2024 NBA Draft Thread - the hawks might be on the clock

I didn’t like Tatum as a prospect at all because of his shot selection. That’s obviously a best case outcome.

We’ll see how it plays out. Bates obviously very talented already
 
I can't see Jalen slipping out of the top 15-20, but maybe there are big time character/background issues.
 
addict4sneakers said:
That’s my brother. I don’t have the energy he has to watch film. Dog been working though.
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ballinsam23 said:
addict4sneakers addict4sneakers Barlow500 is u? If so, congrats man definitely watched his videos here and there.
Click to expand...
addict4sneakers said:
that’s my brother. I jump on his pods every now and again. He deserves all the credit.
Click to expand...
I was trying to find his @, but couldn't. I believe it was Blazers500 or something like that from way back when.
 


2021 NBA draft: A high lottery pick hiding in Turkey? Scouting Alperen Sengun and other international players to know

My hottest take on the 2021 NBA draft is that there is a high lottery pick hiding more or less in plain sight on the other side of the globe.

My second hottest take is that there might be four other internationals who aren’t that far behind. It’s a good overseas class, and it isn’t getting nearly enough attention.

Let’s start at the top. Most evaluators see this as a five-player draft, after which we start getting into a lot of question marks. The same five names show up at the top of most boards: Cade Cunningham, Jalen Suggs, Evan Mobley, Jalen Green and Jonathan Kuminga.

And then, things get iffy. Everybody has another player or two they like at Nos. 6 and 7, but it’s never the same one. Questions only deepen as you go into the back half of the lottery, especially if you’re just focused on the NCAA pool.

Fortunately, we have a strong international group in this lottery. Quite strong, actually. Five international players have established themselves as first-round talents, and for reasons on which I’ll elaborate in a minute, this isn’t the pie-in-the-sky, projecting-way-ahead “first-round” status that has tripped up teams with internationals in the past.

If anything, the hype machine on overseas players has ground to a halt, and for good reason: Nobody can see them!

As hard as it’s been to scout American college players this year, the obstacles thrown up to seeing overseas talent have been even more substantial. Remember, Europe isn’t some monolith like the U.S.; with every individual country more or less sealing its borders and locking down to varying degrees internally, even Europe-based scouts have had trouble getting into arenas this season.

Scouts and execs also normally enter the season with some kind of “book” on the top internationals from U-17 tournaments and stateside events like the Hoop Summit, and to some degree, they’re relying on that knowledge bank this year. (Related story: Some sweat that the 2022 draft will be more challenging since that knowledge bank won’t exist.)

Yes, they still have the tape from the overseas games, but it’s tough to get a sense of size and speed from players you haven’t seen in person. Also, some of the quality on this video is not exactly HBO-level production value.

With staffs vaccinated and some borders opening, that may change to a small extent in May. Some execs are pondering trips to places such as Turkey and Serbia that will allow overseas visitors and admit fans to arenas, but even if they go, it’s a much smaller scope than a typical overseas scouting trip. Also, some countries with high-level prospects, such as Australia and Spain, remain hermetically sealed. Teams also are hopeful that workouts and the NBA Draft Combine will let them see these internationals in person.

Nonetheless, there will be a draft this July, and teams have to do their evaluating the best they can. And from my distant view, it appears they have some pretty good players to chew over.

Here’s where analytics can help, at least to a point. People act like translating European performance is some big mystery, but in fact, history tells us it’s fairly projectable. Players who can play regularly in a good league by the time they’re 20 nearly always make it as something in the NBA, which is why I feel pretty good about five international players in this draft.

In contrast, virtually all the draft busts on internationals have been speculative plays on overseas players with either limited track records or poor production in the highest-level leagues. This is where you find your Benders and Tskitishvilis.

And players who are dominant as teenagers? They’re not failing, even if they aren’t drafted that highly. Luka Doncic is the most prominent example, of course, but let’s not get carried away by a one-of-a-kind. In this instance, some more salient comparables are Jusuf Nurkic (drafted 16th), Jonas Valanciunas (fifth), Ricky Rubio (fifth), Zaza Pachulia (42nd), Nikola Mirotic (23rd) and Danilo Gallinari (sixth).

In terms of dominating a high-level overseas league at a young age, that’s the list from this century.

And we have one player to add to it: Alperen Sengun, who plays center for Besiktas in the Turkish League.

Sengun’s emergence has been more or less out of the blue, as he wasn’t on anybody’s must-see list entering the season. At first, he does not pass the eye test as a 6-foot-10 center without freakish athleticism, and his defense in switches could certainly use some improvement. Nonetheless, he is destroying the Turkish League — probably the second-best domestic league in Europe at this point — as an 18-year-old.

