Hell na that should not be the expectation, I was questioning if he could even be JJ
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/ranking-the-2015-nba-draft-s-top-shooters-012046574.htmlRanking the 2015 NBA draft's top shooters
It doesn't take more than a few minutes of watching an NBA playoff game to realize how important outside shooting has become to the way the sport is evolving these days. Great shooters open the floor for their teammates to operate and make the offense flow much more smoothly. Still, ranking the best shooters in the NBA or this upcoming draft class is a highly subjective proposition.
Players who can sit in the corner and knock down open shots are valuable commodities in today's NBA, but without teammates who can actually create those looks, their value would be diminished because the defense would have no reason to actually leave them open. Every NBA game you watch is a chess match, a give and take of opposing strategies and decisions with adjustments made on the fly based on what coaching staffs and their trusted playmakers are seeing on the court.
The best creators in the NBA are not only great athletes who can get to the rim at will, but also are capable of pulling up off the dribble and punishing the defense. This is arguably a much more difficult and important skill to have – it's incredibly difficult to slow down a great off-the-dribble shooter who can create an open look in a flash.
With that said, how do we evaluate the best shooters available in this draft class? Here are some of the measures we came up with, with an explanation for why we isolated each stat, along with a look at the top-five players in the NBA and the 2015 NBA draft in each category.
This is not an exhaustive study including all of the best shooters in college basketball or even in the 2015 NBA draft class. The only players included in this subset are those deemed to "draftable" NBA prospects. For example, players like Connor Hill (6-3, SG, Idaho, 3.6 threes made per game, 45% 3P%), Lawrence Alexander (6-3, SG, North Dakota State, 3.3 threes made per game, 45% 3P%, Kevin Pangos (6-2, PG, Gonzaga, 2.2 threes made per game, 43% 3P%) were excluded, amongst others.
For the purpose of this article, we also honed in on only those who ranked well in the various categories we studied, which is why you won't see the likes of R.J. Hunter, Rashad Vaughn and to a lesser extent Cameron Payne, who weren't incredibly efficient this past season, but are still likely to get drafted in the first round in part because their potential as shooters.
Data Sources: Synergy Sports Technology, and DraftExpress Blue
3-pointers attempted per-40 minutes
Methodology: Anyone can go out and jack up 3-pointers without conscience, but if that strategy doesn't prove to be effective for winning games, there is little doubt that the player's teammates and coaching staff will quickly pivot away from it. Many of the players we'd consider to be the best shooters in the league are indeed those who heave up the most shots on a per-minute basis. Studies have shown that the volume of a player's attempts in college actually tell us more about what kind of shooter he will develop into than his actual accuracy, which can be swayed easily by the small sample size of the NCAA season. In parenthesis, you'll find the player's actual 3-point percentage this year.
Tyler Harvey 9.8 (41%)
Michael Frazier 8.2 (38%)
D'Angelo Russell 7.6 (41%)
Mario Hezonja 7.4 (39%)
Corey Hawkins 7.4 (49%)
NBA leaders
Stephen Curry 10.1 (44%)
J.R. Smith 9.9 (39%)
C.J. Miles 9.5 (35%)
Louis Williams 8.9 (33%)
Wesley Matthews 8.8 (39%)
3-point percentage
Methodology: While per-minute attempts is an interesting stat, it's important to realize that not every player is in position to heave up a huge amount of outside shots because of their role on the team, style of play, or perhaps a lack of confidence in their ability to make 3s. In a perfect world, we'd be looking for a player who can hit a barrage of outside shots at a great clip, but NBA teams also like players who know their role and are willing to play within the confines of a system. In parenthesis, you'll find the player's 3-pointers attempted per-40 minutes this year.
Corey Hawkins 49% (7.4)
Anthony Brown 44% (5.4)
Pat Connaughton 42.5% (6.6)
Daniel Diez 42.5% (6.4)
Frank Kaminsky 41.6% (3.4)
NBA leaders (min: 3.4 attempts per-40)
Kyle Korver 46.5% (8.0)
Meyers Leonard 45.6 (5.2)
Stephen Curry 44.4% (10.1)
Eric Gordon 44.4% (6.6)
Anthony Morrow 43.4% (6.9)
Klay Thompson 43.4) (8.6)
J.J. Redick 43% (7.7)
Free-throw percentage
Methodology: While it may seem strange to isolate a player's ability at the free-throw line and attempt to extrapolate it to their overall shooting prowess as a whole, there is certainly a method to the madness here. Historical draft studies consistently show that a player's free-throw percentage in college tells us just as much, if not more, than his 3-point percentages do. The explanation here again revolves around sample size (some of the prospects in this study shot only around 100 3-pointers this season), as well as the fact that shooting form, touch, hand/eye coordination and other factors that many great free-throw shooters have overlap quite neatly outside the charity stripe, as well.
