Who do you want us to take at #1?

[RichCollab]

It's gonna be Jabari. I was Chet all season. Over the last week I have been flirting with the idea of Paolo and now have limited concerns. But, I'm completely sold on Jabari and now see him becoming a number 1 option on offense.

[yoyojw17]

It's gonna be Jabari. I was Chet all season. Over the last week I have been flirting with the idea of Paolo and now have limited concerns. But, I'm completely sold on Jabari and now see him becoming a number 1 option on offense.

Why do you think he can be a number 1 option now. I'm in the Chet-ish camp... but like them all.... but want to know what made you enlightened now. Trying to make sure i'ma love whatever we choose. lol

[Xatticus]

Those Auburn guards had very tough time playing with first option who just wants to hold the ball and shoot.

This is opposite of a quote I've seen of an (I think) college basketball scout who said the guards he played with were the worst he could've been paired with because of how badly they shot and how greedily they played. (Particularly Green who only took 1.6 less shots a game than Jabari on horrid numbers.) Said Jabari would much rather get his offense within the flow of the game. He also said Jabari definitely took some bad shots but with the space he was given + unreliability in his guards made it so he had to try to create something out of nothing.

Blaming the potential #1 pick for extremely **** guard play is certainly.. a take.

Ehhh... I take it as apologism for Smith's shortcomings. Experience has taught me that these sorts of arguments are usually BS. Again, you can like Smith for what he is, but he was a contributing factor in Auburn's lack of ball movement at the offensive end. Everyone is blaming his guards, but college basketball is lousy with guards of that type. It's just odd to me that people have lasered in on that particular argument on behalf of Smith, because you can make the same argument for so many others as well.

I am highly critical of Cole Anthony, so I get it, but Jabari Smith Jr. needs to be judged based upon what he is, independent of the quality of the guards on his team. The hope is that Smith evolves as a player, but you can't simply assume it will happen in the absence of such guards. And if he gets drafted by Orlando, he is going to be playing with Cole Anthony anyway.

It's also a bit confounding because people are also lauding Smith for his iso potential. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Either you love him because "he can get his shot off over anyone" or you hope that he evolves as a basketball player when he gets out from playing next to a couple selfish guards.

I prefer Chet because he already knows how to play basketball. He knows when to attack and when not to. He knows a good shot from a bad one. He knows how to make the simple pass. He know when to cut and when to get out of the way. I'm not ruling out his iso potential for late clock situations, but a significant part of his appeal for me is that you don't have to feed him the ball and watch him burn clock to try to get his own shots up.

[RookieStar]

This is my prediction and if realgm is still here 15yrs from now, someone can quote me on this for good or bad.

Jabari will probably produce the best in the early stages and win ROY. However, Chet down the line and in their peaks will be the MVP of their batch. Probably the superstar in their group. BUUUUUTTTT, it is Paolo who will probably play the longest of then all.like a Melo/lbj/Horford/VC type of career where he will be near 40 and still contributing a little.

[RookieStar]

It's gonna be Jabari. I was Chet all season. Over the last week I have been flirting with the idea of Paolo and now have limited concerns. But, I'm completely sold on Jabari and now see him becoming a number 1 option on offense.

Why do you think he can be a number 1 option now. I'm in the Chet-ish camp... but like them all.... but want to know what made you enlightened now. Trying to make sure i'ma love whatever we choose. lol

Im Interested in this as well to know. As of NOW the only go to iso move we know Jabari has is the drive stop amd jumpshot. You can't really say that's a number 1 option. If anything, it's Paolo of the 3 of them that has an arsenal of offensove moves and can be considered a #1 optiom for NOW.

[basketballRob]

I've noticed over the last few years that when a team clamps down on us we can't get a good shot off. Jabari I see as a player that can get the shot off and make a high rate of them. Then he has the ability to lock someone down on defense.

I don't see Chet as a player that can get baskets when the defense clamps down on him.


Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

[basketballRob]

This is my prediction and if realgm is still here 15yrs from now, someone can quote me on this for good or bad.

Jabari will probably produce the best in the early stages and win ROY. However, Chet down the line and in their peaks will be the MVP of their batch. Probably the superstar in their group. BUUUUUTTTT, it is Paolo who will probably play the longest of then all.like a Melo/lbj/Horford/VC type of career where he will be near 40 and still contributing a little.

I doubt Jabari starts fast. Ingram averaged 9 ppg and Tatum 13 ppg at 19-years-old. Chet will be 20 and should start off faster.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

[axl_c_cool]

This is my prediction and if realgm is still here 15yrs from now, someone can quote me on this for good or bad.

