nate33 wrote:stevemcqueen1 wrote:AFM wrote:Wow. I need to watch more Burke. Kyrie and CP3?
I'm skeptical of those comparisons. Those guys didn't exactly fly under the radar. If Burke were in their class he would probably be the first overall pick this year. I don't see any places ranking him nearly that high. DX has him 16th in the class, NBAdraft.net has him going 17th.
You put too much faith in these draft sites, stevemcqueen. They are wrong all the time, particularly this early in the process. I suggest you pay close attention to the guys on this board, especially Dat2U, Ruzious, CCJ, Nivek and doclinkin. They're much better at evaluating talent than the guys at DX or nbadraft.net.
Chad Ford is worth paying attention to in June because he has sources that know what GM's are thinking. But right now, GM's aren't thinking anything about the draft so Chad Ford is only going on his personal opinions, which aren't that accurate.
But all that aside, the league in general has been consistently slow at recognizing new trends. A while ago, they missed the undersized PF boom that allowed guys like Boozer, Millsap and Love to radically outperform expectations. The latest trend is that being undersized at PG isn't the liability it once was. You don't need a 6-4 PG like Westbrook, Rondo or Wall. Little guys like Lowry, Lawson, Lillard and Collison are tearing the league up, and all were taken fairly late. DX may be right that Burke goes late, but they're wrong if they think he'll
perform like a 16th pick.
I don't think NBAdraft.net is that great, but I think DX is excellent and I trust them. No offense to anyone here, but sources like DX and Chad Ford have access to so much more information. They see the prospects in person, they interview them, they talk to NBA scouts and agents and front office people, etc. They see international players play.
And what they typically do very well is rank the prospects in the class. They may not get the draft order exactly right, but sometimes they'll come pretty close within the lottery. And they nail who the lotto picks are. For example, last year DX correctly predicted 13 out of the 14 lottery picks & NBAdraft.net also got 13 out of 14.
I know Dat has said he tries to avoid the groupthink common to national draftnik sources but there is groupthink going on in the small community of this board. How else can you explain Trey Burke being a top 3-ish pick for so many in here when none of the national sources even have him in the lottery? I've seen how these things happen before. One or two very clever posters see something they like in him early on, they argue convincingly for him and people trust them and like their ideas from before. Others start looking for and seeing the same things too which reinforces the original idea. The bias of agreeing with and viewing things in the frame of reference of people you like and trust is unavoidable. The original idea gets repeated enough that it starts developing a ring of truth to it, then voila, an enclave develops a belief even if it veers away from the national perspective on the subject.
And I also think there is a climate of receptiveness and unusual positivity for a player like Burke because people are frustrated with Wall and our PG situation. I think people are overrating him and his skills in part because he is such a different PG from Wall. I saw a similar idea take shape in other places last season: "raw talent/high upside/athleticism = bad because Jan Vesely = bad." What we see with the Wizards heavily shapes our perspective on basketball in general.
I once saw an extremely clever poster on a Redskins board convince practically half the members there that Greg McElroy was going to be the next Tom Brady. That was literally his claim. Obviously that's a lot more extreme a situation, Burke is a clear first rounder and maybe a fringe lotto pick with most sources. But the groupthink dynamic was there. That's why I think it's valuable to come up for air every so often and check myself against what the rest of the world seems to be saying and thinking.