Joseph Young 93.2%
Quinn Cook 89.1%
Tyus Jones 88.9%
Michael Frazier 87.0%
Tyler Harvey 85.6%
NBA leaders
Meyers Leonard 91.2%
J.J. Redick 90.8%
Jodie Meeks 90.6%
Chris Paul 90.6%
Caron Butler 90.2%
Stephen Curry 89.8%
Catch-and-shoot points per-40
Methodology: This stat tells us a bit about the different prospects' role on their former team, as well as their readiness for operating within the confines of an NBA system. These players mostly had narrowly defined duties as floor spacers for their respective teams. For good measure we threw their points–per-shot average in parenthesis, to give you a better idea how accurately they were able to accumulate the scoring numbers they put together in catch-and-shoot situations.
Daniel Diez 7.44 (1.32 PPS)
Mario Hezonja 7.29 (1.24 PPS)
Pat Connaughton 7.01 (1.36 PPS)
Kristaps Porzingis 6.43 (1.13 PPS)
Michael Frazier 6.27 (1.16 PPS)
NBA leaders
Dirk Nowitzki8.73 (1.04 PPS)
J.J. Redick 8.53 (1.22 PPS)
Kyle Korver 8.5 (1.37 PPS)
Klay Thompson 7.64 (1.27 PPS)
Anthony Morrow 7.55 (1.28 PPS)
Danny Green 7.34 (1.28 PPS)
Pull-up jumper points per-40
Methodology: As we discussed in the intro, it's quite a bit more difficult to score points efficiently when players are forced to create offense on their own. As evidence, the NBA sample set below includes some of the league's best pure scorers. Unfortunately, the varying degree in the level of competition of our draft set hampers us from making a real apples-to-apples comparison. While it's extremely impressive to see what type of off-the-dribble damage the likes of Corey Hawkinsand Tyler Harvey were able to do at the low-major level, particularly with the incredible efficiency they combined that with, they were clearly in a better position to do so against the smaller and less athletic competition they faced on a nightly basis. This is hardly a problem unique to this shooting category, as it's one of the biggest challenges NBA teams face as a whole in ranking all NBA draft prospects against each other.
Corey Hawkins 6.37 (1.27 PPS)
Tyler Harvey 5.45 (1.41 PPS)
Joseph Young 4.69 (0.99 PPS)
D'Angelo Russell 4.41 (1.04 PPS)
Mario Hezonja 3.38 (1.06 PPS)
NBA leaders
Chris Paul 8.12 (1.007 PPS)
Stephen Curry 7.04 (1.095 PPS)
Russell Westbrook 6.1 (.799 PPS)
Monta Ellis 5.9 (.788 PPS)
Kyrie Irving 5.5 (.913 PPS)
Overall jump-shot points per-40
Methodology: This is simply an index of all points the different prospects were able to score off jumpers on a per-40-minute basis, be it from catch-and-shoot situations, off pull-ups, and also from what Synergydescribes as “early jumpers." These “early jumpers” aren't quite catch-and-shoot jumpers or true pull ups, as they often involve a few seconds of a player sizing up their opponent, possibly with a jab-step or casual dribble thrown for good measure, before heaving up a jumper, and thus don't fit into either category neatly. This is a nice composite look at pure production of the different jumpshooters, regardless of how they got their offense. The two highly skilled, but undersized low-major combo guards find themselves again at the head of the pack, as does Croatian 20-year old Mario Hezonja, who put up these numbers against ACB and Euroleague competition significantly older than him. Once again, the NBA sample confirms that we are looking at something of great value IF these players were able to translate their jump-shooting scoring prowess to the next level.