Jabari will probably produce the best in the early stages and win ROY. However, Chet down the line and in their peaks will be the MVP of their batch. Probably the superstar in their group. BUUUUUTTTT, it is Paolo who will probably play the longest of then all.like a Melo/lbj/Horford/VC type of career where he will be near 40 and still contributing a little.

Respectfully disagree, just don't see MVP of a class or star in Chet. He's going to be really really really good, but if you think of any of this class in an NBA Finals leading its team offensively and defensively I think it's Smith-Banchero-Ivey-Holmgren (Maybe Sharpe before him too).

He will be an important player, I just don't see more than 18ppg for him, 20ppg at a push. I could be wrong though!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

[basketballRob]

Is Chet any good in a half-court offense?

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

[MartinsIzAfraud]

This is opposite of a quote I've seen of an (I think) college basketball scout who said the guards he played with were the worst he could've been paired with because of how badly they shot and how greedily they played. (Particularly Green who only took 1.6 less shots a game than Jabari on horrid numbers.) Said Jabari would much rather get his offense within the flow of the game. He also said Jabari definitely took some bad shots but with the space he was given + unreliability in his guards made it so he had to try to create something out of nothing.

Blaming the potential #1 pick for extremely **** guard play is certainly.. a take.

So you have seen a quote but you didnt look into the numbers yourself. Its a narrative to make Jabari look better. He was Auburn highest recruit so they blame anyone beside's him.
He had the highest usage on the team and the truth is he made the game very difficult for everyone besides himself.
I see no chance any nba team will allow him to hold the ball and shoot contested jumpshots
Those "bad" guards
K.D Johnson 20/21 38.7% 3p; 21/22 29% 3p
Wendell Green 20/21 36.4% 30; 21/22 31.7% 3p

Thats what happens when you build your offense around players with limited basketball skill and below average game processing. They have good efficiency around their one trick but whole team suffers

Yes i blame potential number 1 pick he made his teammates look bad ! Same story with Cole Anthony year earlier. There is no chance we pick him first if Weltman has even one healthy eye.

If you haven’t you really should watch some of those games. Those guards were the worst and most selfish players I have ever seen and that is Bruce Pearls system he let them go crazy. Jabari had to be selfish because as soon as he passed the ball he knew it wasn’t coming back. They consistently dumped shot clock grenades on him and missed him wide open.

Edit: Chet and Jabari are both not first options coming into the league. That is ok even as number one picks as long as you are sure in 3-4 years you can develop them. But I am skeptical anyone in this draft screams 1st option.

Just don’t bother with this one. HUGE Jabari hate

[RookieStar]

This is my prediction and if realgm is still here 15yrs from now, someone can quote me on this for good or bad.

Jabari will probably produce the best in the early stages and win ROY. However, Chet down the line and in their peaks will be the MVP of their batch. Probably the superstar in their group. BUUUUUTTTT, it is Paolo who will probably play the longest of then all.like a Melo/lbj/Horford/VC type of career where he will be near 40 and still contributing a little.

Respectfully disagree, just don't see MVP of a class or star in Chet. He's going to be really really really good, but if you think of any of this class in an NBA Finals leading its team offensively and defensively I think it's Smith-Banchero-Ivey-Holmgren (Maybe Sharpe before him too).

He will be an important player, I just don't see more than 18ppg for him, 20ppg at a push. I could be wrong though!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

That's fine... no one can see the future though. I will continue to keep saying this though, there is something with Chet that gives me the feeling he can be a star..

[Magic4champ]

This is my prediction and if realgm is still here 15yrs from now, someone can quote me on this for good or bad.

Jabari will probably produce the best in the early stages and win ROY. However, Chet down the line and in their peaks will be the MVP of their batch. Probably the superstar in their group. BUUUUUTTTT, it is Paolo who will probably play the longest of then all.like a Melo/lbj/Horford/VC type of career where he will be near 40 and still contributing a little.

Respectfully disagree, just don't see MVP of a class or star in Chet. He's going to be really really really good, but if you think of any of this class in an NBA Finals leading its team offensively and defensively I think it's Smith-Banchero-Ivey-Holmgren (Maybe Sharpe before him too).

He will be an important player, I just don't see more than 18ppg for him, 20ppg at a push. I could be wrong though!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

That's fine... no one can see the future though. I will continue to keep saying this though, there is something with Chet that gives me the feeling he can be a star..

Read on Twitter

?s=20&t=rGd89hyUs_4BIMZtiInxjg

[Magic4champ]

Respectfully disagree, just don't see MVP of a class or star in Chet. He's going to be really really really good, but if you think of any of this class in an NBA Finals leading its team offensively and defensively I think it's Smith-Banchero-Ivey-Holmgren (Maybe Sharpe before him too).

He will be an important player, I just don't see more than 18ppg for him, 20ppg at a push. I could be wrong though!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

That's fine... no one can see the future though. I will continue to keep saying this though, there is something with Chet that gives me the feeling he can be a star..

