Danny Wolf - Michigan

[tmorgan]

Not seeing it.

He has passing chops but not so much out of the post. His passing is more when used as a point-Center which is totally untenable at the next level. He isnt good enough to play that role, not even close. I dont trust that 3PT% when he is shooting under 60% from the line.

I would take a guy like Alex Condon over him all day, every day. Better athlete, better shooter, close as a passer (And more of a post / high post passer where as outlined above Wolf is passing off the dribble), stronger, etc.(This was also my excuse to bring up Condon who I think is a late R1 talent).

To be fair to Wolf, we can’t know if the way he’s playing in college is because it’s all he can do, or if it’s because it mostly works and it’s what the coaches are asking him to do. This comes up a lot when evaluating the skillset of young players. Some guys are truly limited and fall flat on their faces in the pros (which could be Wolf), some guys are hiding skills they don’t need or are asked not to use.

On the thread’s topic, though… yeah, still no idea. May have slipped a little on my internal board, but probably still a first rounder. Limited upside due to physical factors, but an interesting skillset.

[FarBeyondDriven]

a huge thing in his favor is that PF is the shallowest position in the NBA with the least amount of pressure as far as being a defensive liability so his potential lack of perimeter defense isn't too much of an issue. And I have no problem with him down low defensively against 4s. So really, it just depends on him landing on a team that makes sure he touches the ball a lot and he should do very well for himself. But that's the problem too, how many teams run their offense through their 4 which is what he is

[greg4012]

a huge thing in his favor is that PF is the shallowest position in the NBA with the least amount of pressure as far as being a defensive liability so his potential lack of perimeter defense isn't too much of an issue. And I have no problem with him down low defensively against 4s. So really, it just depends on him landing on a team that makes sure he touches the ball a lot and he should do very well for himself. But that's the problem too, how many teams run their offense through their 4 which is what he is

That's bc the WING position and skillset has overtaken PF in modern basketball. Don't see him hanging with most wings on the perimeter, which he'd have to do at the PF slot.

[azcatz11]

This guy looks like a big oaf and is slow as hell. LOL

[azcatz11]

I have him over Queen. One player can actually shoot from three and is a real offensive hub with a handle, the other is a fun college player who can be a secondary creator and can't hit a three yet.

You are always spot on - I'm so confused with this. Maybe he is sick with the flu (allegedly) but he moves in quick sand.

[babyjax13]

I have him over Queen. One player can actually shoot from three and is a real offensive hub with a handle, the other is a fun college player who can be a secondary creator and can't hit a three yet.

You are always spot on - I'm so confused with this. Maybe he is sick with the flu (allegedly) but he moves in quick sand.

I wish I was always spot on haha : )

There is obviously always the chance with any prospect that we haven't gotten lucky in the games we've seen. I've admittedly caught Queen on 3 occasions in college, all of which he played rather poorly compared to his average. Based on seeing him in high school I thought he would have an outside chance at being a lottery pick because of the skill level, but I've been disappointed so far.

OTOH I had no expectations of Wolf and I like what I see. He reminds me of Olynyk but with a bigger frame and a bit slower/stronger.

[arusinov]

Not seeing it.

He has passing chops but not so much out of the post. His passing is more when used as a point-Center which is totally untenable at the next level. He isnt good enough to play that role, not even close. I dont trust that 3PT% when he is shooting under 60% from the line.

I would take a guy like Alex Condon over him all day, every day. Better athlete, better shooter, close as a passer (And more of a post / high post passer where as outlined above Wolf is passing off the dribble), stronger, etc.(This was also my excuse to bring up Condon who I think is a late R1 talent).

Funny. You don't trust Wolf's 3P% but you claim that Condon is better shooter while his 3PA is minuscule (just 27 3PA this year, and he was bad 3P shooter as freshman ), his FT% this year is barely better than Wolf's, and his career FT% is worse. Also he is 51.6% eFG% player, and Wolf is 58.8% eFG%.

