2020 Draft

[payitforward]

...Almost none of these GM's, or final decision makers are hall of fame players who played in the NBA so they have no idea what the true psychology is of a hall of fame player.....

Ex-NBA players don't make better GMs.

Beal is going to go down as one of the greatest Washington shooting guards ever, so i believe he has had serious input into team decisions and Beal has pretty high BBIQ.

A fair point, WD -- but the exception doesn't prove the rule. Grunfeld was a terrible GM.

[payitforward]

I think that being a HOF basketball player doesn't mean you will be a HOF GM. If you really wanted to know the ratio - you would need to do a study of HOF bball players to HOF GMs. You would need to do a similar NBA bball players to HOF GMs and non NBA bball players to HOF GMs.

And having a high BBIQ doesn't mean you would have a high GMIQ. I would listen to any player in my organization as they all could give useful input. But I wouldn't let a player steer the ship, my 1/2 cent.

The other obvious issue is that you can have an extremely high BBIQ but lack the physical talent and athleticism to be a HOF player. That doesn't mean you can't be a great GM. You shouldn't rule out the greatest basketball minds because they were unfortunate enough to be short, slow or TRex-armed.

He's talking about me, WD -- but should be "and" not "or."

[payitforward]

.

The other obvious issue is that you can have an extremely high BBIQ but lack the physical talent and athleticism to be a HOF player. That doesn't mean you can't be a great GM. You shouldn't rule out the greatest basketball minds because they were unfortunate enough to be short, slow or TRex-armed.

You need to have experience with both. Just because you see it doesn't mean you experience. I can watch Usain Bolt run the thfastest time in the world, but only he knows what it took to get his body to that point. Your thinking process is the reason we have so many underqualified GM making decisions. BBIQ is only part but knowledge from actually doing it. The memories of hardwork it took...whatever that is, you only see the shell. The person that actually did, sees 1000's of hours of experience in addition to knowing how quickly i need to move my steps in order to win the match.

so again, two way HOF guard and 2 way HOF forward. and preferably that 2 way forward is powerforward. A great basketball mind, does not have successful memories of getting his body skilled enough to become a HOF. He may have ideas, he may even have seen others achieve it--(but if this great basketball mind has never done it himself) --why should I trust his opinion over someone who put in the 1000's of hours since they were children to achieve it HOF status.

he may even know what others have told him, but he will not be relying on his experience if he has never achieved it himself. Basketball is part mind, but alot more motor skills and decades of training since you were a child. No adult has ever picked up a basketball with no experience... in the last 30 years and transformed into a HOF nba player. I am sure they were training since they were children or early teens.

So who would i trust more to train my child to become to sprint and one day reach the olympics? Usain Bolt or Usain Bolt's coach?

There is no substitution for experience in actually doing something. A great basketball mind can not pretend that it knows difference between what mechanics look like after shooting a basketball 5000 times, and 50,000 unless someone that has done it tells him. HOpefully this clears things up for you.
Case in point, when i saw bradley beal shoot his jumper with a low elbow, i knew he was going to develop knee problems from his landing because it very difficult to arch your back with a low elbow and shift your momentum backwards off your knees when you land. Your elbow knees to above your eyesocket as you are rising into your shot, ..its not to make your shot more accurate, it is so you can shift your momentum backwards after you release while still in the air and returning to the ground from your shot. You won't learn this in a video game and your coach won't teach you because he himself has bad knees and thinks that it just part of basketball to have poor landing technique. Usain Bolt's coach or Usain Bolt? and No I am not a HOF which is why i am not a GM, just a pretend one here on the website, but it's fun.

It's fun, you bet -- for you & for the rest of us. You've enlivened the discussion substantially -- thanks: you may not be a HOF player or a (potential) HOF GM, but you are a HOF poster on this Board!

That said, the fact that I can point to outstanding GMs who never played, or at least never played well (Daryl Morey & Sam Presti come to mind, indicates that it's not a requirement to become a good GM. & the matching fact -- that I can point to outstanding players who meet your criteria but have not been good GMs -- indicates that even if you have these chops you can still be a bad GM.

At the same time, of course someone who has those chops -- & also has the rest of what is needed, which is a helluva lot -- would be a great GM candidate. & having someone like that on staff would make sense for any GM!

[payitforward]

...after WizD's enthusiastic evaluation, and Dat2U's cautious optimism, I took another look (at Achiuwa). This time, I watched some video.... Man! WizD has a point about his athleticism. The guy moves extremely well and he works very hard. He just wants every ball when it comes off the rim. He has great feet to defend in space and explosive leaping ability to protect the rim. He is equally adept at jumping off one foot or two. He is also apparently ambidextrous, finishing with either hand with ease. ....