Read on Twitter

?s=20&t=rGd89hyUs_4BIMZtiInxjg

NBA teams may have to lean more on what Holmgren did before he came to Gonzaga when evaluating him. He was the MVP of the U19 world championships this past summer, leading Team USA to a gold medal in narrow wins over Canada and France. The team was stacked with future first-round picks, but there was no question about who the best player was. Holmgren, once again, was hyper-efficient within a smaller role, averaging 11.9 points on 62 percent shooting, 6.1 rebounds, 3.3 assists, and 2.7 blocks per game. Like all unselfish big men, he’s somewhat at the mercy of his guards. Holmgren had an assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.4-to-1 in the tournament. He gave up the ball but it didn’t always come back to him.

But when the gold medal was on the line, his teammates knew where to go. The U.S. was down 68-64 to France with eight minutes left in the fourth quarter when Holmgren took over. On three straight possessions, he drew consecutive fouls at the rim on Victor Wembanyama, the early front-runner to be the no. 1 pick in 2023, and scored again on a drive. When he was done, the U.S. had a lead it would never give up and Wenbanyama was on the bench in foul trouble. But describing what he did doesn’t do it justice. It has to be seen to be believed (or not to be):


It’s easy to write that off as something that won’t work in the NBA. It doesn’t look like anything we have seen before. The 7-foot guard is new in the history of basketball and Holmgren doesn’t play like the few who came before him. He doesn’t have the athleticism of Anthony Davis and Giannis Antetokounmpo or the shooting ability of Kevin Durant and Dirk Nowitzki. He’s not blowing by anyone or raining jumpers from all over the floor. What Holmgren does is more deliberate and methodical. He’s leveraging his length by getting to spots where he can score, even if he’s not getting there very fast. It doesn’t look like it should work. But it has worked—at every level that he has played so far.

That’s the difference between Holmgren and Pokusevski. No one had heard of Poku two years before he was drafted. He came out of nowhere and averaged 40 percent shooting in 12 games in a lower-level league in Greece. Holmgren has been a household name in NBA circles since he was 16. He’s as blue chip as it gets. All the pedigree in the world doesn’t mean a prospect won’t bust. But it does make it easier to believe in one without an obvious NBA comparison.

There’s not a lot of downside to Holmgren. Go back to that list of big men drafted in the top three. The only busts (Okafor and Bagley) were players who can’t defend. Holmgren is averaging 3.6 blocks per game. The even more impressive number is that he’s averaging only 2.1 fouls per game while doing that. Younger big men who block a lot of shots also tend to be the ones who commit a lot of fouls. The ability to do the former without the latter is an indication of an intelligent player who can walk the thin line between playing with aggressiveness and discipline. It’s a great sign anytime a prospect is in the same statistical company as Mobley and Anthony Davis:

Lottery Big Man Block Rates
Player Blocks Fouls Block: Foul Ratio
Anthony Davis 4.7 2 2.35
Chet Holmgren 3.6 2.1 1.71
Evan Mobley 2.9 1.8 1.61
Zion Williamson 2.1 1.8 1.17
Deandre Ayton 1.9 2.3 0.83
Karl-Anthony Towns 2.3 2.9 0.79
Joel Embiid 2.6 3.4 0.76
Jahlil Okafor 1.4 2.1 0.67
Marvin Bagley 0.9 1.8 0.67
Holmgren is so long and smart that he doesn’t need great speed. He’s the rare elite rim protector who can also survive on an island on the perimeter. There may be matchups against Goliaths like Joel Embiid and Nikola Jokic where he struggles, but he can slide over and defend smaller players in those games.

He has a high floor and an even higher ceiling. But there’s no way to know how high based on what he’s doing at Gonzaga. We are entering uncharted waters. Holmgren is a sample size of one. Just because no one has ever dominated by playing like him doesn’t mean that he can’t.

[VFX]

Is Chet any good in a half-court offense?

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

You know the answer to this question.

[KillMonger]

someone remind me, last year we worked out franz more than once correct?

[RookieStar]

someone remind me, last year we worked out franz more than once correct?

Yeah i kinda forgot. It was a defcon 1 scenario if ingot it right. All i remember he mysteriously stopped all his workouts which had everyone saying he had a promise in the lotto which everyone thought was because of SAC.

[zaymon]

Those Auburn guards had very tough time playing with first option who just wants to hold the ball and shoot.

This is opposite of a quote I've seen of an (I think) college basketball scout who said the guards he played with were the worst he could've been paired with because of how badly they shot and how greedily they played. (Particularly Green who only took 1.6 less shots a game than Jabari on horrid numbers.) Said Jabari would much rather get his offense within the flow of the game. He also said Jabari definitely took some bad shots but with the space he was given + unreliability in his guards made it so he had to try to create something out of nothing.

