jakobe & Dick were bad picks

[Tha Cynic]

What an overreaction thread. Some of you need to look at the history of players drafted in the range these two were drafted in.

There’s still time for them to carve out a good career in the NBA, and there’s nothing to indicate they aren’t players who work hard and have a chance to improve.

Fact is, players in their range typically don’t end up amounting to much. I can see them being solid rotation players.

[Indeed]

Filipowski was dropped due to violation, he was invited to the green room.
As for Holmes and Missi, those are unlikely a fit to our roster. We have no quick PG that provides rim pressure with a screen, and neither of these works with Barnes.

Sounds a lot like major sour grapes.

A back-up defensive C has been our biggest need for quite a while. A good PG is secondary to that.

Filip dropped due to his weird Mormon GF situation. It takes a good management with balls and maneuvering capabilities to take him.

There is just no good one in the 2024 draft.

2nd round pick Ajay Mitchell is averaging 16.7 PPG so far..I didn't know about him before the draft, but some users were vying for him.

As for the comparison of 2023 and 2024, because 2024 has more 5th year graduates, so teams may opt for drafting with safe picks. Someone like Leonard Miller in the 2023 draft was special, they are higher risk and younger vs Mogbo who is a senior.

Being a senior doesn't make it a bad pick and doesn't mean they shouldn't be drafted higher. Nor does it mean that the 2024 draft didn't have depth. In fact, it seems that drafting established older rookies in the 2nd round may lead to more success (e.g. Norman Powell, Jaylen Wells, Kalkbrenner)

Your argument is that 2024 was a weak draft even in later rounds. Yet 2024 could possibly have the best 2nd round depth in the last 5 years. Rank these drafts:

2024 2nd round
Jonathan Mogbo
Kyle Filipowski
Ajay Mitchell (entered league at 22)
Quinten Post
Jamal Shead
Jaylen Wells
Oso Ighodaro
Adem Bona
Cam Christie
Cam Spencer


2023 2nd round
Toumani Camara (entered league at 23)
GG Jackson
Jalen Pickett
Colby Jones
Andre Jackson Jr.
Jaylen Clark
Mouhamed Gueye
Tristan Vukčević

2022 2nd round
Andrew Nembhard (entered league at 23)
Caleb Houstan
Vince Williams Jr.
Jaylin Williams
Max Christie
Jaden Hardy

2021 2nd round
Herbert Jones (entered league at 23)
Miles McBride
Dalano Banton
Luka Garza
Aaron Wiggins
Jericho Sims

2020 2nd round
Nick Richards
Isaiah Joe
Paul Reed
Sam Merrill

Mitchell was discussed on the draft thread, but he is an undersized SG on a team with the best C.
As for backup C, those are not stretch 5, and it is a big risk drafting a big C in the lottery these days (look at how many of them being a fail project).

As for drafting at younger age, that has been how teams rank them in tiers. Unless they can dominate in high level, otherwise, someone being a project, it will rank higher based on age. This is why we have a lot of success in drafting seniors (Powell, VanVleet, Battle, etc.), and also failure drafting them (Flynn, etc.).

Regardless, I think down the line you will hardly see these 2nd round, regardless of year drafted, so the comparison isn't meaningful in claiming they are better.

[dballislife]

i mean the vast majority of the picks before and after dick and walter all pretty much sucked too

[ATLTimekeeper]

I think they'll both have long NBA careers.

[Johnny Bball]

Nah. I really like Walter and think he's got potential to start one day. If he stays a bench player, that's still not a bad pick.

Grady is what he is. But he can play in this league.

[anotherhomer]

i think a potential miss was cedric coward....CMB is solid but you can't help but think....Cedric is the type of guy you need who can give you half-court offense, and a really smart guy....

[Tripod]

Dick

41.4 3pt% (7.3 per 36)
61.0 ts%

So he is doing pretty much as we hoped.

[PushDaRock]

I don't like Gradey that much but he has obvious scoring potential. If he can grow leaps and bounds like DeRozan did he'll be really good.

As far as I can see. He stuffs the stat sheet. He's getting to the FT line and nailing his 3s. He's had a few games where he rips teams apart in garbage time and basically has a point per a minute.

We should keep him on a short leesh and let him cook against weaker teams. He should be good against Philly. We need someone who can space the floor reliably.

Walter is too young to judge. I'd give him another year. I want to see him be a solid POA defender who can hit spot up 3s. If he can read a defense and attack occasionally and finish that'd be great. He needs to simplify what he's doing and build on that next year.

lol stuff the stat sheet is hyperbole for Gradey. He has 2 assists in 140 mins of play this season, but it's balanced out by only having 1 turnover.

