2025 Draft Thread - Part 4

[The Consiglieri]

The big Johnson guys were Dat and I. Dat has been on him all season. We're also the posters with the biggest johnsons so do with that what you will

Dat hardly mentioned Tre while he was playing. I don't think Dat was watching the games as they happened. The first time I saw Dat mention him he was questioning Tre's ability to get separation off the dribble.

It was really in the last two months that Dat got on the Tre bandwagon.

I was posting about Tre's games as they happened and the board's general response seemed to be pretty muted.

If he hits as big as you think he will, I will 1000% eat crow on my non-caveat'ed takes. You were 1000% the biggest Tre booster, and obviously so, there's no question about it.

The only thing I wonder right now, is whether a bit of my vague coming round, is just the typical "post draft cope," that always happens or nearly always (I don't think anyone came around on Johnny Davis, or Arvis Hayes or Ared Jeffries, I think most hated Vesely although I think few assumed he'd be totally and utterly useless, and not just disappointing), so I'm kind of metacognitioning my own reactions, from irate frustration draft night, to settling into a vague acceptance now and I think what helps me settle into vague acceptance would be...:

1.Some highly respected analysts, really all of the non-analytics guys, had Tre as the best option after the big 4, and at least one of them lifted him into the top 3 by the end of the process.

2. The reports that he's a big time worker, first in, last out type, (and the lack of stinky press, and stupid quotes from him)

3. He was a consensus top 4-6 recruit from literally every site I came across rating high school recruits, underlining that he was either of a tier with Harper and VJ, and behind Bailey and Flagg, or the top of the next tier after the four of them.

4. Bailey just doing an unbelievable job of tanking his draft stock, and his reputation due to his performance in the interviews/workout portion of the draft performances, and even the post draft performance.

It's very difficult to compare Bailey's supposed approach in '24-'25 as a college player and in '25 as a prospect, and Tre Johnsons and fail to think that Tre at least between the ears (and honestly his jumper too) understand's what it takes to be a professional and pursue greatness far more than Ace does.


In fairness, I look at Bailey's high school cv, which is just beautiful, from extra curricular, to GPA, to performance, and not think this will all blow over quick, otoh, what kind of person hires a team this colossally moronic and self-defeating, and handles the process this badly? It makes me think that the high school CV, was just creating a nice gloss that didn't reflect the guy. I can't in the end believe that, but what's happened the last month is so bad, it's difficult to find comparisons historically. Like, the Commanders just brought in a guy who dropped like a rock on draft day 7 or 8 years ago because a guy tried to extort him so he wouldn't release to media a picture of him gas masking weed, but that's still, nothing compared to the past month of Bailey hiring an ex-murderous drug dealer, and a bunch of --- clowns to torpedo his draft stock supposedly so he could engineer his landing spot, give an unbelievably bad interview for a story, and then handle the post draft process this badly to insure the stink remained....it's insane...I can remember guys that got hammered by rumors of drugs like Dan Marino and Warren Sapp, and dropped because of it, but this scale of stupidity is just unparalleled for me, I'm sure I'm forgetting someone, but none come to mind.

So I sit here, wondering if it's all about cope, that part of me is relieved we got Tre, or is it just the reality that I do understand like you guys, that what is in the ears, and in the chest is as important and to some degree moreso, than athletic profile and skills, once you reach a level like both Tre and Bailey clearly reached as teenagers. Tre clearly at least sounds like he gets it, and is a worker naturally, Ace clearly sounds like he's a mess and doesn't entirely get it....will be interesting to see how this looks 2,3,4,5 years later. The Ball family now, is the only thing that really reminds me at all of this, and they were clean (so is Bailey, but not his team)....

[The Consiglieri]

Well, lol, they drafted the one guy you wanted above all others, and believed would be the absolute best option possible if we fell to 5 or 6 lol, so of course you don't want to be bothered with Ace talk lol, you got your guy. I most definitely did not get my guy, and now I'm left with praying non-stop that guys like you are right about Tre, and suddenly, mysteriously, he will start caring about things he's literally never given 2 ----'s about his entire prospect/recruit based career.

