Alex Len and his future

[Frank Lee]

by bwgood77 » Thu Jun 27, 2013 8:01 pm

We should take Len. I bet he will be beasting by January 2015.

a sage among us?

[BurningHeart]

Just goes to show that people know *jack ***** about drafts and all the hysterics that come along with draft preparation, evaluation, and emphasis of getting #1 picks are dumb as hell.

One day sports fans will recognize this pattern.

EDIT:

#205 » by BurningHeart » Thu Jun 27, 2013 5:20 pm
Dude, all you guys keep saying "In McDonough we trust", "In McDonough we trust".....and when he does something supposedly "unconventional" then you decide you don't trust him?

Which is it? Do you ACTUALLY trust him or did you think that because he's 33 years old and isn't some old fogie and "omg uses advanced stats and stuff" that he'd just confirm what YOU think is right?

Have. Some. Patience.

This post still holds true.

[Scutt]

Just goes to show that people know *jack ***** about drafts and all the hysterics that come along with draft preparation, evaluation, and emphasis of getting #1 picks are dumb as hell.

Or take it as how important getting a top 5 pick can be for your franchise. Most were hating on Len from the moment we drafted him, up until the start of this season. Some posters on here, even used him as an example of how meaningless and dumb it is to want a top pick, because you may end up with a bust like him. Now he is looking to a true franchise center in the making.

Alex Len has been the only bright spot on the team this year, and we would never have gotten him if we were picking 14th or 15th in 2013. There is nothing "dumb as hell" about a rebuilding team wanting a top pick to give themselves a chance to land a franchise player, when they desperately need one.

[Qwigglez]

I'm just waiting for Scooper or someone to make a Len compilation video for the last two months. I can't stop watching Alex Len highlights lol

[Walt_Uoob]

Apologies if this has already been posted, but there's a TrueHoop video just gushing over Len and Nurkic here: http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=espn:12172335 .

[Revived]

I'm just waiting for Scooper or someone to make a Len compilation video for the last two months. I can't stop watching Alex Len highlights lol

^this. Unfortunately I think Scooper left us to become a blog writer for BSOTS.

[Moochthemonkey]

Just goes to show that people know *jack ***** about drafts and all the hysterics that come along with draft preparation, evaluation, and emphasis of getting #1 picks are dumb as hell.

Or take it as how important getting a top 5 pick can be for your franchise. Most were hating on Len from the moment we drafted him, up until the start of this season. Some posters on here, even used him as an example of how meaningless and dumb it is to want a top pick, because you may end up with a bust like him. Now he is looking to a true franchise center in the making.

Alex Len has been the only bright spot on the team this year, and we would never have gotten him if we were picking 14th or 15th in 2013. There is nothing "dumb as hell" about a rebuilding team wanting a top pick to give themselves a chance to land a franchise player, when they desperately need one.

I could use plenty of other examples of players who were a bust within the draft lottery, and plenty of players picked outside of the draft lottery that were not busts...it doesn't make trying to get a top pick dumb as hell, but it goes to show that positioning is overrated. Scouting and development will always trump draft position IMO.

Len still wasn't #1, let alone ever considered to be around that range by most "experts", meaning that a lot of unsubstantiated hype goes into getting the #1 pick. Despite all that, an albeit it's too early to draw conclusions but Len has shown better promise than other #1 prospects thus far sans Oladipo. That, I think, was BH's point. Len probably would not have been available at 14th or 15th but players I consider of around equal value such as Steven Adams might have been (picked #12) and Gobert likely would have been (#27). Again, draft positioning is important to have for the sake of having a bigger pool of players to select from, but to implicate that quality centers likely cannot be achieved outside the 1-5 range is simply untrue. For example, these quality starting centers across the league:

-Deandre Jordan (#35)
-Tiago Splitter (#28)
-Steven Adams (#12)
-Marc Gasol (#48)
-Jusuf Nurkic (#16)
-Robin Lopez (#15)
-Nikola Pekovic (#31) & Gorgui Deng (#21)
-Rudy Gobert (#27)
-Brook Lopez (#10)
-Nikola Vucevic (#16)
-Marcin Gortat (#57)
-Al Jefferson (#15)
-Timofey Mozgov (Undrafted) & Anderson Varejao (#30)
-Joakim Noah (#9)
-Andre Drummond (#9)
-Roy Hibbert (#17)

[BurningHeart]

Yes, that was my point. Len was #5. Not #1. And everyone hated the Len pick except myself and others who exercised caution because we know that the draft is all hype and cockstroking and literally nobody knows jack about any of these guys until they play in the NBA for a while because we recognize that this is the pattern.

Well, we were right----again.