Blaming the potential #1 pick for extremely **** guard play is certainly.. a take.

Ehhh... I take it as apologism for Smith's shortcomings. Experience has taught me that these sorts of arguments are usually BS. Again, you can like Smith for what he is, but he was a contributing factor in Auburn's lack of ball movement at the offensive end. Everyone is blaming his guards, but college basketball is lousy with guards of that type. It's just odd to me that people have lasered in on that particular argument on behalf of Smith, because you can make the same argument for so many others as well.

I am highly critical of Cole Anthony, so I get it, but Jabari Smith Jr. needs to be judged based upon what he is, independent of the quality of the guards on his team. The hope is that Smith evolves as a player, but you can't simply assume it will happen in the absence of such guards. And if he gets drafted by Orlando, he is going to be playing with Cole Anthony anyway.

It's also a bit confounding because people are also lauding Smith for his iso potential. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Either you love him because "he can get his shot off over anyone" or you hope that he evolves as a basketball player when he gets out from playing next to a couple selfish guards.

I prefer Chet because he already knows how to play basketball. He knows when to attack and when not to. He knows a good shot from a bad one. He knows how to make the simple pass. He know when to cut and when to get out of the way. I'm not ruling out his iso potential for late clock situations, but a significant part of his appeal for me is that you don't have to feed him the ball and watch him burn clock to try to get his own shots up.

People pick their favourite prospect and just ideologize him (i do it too with Banchero, but at least i do my research). It was the same when i was against drafting Bamba. Its so easy to say "you just hate him" and so much harder to have independent opinion based on research. People just create excuses to feel better about their choice.
Why every player except Zep Jesper shot worse from 3 than year before ? Wendell Green and K.D Johnson were good shooters as freshman but bad shooters in Auburn. Is it bad luck or is it the downside of having offense created around one trick pony player ?
Why Auburn guards are pictured as selfish while Wendell Green had 36% assist rate which is the highest among Auburn, Gonzaga, Duke guards? Their 2 point attempts are not that high, its 3 point attempts that stand out. Johnson was the more selfish guard but he had 5.6 two point attempts on 46.3% while Jabari Smith had 7 two point attempts on 42.9%.
I am not saying that Jabari is the only problem but that he was part of the problem. If he could dribble and read the game better his teammates would have a better time playing with him.
Players projected to go number one should elevate their team and make everyone around them better. While Auburn guards were not the best year earlier they were even worse next to Jabari Smith this year.

[axl_c_cool]

This is my prediction and if realgm is still here 15yrs from now, someone can quote me on this for good or bad.

Jabari will probably produce the best in the early stages and win ROY. However, Chet down the line and in their peaks will be the MVP of their batch. Probably the superstar in their group. BUUUUUTTTT, it is Paolo who will probably play the longest of then all.like a Melo/lbj/Horford/VC type of career where he will be near 40 and still contributing a little.

Respectfully disagree, just don't see MVP of a class or star in Chet. He's going to be really really really good, but if you think of any of this class in an NBA Finals leading its team offensively and defensively I think it's Smith-Banchero-Ivey-Holmgren (Maybe Sharpe before him too).

He will be an important player, I just don't see more than 18ppg for him, 20ppg at a push. I could be wrong though!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

That's fine... no one can see the future though. I will continue to keep saying this though, there is something with Chet that gives me the feeling he can be a star..

100% no one can, and if we take him, I really really hope you are right. It's such a shame there is no clear generational talent in this draft

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

[axl_c_cool]

Respectfully disagree, just don't see MVP of a class or star in Chet. He's going to be really really really good, but if you think of any of this class in an NBA Finals leading its team offensively and defensively I think it's Smith-Banchero-Ivey-Holmgren (Maybe Sharpe before him too).

He will be an important player, I just don't see more than 18ppg for him, 20ppg at a push. I could be wrong though!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

That's fine... no one can see the future though. I will continue to keep saying this though, there is something with Chet that gives me the feeling he can be a star..

Read on Twitter

?s=20&t=rGd89hyUs_4BIMZtiInxjg

Great read, thank, just reaffirms me back in no idea who to take after I'd put Chet at 3!

Sent from my SM-G996B using RealGM mobile app

[basketballRob]

Chet is the same shot-blocker that Bamba was in college. Chet's block rate is 12.6% and Mo's is 13.1%. Chet gets 7.4 blocks per 100 possessions and Mo 7.3.

Their steal rates are near identical also. You could argue if Mo played in the WCC against a bunch of short players, he could've looked like Wilt Chamberlain. Timme looked like Dirk and will probably not play in the NBA.

Watch on YouTube