He is second in the league in scoring, rebounding and blocks. Nobody has had a PER above 30 in this league for the last decade (that’s as far back as the stats I’ve found go); Sengun’s is at a stratospheric 32.9, which needless to say leads the league by a wide margin.

Did I mention he’s 18?

If he fails with this kind of track record in a good overseas league, he’ll be the first of his kind.

What immediately jumps out about Sengun is how good and instinctive he is on the low block. He has a solid frame, good short-range quickness, great hands and Kevin McHale-esque footwork on pivots and drop steps in the post. He can finish with either hand and has a veteran’s knack for feeling forearm pressure from an opponent and spinning out of it. He also reads help defense well and passes adroitly out of it. Nit-pickers will point out his habit of hitting away a post defender’s arm, which is an automatic offensive foul in the NBA, but that’s an easy correction.

Just watch some of this stuff. First, let’s start with the McHale sequences on the block. The first move shows him rope-a-doping a defender by keeping his balance and pirouetting through multiple pivots until he has a layup. The second one is a fairly unique move that Sengun goes to quite a bit, where he shot fakes with the right, spins back to the left and shoots with his left hand:

Those are fun, but my favorite Sengun clips are when he channels his inner Nikola Jokic and makes plays for other people. The first one of these is him reading that the opponent will double because he has a switch with a guard. He waits for it, throws a lookaway pass to an open 3-point shooter and then mauls three opponents on the glass for the offensive board.

If you prefer transition, here’s some more entertainment. The first of these shows his ball skills, and he leads the break and sets up a kickout 3 without committing an offensive foul. The second one is pure joy, as he turns a transition into a post-up into an around-the-back pass to a cutter.

So let’s talk about the downside here: The defense isn’t great. Sengun is undersized for a five at 6-10 and at this point isn’t comfortable defending in space. He has some good instincts for shot-blocking around the basket, actually, with a 5.6 percent block rate.

However, he really gets in trouble when he has to guard the perimeter. Partly this is because he’s never been asked to before this season, and he still plays almost exclusively drop coverages.

Going through his tape, I don’t think his feet are that awful per se, which gives me some hope that this is fixable. As for his technique …. umm, yeah. Sengun tends to lunge out at dribblers and get caught way out over his skis; at that point, he’s toast.

Some look at this and say “this is why he shouldn’t be a first-round pick.” For me, it’s more like “This is why he shouldn’t go in the top three.” Sengun isn’t a high-wire rim protector, and the 18-year-old version of him is toast on switches. That said, his current role as an unswitchable, drop-coverage big isn’t necessarily emblazoned in stone either. His feet aren’t tragic, and his instincts are tremendous.

Meanwhile, another concern about him I think is much ado about nothing: his shooting. Scouts see him as a traditional big because he never has to venture beyond the 3-point line, but Sengun could easily adapt his game to play on the outside. He can handle the ball, pass and make decisions, and he shoots 80 percent from the line.

This is not the stroke of somebody who won’t shoot 3s in his mid-20s:

Overall then, Sengun profiles as a massively productive offensive player and rebounder who comes attached with some size and defense concerns.

Remind you of anybody? For me, it’s Kevin Love, another player who had awesome production as a teenager but had scouts questioning his defensive role and NBA sustainability even while he crushed opponents as a teen and even into his early years in Minnesota. Love never became a plus defender, or anything close to it, but he turned into an All-Star anyway. Maybe a Love-type talent shouldn’t be a top-five pick in this draft, and maybe I’m reaching comparing him to Love.

Nonetheless, I think Sengun should be in play starting at No. 6. I realize I’m outlier high on here compared to the masses, but his production suggests he’s far less risky a choice than many imagine, and one that comes with some pretty huge offensive upside.

Four more players to watch in the first round
In addition to Sengun, four other players have done enough overseas to warrant first-round attention, and two of them could end up in the lottery.

Again, let’s back up before we go forward. Players who are rotation-caliber European league players as teenagers have a very strong record of eventual NBA success, even if they don’t destroy the league Sengun-style. (Actually, one of them might be the NBA MVP this year.) It’s not quite an ironclad guarantee of success, but it’s a pretty strong omen. Plus, these players seem like especially strong bets when you get into the late teens and 20s in the draft, a point where the failure rate on college players skyrockets.

Let’s talk about them.

Josh Giddey, PG/SF, Adelaide 36ers

Australia’s league is getting better, but it’s still not quite on par with some of the top leagues in Europe. Fortunately, LaMelo Ball and RJ Hampton (and, um, Terrance Ferguson) offer us some kind of production barometer for what we might want to see from Giddey to place him in the top 20 on a draft board. Scouts are familiar with him, too, from his February 2020 appearance at the league’s Basketball Without Borders camp in Chicago — which is good, since they can’t get to Australia to see him now.