Tyler Harvey 12.76 (1.27 PPS)
Corey Hawkins 11.31 (1.34 PPS)
Mario Hezonja 11.1 (1.16 PPS)
Joseph Young 10.77 (1.06 PPS)
D'Angelo Russell 9.49 (1.07 PPS)
NBA leaders
Klay Thompson 13.64 (1.14 PPS)
Stephen Curry 13.06 (1.17 PPS)
J.J. Redick 12.97 (1.13 PPS)
Chris Paul 12.36 (1.07 PPS)
J.R. Smith 11.7 (1.10 PPS)
Points per shot on jump-shot attempts
Methodology: This is a pure efficiency measure, a look at how effectively the prospects in our dataset were able to put the ball in the basket in jump-shooting situations regardless of shot type. For good measure we threw in the number of jumpers they attempted per-40 minutes, to give you an idea of the volume of shots they took, an important component in evaluating a players' efficiency. Obviously the more attempts a player averages, the more difficult it is to convert at a great clip.
Corey Hawkins 1.34 (8.42)
Pat Connaughton 1.28 (6.07)
Tyler Harvey 1.27 (10.05)
Daniel Diez 1.23 (7.05)
Mario Hezonja 1.16 (9.56)
NBA leaders (min. 5 attempts per game)
Kyle Korver 1.33 PPP (6.4)
Stephen Curry 1.17 PPP (9.6)
Eric Gordon 1.16 PPP (6.
Wesley Matthews 1.15 PPP (7.4)
Danny Green 1.14 PPP (5.7)
J.J. Redick 1.14 PPP (10.95)
Klay Thompson 1.14 PPP (9.5)
Jump-shot points per possession over degree of difficulty
Methodology: This is a unique stat compiled by DraftExpress director of operations Matt Kamalsky, an index composite based on the expected shooting percentage of all the shots we studied based on the group average of our sample. To compile it, he averaged the efficiency of all the shooters we looked at in the different situations we studied, and then weighted in how they performed with the attempts they averaged. Players who took and made the biggest quantity of high-degree-of-difficulty shots based on how the group as a whole performed rank highest here.
Corey Hawkins, the son of former NBA player Hersey Hawkins,comes out very well in this study as a whole, and his ability to convert off-the-dribble jumpers at an outrageous clip is well represented in this area. Much of the same can be said about Tyler Harvey, to a slightly lesser degree. And while Pat Connaughton doesn't take that many pull-ups or no-drive jumpers, the fact that he hits his catch-and-shoot jumpers at such a fantastic clip helps him quite a bit here. In future studies, we may try and add a "level-of-competition" measure into this stat, which would likely make Daniel Diez and especially Mario Hezonja (who also competes in the tougher Euroleague, in addition to the ACB) look even more impressive.
Corey Hawkins +0.26
Tyler Harvey +0.15
Pat Connaughton +0.07
Daniel Diez +0.04
Mario Hezonja +0.01
NBA leaders
Chris Paul +0.00
Kyrie Irving -0.02
Stephen Curry -0.05
Gordon Hayward -0.06
Klay Thompson -0.07
Overall shooting rankings
1. Mario Hezonja
2. D'Angelo Russell
3. Frank Kaminsky
4. Corey Hawkins
5. Tyler Harvey
6. Pat Connaughton
7. Kristaps Porzingis
8. Devin Booker
9. Daniel Diez
10. Joseph Young
This last ranking is entirely subjective, and takes into account everything we discussed above, as well as additional factors like size, level of competition, role on their team and age, which could leave room for future improvement. NBA teams will also look at other components when ranking prospects in the draft as a whole, specifically defense, which is a crucial element we did not discuss that will play a huge role in whether many of these players will even see the floor at the NBA level.
http://espn.go.com/blog/boston/celt...tting-drafty-how-celtics-prep-for-their-picksGetting drafty: How Celtics prep for their picks
The Boston Celtics knew that Marcus Smart might be their guy when he worked out for the team two weeks before last year's draft, which is why members of the team's front office cringed a bit when he labored through what Celtics assistant general manager Austin Ainge bluntly described Wednesday as a "horrible" workout.
"We liked Marcus. We were like, ‘Wow, that was bad,’" Ainge explained Wednesday while offering a recent example of how one workout doesn't make or break the team's evaluation of a player. "So we called him and his agent again and said, ‘Look, we know you can play better than you did.’ And we probably would have still drafted him anyway, but we convinced him to come back, just so we could all feel more comfortable about it.
"He came back and he played great and that kinda put everybody at ease."