That bottom line doesn't work. We'll always know we could have potentially traded up, we could have lost that final game of the season, we could have not won 3x as many games as Utah the final 3rd of the season. Instead, exactly what I predicted (a player having a 50% chance of falling out of a draft with a big 4, to 5) happened, and we blew it and a consensus #2 overall recruit and top 4 prospect in a perceived 4 player draft was picked 1 selection in front of us after falling.

You don’t know enough about Tre Johnson to determine what he does or does not give “2 ——-‘s” about. Your awareness of what he cares about is superficial at best.

Some of y’all need to stop judging these young men’s character as if you personally know them.

And what is this stuff about this being a 4 player draft? I’ll give you Flagg and Bailey, but after that Johnson has just as good a chance as anybody of being the third best player from this week’s draft.

#1: It's reflected in the scouting reports, so yeah, I do know, and even if you don't believe me, our own F.O. has alluded SPECIFICALLY TO IT, so yeah, I do know what I'm talking about.

#2: You could read our boards, or you could read every single thing written about this class for the last 2 years. The view going into the college season was this draft at the top was:

Tier 1:
#1 Flagg-A tier unto himself.

Tier 2:
#2 Bailey-A tier just below flag and above the other two.

Tier 3:
3. VJ Edgcombe
3B. Dylan Harper

This was the consensus literally everywhere, just like next year has been a consensus Dybantas or Peterson #1 and #1B (it was Dybantsa, but Peterson passed him for now), followed by Boozer, and then followed by Ament who raced from a separate tier into the big 3 as a 4th top end prospect. For now, the '26 class has a big 4 too, college will decide how that evolves.....

Now the college season of generally 30ish games of sample size data reorganized the big 4:
Harper flew up from basically tied with Edgecomb to #2 overall on just about every board.
Bailey's erratic season caused him to fall behind Harper and Edge.
Edge held firm at #3, and passed Bailey to boot due to Bailey's fall.


That's how this class was viewed from '23-'24 in high school, through the new data that came from the '24-'25 season. The draft process, from the lottery which dramatically changed what the teams at the top would prioritize, to the meetings/tape scouting, to the combine, to the interview and workout process, caused Bailey to fall even further, seemingly by design (probably would have landed at 6 if Utah hadn't brought in Ainge as their GM).


FTR, I am balancing when I think about Tre, how he performed in interviews, and the seeming information from background checks, with the actual scouting reports on his defense, on his finishing, on his consistency (takes plays off enough to cause Dawkins to confront him about it and gauge his response) and trying to figure out if the new information tells us that Johnson's mentality (multiple reports that he's a hard worker, and a first in last out type) will cause him to seriously work on these areas, or if the fact that he didn't in high school or college, suggests that he's just this player (as one coach or scout suggested in the athletic breakdown from Aldridge) and this is who he will always be.

To show and illustrate that I'm actually more serious and considered then you seem to think I am, let me add something I don't think anybody has mentioned in their critiques or supporting write ups on Tre.....

Nobody is considering what the coaches there actually wanted him to do? Did they think the best value they could get out of Tre was simply keeping him out of the finishing inside business, and focusing on his jumper and 3 pt threat? The fact that he was so ridiculously good at it, suggests an efficiency that Texas wasn't about to say no to right? So maybe the fact that he didn't go inside much at all was partly simply by design? I can't use as a way to talk up his defending, but it certainly could be an argument, if true, for why his finishing game was so Bub-like.

We'll see. As I've suggested in prior posts, I'm equivocal on this prospect, much like Bailey, I am having a hard time figuring out how to feel with how this went, but Tre is making me feel far more sanguine about his future prospects compared to Bailey whose made a mess of everything, deliberately or not.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

I wonder if Bailey is the type of guy who won’t get his sh*t together until he is on his second contract. Kinda like Zach Randolph or Andrew Wiggins.

Nah, I totally disagree.

Zach Randolph punched out a teammate in practice early in his career.

I met Zach Randolph the same day I met Kwame Brown at Pete Newell's Big Man Camp. Each had finished their rookie seasons.

I talked to Zach. He listened. I dont think he said a word, but he listened attentively.

