2021 Draft Thread

[Onus]

I'd like to leave this link here in the thread: https://deanondraft.com/

Hugely underrated site, unknown to many, brings lots of good points about many players.

Just another drop of water in the sea for us to study our craft.

Thanks! Lots of good stuff on here. Making me want to re-look at Wagner....

I looked through that site but my jaw dropped when I got to the Giddey part. Its nonsensical. They provide a list of tall players with high assist %s... ok. Each one of them had other elite skills, and the ones that didn't? They failed! And Giddey can't score (Luka, Middleton, George) and isn't an elite defender (Draymond, Simmons, Iguodala, Anderson, George again).. so here's the NBA players on that list that weren't elite scorers/defenders:

Tomas Satoransky
Ronnie Brewer
Julius Hodge
Corey Brewer
Nic Batum

He made a very compelling argument as to why Giddey should be avoided, but then ranked him 6t

I liked dean for some of his analysis but he seems to be way off this year. Way too much emphasis on passing. I think lamelo skewed his draft perception this year.

[TB]

I'd like to leave this link here in the thread: https://deanondraft.com/

Hugely underrated site, unknown to many, brings lots of good points about many players.

Just another drop of water in the sea for us to study our craft.

Thanks! Lots of good stuff on here. Making me want to re-look at Wagner....

I looked through that site but my jaw dropped when I got to the Giddey part. Its nonsensical. They provide a list of tall players with high assist %s... ok. Each one of them had other elite skills, and the ones that didn't? They failed! And Giddey can't score (Luka, Middleton, George) and isn't an elite defender (Draymond, Simmons, Iguodala, Anderson, George again).. so here's the NBA players on that list that weren't elite scorers/defenders:

Tomas Satoransky
Ronnie Brewer
Julius Hodge
Corey Brewer
Nic Batum

He made a very compelling argument as to why Giddey should be avoided, but then ranked him 6t

Thought the same thing. Giddey is a do not draft for me. Also thought the Moody write up would make someone put Moody HIGHER than he was. Still though, always like seeing some stuff to make me reevaluate since I can get stuck in my ways. In this case looking at Barnes and Wagner more, and making sure I don't have tunnel vision on Jalen Green as priority 1.

[TB]

Defensively I think Mitchell is Bev and not close to Smart. Thats not a bad thing, I just don't think he has the size to guard bigger guys like Smart or Dort do. And yes I saw the Cade clips so I could be wrong on this. He's just not as tall, long, or strong as Smart/Dort.

Offensively I don't think he's anywhere near Kemba either. So for me Mitchell probably lands somewhere between Bev and Mike Conley. He's a good player, and one i'd look at if he dropped to 14. But probably not 7th.

[bay2hk]

The Ringer's Kevin O'Connor mocked Mitchell at 7 and Chris Duarte at 14 for us.

Can't think of a worse draft for us if it comes down to that.

You simply don't draft a 6'1'' 23-year old, Patrick Beverly-clone PG at the 7, and a 23-year old which played 2 college seasons at the 14.

Swing for the fences, get high-upside players instead of guys who will be 27 by the time their rookie contract ends.

Mitchell at 7 would be a disaster for the reasons you listed.. and also how does that even fit? He'd be sharing a backcourt with either Curry or Poole at any given time, meaning one of them is likely guarding SGs, unless Mitchell has that ability too (an unknown at this point)

Frankly the mocks I see have no reasoning behind them. Hopefully its just that, and not rumblings they hear from the W's. I obviously have a hard time trusting their judgement when it comes to lottery picks right now

Mitchell / Giddy would be PG insurance in case Curry miss time. I think a lot of people had concern about Lamelo fitting in with Curry last season and drafted Wiseman because of it. We are one Curry injury from being a play in team. Let's draft a controllable young gun to groom behind Curry. Either way, don't expect any of the rookies to get significant time unless we trade up to top 4.