The Celtics selected Smart at No. 6 and he went on to earn All-Rookie second team honors in a season in which he ascended to starting point guard while aiding Boston's second-half surge to the playoffs. On Wednesday, Ainge sat next to Smart during a six-player pre-draft workout and sought his advice about players the Celtics might nab this June.
The Celtics have spirited internal debates about how much to value a single workout, but what's clear is that these team workouts are often a final glance at the players the Celtics hope will serve as part of their foundation moving forward.
Boston, currently armed with picks Nos. 16, 28, 33 and 45, will audition as many draft hopefuls as they can cram into the next three weeks with a goal of maximizing those picks. Ainge, the team's draft workout organizer, said he hadn't added up the exact number of players the team hopes to bring through Waltham in advance of next month's draft but guessed that between this month's draft combine, agency workouts and Boston's team workouts, the team will observe over 100 potential options. The Celtics will also have representatives overseas for next week's Eurocamp, where another 60 international prospects will be showcased.
So how much can be gauged from a single hour-long workout run by the team's coaching staff and observed by Boston's front office?
"It’s just a piece; it’s all in context," said Ainge. "If the guy has a great shooting day and we see him shoot poorly his whole career, then we take it in context. It’s just small pieces, and that’s really all the draft process is: Adding up all the small pieces together and trying to paint as clear a picture as we can."
But Ainge admits that, even for analytic-loving Boston, there's no perfect formula for ensuring more draft hits than misses. He joked Wednesday that the team had drafted players who had bad workouts and they turned out to be bad picks. But Smart is a reminder not to overthink a single poor outing, especially considering that many of these draft hopefuls are shuttling across the country trying to win over prospective employers.
The Celtics were comfortable that Smart's poor workout last year was an outlier and brought him back to simply cleanse the palette before he officially landed in a green jersey. They can laugh about his poor showing a year later.
Boston brought in six players on Wednesday in Arkansas' Bobby Portis (16th on Chad Ford's Big Board), LSU's Jordan Mickey (37), Syracuse's Rakeem Christmas (39), Ohio State's Shannon Scott (86), William & Mary's Marcus Thornton (100), and Cal's David Kravish (NR). Last week, the team auditioned Stanford's Anthony Brown (54), Maryland's Dez Wells (69), St John's Sir'Dominic Pointer (7, Florida State's Aaron Thomas (NR), UTEP's Julian Washburn (NR), and Holy Cross' Malcolm Miller (NR).
More group workouts are planned for Thursday and Friday, then another batch from Monday to Wednesday next week. Given Boston's diversity of picks, which also enhances its potential to maneuver around the draft board, the Celtics are eager to get a look at anybody they can get in the building.
"We do have four picks, we gotta look at a lot of guys," said Ainge. "But also sometimes we bring guys in that we maybe don’t want to draft this year because they’ll go to Europe and you never know who is going to get better. We bring them in, get to know them, get some measurements -- just get a feel because knowing their personality is a big advantage down the road when we’re looking at free agents."
Ainge stressed that the team will observe a large number of bodies this year, but it's not completely different than most years.
"It’d be a little different [in other years], but it wouldn’t be by our choice," said Ainge. "Agents have to limit these guys; they can't work out for all 30 teams. So they have to keep the guys to maybe the 15 teams in their range. That is a great luxury we have this year, we’re in almost everyone's range."
The most difficult part for Boston will be convincing potential lottery picks to visit given that Boston's first pick comes at 16.
"I call an agent and say, ‘We’d like to have your guy in,’ and he says, ‘You’re not in our range.’ And I say, ‘Well, we’ll move up.' We all tell him we’re going to move up; they’ve heard that line before," cracked Ainge. "I think there is more credibility with us having four picks, but it takes two to trade. We can’t force that on anybody else, nor is it always smart. The Patriots have done very well doing the opposite."
Which is to say, Boston is exploring all options.
So what exactly happens at a typical pre-draft visit?
The Celtics meet with the player and take their own set of measurements that the staff finds more helpful than those logged at the draft combine. Coach Brad Stevens and his assistants then put the players through a workout that's often personalized to gauge how the players would perform in Boston's system.
Ainge noted that Wednesday's workout featured, "a lot of 3-on-3, defending different situations, a lot of pick-and-roll defense and offense, some transition and shooting." All workouts close with the team's famous Boston Marathon -- a three-minute sprint drill that leaves invitees struggling to catch their breath at the end of the session (Northeastern's Jonathan Lee owns the team record at 29.5 court lengths, and Ainge confirmed the record was still standing after Wednesday's session).