[azcatz11]

I have him over Queen. One player can actually shoot from three and is a real offensive hub with a handle, the other is a fun college player who can be a secondary creator and can't hit a three yet.

You are always spot on - I'm so confused with this. Maybe he is sick with the flu (allegedly) but he moves in quick sand.

I wish I was always spot on haha : )

There is obviously always the chance with any prospect that we haven't gotten lucky in the games we've seen. I've admittedly caught Queen on 3 occasions in college, all of which he played rather poorly compared to his average. Based on seeing him in high school I thought he would have an outside chance at being a lottery pick because of the skill level, but I've been disappointed so far.

OTOH I had no expectations of Wolf and I like what I see. He reminds me of Olynyk but with a bigger frame and a bit slower/stronger.

Okay - this is actually a pretty impressive showing from Wolf. I can see his offensive ability. Really a dominant first half. Kind of getting Frank Kaminsky vibes...

[Chuck Everett]

You are always spot on - I'm so confused with this. Maybe he is sick with the flu (allegedly) but he moves in quick sand.

I wish I was always spot on haha : )

There is obviously always the chance with any prospect that we haven't gotten lucky in the games we've seen. I've admittedly caught Queen on 3 occasions in college, all of which he played rather poorly compared to his average. Based on seeing him in high school I thought he would have an outside chance at being a lottery pick because of the skill level, but I've been disappointed so far.

OTOH I had no expectations of Wolf and I like what I see. He reminds me of Olynyk but with a bigger frame and a bit slower/stronger.

Okay - this is actually a pretty impressive showing from Wolf. I can see his offensive ability. Really a dominant first half. Kind of getting Frank Kaminsky vibes...

The whole question with Danny is, can he defend at the pro level. Dude is very talented as a basketball player at his size. I don't know how he doesn't carve out an NBA career with his ball skills. He's better at basketball than guys like Zach Collins, Alex Len and Kai Jones right this very minute.

[arusinov]

I wish I was always spot on haha : )

There is obviously always the chance with any prospect that we haven't gotten lucky in the games we've seen. I've admittedly caught Queen on 3 occasions in college, all of which he played rather poorly compared to his average. Based on seeing him in high school I thought he would have an outside chance at being a lottery pick because of the skill level, but I've been disappointed so far.

OTOH I had no expectations of Wolf and I like what I see. He reminds me of Olynyk but with a bigger frame and a bit slower/stronger.

Okay - this is actually a pretty impressive showing from Wolf. I can see his offensive ability. Really a dominant first half. Kind of getting Frank Kaminsky vibes...

The whole question with Danny is, can he defend at the pro level. Dude is very talented as a basketball player at his size. I don't know how he doesn't carve out an NBA career with his ball skills. He's better at basketball than guys like Zach Collins, Alex Len and Kai Jones right this very minute.

Hm... Are there actually defense issues or is it just assumption that they are supposed to be (because he looks like someone who should be bad defender)?

Sadly I can't watch much of his games outside highlights but what I could - he actually looked decent both defending at 4 and at 5,

Also his advanced defensive metrics looks pretty good: DRtg 90.5, DWS 1.7, DBPM 5.7 - all best among rotation players in his team, DPBM is best in Big Ten, and he also leads Big Ten in rebounds, and 5th in Big Ten in blocks per game.

[Chuck Everett]

Okay - this is actually a pretty impressive showing from Wolf. I can see his offensive ability. Really a dominant first half. Kind of getting Frank Kaminsky vibes...

The whole question with Danny is, can he defend at the pro level. Dude is very talented as a basketball player at his size. I don't know how he doesn't carve out an NBA career with his ball skills. He's better at basketball than guys like Zach Collins, Alex Len and Kai Jones right this very minute.

Hm... Are there actually defense issues or is it just assumption that they are supposed to be (because he looks like someone who should be bad defender)?