[FNQ]

Thanks! Lots of good stuff on here. Making me want to re-look at Wagner....

I looked through that site but my jaw dropped when I got to the Giddey part. Its nonsensical. They provide a list of tall players with high assist %s... ok. Each one of them had other elite skills, and the ones that didn't? They failed! And Giddey can't score (Luka, Middleton, George) and isn't an elite defender (Draymond, Simmons, Iguodala, Anderson, George again).. so here's the NBA players on that list that weren't elite scorers/defenders:

Tomas Satoransky
Ronnie Brewer
Julius Hodge
Corey Brewer
Nic Batum

He made a very compelling argument as to why Giddey should be avoided, but then ranked him 6t

Thought the same thing. Giddey is a do not draft for me. Also thought the Moody write up would make someone put Moody HIGHER than he was. Still though, always like seeing some stuff to make me reevaluate since I can get stuck in my ways. In this case looking at Barnes and Wagner more, and making sure I don't have tunnel vision on Jalen Green as priority 1.

The Wagner write up was really well done, a lot of them are. I dont agree with all, but I see the logic in it, and I think that's whats most important. But that was shattered when I got to Giddey.. feel like its working backwards from a preferred answer. His success seems to hinge on him being really good at something that he hasn't shown any signs of being really good at yet.

[FNQ]

The Ringer's Kevin O'Connor mocked Mitchell at 7 and Chris Duarte at 14 for us.

Can't think of a worse draft for us if it comes down to that.

You simply don't draft a 6'1'' 23-year old, Patrick Beverly-clone PG at the 7, and a 23-year old which played 2 college seasons at the 14.

Swing for the fences, get high-upside players instead of guys who will be 27 by the time their rookie contract ends.

Mitchell at 7 would be a disaster for the reasons you listed.. and also how does that even fit? He'd be sharing a backcourt with either Curry or Poole at any given time, meaning one of them is likely guarding SGs, unless Mitchell has that ability too (an unknown at this point)

Frankly the mocks I see have no reasoning behind them. Hopefully its just that, and not rumblings they hear from the W's. I obviously have a hard time trusting their judgement when it comes to lottery picks right now

Mitchell / Giddy would be PG insurance in case Curry miss time. I think a lot of people had concern about Lamelo fitting in with Curry last season and drafted Wiseman because of it. We are one Curry injury from being a play in team. Let's draft a controllable young gun to groom behind Curry. Either way, don't expect any of the rookies to get significant time unless we trade up to top 4.

Drafting a backup PG in the lottery for insurance seems like wasting a pick. The bottom line is that we're always going to be one Curry injury away from being a very bad team. We shouldnt be drafting with that idea at the forefront

Frankly I thought Poole was fine as a Curry stand-in, and probably lines up him more than any prospect in the draft. And he also has 2 years in the system.

[FNQ]

to bolden the point:

Poole started 7 games without Curry:

21.4 ppg
2.7 rpg
3.6 apg
.588 TS%

if we're going after another handler fine, but there's very unlikely to be a guy in the draft who can step in for Curry better than Poole

[GSWFan1994]

I'd like to leave this link here in the thread: https://deanondraft.com/

Hugely underrated site, unknown to many, brings lots of good points about many players.

Just another drop of water in the sea for us to study our craft.

Thanks! Lots of good stuff on here. Making me want to re-look at Wagner....

TB, I strongly recommend you (and others) to read his stuff. Specially the older articles.

This guy got a lot of things right. He called Josh Richardson as a NBA players, before he was even considered as a 2nd round guy.

Read what he wrote about other top-tier talent players, Doncic, Jabari Parker and so on.

Of course he got some things wrong, but in the end he had much more good takes than bad.

This "Dean on Draft" is a hugely underrated site for draft analysis, the 2nd best one I ever saw on the confines of the internet, besides this one:

Hoops Analyst

Do you know the story of this site?