I would hope that any player who people project to go somewhere between, say, 9-15 in the draft would look extremely good in a video scouting workup (especially in the "Strengths" section, obviously). Otherwise, why would anyone project him in that range?

I would also expect that guy to have a shot at becoming a good NBA player. How not?

But, there are so many other factors that will determine a player's actual result -- Achiuwa's or anyone's -- that restricting yourself to thinking about how to use your draft assets within the narrow frame of "will X be good?" is a sub-optimal way to approach this or any draft. Just as trying to be smart enough to pick the single stock you should buy is a terrible way to approach investing.

In both cases, there is simply too much noise in the system for this approach to work out well over time. Hey, sometimes it works -- I bought Amazon at $287 a share a few years ago. It's trading today at $3176.xx. I also bought some other stocks, but I'm not going to tell you about the 3D printing company I invested in: I can't buy an hour on a parking meter with what's left of that investment!

Precious may be Amazon; he may be the 3D printing company; or, most likely, he'll wind up at some spot between those two -- a spot we absolutely cannot predict. WD can't. Zards can't. I can't. Rinse & repeat for Okongwu.

Of course, sometimes there's nothing for you to do but make that single choice. I've been happily married for going on 30 years. Of course, it's my 3d marriage....

But, if you like a few players as options to take at a certain spot, & you think you can still get one of them if you trade down a few spots, you need to be looking for that trade partner. You're going to get one of those aforementioned guys -- & another prospect as well. Precisely because of those "many other factors" I pointed to above. If you can't find one... then take your best shot, of course.

This does not work in marriage, however. I'm guessing you already knew that! In marriage, you have to go all in on a single person. You have to think you've found the one. In the draft you have to try to get that one & another one too.

[WizarDynasty]

use my eyes

[doclinkin]

Of course, sometimes there's nothing for you to do but make that single choice. I've been happily married for going on 30 years. Of course, it's my 3d marriage....

You 3D printed your wife? That's smart, you got to design her from the blueprints and coding on up. Or are you saying your previous marriages were only on paper...

[payitforward]

Of course, sometimes there's nothing for you to do but make that single choice. I've been happily married for going on 30 years. Of course, it's my 3d marriage....

You 3D printed your wife? That's smart, you got to design her from the blueprints and coding on up. Or are you saying your previous marriages were only on paper...

You clever fellow, doc...

Actually, she redesigned me rather than the reverse -- to my great good fortune!

[payitforward]

Precious may be Amazon; he may be the 3D printing company; or, most likely, he'll wind up at some spot between those two -- a spot we absolutely cannot predict. WD can't. Zards can't. I can't. Rinse & repeat for Okongwu.

The only thing that i can predict is what i see with my eyes. There are many factors that can influence a players career. A player could be a serious drug user, he can domestic violence issues, he may have an anti social personality and hate flying in planes, the psychological make up of a person and what they go through in their personal life can have a huge impact on who they are. We as pretend GM's have limited resources on what goes behind the scenes in their personal lives, their psychological make up and maturity. It's up the people who get paid millions of dollars to do the psychological testing. For instance, if John Wall likes to secretly gang bang or if Beal secretly hates playing in washington and can't wait to ditch the wizards to go live and play in LA for a huge discount. I only make analysis for what i see on the court from film session. That part I am pretty accurate at predicting.

I wouldn't compare nba players to stock. Do only part about an nba player that is unpredictable is what they do in their personal lives.
The CEO's that control stock prices secretly do things behind the scenes that they don't allow for investors to see. You can't see a if a player has serious knees issues and is trying to mask it so that they get drafted but if you are skilled, you can see when they favor their leg based on mechanical flaw in their movement.

Bradley Beal has really bad knee due to his landing mechanics, and his bad landing mechanic is due to the fact that he doesn't arch his back before he rises into shot and he doesn't cock his elbow to a 45 degree angle. that lack of motor coordination to adjust from 90 degrees has over time destroyed his landing mechanics and damaged his knee cartilage. And what leads to him having a low 90 degree elbow instead of 45 degree elbow is because he catches the ball at his waist with two hands instead of bouncing the ball so hard just before he shoots that it rises to shoulder. Rarely do you see the Beal catch his dribble bounce just before he shoots up by his chest. He has really poor hip bend when he is catching that power dribble just before he shoots. His hips are almost never bent prior to catching the dribble just before a shot. Its like a chain..that effects all of his mechanics and the end results is damaged cartilage in his knees from landing without his momentum moving backwards due to poor hip bend before rising, poor back arch, poor control over his shoulder and elbow neural pathways that allow for him to control fine movement. Now Leonsis would do well to bring in a specialist that had studied optimal mechanical movements for accuracy and career longetivity.
You can blame coaches for not teaching him landing mechanics (but coaches are paid to extend their players career--just to win), but coaches care about X and O's, not landing mechanics.
The average fan who knows nothing about basketball will have no clue what i am talking about. This " no clue" is what you describe as "absolutely cannot predict", but its actually staring you in the face and you just can't see it. If you pay very close attention to all basketball players, they are like open books, but you have to know what to look for. But if you don't know what to look for, they are not going to shout out to you, hey, pay attention to this flaw that I have. "Rinse and Repeat".