Most workouts only confirm what the team suspects of a player. But it's an important part of the process. After all, history shows that the league's most sustained contenders often have more hits than misses in the draft.
Every minute with a prospect increases the chance of making contact in late June.
In 2k14 I'd light dudes up with him.
http://www.si.com/nba/2015/05/29/nb...wns-jahlil-okafor-frank-kaminsky-delon-wrightNBA draft deep dive: Towns-Okafor in context, this year's sleepers and more
As rich as this draft is in talent, it's even deeper in big questions: The debate at No. 1 between freshmen big men Karl-Anthony Towns and Jahlil Okafor, the lack of clarity over who'll be the first wing (Justise Winslow or Stanley Johnson?) and first scoring guard (D'Angelo Russell or Emmanuel Mudiay?) taken, the arguments over the pro value of unique veterans Frank Kaminsky and Willie Cauley-Stein, and the undefined pecking order of the second tier of point guards that includes Cameron Payne, Tyus Jones, Jerian Grant, Delon Wright and Andrew Harrison. I don't have all the answers, but I've spent the past seven months covering these prospects and analyzing their advanced statistics, and this is (the bulk of) what I know:
1. Karl-Anthony Towns' defense tends to get discussed in the context of Jahlil Okafor's defense. As in: Towns' defensive value was superior to Okafor's in college, and is likely to be superior to Okafor's in the NBA. I agree with this—it might be the most widely agreed-upon thing in the draft—but also think it short-changes Towns. By at least one metric, his defensive contributions were greater than any other college player over the past five seasons.
Basketball-Reference.com developed an all-encompassing stat called Win Shares; while the formula is complicated, it's essentially a hybrid of Dean Oliver's Offensive and Defensive ratings and Bill James' baseball concept of assessing individual credit for team success. BR has comprehensive college win-share data going back to '09-10, and if one takes strictly the defensive portion of the formula and applies it on a per-40 minute basis, the top 10 includes current all-NBA defender Draymond Green at No. 10, for his work at Michigan State in 2011-12, freak of nature Anthony Davis at No. 3, for his incredible D on Kentucky's 2012 national-title team … and Towns at No. 1.
Win Shares, like all other attempts at all-encompassing stats, has its flaws and blind spots. Defensively, it uses an Oliver rating that’s based on box-score stats (defensive boards, blocks and steals), which never tell the full story, and heavily favors big men who are on great overall defensive teams. So Towns's value could very well be overstated here, due to the fact that he excels at box-score defensive stats and struggles in less-measurable areas (leaving his feet and fouling, getting caught flat-footed on pick-and-rolls, being physical, etc.), and that he played alongside some excellent defenders at Kentucky. Expecting him to be a better NBA defender than Green or Davis would be unwise. But it's not a stretch to call Towns a key component of one of college basketball's greatest modern-era defenses and one of the top 2-3 defensive prospects in the entire draft—both of which are more appropriate labels than simply being called Better Than Okafor.
2. Willie Cauley-Stein might still be underrated. That Kentucky's Cauley-Stein, the man whose middle name is now officially "Trill", is No. 2 in that DWS/40 chart despite his best qualities falling outside traditional box scores is remarkable. The rangy 7-footer gets his share of rebounds, blocks and steals, but when I charted the Wildcats' defense for an SI magazine project this season, Cauley-Stein's real value became evident in rim protection (he was Kentucky's best at this); overall turnovers forced (also best on the team on a per-possession basis); switchability on pick-and-rolls, handoffs and off-ball screens; and his ability to act as a sort of rover who could, on any given possession, guard men on the blocks, cut off penetration, or close out on perimeter shooters. It's these hard-to-track and less-quantifiable attributes that make Cauley-Stein a justifiable top-five pick with the potential for a long, valuable NBA career.
3. The Towns-Okafor debate isn't splitting hairs. Everyone is also well aware that Towns is the superior free-throw shooter. Towns' accuracy was remarkable—he was 30-of-34 (88.2%!) from the stripe in the postseason—and Okafor's struggles were his only major offensive flaw. But it wasn't until I placed their work in context of elite frontcourt prospects of the past that the level of disparity became clear.