I told him, "i believe you're going to be an All-Star one day."

nare35, it took a few years, and for a trade Memphis. It also to management smarter than Ernie Grunfeld. Zach was still a rascal. The Grizzlies made his weapon issue go away. (My parents were both born there. I get why people feel they need to carry). That said, Zebo was a crowd pleaser. His second contract did, in fact, prove better. Doesn't it make sense?

The group think, en vogue trend is to draft 18-year-olds and to hope the embryos turn into the next Kobe, KG, or Giannis. Some guys take longer.

Ace Bailey in MJ's era would have played two or three, even four years of college. Now, the money is too great to wait for mental/emotional maturity.

I don't follow. What do you disagree about? You just explained how Zach had some problems early in his career but then righted the ship later on. Are you saying you don't think Ace will do that? Is that because you think Ace will be okay from Day 1? Or do you think Ace will just never figure it out?

I think Zach was good from day one as a player. His team was a mess. He had Michigan State NCAA Championship coaching. He had toughness

Bailey is different. He's light in the cakes. He is probably light upstairs.

BELOW IS A LINK revealing the culture of Zach Randolph's Portland locker room.

https://www.basketballnetwork.net/latest-news/zach-randolph-tells-side-of-story-on-infamous-fight-with-teammate-ruben-patterson

[tontoz]

There is no illegal D in college. When Tre drove to the basket most of the time he wasn't trying to beat one guy, but two or 3.

One interesting criticism I heard about Tre on the hoops tonight podcast was that he plays too fast. He isn't patient inside which leads to taking shots off balance. He doesn't do a good job playing off two feet and getting the D off balance, something coaching should help.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

The big Johnson guys were Dat and I. Dat has been on him all season. We're also the posters with the biggest johnsons so do with that what you will

It’s hard to remember you were a Tre guy when 90% of your posts were about DDQ

We shouldn't be obsessing so much about Ace. Bottom line is that he wasn't on the board when we picked.

The important issue is whether we picked the best guy available and I think we did.

Obsessing about, who?

[doclinkin]

In my talent evaluation I always have the caveat in mind of “on this team”. That is, I think if we drafted Ace then he woulda been better than he will be elsewhere. Likewise Maluach. Etc.

Tre will do here what he’d do anywhere else. That is: he will score efficiently from outside. Off the dribble or off ball.

On this team he’s a younger longer Jordan Poole. But better by comparison since his trigger is quicker without the “lookitme dribble”showboating tendencies. We will see a slight uptick in assists.

The swing skills for Tre are passing and defense.

I expect in college both deficiencies relate somewhat to role and usage. Tre coasted on defense because he carried his team at the other end with a 30% usage rate on offense. Likewise he didn’t pass much since his team needed him gunning.

At the next level he will be challenged to improve. If he’s as serious and focused as he comes off then he will get better under this team’s development program. Coach BK emphasizes defense above all. And really it seems allows the players to carry their own offense. Make decisions without sets and input. Both those aspects are a good fit for Tre. He’s an instinctive scorer. On and off the ball. Sees the court quickly. With chemistry that should translate to playmaking. On defense though he will be held to a standard. We have enough guards and wings that a player can be subbed in and out to be given instruction on D. With guys like Smart there to help even if the coaches are occupied.

I expect Tre’s defense will only be limited by his strength and reps. A slim kid I get the sense he avoided mixing it up at both ends to avoid getting bounced around. If we can thicken him up and develop his core strength he may find he likes the challenge.

Same way, as with Bub I’m not really anxious about Tre scoring on the inside. As he gets bigger and stronger he may develop that skill, but his best utility is as a floor spacer and a “chase me” motion guy to drag the defense around.

Ok we don’t have inside scorers. We will have to get those guys later. Or literally grow them out of our Frenchmen. Meanwhile we are relying on motion and smarts and shooting. In that respect Tre makes us better by maintaining the shooting part that we lose in shipping Poole, with at least the hope of better defense over time.

So yeah. We picked up a shooter. We still need the rest of a team. Especially a franchise player. Nothing new. We knew that once we dropped in the lotto. This crew is still fun to watch develop. For me anyway.