I hope to hell you are working in this field, WD -- you know a whole lot about it!

One thing is sure: you need to stick around here, so we can find out how accurate you turn out to be about Precious. Whether we take him or not, of course, I hope he turns out great -- got to want that for all these kids!

[DCZards]

Bradley Beal has really bad knee due to his landing mechanics, and his bad landing mechanic is due to the fact that he doesn't arch his back before he rises into shot and he doesn't cock his elbow to a 45 degree angle. that lack of motor coordination to adjust from 90 degrees has over time destroyed his landing mechanics and damaged his knee cartilage.

Earlier in his career, Beal was out with a bad lower right leg (I believe it was a stress fracture) and this year he missed some games with injuries to his shoulder and the same leg. BB has never been out due to knee problems. So I'm not sure how you've come to the conclusion that he has a "really bad knee."

[WizarDynasty]

Precious may be Amazon; he may be the 3D printing company; or, most likely, he'll wind up at some spot between those two -- a spot we absolutely cannot predict. WD can't. Zards can't. I can't. Rinse & repeat for Okongwu.

The only thing that i can predict is what i see with my eyes. There are many factors that can influence a players career. A player could be a serious drug user, he can domestic violence issues, he may have an anti social personality and hate flying in planes, the psychological make up of a person and what they go through in their personal life can have a huge impact on who they are. We as pretend GM's have limited resources on what goes behind the scenes in their personal lives, their psychological make up and maturity. It's up the people who get paid millions of dollars to do the psychological testing. For instance, if John Wall likes to secretly gang bang or if Beal secretly hates playing in washington and can't wait to ditch the wizards to go live and play in LA for a huge discount. I only make analysis for what i see on the court from film session. That part I am pretty accurate at predicting.

I wouldn't compare nba players to stock. Do only part about an nba player that is unpredictable is what they do in their personal lives.
The CEO's that control stock prices secretly do things behind the scenes that they don't allow for investors to see. You can't see a if a player has serious knees issues and is trying to mask it so that they get drafted but if you are skilled, you can see when they favor their leg based on mechanical flaw in their movement.

Bradley Beal has really bad knee due to his landing mechanics, and his bad landing mechanic is due to the fact that he doesn't arch his back before he rises into shot and he doesn't cock his elbow to a 45 degree angle. that lack of motor coordination to adjust from 90 degrees has over time destroyed his landing mechanics and damaged his knee cartilage. And what leads to him having a low 90 degree elbow instead of 45 degree elbow is because he catches the ball at his waist with two hands instead of bouncing the ball so hard just before he shoots that it rises to shoulder. Rarely do you see the Beal catch his dribble bounce just before he shoots up by his chest. He has really poor hip bend when he is catching that power dribble just before he shoots. His hips are almost never bent prior to catching the dribble just before a shot. Its like a chain..that effects all of his mechanics and the end results is damaged cartilage in his knees from landing without his momentum moving backwards due to poor hip bend before rising, poor back arch, poor control over his shoulder and elbow neural pathways that allow for him to control fine movement. Now Leonsis would do well to bring in a specialist that had studied optimal mechanical movements for accuracy and career longetivity.
You can blame coaches for not teaching him landing mechanics (but coaches are paid to extend their players career--just to win), but coaches care about X and O's, not landing mechanics.
The average fan who knows nothing about basketball will have no clue what i am talking about. This " no clue" is what you describe as "absolutely cannot predict", but its actually staring you in the face and you just can't see it. If you pay very close attention to all basketball players, they are like open books, but you have to know what to look for. But if you don't know what to look for, they are not going to shout out to you, hey, pay attention to this flaw that I have. "Rinse and Repeat".

I hope to hell you are working in this field, WD -- you know a whole lot about it!

One thing is sure: you need to stick around here, so we can find out how accurate you turn out to be about Precious. Whether we take him or not, of course, I hope he turns out great -- got to want that for all these kids!