In the past 30 drafts (1985-2014), 12 players 6'11" or taller have gone Nos. 1 or 2 overall, as Towns and Okafor are projected to go in June. I used DraftExpress' database to compare the free-throw shooting stats of such players from their age-19 college seasons*, and Towns' 81.3% was better than anyone in that group … and Okafor's 51.0% was worse than anyone in that group.
So, in the Towns-Okafor debate, you're not just looking at one big man who shoots well from the stripe and one who struggles. You're looking at potentially the best and worst free-throw shooters of any franchise-center prospects over the past three decades. That Okafor even remains in the conversation for No. 1 is a testament to just how good he is as a low-post scorer and passer—arguably the most advanced freshman post player in the entire modern era of college basketball.
(* Oden's 18-year-old season is used here because he turned pro afterwards; Olowokandi's 20-year-old season is used because he was that old as a freshman.)
4. We didn't see the full version of Towns at Kentucky. It is a pre-draft rite of passage for big men who didn't shoot many jumpers in college to claim to have that skill in their arsenal—that it was merely under-showcased. Most of the time this is nonsense, an agent's ploy to boost draft stock. But in the case of Towns, who attempted just eight treys as a Kentucky freshman, there's reason to believe he could eventually become Stretch-Towns in the NBA, and not just because of his pure stroke from the free-throw line.
During the NCAA tournament, I was interviewing Dave Turco, Towns' high-school coach from St. Joseph's (Metuchen, N.J.), and brought up the topic of his limited three-point opportunities as a Wildcat. That Towns had attempted just eight, Turco said, "Is insane, because I'm telling you, that's his best shot. He can knock down threes."
And Towns is not just a practice shooter: In three years at St. Joseph's, Towns made 127 treys, and his senior season, he shot 51.6% from deep. When he played for the Dominican Republic's U17 team in 2011, he shot 45.5% (10-of-22) on FIBA-length threes. And there were occasional glimpses of this in Lexington, like this fluid, corner catch-and-shoot against Eastern Kentucky in December:
Kentucky big men under John Calipari are not typically green-lit to take threes, and Calipari felt that Towns, even with his past as a shooter, was more valuable to the Wildcats playing near the rim. Towns' development as an interior force at Kentucky is what put him in the No. 1-pick conversation, so that strategy didn't hurt his stock one bit, but it does seem probable that he can take on an expanded offensive role.
5. Finding an NBA comparison for Frank Kaminsky isn't easy. Wisconsin 7-footer Frank Kaminsky doesn't need to convince anyone he can shoot. There's ample evidence of the winner of the Naismith and Wooden awards hitting threes, so much so that the NBA player he's been most frequently compared with in the lead-up to the draft is Magic stretch-four Channing Frye. Being compared to Frye isn’t insulting, as he's one of the best long-range bigs in the league, but it short-changes Kaminsky's offense. When evaluating "Frank The Tank" as a prospect it's important to remember that he was super-effective from beyond the arc and in the paint, and in the latter portion of his senior season, he was dominating with off-the-dribble basket attacks and interior moves far more than he was with long-range shots.
The Kaminsky-Frye comparison doesn't hold up when you place their '14-15 shot charts (via ShotAnalytics.com) side-by-side, because one is that of a multi-dimensional scorer, the other is one-note. Kaminsky's formula of paint points + top-of-arc/wing threes + midrange avoidance gives him a shot chart that looks more like a rich man's Kelly Olynyk or Draymond Green than it does a facsimile of Frye:
6. Feel free to call Kaminsky the most efficient shooting and posting big man in the draft. His 1.051 PPP on post-ups this season was the best of any potential draftee with at least 100 post-up possessions in Synergy Sports Technology's database—and well ahead of Okafor and Towns:
I still regard Okafor as this draft's best long-range prospect in the post. What he accomplished at his age and at that volume—posting up 8.4 times per game compared to Kaminsky's 4.7, with reasonable efficiency—leads me to believe that Jah will be a low-block monster in the NBA. But that's not the point of this chart. The point is to offer further proof that Kaminsky's value goes well beyond shooting. And the point of the next chart is to show that his value also extends into …
7. ... the most under-appreciated part of Kaminsky's game: Playmaking. As Grantland's Zach Lowe wrote this week, defensive evolutions in the NBA are making "playmaking fours"—guys who can spot-up shoot but also make things happen off the bounce—more in-demand. Which bodes well for Frank, because it's exactly what he did this season at Wisconsin.