Sadly I can't watch much of his games outside highlights but what I could - he actually looked decent both defending at 4 and at 5,

Also his advanced defensive metrics looks pretty good: DRtg 90.5, DWS 1.7, DBPM 5.7 - all best among rotation players in his team, DPBM is best in Big Ten, and he also leads Big Ten in rebounds, and 5th in Big Ten in blocks per game.

Sadly, those defensive stats aren't really going to tell us enough because he's playing against mostly non-NBAers (and next to another 7'0 in Vlad Goldin).

You have to ask yourself, if he's an oversized 4 man (like Lauri Markannen for example), can he guard the somewhat smaller/quicker big guys like Scottie Barnes, Jalen Johnson, Jaren Jackson Jr, Julius Randle, and Paolo Banchero? Like Evan Mobley can guard all of those guys, but he can also scale up and defend the rim, Markannen cannot do that, even if he is a better offensive player than Evan so far in his career. Danny is 7'0 or so, but he's still not really a rim protector, the way recent draftees like Clingan, Lively, Holmgren, Missi, Kessler or Ware are.

So if he can't really get away with being a small-ball 5 due to his lack of effective rim protection, you need him to exhibit elite offensive skills against pro defenses (ala Sengun, Sabonis, Jokic) to make up for it. Otherwise, some NBA team is just going to stick him in a corner and make him be a stretch big and pray to God he isn't a sieve as a backline defender off the bench (ala Kelly Olynyk or Bobby Portis).

[peZt]

Guys are gonna overthink crazy with a guy like him again and will eat crow when he becomes a serviceable NBA big

[arusinov]

The whole question with Danny is, can he defend at the pro level. Dude is very talented as a basketball player at his size. I don't know how he doesn't carve out an NBA career with his ball skills. He's better at basketball than guys like Zach Collins, Alex Len and Kai Jones right this very minute.

Hm... Are there actually defense issues or is it just assumption that they are supposed to be (because he looks like someone who should be bad defender)?

Sadly I can't watch much of his games outside highlights but what I could - he actually looked decent both defending at 4 and at 5,

Also his advanced defensive metrics looks pretty good: DRtg 90.5, DWS 1.7, DBPM 5.7 - all best among rotation players in his team, DPBM is best in Big Ten, and he also leads Big Ten in rebounds, and 5th in Big Ten in blocks per game.

Sadly, those defensive stats aren't really going to tell us enough because he's playing against mostly non-NBAers (and next to another 7'0 in Vlad Goldin).

You have to ask yourself, if he's an oversized 4 man (like Lauri Markannen for example), can he guard the somewhat smaller/quicker big guys like Scottie Barnes, Jalen Johnson, Jaren Jackson Jr, Julius Randle, and Paolo Banchero? Like Evan Mobley can guard all of those guys, but he can also scale up and defend the rim, Markannen cannot do that, even if he is a better offensive player than Evan so far in his career. Danny is 7'0 or so, but he's still not really a rim protector, the way recent draftees like Clingan, Lively, Holmgren, Missi, Kessler or Ware are.

So if he can't really get away with being a small-ball 5 due to his lack of effective rim protection, you need him to exhibit elite offensive skills against pro defenses (ala Sengun, Sabonis, Jokic) to make up for it. Otherwise, some NBA team is just going to stick him in a corner and make him be a stretch big and pray to God he isn't a sieve as a backline defender off the bench (ala Kelly Olynyk or Bobby Portis).

Look. I will always remember how people discarded my explanations that Deni Avdija is rarest case of teenager which is considered well above average wing defender which can switch on bigs and PGs in EuroLeague (which basically never happens, the only other good defender among young prospects in EuroLeague was Rubio ) and claimed that in NBA he is too slow to guard wings and too weak to guard bigs... because for them he just looked as someone who can't be good defender.

