I_Like_Dirt wrote:queridiculo wrote:Quite a bit of conjecture there.
Turning down a call isn't quite the same as declining to be drafted.
There's very little Robinson could have done if a team called his name irrespective of his availability.
It depends a bit. I don't know the details of what happened with any specific player but my understanding is that a lot of these 2nd rounders aren't so much declining to be drafted but declining to go unsigned as a draftee. Lots of teams are looking for 2nd rounders to sign 2-way contracts or be stashed somewhere or something like that. If a player refuses those kinds of contracts, the NBA team is required to offer at least an NG one-year minimum contract to any draft pick, including 2nd rounders. If the player in question signs that, the NBA team is stuck either keeping that player on their roster for the year or cutting them and allowing them to become UFAs which is effectively the same result as going undrafted and the team wasting their pick entirely.
Guys that are "refusing to be drafted" tend to be guys who are refusing to be drafted and go unsigned by the team that drafts them. Then the team has to make the choice of drafting the player and actually rostering them and paying them an NBA salary or drafting a different player.
My understanding is that Fred VanVleet was one such player who had teams who would have drafted him had he been amenable to being stashed somewhere but he wanted an NBA contract so nobody drafted him, the Raptors gave him one and it worked out for him. It won't work out for every player but it does make sense, particularly for players who aren't on the best of financial grounds and are facing a dramatic disparity in pay between the NBA, even on just a partial guarantee, and the alternatives. It seems like the Raptors just did something similar with Terence Davis in this draft, too. Just as the Spurs took full advantage of the draft and stash formula, the Raptors seem to have moved onto a new draft inefficiency. You still have to be able to scout well and develop players to make it work but I'd imagine we're going to start seeing more teams looking at such players. The Rockets and Celtics have already been doing variations of the same thing as the Raptors, just less effectively.
Queridiculo is correct all the same. If a team had wanted Robinson, & if they did have room for him on their regular roster, he'd have had no leverage of any kind. You can turn down the contract they offer you, but it doesn't make you a FA. They own your NBA rights.
Since we can assume Robinson's deal w/ the Wizards was worked out w/ his agent pre-draft, & since it is only partially guaranteed, I think we can also assume that if another team had called his agent & said, "we're taking you, & we'll give a fully-guaranteed NBA contract," he would be on that other team. Nobody turns down guaranteed $$ b/c he likes the Wizards.
Hence, I think we can conclude that there was no other call of that nature.