[payitforward]

Well, lol, they drafted the one guy you wanted above all others, and believed would be the absolute best option possible if we fell to 5 or 6 lol, so of course you don't want to be bothered with Ace talk lol, you got your guy. I most definitely did not get my guy, and now I'm left with praying non-stop that guys like you are right about Tre, and suddenly, mysteriously, he will start caring about things he's literally never given 2 ----'s about his entire prospect/recruit based career.

That bottom line doesn't work. We'll always know we could have potentially traded up, we could have lost that final game of the season, we could have not won 3x as many games as Utah the final 3rd of the season. Instead, exactly what I predicted (a player having a 50% chance of falling out of a draft with a big 4, to 5) happened, and we blew it and a consensus #2 overall recruit and top 4 prospect in a perceived 4 player draft was picked 1 selection in front of us after falling.

You don’t know enough about Tre Johnson to determine what he does or does not give “2 ——-‘s” about. Your awareness of what he cares about is superficial at best.

Some of y’all need to stop judging these young men’s character as if you personally know them.

And what is this stuff about this being a 4 player draft? I’ll give you Flagg and Bailey, but after that Johnson has just as good a chance as anybody of being the third best player from this week’s draft.

I'm with my man Zards. Every one of these kids is imperfect. every one of them has plenty to work on. and so do the other kids, the ones drafted by other teams.

But they all bring plenty to the process.

I'm not interested in focusing on whom we didn't get. there is plenty to think about in the 3 picks we cam away with and the Pierre kid we also added.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

So as easy as it was to move up in the draft I'm surprised we didn't try? I wonder if we didn't like any of those second round bigs and we took the guy we wanted?

Sent from my SM-S926U1 using RealGM mobile app

It wasn’t easy at all to move up in the draft. Teams were extracting massive compensation to trade down a few spots.

Atlanta got an unprotected FRP from New Orleans to drop from 13 to 22. We got 3 SRPs to drop from 18 to 21.

Charlotte was surely asking a massive price from us to move up from 6 to 4. We ultimately declined.

I would argue the consensus around the league, and around insiders was that Atlanta didn't get market rate, but rather swindled the ever living ---- out of a truly moronic front office. That doesn't sound like the going rate, it sounds like someone got the dime store version of Docic'd. The Pelican FO were absolute drooling imbeciles.

How's Troy Weaver done in the past?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troy_Weaver#:~:text=Troy%20Weaver%20(born%20March%201,National%20Basketball%20Association%20(NBA).&text=Washington%2C%20D.C.&text=(Washington%2C%20D.C.)

I'm wondering when he became an imbecile.

https://www.mlive.com/pistons/2020/06/five-things-to-know-about-new-pistons-gm-troy-weaver.html

Coached DC Assault to 85-17.

578-434 with OKC 11 years, 9 playoffs.
He picked Russ 4th (Ahead of Kevin Love).

Made 11 playoffs, 4 WCFs, 1 NBA Finals (2013) against prime LeBron

Weaver recruited Caemelo Anthony to Syracuse.
He guided Utah to draft Paul Millsap.

WINGER AND DAWKINS respect Troy Weaver.

https://www.hoopsrumors.com/2024/06/troy-weaver-to-join-wizards-as-senior-advisor.html


When Pistons owner Tom Gores named Trajan Langdon President of Basketball Operations, both GM Troy and Coach Monty were let go. The Pistons had gone a Wizards-like 74-244 since 2020 under Weaver.

He got fired just as the Pistons tank ended, and the team went to the playoffs.


TRULY MORONIC FRONT OFFICE?

I doubt it. Nobody believed me when I said Millsap is a lottery talent.

Queen and Zion will dominate. The last time Weaver recruited a Baltimore guy, Carmelo soon won a natty.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

The big Johnson guys were Dat and I. Dat has been on him all season. We're also the posters with the biggest johnsons so do with that what you will

I'm very modest.

I got ex-wives. Fifty-four years. 3x18. Child support.

Whatever I got (I can not share NDA stories) a few actresses have smiled.

AND MY NAME IS HOLMES!