Now. I don't say that Wolf is like Avdija. Obviously he's not playing in 2nd best league and he's already 3rd year player. Still. When you say for example - look Markannen's struggling, you should remember that Markannen was rather bad defender in college. He was specifically bad rim protector for his size with just 0.5 blk per game to Wolf's not bad at all 1.6, he was below average defensive rebounder at 4.8 per game - to Wolf's really good 7.8. His DPBM was among worst on his team, his DRtg was below average on his team (DWS was good though) - while Wolf leads his team in all those metrics and among leaders in his league too.

Sure Lauri was freshman and Wolf is junior (while only one year older) and he could improve by 3rd season if he was still in college... but still you can't project outcome of pretty bad college defender to pretty good college defender.

[Chuck Everett]

Hm... Are there actually defense issues or is it just assumption that they are supposed to be (because he looks like someone who should be bad defender)?

Sadly I can't watch much of his games outside highlights but what I could - he actually looked decent both defending at 4 and at 5,

Also his advanced defensive metrics looks pretty good: DRtg 90.5, DWS 1.7, DBPM 5.7 - all best among rotation players in his team, DPBM is best in Big Ten, and he also leads Big Ten in rebounds, and 5th in Big Ten in blocks per game.

Sadly, those defensive stats aren't really going to tell us enough because he's playing against mostly non-NBAers (and next to another 7'0 in Vlad Goldin).

You have to ask yourself, if he's an oversized 4 man (like Lauri Markannen for example), can he guard the somewhat smaller/quicker big guys like Scottie Barnes, Jalen Johnson, Jaren Jackson Jr, Julius Randle, and Paolo Banchero? Like Evan Mobley can guard all of those guys, but he can also scale up and defend the rim, Markannen cannot do that, even if he is a better offensive player than Evan so far in his career. Danny is 7'0 or so, but he's still not really a rim protector, the way recent draftees like Clingan, Lively, Holmgren, Missi, Kessler or Ware are.

So if he can't really get away with being a small-ball 5 due to his lack of effective rim protection, you need him to exhibit elite offensive skills against pro defenses (ala Sengun, Sabonis, Jokic) to make up for it. Otherwise, some NBA team is just going to stick him in a corner and make him be a stretch big and pray to God he isn't a sieve as a backline defender off the bench (ala Kelly Olynyk or Bobby Portis).

Look. I will always remember how people discarded my explanations that Deni Avdija is rarest case of teenager which is considered well above average wing defender which can switch on bigs and PGs in EuroLeague (which basically never happens, the only other good defender among young prospects in EuroLeague was Rubio ) and claimed that in NBA he is too slow to guard wings and too weak to guard bigs... because for them he just looked as someone who can't be good defender.

Now. I don't say that Wolf is like Avdija. Obviously he's not playing in 2nd best league and he's already 3rd year player. Still. When you say for example - look Markannen's struggling, you should remember that Markannen was rather bad defender in college. He was specifically bad rim protector for his size with just 0.5 blk per game to Wolf's not bad at all 1.6, he was below average defensive rebounder at 4.8 per game - to Wolf's really good 7.8. His DPBM was among worst on his team, his DRtg was below average on his team (DWS was good though) - while Wolf leads his team in all those metrics and among leaders in his league too.

Sure Lauri was freshman and Wolf is junior (while only one year older) and he could improve by 3rd season if he was still in college... but still you can't project outcome of pretty bad college defender to pretty good college defender.

If you believe Wolf will be the offensive player (or of similar success) as Markannen, of course you draft him and don't look back, just don't be surprised if he becomes situational if he can't find his place as a defender as well. One thing about the NBA, a player usually has to earn extra responsibilities on offense. It's the defense that gets them on the floor first (unless they are top 5-10 picks).

[arusinov]

...

If you believe Wolf will be the offensive player (or of similar success) as Markannen, of course you draft him and don't look back, just don't be surprised if he becomes situational if he can't find his place as a defender as well. One thing about the NBA, a player usually has to earn extra responsibilities on offense. It's the defense that gets them on the floor first (unless they are top 5-10 picks).

