Duke4life831 wrote:Okay but nothing about what Mark has improved on makes me feel like he should be taken any higher in the draft. We have had this discussion multiple times on this board so I wont go down this road again. But I just dont feel like taking a raw athletic 5 with practically 0 offensive skills worth using a top pick for. You can find top tier defensive bigs later in the draft. There is nothing about Duren's game makes me believe he will be anything more than a defensive big. He is a horrible FT shooter, so I dont see much hope for him becoming a big that can spread the floor. People talk about his passing, but he has 18 assists to 38 turnovers so far on the season. And again he is doing this against very weak competition. Also add in he is a really bad rebounder as well, he is rebounding basically equal to JJJ and Duren spends practically the entire time in the paint.
So again the best I see Duren turning into is a really good defensive big that is just a lob threat on the offensive end. You can find multiple of those guys every year late 1st and early 2nd.
I sort of agree, though Duren is a pretty good rebounder 10 per 36 instead of 11 like Koloko and Williams but again 2 years younger (3.5 younger than Koloko), easy to project him getting another board per 36.
Wings are so valuable, that hitting 80% on Kendall Brown or whoever at that spot is as good as hitting 100% on Duren. We could trade OG for a decent starting center (Turner or Holmes say) AND get a lottery protected first rounder at least from those teams and probably another asset.
That's the nice fallback to the Masai "only go after 6'8 or 6'9 guys approach. You can basically always move one for a 5 or a 1 if you need to, or the assets to get one. Look at the return Robert Covington got in 2 trades, and he's not a special man to man defender and can't dribble or pass, and is a good but not gunner of a 3pt shooter.
I just mean Duren is probably going to go 10-12th because some team will see him as a starter and not judge the wings available to be likely to become starters. Right now I'd guess Wizards at 11 or Memphis at 13 to replace Adams after a year. But it's not inconceivable he falls and nobody wants a center and Charlotte gets him at 18. At that point, I think he's a good pick. He's performed well at a young age on a terrible team (his judgement in picking Memphis is another thing though, seems like a red flag. Sure he got NIL money but not more than a couple draft slots worth and there's lot of teams with actual guards and coaching) and was a top 5 recruit.
In general things get fuzzy for me after pick 13 here: https://www.tankathon.com/mock_draft
I've seen the guys at big schools, but not the G-League Ignite guys, but they all look sort of meh to me, even though you know someone with a handle and an NBA body like Keels or Daniel will develop a jumper and turn out good.
