2020 NBA Draft

[NotMyKawhi]

stewart and mcdaniels have not met my expectations

[NotMyKawhi]

Okongwu will be the best NBA player to come out of chino hills

[eminence]

Watch on YouTube

So much more aggressive, including shooting pull-ups and getting some buckets in the midrange. Please, please let him continue to be this aggressive and show some consistency in those areas (preferably with an increase in FTs, but I'll settle for less, too). He's worth a top 5 pick to me if he can do that.

Agreeing on Haliburton being absolutely spectacular so far.

[The-Power]

Soo, Cole Anthony's finishing inside is starting to be really worrying.

I still contend that his team is just terrible offensively and teams are loading up on him, shutting down lanes on drives because there are no good shooters on the team (so the spacing just sucks) and trying to make it as tough for him as possible to even get the ball.

But still, in many instances he gets off shots that he should be capable of converting at higher rates than he actually is. His touch has been rather poor overall and his athleticism hasn't really helped him to create easier looks. He has to really fix that or else there will be legitimate doubts about his scoring ability (and he isn't a top-pick candidate unless he projects to be a primary scorer at the next level).

[doordoor123]

Haliburton is getting better every game, I’m starting to believe in the top 10 hype.

[doordoor123]

Soo, Cole Anthony's finishing inside is starting to be really worrying.

I still contend that his team is just terrible offensively and teams are loading up on him, shutting down lanes on drives because there are no scary shooters on the team and trying to make it as tough for him as possible to even get the ball.

But still, in many instances he gets off shots that he should be capable of converting at higher rates than he actually is. His touch has been rather poor overall and his athleticism hasn't really helped him creating easier looks. He has to really fix that or else there will be legitimate doubts about his scoring ability (and he isn't a top-pick candidate unless he projects to be a primary scorer at the next level).

Cole Anthony is a poor man’s CP3, I think he’ll be better in the NBA with a better team around him. He needs a good big and good shooters around him.

[clyde21]

Tre Jones is the poor mans CP3...Cole is kinda the (very) poor man's D Rose

[clyde21]

i'd take Haliburton over LaMelo, doesn't have the on-ball potential but I trust his decision making more and is infinitely better on defense and is quite useful off-ball as well.

[clyde21]

Jalen Smith is pretty good, NBA body, starting to show NBA range propensity, defends the rim, hits his FTs, not sure about ceiling with him but I think he's top25 guy probably

[clyde21]

top12

1. SCOTTIE LEWIS
2. RJ HAMPTON
3. ANTHONY EDWARDS
4. COLE ANTHONY
5. JAMES WISEMAN
6. NICO MANNION
7. QUENTIN GRIMES
8. TYRESE HALIBURTON
9. TRE JONES
10. OSCAR TSHIEBWE
11. JOSH GREEN
12. ISAAC OKORO


after it gets muddy for me, maybe LaMelo or Joe

[Justwar]

Tre Jones is the poor mans CP3...Cole is kinda the (very) poor man's D Rose

Tre is not near as dynamic as Paul. Like huge difference.

[clyde21]

Tre Jones is the poor mans CP3...Cole is kinda the (very) poor man's D Rose

Tre is not near as dynamic as Paul. Like huge difference.

i mean, yeah, of course, Cp3 is like a top5 PG of all time...but similar archetype...great defender, cerebral, outstanding facilitator, similar size, etc.

Tre is just not quite as good as Cp3 at any of these things, but he's still damn good.

[Justwar]

The lack of scoring is huge though. Sounds like a poor man's rondo in 08

[BongBoyKlay]

Well none of the players look like franchise stars in this draft, the ones that could would need of development. You have to play these young guys when they aren't impactful so that they can learn and one day be impactful. You'd be doing that the first 2-3 years which would be detrimental to the team unless one already had NBA level defense and offense as a base.

I don't subscribe to the idea that you have to play young players in a bigger role than they are prepared for in order for them to become great players. In fact, I'd argue that it's often detrimental to the development of young players. I have yet to see evidence that talented players with initially big roles on crappy teams are more likely to develop into good players than talented players with initially lesser roles on good teams. I'd actually expect that the opposite is the case more often than not, but I know many people seem to disagree with me on this.

This ignores the fact that the vast majority of draft picks end up not being great and any young player who isn't will have the most value to other teams earlier in their career (or likely even before their career starts if you're willing to trade a future unprotected pick that later becomes that particular player). Additionally, most high lottery teams (obviously the Warriors are going to be an extremely rare exception here) should be realistic in knowing that one rookie isn't immediately going to take them from 22 wins or whatever to the playoffs and that the value in learning more about how good that player can potentially become is more important than the difference between winning 25 and 33 games.

A good recent example of this would be the Kings, who were very much "durrr you gotta earn your playing time because we're trying to win" at first with Fox, and then when the next draft rolled around, they still sucked and the BPA was the same position as Fox, so they had to take the next-best guy rather than trade Fox because they'd tanked Fox's value by not playing him in a system that best suited his talents.

This also ignores very real free agency constraints; the Hawks certainly would've won more games last year starting Jeremy Lin rather than Trae Young early on, but it wouldn't have been so many more as to even make the playoffs (much less be anything more than a first-round doormat), and if you look a few years into the future I'm sure them putting their trust in him from the start will give Atlanta (especially if they aren't yet a contender) a much better chance of holding onto him than if they'd been bringing him off the bench. The truly great players are going to be great no matter where they end up, and the players who are involved from the start (Westbrook) have a much better chance of sticking around than the ones who are held back (Harden).