My dad's brother, Uncle Johnny. John Holmes. You can not make this up.

P.S. I think my second ex found a "bigger, better, d(eal)."

If I was all that I wouldn't be celibate for so long ...

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

The big Johnson guys were Dat and I. Dat has been on him all season. We're also the posters with the biggest johnsons so do with that what you will

It’s hard to remember you were a Tre guy when 90% of your posts were about DDQ

I was a Tre at 6 DDQ at 12 via trade guy. I love Tre but his pockets aren't fatter than Dairy Queen and he doesn't turn the low post to a scary scene. But his 3 ball is very mean.

Too bad Isaac Hayes is not alive to record that.

[DCZards]

#1: It's reflected in the scouting reports, so yeah, I do know, and even if you don't believe me, our own F.O. has alluded SPECIFICALLY TO IT, so yeah, I do know what I'm talking about.

#2: You could read our boards, or you could read every single thing written about this class for the last 2 years. The view going into the college season was this draft at the top was:

Tier 1:
#1 Flagg-A tier unto himself.

Tier 2:
#2 Bailey-A tier just below flag and above the other two.

Tier 3:
3. VJ Edgcombe
3B. Dylan Harper

This was the consensus literally everywhere, just like next year has been a consensus Dybantas or Peterson #1 and #1B (it was Dybantsa, but Peterson passed him for now), followed by Boozer, and then followed by Ament who raced from a separate tier into the big 3 as a 4th top end prospect. For now, the '26 class has a big 4 too, college will decide how that evolves.....

Now the college season of generally 30ish games of sample size data reorganized the big 4:
Harper flew up from basically tied with Edgecomb to #2 overall on just about every board.
Bailey's erratic season caused him to fall behind Harper and Edge.
Edge held firm at #3, and passed Bailey to boot due to Bailey's fall.

That's how this class was viewed from '23-'24 in high school, through the new data that came from the '24-'25 season. The draft process, from the lottery which dramatically changed what the teams at the top would prioritize, to the meetings/tape scouting, to the combine, to the interview and workout process, caused Bailey to fall even further, seemingly by design (probably would have landed at 6 if Utah hadn't brought in Ainge as their GM.

Personally, I don’t pay a lot of attention to what a bball player did in high school or where they were ranked in h.s., especially since there is so much variance in the level of competition at the h.s. level.

I focus more on what a one-and-done player did in college. In Tre Johnson I see someone who led the top conference in college bball in scoring as a 18 yr old freshman. I also see a versatile scorer who shot almost 40% on 3s and 87% from the FT line.

I also see a young man with great size (6-6 in shoes) for a SG, and a 6-10 wingspan.

There are no doubt holes in Tre’s game, including his defense, ability to get to the rim, and him taking plays off…and it’s perfectly fine to point those things out.

But the kid’s upside is immense and, if his work ethic is as legit as has been reported, we got ourselves a good—if not a great—one, imo.

[AFM]

It’s hard to remember you were a Tre guy when 90% of your posts were about DDQ

I was a Tre at 6 DDQ at 12 via trade guy. I love Tre but his pockets aren't fatter than Dairy Queen and he doesn't turn the low post to a scary scene. But his 3 ball is very mean.

Too bad Isaac Hayes is not alive to record that.

Someone on the general board said it sounded more like Kool G Rap.

Watch on YouTube

[Silvie Lysandra]

TRULY MORONIC FRONT OFFICE?

I doubt it. Nobody believed me when I said Millsap is a lottery talent.

Queen and Zion will dominate. The last time Weaver recruited a Baltimore guy, Carmelo soon won a natty.

The problem is that Queen is a rookie, Zion has missed over half the games he could have theoretically played (missed 52/80 games last year, and has been credibly accused of rape), and don't have a great team outside them (and what if Poole goes back to bad Poole while eating up a ton of minutes for them?). If Queen ends up as Jokic 2.0 or even Sabonis 2.0, none of this will matter, that's better than what they'd likely get with next year's pick (they're more like a play-in team than a lottery team despite their record this year) and clearly that's what they're banking on, but it's a *huge* gamble. A much bigger one than tearing the team down to the studs and resetting for when the Clippers fall apart, Randle and Gobert really start their decline phase without being able to retool around Ant and Jaden, when Jokic finally walks (I don't think he'll be a Nugget for life), etc etc.