Ed Weiland was a truck driver (Fed Ex delivery man) who predicted Jeremy Lin being a NBA player way before, when he was in college.

Just read his analysis on past drafts.

Too bad he doesn't write for the site anymore (for a few years now)... you know why? Keep reading.

Back in the past, a few years ago, I wrote him a comment in some article asking why did he forgot about Nikola Jokic on his since-then "top 60" player rankings. This was 1 or 2 years before Jokic was drafted. I already knew about him. There are/were old Jokic clips on YT, when he was playing in the Adriatic League in which you could saw his potential.

I assumed a guy like him (Weiland) would NEVER forget about adding a since-then underrated Jokic to this big of a list.

He deleted my comment, never replied. A few weeks later, he stopped posting at the site, then news came that he was hired as a scout by a NBA team (I guess Denver!).



Here's a Business Insider article on him, check it out.

[GSWFan1994]

Mitchell at 7 would be a disaster for the reasons you listed.. and also how does that even fit? He'd be sharing a backcourt with either Curry or Poole at any given time, meaning one of them is likely guarding SGs, unless Mitchell has that ability too (an unknown at this point)

Frankly the mocks I see have no reasoning behind them. Hopefully its just that, and not rumblings they hear from the W's. I obviously have a hard time trusting their judgement when it comes to lottery picks right now

You're absolutely right.

Mitchell being an awesome NCAA-level defender is very different than him being an above average NBA-level defender.

Just for starts, the players are way bigger, more skilled, etc, etc, etc.

Also, how much difference can an supposedly "very good PG defender" make in the NBA? Is it a real, actual difference maker?

[TB]

^ Okay that story is amazing hahaha (jokic one)

Will definitely check out some more from both of those sites.

[GSWFan1994]

I'd like to leave this link here in the thread: https://deanondraft.com/

Hugely underrated site, unknown to many, brings lots of good points about many players.

Just another drop of water in the sea for us to study our craft.

Thanks! Lots of good stuff on here. Making me want to re-look at Wagner....

I looked through that site but my jaw dropped when I got to the Giddey part. Its nonsensical. They provide a list of tall players with high assist %s... ok. Each one of them had other elite skills, and the ones that didn't? They failed! And Giddey can't score (Luka, Middleton, George) and isn't an elite defender (Draymond, Simmons, Iguodala, Anderson, George again).. so here's the NBA players on that list that weren't elite scorers/defenders:

Tomas Satoransky
Ronnie Brewer
Julius Hodge
Corey Brewer
Nic Batum

He made a very compelling argument as to why Giddey should be avoided, but then ranked him 6t

First of all, I also don't agree with his ranking of Giddey, let it be clear.

But I understand his reasoning: at the top of the draft, you look for outlier skills, in hope that the player can, over time, improve other facets of his skillset to a passable level.

However, there are physical limitations to this logic - Giddey has a cap level on some of his weaknesses.

And I like Giddey, he's in the 8-12 range for me ATM.

[GSWFan1994]

Defensively I think Mitchell is Bev and not close to Smart. Thats not a bad thing, I just don't think he has the size to guard bigger guys like Smart or Dort do. And yes I saw the Cade clips so I could be wrong on this. He's just not as tall, long, or strong as Smart/Dort.

Offensively I don't think he's anywhere near Kemba either. So for me Mitchell probably lands somewhere between Bev and Mike Conley. He's a good player, and one i'd look at if he dropped to 14. But probably not 7th.

Definitely.

Mitchell is barely 6'1'' with a very short wingspan related to his height.

Smart is 6'3'', strong, great wingspan.

Very different players.

Regarding Mitchell's offensive repertoire, just check this video:

Watch on YouTube

The guy just goes off one hand, can't use the other. Has no in-between dribble game. Imagine him finishing amongst the trees in the NBA.

Make no mistake about it, Mitchell is valuable and should be a good rotation piece as a combo guard off the bench over time, but at the 7th pick? Hell no. At the 14th there are better options too, with a much better upside... like Springer.