If the Warriors end up keeping their high lottery pick, I don't think they will expect that player to come in and have a huge right away even if it is a player that has all star potential. Due to the talent they have on their roster, they will be able to bring the rookie along slowly and help him develop into an all star. This will allow the player to play to his strengths, without being forced to do too much. If they were to pick someone like Edwards(not saying they will or should), they could use him as a scoring 6th man initially while he develops the rest of his game. They wouldn't be putting a ton of weight on his shoulders to carry the offensive load and getting more minutes against second units will help ease his transition into the league. The player's strengths will also help contribute to winning as he should have some immediately translatable skills since he is a high draft pick unless they were to pick a huge developmental project which doesn't seem likely. Then, in future years as he develops his role will expand while the existing stars decline and cede some of their duties to him. Kerr also makes sure that he rotates in the young guys throughout the season instead of having them sit on the bench or play in the G-League even if they may not truly be ready.

A good example of a high draft pick not getting many minutes early is Jaylen Brown. He didn't get many minutes at all at the start of the season for the Celtics, and they brought him along slowly as the season progressed. He ended up averaging only 17 minutes a game for his rookie year. He slowly improved his game over the years, and now he a key starter on a contender. This also didn't have an impact on his free agency decision as he just resigned with the Celtics. The Spurs also follow this method, as they tend to not give rookies a ton of playing time early on. For every player that has developed well by playing a ton of minutes on a losing team, there is also a player that never reached his potential due to being in that situation. When players are in that situation, it makes it more likely for them to pick up bad habits since they aren't surrounded by a winning culture. It's a lot more likely for a player to reach his potential playing for a team like the Spurs, Celtics, or Raptors than the Suns, Kings, or Knicks.

The Kings are a terrible comparison to the Warriors because they were in a much different position and the King's management is/was trash. The Kings should've expected to be a high lottery team, so they should have played Fox as much as possible because that would most likely have led to more losses.

Also, Harden was traded from OKC, it's not like he walked away in free agency. We can all speculate as to why OKC traded him, but there isn't really a definite answer as to why they did it. Some say salary, some OKC didn't see Harden's ceiling, and some say OCK liked the package from the Rockets. We won't really know unless Presti comes out and says it, so to say that Harden left because he wanted to start is all speculation. He was also getting starter minutes and was a closer for OKC in their finals run, so it wasn't like they really restricted him or anything.

[azcatz11]

top12

1. SCOTTIE LEWIS
2. RJ HAMPTON
3. ANTHONY EDWARDS
4. COLE ANTHONY
5. JAMES WISEMAN
6. NICO MANNION
7. QUENTIN GRIMES
8. TYRESE HALIBURTON
9. TRE JONES
10. OSCAR TSHIEBWE
11. JOSH GREEN
12. ISAAC OKORO


after it gets muddy for me, maybe LaMelo or Joe

Where are you on Nnaji now?

[clyde21]

top12

1. SCOTTIE LEWIS
2. RJ HAMPTON
3. ANTHONY EDWARDS
4. COLE ANTHONY
5. JAMES WISEMAN
6. NICO MANNION
7. QUENTIN GRIMES
8. TYRESE HALIBURTON
9. TRE JONES
10. OSCAR TSHIEBWE
11. JOSH GREEN
12. ISAAC OKORO


after it gets muddy for me, maybe LaMelo or Joe

Where are you on Nnaji now?

i think he's okay, I don't know if he's a starter in today's NBA but can potentially be a 3rd big type in the right situation, defensively he's not really a strong presence and offensively he's more of an inside guy than anything else at this point.

i think Nico is by far the best prospect on Arizona, Green is good too

[clyde21]

The lack of scoring is huge though. Sounds like a poor man's rondo in 08

he's scoring better now though, almost 80% from the line and that 3pt% is up to 34% on more attempts, i think he gets to the point where he can be a decently reliable shooter honestly, he's getting more comfortable with his shot, he's attempting pull up 3s now something he didn't do as a freshmen and hitting them.

[BongBoyKlay]

top12

1. SCOTTIE LEWIS
2. RJ HAMPTON
3. ANTHONY EDWARDS
4. COLE ANTHONY
5. JAMES WISEMAN
6. NICO MANNION
7. QUENTIN GRIMES
8. TYRESE HALIBURTON
9. TRE JONES
10. OSCAR TSHIEBWE
11. JOSH GREEN
12. ISAAC OKORO


after it gets muddy for me, maybe LaMelo or Joe

Can you explain what makes you so high on Lewis?

[clyde21]

top12

1. SCOTTIE LEWIS
2. RJ HAMPTON
3. ANTHONY EDWARDS
4. COLE ANTHONY
5. JAMES WISEMAN
6. NICO MANNION
7. QUENTIN GRIMES
8. TYRESE HALIBURTON
9. TRE JONES
10. OSCAR TSHIEBWE
11. JOSH GREEN
12. ISAAC OKORO


after it gets muddy for me, maybe LaMelo or Joe

Can you explain what makes you so high on Lewis?

already did like a page ago

[MemphisX]

i'd take Haliburton over LaMelo, doesn't have the on-ball potential but I trust his decision making more and is infinitely better on defense and is quite useful off-ball as well.

This probably ssems like a crazy take but in this draft...I can see it. Haliburton (and Melo) are both late developers and both of their games seem to be exapnding by the game. Haliburton's game is light years ahead of what he was last season. I am not sure what either becomes at this point.