It was easy to see that Markannen's offense was obviously good and quite probably suitable for NBA. He was pretty athletic, and shot 42% from 3P on almost 4.5 3PA per game, and 83.5% FT%. But as you said Markannen was always oversized PF - he never played as center (and certainly not guard) on offense or defense.

No one can say whether Wolf's offensive game will pan out - he's unique player which can play center (as he did most time for Yale) or handle ball on perimeter like guard. But he's not very athletic in conventional sense, and his shot is not sure thing - 36% from 3 on not very big 3PA, and he shot just 60.9% FT% this season (and 66.9% career).

His qualities are unusual and how and whether they translate is unknown. But he's also not limited like Markannen - his role on both sides can be adapted to situation, and being much better defensive player in college than Markannen he's not predestined to struggle on defense.

[azcatz11]

...

If you believe Wolf will be the offensive player (or of similar success) as Markannen, of course you draft him and don't look back, just don't be surprised if he becomes situational if he can't find his place as a defender as well. One thing about the NBA, a player usually has to earn extra responsibilities on offense. It's the defense that gets them on the floor first (unless they are top 5-10 picks).

It was easy to see that Markannen's offense was obviously good and quite probably suitable for NBA. He was pretty athletic, and shot 42% from 3P on almost 4.5 3PA per game, and 83.5% FT%. But as you said Markannen was always oversized PF - he never played as center (and certainly not guard) on offense or defense.

No one can say whether Wolf's offensive game will pan out - he's unique player which can play center (as he did most time for Yale) or handle ball on perimeter like guard. But he's not very athletic in conventional sense, and his shot is not sure thing - 36% from 3 on not very big 3PA, and he shot just 60.9% FT% this season (and 66.9% career).

His qualities are unusual and how and whether they translate is unknown. But he's also not limited like Markannen - his role on both sides can be adapted to situation, and being much better defensive player in college than Markannen he's not predestined to struggle on defense.

I can see a little Jokic in his game...he's just a very unusual player. He kind of moves like Jokic also. He's slow and plodding but effective in short areas. He really showed everything offensively yesterday.

I would take a late first flyer on the kid since he's so damn big

[BlazersBroncos]

I dont see him as being able to guard 4. Lauri isnt a quick twitch guy but he is super mobile for his size and he is absolutley jacked as well.

I see a Olynyk or Okur like player as his best outcome (IE floor stretching big who can pass), but I still am having trouble coming around to buying his stock. Just a really hard guy to project at the next level.

[arusinov]

Danny Wolf in the close win over Indiana:

20 Pts — 7/13 FG, 1/3 3P, 5/5 FT , 9 Rbs , 5 Assists (2 To), 1 Blk
He was great in clutch, including and-1 and scoring all 5 ft he had in last minute and half.

Michigan improved to 10 / 2 in Big Ten (2nd place together with Michigan St.) and 18 / 5 overall

Watch on YouTube

[babyjax13]

Danny Wolf in the close win over Indiana:

20 Pts — 7/13 FG, 1/3 3P, 5/5 FT , 9 Rbs , 5 Assists (2 To), 1 Blk
He was great in clutch, including and-1 and scoring all 5 ft he had in last minute and half.

Michigan improved to 10 / 2 in Big Ten (2nd place together with Michigan St.) and 18 / 5 overall

Watch on YouTube

Side note: god Indiana needs to fire Woodson.

[azcatz11]

[youtube][/youtube]

Danny Wolf in the close win over Indiana:

20 Pts — 7/13 FG, 1/3 3P, 5/5 FT , 9 Rbs , 5 Assists (2 To), 1 Blk
He was great in clutch, including and-1 and scoring all 5 ft he had in last minute and half.

Michigan improved to 10 / 2 in Big Ten (2nd place together with Michigan St.) and 18 / 5 overall

Watch on YouTube

Side note: god Indiana needs to fire Woodson.

I don’t think he’s bad. Their guards suck. Ballo has been bad. It seems like they’re in every game. They lost 2 games at the buzzer against Illinois and the other day. They’re winning rn over mich st