[GSWFan1994]

Mitchell / Giddy would be PG insurance in case Curry miss time. I think a lot of people had concern about Lamelo fitting in with Curry last season and drafted Wiseman because of it. We are one Curry injury from being a play in team. Let's draft a controllable young gun to groom behind Curry. Either way, don't expect any of the rookies to get significant time unless we trade up to top 4.

The rookies won't need to get major playing time.

The majority of it will go to Curry, Klay, Wiggins, Green, Looney, JTA, plus a bit more for Wiseman & Poole. You already have 8 guys here.

That's actually a very good situation for the rookie (& also Wiseman/Poole), as they won't have pressure to perform and could hone their craft and take over in time.

... just like Poole's situation this past season.

[Scoots1994]

After Cade, Mobley, and Suggs all the young guys are where they are on potential and projecting them developing skills they haven't shown well. What makes this draft so deep is that so many have shown potential while also several have shown enough to have a high floor but a relatively low ceiling.

Barnes and Giddey are poster children for betting on potential.

[Onus]

Defensively I think Mitchell is Bev and not close to Smart. Thats not a bad thing, I just don't think he has the size to guard bigger guys like Smart or Dort do. And yes I saw the Cade clips so I could be wrong on this. He's just not as tall, long, or strong as Smart/Dort.

Offensively I don't think he's anywhere near Kemba either. So for me Mitchell probably lands somewhere between Bev and Mike Conley. He's a good player, and one i'd look at if he dropped to 14. But probably not 7th.

The difference between Bev an Mitchell is that Mitchell has elite quickness. You see his first step on offense by blowing by guys easily. Then you see it on the defensive end where he constantly bodies players and beats them to the spot. He will be very hard for taller guys to dribble around him. They may be able to shoot over the top, but he can absolutely be a cp3 defender. To me Bev isn't a good defender. Whereas I've seen CP3 guard durant sufficiently.

[weekend_warrior]

Not sure if #7 would be too high and also I didn't see al that much of him, but from what you can read on the draft boards I like Wagner.

Would fill a clear need on our roster as a SF that can slide up to PF in a small-ball line-up. Probably no all star upside, but seems to be very solid across the board. Could be a more intelligent Oubre down the line for us?!

[FNQ]

Thanks! Lots of good stuff on here. Making me want to re-look at Wagner....

I looked through that site but my jaw dropped when I got to the Giddey part. Its nonsensical. They provide a list of tall players with high assist %s... ok. Each one of them had other elite skills, and the ones that didn't? They failed! And Giddey can't score (Luka, Middleton, George) and isn't an elite defender (Draymond, Simmons, Iguodala, Anderson, George again).. so here's the NBA players on that list that weren't elite scorers/defenders:

Tomas Satoransky
Ronnie Brewer
Julius Hodge
Corey Brewer
Nic Batum

He made a very compelling argument as to why Giddey should be avoided, but then ranked him 6t

First of all, I also don't agree with his ranking of Giddey, let it be clear.

But I understand his reasoning: at the top of the draft, you look for outlier skills, in hope that the player can, over time, improve other facets of his skillset to a passable level.

However, there are physical limitations to this logic - Giddey has a cap level on some of his weaknesses.

And I like Giddey, he's in the 8-12 range for me ATM.

Wouldnt that basically be what Satoransky is then? A guy who can pass and had little else, became essentially passable.. he's a 20mpg player and not a particularly adept one.

I dont think a passable level cuts it here. I think for a player like Giddey to be drafted in the lottery, there has to be a logical path to him being a starter, and I dont see one. The guys who were listed as successes have another *elite* part of their game to supplement the passing. And even then, arguably, you still might not be much of an impact player (Rubio).