Among the power forwards and centers likely to be drafted in 2015, Kaminsky had the most assists per 40 minutes, pace-adjusted, and he was the only big man with a positive Pure Point Rating—a John Hollinger-developed stat that assesses playmaking with this formula: 100 x (National Pace/Team Pace) x ([(Assists x 2/3)-Turnovers] / Minutes).
How rare is it for an elite big man to come out of college with a positive Pure Point Rating? Well, in the past 10 drafts, there's only been one first-round pick 6'10" or taller with a PPR better than negative-1: Kentucky's Anthony Davis (-0.59 in '11-12), who's on a trajectory to win an MVP in the next 2-3 years. And there's been just one draftee 6'10" or taller with a better college PPR than Kaminsky's +0.47: Florida's Chandler Parsons (+0.82 in '10-11), who was a second-round steal by the Rockets and functions as a small forward.
8. Don't sleep on Delon Wright. A weakness of college hoops writers, who moonlight as draft analysts, is that we tend to get too bullish on seniors, so take this with that in mind: I'm bullish on Utah's Delon Wright as this draft's late-first/early-second round sleeper. A 6'5" point guard, Wright passes the eye test as a savvy playmaker and long-armed, steal-generating defender (he got the nickname "Sticky" from his old AAU coach for always getting his hands on the ball), and he excels in key statistical categories.
Assists, rebounds and blocks per 40 minutes are some of the college stats with the strongest correlations to the NBA, and college steals per 40 are viewed as a success indicator. This past season, Wright averaged 6.2 assists, 6.2 rebounds, 1.2 blocks and 2.6 steals per 40 minutes, pace-adjusted. In the past 15 seasons of college hoops, there were only five other players—overall, not just among draft prospects—who averaged at least 5.0 assists, 5.0 rebounds, 1.0 blocks and 2.5 steals:
An MVP, Linsanity, a 10-year veteran, a Rookie of the Year and a guy who at least briefly played well for OKC: This is good company for Wright to keep. He was arguably a better college player than everyone on that list except Dwyane Wade, has held his own in Drew League and pickup games with his older brother Dorell's NBA friends for years, and should be able to contribute in a bench role immediately as a pro. Scouts have concerns over Wright's long-range shooting ability, due to his general reluctance to take threes, and the fact that he made just 22.6% of them as a junior, but I think it's a bit overblown. He shot 35.6% from deep as a senior and 83.5% from the free-throw line, which is relevant because it tends to correlate to distance-shooting success in the NBA.
9. My deeper sleeper is a 3-and-D candidate. Deep as in, someone who doesn't even appear in the first or second round of major mock drafts. My mystery man is Villanova's Darrun Hilliard, a 6'6" wing who shot 39.9% from long range over the past two seasons. He can make plays off the bounce without committing turnovers and he's an athletic, smart perimeter defender who can guard point guards and wings.
Hilliard earned some All-America votes during Villanova's 33-3 run this season, so he isn't anonymous, but his true impact on the Wildcats' back-to-back Big East title teams has been under-acknowledged. In '13-14, according to HoopLens.com's plus-minus data, the Wildcats had an efficiency margin of +0.201 points per possession when Hilliard was on the floor—the highest margin of anyone in their rotation. And in '14-15, Villanova was an amazing +0.273 PPP with Hilliard on the floor—again the highest margin of anyone in its rotation. He had massive, positive impact on 'Nova's offense and D, and was quietly one of the nation's most valuable players. He's worth a late-second-round pick.
10. The biggest value pick of all, though, could be Duke small forward Justise Winslow if he drops into the 7-9 range. It's rare to land someone at that slot who has a chance to be the best player in the draft, and if you watched Winslow this postseason, when he often looked more like a first-team All-American than The Third-Most Famous Duke Freshman, you know what he's capable of when fully healthy. His package of shooting, finishing, rebounding and defense rates well analytically, and his explosive-yet-graceful basket attacks and ability to maneuver in traffic passes the eye test.
I prefer Winslow in most regards over Arizona freshman Stanley Johnson, who's his prime competition to be the first wing off the board, and also think Winslow played far better against high-level competition than did Ohio State freshman D'Angelo Russell, who's likely to be the first perimeter player taken overall. Russell is a promising guard to land at Nos. 3-4; Winslow is a steal at anywhere from the seventh pick and beyond.
