitz chronicled Morant's performance here.
• Ty Jerome also helped himself at the CP3 camp, carving out the last spot in the first round of this mock draft in turn. Virginia was already home to one projected first-rounder in De'Andre Hunter, making Virginia an intriguing team for NBA scouts to follow in the ACC.
Other projected first-rounders we covered this summer:
•Luka Samanic's up-and-down showing at the U18 European Championship
•Projected first-rounders Bol Bol, Daniel Gafford, De'Andre Hunter, Rui Hachimura, Jaylen Hoard, Darius Bazley and others at the Nike Basketball Academy