In a nutshell, I’d say he’s comfortably cleared the bar. But let’s start with the bad news: Giddey is fairly slow, doesn’t shoot particularly well and isn’t the most active or impactful defender, and those are concerns. Fixing his shot, a mostly set release with his elbow out, is probably the most paramount concern: Giddey is at 31.3 percent from 3 and 65.0 percent from the line. He also rarely draws fouls, something he could probably do more of as he fills out.

But as a 6-8 on-ball initiator, it may not matter much. Giddey is an elite passer who slips one-handed dishes with either hand, and while he can be extremely upright in his dribble, he gets low once he’s on the move and is able to protect the ball with surprising strength. With the size to see over the defense, he can take advantage of any opening once he’s gained an advantage, like this:

Additionally, he’s made steady improvement over the course of the season, including a triple-double in his most recent outing. For the year his 13.4-7.2-7.1 triple crown stats are pretty impressive, especially considering that overseas leagues are much tighter handing out assists than NBA scorekeepers. And you’ll notice those rebounding numbers: For a skinny perimeter player, a 12.1 percent rebound rate is quite impressive.

He’s doing this at just 18 and won’t turn 19 till October. He’s a full year younger than likely top pick Cunningham, for example, and eight months younger than Hampton was when he played in Oz a year ago.

Giddey’s production at his age provides proof of concept for his floor, but the other reason Giddey is a likely lotto pick is the scarcity of his skill set. Every team is looking for big playmaking wings, and every team that has one is looking for another. Even if he hits as a middling version of this archetype with below-average defense, that likely is still pretty valuable at the NBA level. The background on him is strong too, with opponents impressed with his competitiveness and court sense.

He has some real weaknesses, and I worry the hype on Giddey might getting a little ahead of itself, but again, bet on the production level at this age. Overall, I’m comfortable with him as a late lottery pick.

Usman Garuba, PF/C Real Madrid

Garuba is almost the antithesis of the first two players in that his defense is where most of the value lies. Some saw him as a top-10 pick heading into the season, but that has cooled off due to worries about his offensive game fitting in.

Garuba has played extensively at center overseas, but I wonder if his best NBA position is the four. While the best European leagues tend to play bigger lineups than even the NBA, Garuba is just 6-8, 220 pounds, and his mobility on the defensive end is his main advantage. He’s an NBA athlete but not a freak, and at his size, he’s neither a pure rim protector (3.4 percent block rate) nor an awesome rebounder (16.5 percent rebound rate).

Overall, I think he has a better chance of being OG Anunoby than he does of being Clint Capela. Garuba rarely makes defensive mistakes even at his young age (although he leaves his feet a bit much) and books up and down the court in transition. More importantly, he has some real dexterity as a perimeter defender that will make him a coveted on-ball defender in NBA schemes.

Watch here, for instance, as they leave him on an island against Nikola Mirotic — probably the best player not currently in the NBA — and he slides his feet to stop the drive before knocking the ball off Mirotic’s leg for a turnover.

Garuba’s shot is still coming around, but he’s become increasingly comfortable launching set shot 3s from the corner; these weren’t in his bag until recently, but he’s at 30.5 percent from 3 this year. Baby steps.

However, he does show some interesting grab-and-go ability during the rare times he’s allowed to do much as a ballhandler. Here, he shows off his straight-line speed, grabbing a board and going coast-to-coast for a dunk against FC Barcelona. The handle gets wobbly after the crossover, but he is able to protect the ball at the end from noted ball-pilferer Nick Calathes:

The other reason I don’t see a future for Garuba as a five except in small-ball situations is that he isn’t super explosive around the rim. Even in a low-usage “dunks and layups” type role, he shoots 59.8 percent on 2s, which is good but hardly exceptional for a frontcourt prospect. Here, for instance, he tries to power up after a paint catch, and his shot is sent back by Brandon Davies, who played the four in the NBA:

Overall, Garuba’s defensive ceiling and track record at his age warrant a first-round selection, but the lack of offensive upside may keep him out of the lottery. With a flimsy group in the 11 to 20 range right now on the NCAA side, I can argue strongly for Garuba someplace in the teens.

Roko Prkacin, PF, Cibona Zagreb

Prkacin competes in the Adriatic League (the not-quite-domestic league that includes teams from six of the seven countries of the former Yugoslavia), which is a half-notch below some of the others on this list. The Adriatic yielded swarms of talent mid-decade (Jusuf Nurkic, Dario Saric, Nikola Jokic, Bogdan Bogdanovic and 2015 first-rounder Nikola Milutinov were playing in this league as teenagers at the same time in 2014) but hasn’t quite kept up with the other top-flight domestic leagues in recent years. However, it’s still a competitive league — not on par with Spain, Turkey or Russia but capable of hanging with the rest.