I wanted steven adams over otto porter. I wanted Harrison Barnes over bradley beal. Rui fell to us but that's who i wanted. last 2 years we basically had no draft picks and picking in mid to late teens in weak drafts. This draft is pretty good compared to the last 2 years.

[Dat2U]

Ok I'm down to R.J. Hampton, Precious Achiuwa & Aaron Nesmith at 9 unless someone falls like Haliburton or Okongwu. I'd probably take Wiseman as well if he slipped and bet on the upside.

After Ball, Hayes & Haliburton, Hampton is the most intriguing guard left in a guard heavy draft. It looks like he really cleaned up his jumper during the downtime. With his explosiveness handle & size, a reliable jumper makes him a real weapon. Achiuwa as we've talked about has the defensive upside were looking for as a rim protector who can switch on P&Rs. That and the work ethic to match. He just needs coaching (gulp) and structure.

Nesmith is still the best pure shooter in the draft based on what I've scouted. Even tho he doesn't project as a plus defender you can never have enough shooting. Unless he loses his jumper he's a safe pick.

I would pass on pass on Edwards, Toppin, Vassell & Okoro. Edwards due to concerns about work ethic, doing his own thing at UGA. Not knowing plays. Toppin due to narrow stiff hips and his inability to move laterally on defense. Who does he defend? Vassell over concerns with his frame, shot creation, passivity. Okoro over concerns with his shooting. It needs alot of work. I see limited value in a non-shooting wing.

[payitforward]

wow... I just realized -- instead of being something we just talk about for months on end, the draft is actually going to happen in 4 weeks.

I won't believe it until I actually see it!

[WizarDynasty]

alot of good options

[payitforward]

Most recent CBS mock draft -- best thing about it is that Okongwu falls to us (current board fave Precious goes at #11.

https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/2020-nba-mock-draft-lamelo-ball-jumps-up-to-no-1-selection-by-the-timberwolves-in-first-two-round-mock/

This mock puts a huge amount of value far down in R2, IMO -- Otoru, Pritchard, T. Bey, all go in the 40s, & Paul Reed drops to #50.

[payitforward]

bleacher report mock: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2914096-2020-nba-mock-draft-3-trades-that-would-turn-the-lottery-upside-down

[payitforward]

Ok I'm down to R.J. Hampton, Precious Achiuwa & Aaron Nesmith at 9 unless someone falls like Haliburton or Okongwu....

If you have these guys equal, then it would make sense to trade down a few spots & pick up a late R1 pick: if we traded with Boston, the chances would be very good that one of those guys would still be on the board -- more likely 2, & maybe even all 3 of them.

WD likes Jahm'ius Ramsey as a late R1 pick, & he is almost certain to be there -- so we could get him at that point. Tillman would be another choice, as would Tyler Bey.

[payitforward]

A guy that I really like that I wish we had another first round pick for is Jahmi'us Ramsey. That guy would be really beneficial and enjoyable to watch. We keep our 9th overall grab precious, and then trade one our young assets for a late first rounder and gab Ramsey. That would give us a great pop.

CBS mock has him on the board at #37, & we pick him there.

As to trading "one of our young assets" for a late R1 pick... if you mean Moritz Wagner or Jerome Robinson, sure -- but no one would give us that much for either of them. I'm not sure anyone would give us a R2 pick for Wagner, & I'm sure they would not give us one, not even in the 50s, for Jerome Robinson.

If you mean Brown, Bonga or Bryant... I'd call that a terrible idea.

[Ruzious]

Robinson's value is that he could serve as filler in a trade - which seems like nothing but could actually make the difference in being able to make a trade.

[WizarDynasty]

A guy that I really like that I wish we had another first round pick for is Jahmi'us Ramsey. That guy would be really beneficial and enjoyable to watch. We keep our 9th overall grab precious, and then trade one our young assets for a late first rounder and gab Ramsey. That would give us a great pop.

CBS mock has him on the board at #37, & we pick him there.

As to trading "one of our young assets" for a late R1 pick... if you mean Moritz Wagner or Jerome Robinson, sure -- but no one would give us that much for either of them. I'm not sure anyone would give us a R2 pick for Wagner, & I'm sure they would not give us one, not even in the 50s, for Jerome Robinson.

If you mean Brown, Bonga or Bryant... I'd call that a terrible idea.

He is definitely not making it to #37, he will be gone by pick 24, you can bet on that but if wizards have a way to grab another pick that's where you aim at.

[payitforward]

Robinson's value is that he could serve as filler in a trade - which seems like nothing but could actually make the difference in being able to make a trade.

Yes, absolutely. But, if his team took IT for him straight up, then waived IT, that tells you they put a value of zero on his abilities as a player. OTOH, in fairness, he played a little better for us than he did for the Clippers.