[I_Like_Dirt]

These guys weren't bad picks. They were both close to being the actual BPA at their spots. The Raps are just suddenly deep right now so Gradey is reduced to the role of sniper/gravity off the bench - a role he is thriving in - and Jakobe doesn't actually have much of a role for now. Injuries and/or trades could clear the path for either guy at any point. They both have handlers, jumpers, some passing ability, and play decent positional for their age. It’s the kind of cheap depth teams need if they want to try to consistently win.

[YogurtProducer]

What an overreaction thread. Some of you need to look at the history of players drafted in the range these two were drafted in.

There’s still time for them to carve out a good career in the NBA, and there’s nothing to indicate they aren’t players who work hard and have a chance to improve.

Fact is, players in their range typically don’t end up amounting to much. I can see them being solid rotation players.

they were fine picks for sure - but they’re certainly no home run (but not a strikeout either).

You’re not gonna hit on a future star every time

[Shakril]

Both picks were ok, not everything can pan out as we wish.

What annoys me though is, that Battle outplays them both and cant get serious minutes. And he always was good from the 3, not just this season but also seasons prior.

[I_Like_Dirt]

they were fine picks for sure - but they’re certainly no home run (but not a strikeout either).

You’re not gonna hit on a future star every time

Define home runs? Who were they supposed to pick at those spots that were home runs? Whoever listed all those 2nd round picks had 3 guys on it that were playing 20+ mpg and none of them were stars. Home runs generally aren't available in those spots and the Kobe Bufkin love of this board is quietly swept under the rug.

These guys are both in the rotation (at the end of but still in the rotation) of a team that looks like it's going to win more than it loses despite not having any 1st team all NBA level players on it and neither of them is 22 yet. That's about as good as it gets when it comes to these kinds of picks. They're both producing at similar levels to guys like Norman Powell and Delon Wright in their early careers, and both of those guys were significantly older when they were drafted and went on to long, productive NBA careers.

[James_Raptors]

Excellent posts ILD.
Spot on.

[UnbelievablyRAW]

I wanted the following

Missi: Pretty good, would have had a role on the team as a bench big

Collier: Decent pg skills but Shead is a better overall player imo

Carrington: Had flashes but unsure if its the Wizards structure or him not progressing in the right way

Ky George: Looks great, wanted him for the 3D potential and he looks like he has some on ball stuff going on too

Da silva: Has looked better than JKW overall since rookie season

[DreamTeam09]

Another guy we missed was Cedric coward....ya I get we had a backlog of guards but Cedric is playing great

CMB is better than Coward,
Memphis themselves would look really cool with a CMB next to JJJ

[dagger]

One of the things to remember is that a few of the guys who are supposedly outshining our picks are on bad teams where their shortcomings are forgiven and they can count on playing big minutes, as starters. We are asking our bench players to change their approach that they had last season when they were allowed to play through their mistakes. Now, they have to come in and contribute in short bursts to WINNING. And when injuries and load management do come - the Raptors have been incredibly lucky with injuries during the early going whereas last season they were incredibly unlucky - our bench guys will be asked to step up and play bigger, impactful minutes. I'm not seeing the downside in this.

[bluerap23]

Gradey is improving. Still only 21. His efficiency is trending up over last year (and that over the prior), despite considerably less playing time and usage. He is averaging the lowest of both in his career and is having his highest efficiency. He will never be an above average defender but he looks like a solid bench scorer to me. Jakobe just turned 21 and is basically not able to get rotation minutes due to depth. He is playing very poorly but needs reps. I expect him to go to 905. We won't really see how he is progressing until he gets an opportunity to play in the top 9 (and make mistakes) which only happens if there are injuries to guys ahead of him. CM Beast is going to be an all-star and all-defence. That pick was a homerun.

[Tripod]

The biggest thing that is clear is that we could use a consolidation trade...or trade a guy for pick. Just not enough playing time for everyone when we are healthy.

Or a G for C swap helps when the next injury to Yak to Mamu happens.

But yeah, this pics are are not homeruns. But we didn't miss out on homers either.

[UnbelievablyRAW]

The biggest thing that is clear is that we could use a consolidation trade...or trade a guy for pick. Just not enough playing time for everyone when we are healthy.

Or a G for C swap helps when the next injury to Yak to Mamu happens.

But yeah, this pics are are not homeruns. But we didn't miss out on homers either.

Been saying since game 2 it’s clear the FO needs to clarify the bench wing position. That or make CMB or Mamu a 3 offensively and bring in a C. So far it’s looking like Dick is winning the position battle against JKW/Ochai/Battle

[LoveMyRaps]

Gradey is off to a nice start this season.

Defensively he's making small strides. Still a below average defender. But his awareness/placement is slowly improving.