I dont want to draft a player in the lottery with the basis of their success being an elite skill popping up out of nowhere. Thats something you could do in the late 1st and maybe even the 2nd

[Onus]

Defensively I think Mitchell is Bev and not close to Smart. Thats not a bad thing, I just don't think he has the size to guard bigger guys like Smart or Dort do. And yes I saw the Cade clips so I could be wrong on this. He's just not as tall, long, or strong as Smart/Dort.

Offensively I don't think he's anywhere near Kemba either. So for me Mitchell probably lands somewhere between Bev and Mike Conley. He's a good player, and one i'd look at if he dropped to 14. But probably not 7th.

Definitely.

Mitchell is barely 6'1'' with a very short wingspan related to his height.

Smart is 6'3'', strong, great wingspan.

Very different players.

Regarding Mitchell's offensive repertoire, just check this video:

Watch on YouTube

The guy just goes off one hand, can't use the other. Has no in-between dribble game. Imagine him finishing amongst the trees in the NBA.

Make no mistake about it, Mitchell is valuable and should be a good rotation piece as a combo guard off the bench over time, but at the 7th pick? Hell no. At the 14th there are better options too, with a much better upside... like Springer.

Why are we short changing Mitchell's height to make a point? He's 6'2'' with a 6'5'' wingspan. Smart is 6'3'' with a 6'9'' wingspan.

Wingspan is nice and helps defensively especially with stripping the ball. But really what Mitchell is so good at is bumping you with his body by beating you to the spot so that you stumble and then he stabs at the ball. So wingspan would help there but he's still beating guys to the spot with his body first. Really it's his quickness and strength that makes him such a good defender.

I don't even know what you mean he goes off of one hand, he goes left or right. He's not right hand dominant like someone like Wagner is. He is constantly taking mid range pull ups. I'm guessing you're talking about floaters, which in the video you linked (I think) said he was good at but just wasn't a large sample size (maybe it was a different video).

I get people think he's overrated and there are legit concerns. But if his shot is for real and he plays in a spread offense he's going to be a legit player.

[Onus]

I looked through that site but my jaw dropped when I got to the Giddey part. Its nonsensical. They provide a list of tall players with high assist %s... ok. Each one of them had other elite skills, and the ones that didn't? They failed! And Giddey can't score (Luka, Middleton, George) and isn't an elite defender (Draymond, Simmons, Iguodala, Anderson, George again).. so here's the NBA players on that list that weren't elite scorers/defenders:

Tomas Satoransky
Ronnie Brewer
Julius Hodge
Corey Brewer
Nic Batum

He made a very compelling argument as to why Giddey should be avoided, but then ranked him 6t

First of all, I also don't agree with his ranking of Giddey, let it be clear.

But I understand his reasoning: at the top of the draft, you look for outlier skills, in hope that the player can, over time, improve other facets of his skillset to a passable level.

However, there are physical limitations to this logic - Giddey has a cap level on some of his weaknesses.

And I like Giddey, he's in the 8-12 range for me ATM.

Wouldnt that basically be what Satoransky is then? A guy who can pass and had little else, became essentially passable.. he's a 20mpg player and not a particularly adept one.

I dont think a passable level cuts it here. I think for a player like Giddey to be drafted in the lottery, there has to be a logical path to him being a starter, and I dont see one. The guys who were listed as successes have another *elite* part of their game to supplement the passing. And even then, arguably, you still might not be much of an impact player (Rubio).

I dont want to draft a player in the lottery with the basis of their success being an elite skill popping up out of nowhere. Thats something you could do in the late 1st and maybe even the 2nd

You definitely changed my thinking on Giddey

[RichmondWarrior]

I would try to do what I could to move up to 4 if one of Green/Suggs falls.....give up the 7,14 and something else other than Wiseman. I wanted Lamelo bad last year but I’ll give Wiseman 1 full year with a training camp. At 7 I like Jalen Johnson I doubt he’ll be there at 14. Moody would be my other choice, seems to fit the roster well. If Wagner is there at 14 it’d be hard for me to pass on him