JMAC3 wrote:The amount of people who were still saying Scoot should go #1 in this latest draft...
Meanwhile Scoot in year 2
Off EPM 15%
Def EPM 5%
Overall EPM 4%
Ranks 381/397 in overall EPM grade.
I'm not sure that we are to the point where sample size is large enough to be definitive, but based on the season so far ...
Point guards only,
Players worse than Scoot by CPM (-4.2): no one
others clustered near: Keyonte George (-4.0), Jamal Shead (-3.9), Carlton Carrington (-3.8), Rob Dillingham (-2.7)
worse DARKO (-2.9): Keyonte George (-4.7), Jamal Shead (-3.2), Carlton Carrington (-3.0), Stephon Castle (-2.9, tie)
close: Rob Dillingham (-2.7), Reed Sheppard (-2.7)
worse EPM (-4.8): Isaiah Collier (-4.9)
close: Jalen Hood-Schifino (-4.1), Keyonte George (-3.8), Carlton Carrington (-3.6), Rob Dillingham (-3.6)
Right now he is clustered with other similarly young point guards, but you'd obviously hope a player drafted higher, and in a better draft than 2024 is likely to be, would be performing much better. DARKO is supposed to be predictive of future value, rather than a measure of current value (it is based on current value as a prior) and it expects Scoot to cluster with the same guys we see in the other +/- metric (which makes sense).
Scoot had an abysmal 3 game start to the season, and once that noise is out I think he's going to regularize higher than some of these guys (same case with George). But, no, it does not look fantastic. I still have faith that he has the talent and physical attributes to be a successful starting point guard, but if he is a success story, it might be the "Kemba Walker" path (who was terribly inefficient for his first 4 seasons, only one above 50%TS, his second at 51.1%).
But I'll still maintain my position, I think Scoot after his rookie season, with all the information we had, still would have gone top two. If after this season he makes no meaningful improvements, then I'll sell most of my stock and it will be clear that people were right about the red flags.