[PaulinVA]

"Sorry to drive the truck over the Pels again, but give me one more second here. Look, we’ll see if Derik Queen becomes a player. But in terms of asset value, New Orleans trading a likely future lottery pick to Atlanta for the right to move up from 23 to 13 might be the single worst draft move I’ve seen in (redacted) years of doing this. Your odds of winning that swap are small, and the risk of losing it massively is significant.

At this late hour, only two other historically bad “worst asset move” contenders come to mind. The first is the Clippers trading out of the second pick and Antonio McDyess in 1995 to move down to 15th, so they could add Rodney Rogers. The second is the Wizards trading the sixth pick in the 2009 draft to Minnesota for Mike Miller and Randy Foye instead of, say, drafting Steph Curry..."

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6455565/2025/06/27/2025-nba-draft-pelicans-yang-hansen-nets/?source=athletic_freeweeklyemail&campaign=602288&userId=7030725

[The Consiglieri]

There is no illegal D in college. When Tre drove to the basket most of the time he wasn't trying to beat one guy, but two or 3.

One interesting criticism I heard about Tre on the hoops tonight podcast was that he plays too fast. He isn't patient inside which leads to taking shots off balance. He doesn't do a good job playing off two feet and getting the D off balance, something coaching should help.

+1

[AFM]

Yeah I hate that trade for Queen and he’s my guy. You’re basically trading a top 5 pick next year for him. Makes zero sense unless NO believes they’re a playoff team next year. I think their front office is off that same ganja lil Wayne is smoking down there.

[The Consiglieri]

#1: It's reflected in the scouting reports, so yeah, I do know, and even if you don't believe me, our own F.O. has alluded SPECIFICALLY TO IT, so yeah, I do know what I'm talking about.

#2: You could read our boards, or you could read every single thing written about this class for the last 2 years. The view going into the college season was this draft at the top was:

Tier 1:
#1 Flagg-A tier unto himself.

Tier 2:
#2 Bailey-A tier just below flag and above the other two.

Tier 3:
3. VJ Edgcombe
3B. Dylan Harper

This was the consensus literally everywhere, just like next year has been a consensus Dybantas or Peterson #1 and #1B (it was Dybantsa, but Peterson passed him for now), followed by Boozer, and then followed by Ament who raced from a separate tier into the big 3 as a 4th top end prospect. For now, the '26 class has a big 4 too, college will decide how that evolves.....

Now the college season of generally 30ish games of sample size data reorganized the big 4:
Harper flew up from basically tied with Edgecomb to #2 overall on just about every board.
Bailey's erratic season caused him to fall behind Harper and Edge.
Edge held firm at #3, and passed Bailey to boot due to Bailey's fall.

That's how this class was viewed from '23-'24 in high school, through the new data that came from the '24-'25 season. The draft process, from the lottery which dramatically changed what the teams at the top would prioritize, to the meetings/tape scouting, to the combine, to the interview and workout process, caused Bailey to fall even further, seemingly by design (probably would have landed at 6 if Utah hadn't brought in Ainge as their GM.

Personally, I don’t pay a lot of attention to what a bball player did in high school or where they were ranked in h.s., especially since there is so much variance in the level of competition at the h.s. level.

I focus more on what a one-and-done player did in college. In Tre Johnson I see someone who led the top conference in college bball in scoring as a 18 yr old freshman. I also see a versatile scorer who shot almost 40% on 3s and 87% from the FT line.

I also see a young man with great size (6-6 in shoes) for a SG, and a 6-10 wingspan.

There are no doubt holes in Tre’s game, including his defense, ability to get to the rim, and him taking plays off…and it’s perfectly fine to point those thing out.

But the kid’s upside is immense and, if his work ethic is as legit as has been reported, we got ourselves a good—if not a great—one, imo.