Prkacin is interesting because he’s the prototype of a big wing with perimeter skills. He looks every bit of 6-9 on tape, with square shoulders and long-ish arms (side note: teams are craving height and weight measurements on the internationals and are hoping to get them at the combine). He a full-time perimeter player, but his rebound rate (17.2 percent) in ABA games is pretty impressive.

Like Giddey, Prkacin has a late birthdate (November 2002) that will make him one of the youngest players in the draft, if not the absolute youngest.

Size it all up, and he screams of an NBA four, especially if he can slightly boost his skill level from its current stats. Prkacin’s jumper isn’t what you’d call pure; he gets a nice arc, but off the dribble, he can jackknife his legs, and from a standstill, everything is a little awkward from the wide stance on up:

He’s made 35.2 percent from 3 and 65.0 percent from the line this season, and that 3-point mark is outlier good relative to his previous career totals. (I say “career”; he’s 18 but has been playing at Cibona since he was 16, plus we have stats from some youth tournaments and other events going back a bit for overseas players.)

Prkacin also shows some facility as a passer and shot creator. He is comfortable attacking off the dribble and has a knack for short runners and floaters in the paint. Watch here as he somehow turns a post-up into a floater.

Where the real question comes is at the defensive end. Right now he’s just OK, with iffy reactions on the weak side and some discomfort in switching situations abasing guards, but he has the size, length and mobility profile to eventually be much better. Like, at some point he’ll figure out how to show on this pick-and-roll and not end up with his butt facing the dribbler:

Overall, he’s had an impressive season on a weak team, and while he could maybe use one more year of seasoning overseas, you could say the same thing about most of the players who will be picked between 10 and 20 this year. I’m pretty impressed with Prkacin as an NBA four and think the draft world is sleeping on him a bit; he’ll end up in the top 20 on my final board for sure and could have a case to land higher.

Rokas Jokubaitis, PG/SG Zalgiris

Of the five international players here, Jokubaitis has the weakest case as a first-rounder; he’s a bit older than the others and hasn’t been quite as productive. Also, the draft is always about upside at some level, and Jokubaitis’ athletic limitations put a pretty firm ceiling on him.

Let’s start with the good news: He established himself as a rotation player as a teenager in a high-level European team, the Lithuanian squad Zalgiris. While his numbers are a bit down from a year ago, in 31 EuroLeague games, he’s posted a 10.6 PER, shot decently and not looked overmatched running pick-and-roll. He turned 20 in November and is playing over 20 minutes a game on a solid team (17-17) in the highest division of European basketball; this is much more impressive than averaging 12 points a game in the SEC.

The bad news on Jokubaitis is that his athletic limitations are a greater question mark than for the other players listed above. At 6-4, he’s going to be undersized at the two, and despite his knack for running pick-and-roll, I’m not sure he has the handle or speed to play the one. Additionally, his athletic indicators are all really poor — Jokubaitis has a very low steal rate, rebounds like a point guard and has not blocked a single shot in 41 EuroLeague games over the past two seasons.

You might overlook this if he was a crazy flamethrower from deep, but his shot has been inconsistent thus far. While it doesn’t look broken, he’s made 32.7 percent of his 3s across all competitions over the past three seasons, and 74.6 percent from the line. He’ll probably be an OKish shooter, but with his size/athleticism profile, that may not be enough.

What Jokubaitis can do is run pick-and-roll, especially going left, and with the size, leftiness and overall craft, he at times reminds you of Beno Udrih.

Overall, that probably isn’t enough to get him in the top 30 names on every team’s board, and since he doesn’t have a crazy high ceiling, I get it.

But I do think he still has a case as a first-rounder and could be especially useful for a team picking in the 20s who wants him to develop overseas another year before bringing him over. For instance, Minnesota drafted Leandro Bolmaro 23rd a year ago in similar circumstances, and Jokubaitis’ resume at this point is much stronger than Bolmaro’s was a year ago.
Can't embed the vids in the article.
 
Kinda falling in love with Garuba as a good role player. He's basically what I wish Grant Williams could be on the Cs, but struggles because of his limited athleticism. Garuba isn't really an explosive athlete, but he's fluid and can actually get off the floor. Think he can be a flat out awesome defender. Paul Milsap-ish. He looks really raw offensively, but he's going to get random buckets in the paint and looks semi-comfortable with the C&S 3. Made some decent passes in the videos I watched too.
 
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