You don't need to be the worst team in the league to get a potential star, ok? That's the bottom line and all the morons who clamored for us to lose on purpose just so we could have a precious #1 pick instead of a #5 pick and all those who "trust McDonough" and whined whined whined that we took a big white stiff over "sure things" in McLemore and Noel can choke on it.

[Revived]

Teams with dumb GMs make bad decisions with top 5 picks. Teams with good GMs make good decisions with top 5 picks.

Teams with good GMs are also capable of getting good players with later round picks. However, its obvious that the best players usually tend to be selected in top of the draft.

A case can be made when looking at the best players in the NBA right now; Curry, Harden, LBJ, Durant, Davis, Westbrook, Griffin, Wade, CP3, Westbrook etc. Of course there are some exceptions like Marc Gasol, Ginobili, Parker, George, Duncan etc but those are the exceptions not the rule.

[hoopnharm]

duncan......

[WTFsunsFTW]

Grantland has a fantastic article on the ultimate crapshoot that the draft really is:
http://grantland.com/features/nba-draft ... pick-1995/

[thamadkant]

Scouting is SIGNIFICANT in getting the right picks.

Sometimes...you dont need much scouting work, like when Lebron, A.Davis, Duncan, Shaq, Robinson etc are available at that draft year.... but in Len's draft class.... when THERE WERE NO UNANIMOUS NO.1 pick.... Scouting is HUGE.

Bennett was always going to be a high risk high reward pick... 6'8 inconsistent motor Power forwards are a HUGE risk.. Larry Johnson and Charles Barkley were unique that they were ultra-skilled, athletic and high-work rate under sized power forwards.
Cleveland was basically being typical Cleveland by making that pick..

But you know what?
I'm GLAD Cleveland picked him Number 1, because they were also eyeing Len as pick 1.... remember Len climbed the projections to number 1, a couple of weeks before draft.

[lilfishi22]

Scouting is SIGNIFICANT in getting the right picks.

Sometimes...you dont need much scouting work, like when Lebron, A.Davis, Duncan, Shaq, Robinson etc are available at that draft year.... but in Len's draft class.... when THERE WERE NO UNANIMOUS NO.1 pick.... Scouting is HUGE.

Bennett was always going to be a high risk high reward pick... 6'8 inconsistent motor Power forwards are a HUGE risk.. Larry Johnson and Charles Barkley were unique that they were ultra-skilled, athletic and high-work rate under sized power forwards.
Cleveland was basically being typical Cleveland by making that pick..

But you know what?
I'm GLAD Cleveland picked him Number 1, because they were also eyeing Len as pick 1.... remember Len climbed the projections to number 1, a couple of weeks before draft.

I don't feel Len was a serious contender for the #1. I think Cavs didn't want to pick #1 and made it leaked out to sources they were considering Len to spark trade talks.

[Revived]

The Rising Stars Challenge featuring NBA rookies and second-year players will have a change in format this year.

Players from the United States will play against players that were born Internationally.

Andrew Wiggins, Dante Exum, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Steven Adams, Rudy Gobert, Nikola Mirotic and Jusuf Nurkic figure to be a few of the players on the International team.

The international front court is gonna be completely loaded compared to the US front court.

SF Giannis/Wiggins
PF Mirotic/Olynyk
C Adams/Nurkic/Gobert/Len/Dieng

[DaleyBlind]

Grantland has a fantastic article on the ultimate crapshoot that the draft really is:
http://grantland.com/features/nba-draft ... pick-1995/

in his redraft he has MCW going #1

[WTFsunsFTW]

It was written a while ago before Len had a chance to impress. MCW was ROY too...

[Qwigglez]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/SeanSullivanNBA/status/558343127069507584[/tweet]

[GetYourPHX]

Here are a couple of threads I found useful Bigfoot.

Grade the Draft-
viewtopic.php?f=27&t=1258857

Draft Thread part3-
viewtopic.php?f=27&t=1255091

Draft Thread part4-
viewtopic.php?f=27&t=1258703

You're welcome.

Love looking back at the draft threads. This board gave me so much **** for liking the Len pick.

[Sunsdeuce]

One thing to account for too is the situation a player drafted ends up in. The system a player plays in can make or break a player very quick. Tucker is a perfect example. In another environment (different team) he couldn't get off the bench and was eventually cut. And now he is a starter with the Suns.

Situations/team environment/coaches/systems/teammates can make or break NBA rookies. Take Duncan for example. He has made his teammates look so much better than they really are for years. He basically covered up his teammates flaws for years.

[BurningHeart]

We need to start using him in pick-and-pop situations too. Kinda like how we used to use Kurt Thomas.

In fact, we need to see a TON more PNR-PNP from this Suns team.