I only started paying attention to high school status with this draft and part of the reason was the unusually high hit rate of highly rated recruits, and them being legit mega prospects for the NBA too. I mean, they were like for like, all of the top 5, ended up being the top 6 in the draft. I don't think that's typical. If you get into a top 30, there are a bizillion either misses, or players that were gonna take time to develop or just went to the wrong schools etc, but one of the reasons I just decided after 37 years of watching this, to actually research recruiting status was the fact that our new FO is so fixated on 18-19-20 year olds with top draft picks, and young prospects acquired through trades. The FSU guy is really the first old guy they've drafted or traded for in 3 offseasons.

So I figured, finding out what they looked like to recruiters based on their high school recruit rankings would provide additional sample size.
Flagg was 1 and 1
Harper 3 and 2
VJ was 4 and 3
Bailey was 2 and 5
Tre Johnson was 5 and 6 etc.

The fact that Tre didn't miss a beat between high school and college is both consoling, and a little more worrisome, but I like some of the posts above me looking into why some issues were present at Texas, I find them if not 100% persuasive, at bare minimum, fascinating to look into and consider. It's going to be really interesting watching how this team evolves. I'm a bit worried because we solved a couple of our major issues if Riley and Tre hit like so many think they will (Riley was 12th for high school and 21st for the draft, a fast climber example would be Carter Bryant, who flew up boards from the 20's-30's as a high schooler to a top 10ish expectation going into the draft). I do wonder a little if they put big man on the back burner because solving that like they potentially did shooting with this class, might make us jump like Portland did with Deni. Hopefully we see a lot of improvement from our kiddos and draftees, but slow improvement if any in win total, next year's draft is the linchpin, if we don't get a grand slam/home run with that class, it will take until '28 or longer to turn this ship around and avoid becoming a 30-40 win team like we have been most of the time since 1980 when we aren't even worse.

[AFM]

Who cares? Shabazz Muhammad was the top HS recruit for years. Is Seventh Woods in the NBA?

[AFM]

Watch on YouTube

[dobrojim]

Well, lol, they drafted the one guy you wanted above all others, and believed would be the absolute best option possible if we fell to 5 or 6 lol, so of course you don't want to be bothered with Ace talk lol, you got your guy. I most definitely did not get my guy, and now I'm left with praying non-stop that guys like you are right about Tre, and suddenly, mysteriously, he will start caring about things he's literally never given 2 ----'s about his entire prospect/recruit based career.

That bottom line doesn't work. We'll always know we could have potentially traded up, we could have lost that final game of the season, we could have not won 3x as many games as Utah the final 3rd of the season. Instead, exactly what I predicted (a player having a 50% chance of falling out of a draft with a big 4, to 5) happened, and we blew it and a consensus #2 overall recruit and top 4 prospect in a perceived 4 player draft was picked 1 selection in front of us after falling.

You don’t know enough about Tre Johnson to determine what he does or does not give “2 ——-‘s” about. Your awareness of what he cares about is superficial at best.

Some of y’all need to stop judging these young men’s character as if you personally know them.

And what is this stuff about this being a 4 player draft? I’ll give you Flagg and Bailey, but after that Johnson has just as good a chance as anybody of being the third best player from this week’s draft.

I'm not sure you should stop there. Yes we all know
Flagg and Harper were rated highest. But we also
know from history that draft position ain't no
guarantee of nothing. Would I bet on it? No. Would
I be shocked if it turned out differently? Not at all.

We won't know until we know.

Re who was high on which player...I won't try to say
I was on Tre's bandwagon except that like a bunch of
players, he was one I was intrigued by. I did watch
several UTexas games. Not as many Baylor games
or Duke games or Rutgers games. I would say I kept
an open mind or if you want, I was noncommittal.
Since I only could assume we would pick fairly high,
I stayed away from laser focus. But Tre was a guy I watched
about as much as any. I liked him. I still like him.
I would not be shocked if he ended up top 3 in this
draft and would not be shocked if he ended up
much worse. But barring injury, I think he's going
to be really good.

PS agree strongly with DCZards that we don't know
these guys that well. Right now it seems like Ace is a knucklehead. But the light could get switched on anytime
or never. He's a very young man and these are early days.