Category Archives: International

Is Luka Doncic The Best Prospect Ever?

03 Friday Feb 2017

Posted by in International

≈ 65 Comments

Tags

done3

17 year old Luka Doncic is currently projected to go #2 overall in the 2018 draft, and it seems absurd to discuss whether he may be the best prospect ever. But when I say best prospect ever, I really mean “best prospect of past 35ish years” because I honestly have no idea how to retrospectively rate prospects like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Oscar Robertson, or Wilt Chamberlain.

It is not that probabilistically unlikely that any given draft will contain the best prospect of a 35 year stretch. It is akin to winning a bet on a specific number in roulette, which happens all the time. And in 5 drafts since my blog has existed, this is the first time I have raised the question. The odds of the top prospect existing in a 5 year stretch is 1 out 7, barely lower than the odds of rolling a particular number with a die. It stands to reason that in 1/7 of the sample of drafts that at least one player should raise the possibility, so this should not taken as a hyperbolic question, but rather a level headed, rational analysis of an impressively outlier 17 year old.

Why Is Doncic Special?

At age 17, Doncic is already one of the best players for the best team in the best basketball league outside of the NBA. Playing for Real Madrid in Spanish ACB, Doncic is likely the team’s 3rd best player behind Sergio Llull and Gustavo Ayon. Among the 12 man rotation, here are his per 40 minute ranks:

MP PTS 2P% 3P% FT% REB AST STL BLK
5 6 4 3 4 6 2 5 3

Seeing that 6.5 would be the median, he rank as above average at everything. And this is a roster full of former NBA players, mostly in their primes (age in parentheses): Gustavo Ayon (31), Rudy Fernandez (31), Anthony Randolph (27), Jeff Taylor (27), Andres Nocioni (37), Othello Hunter (30). And that does not include best player Sergio Llull who is a former #34 overall pick likely good enough to play in the NBA if he wanted. Or Jaycee Carroll, an exceptionally skilled Utah State grad who did not have the physical tools to draw NBA interest.

Yet this 17 year old kid is average or better relative to these players at EVERY PHASE of the game. It is one thing to be a good professional player at age 17, but to also lack any notable weakness in the profile puts him on an entirely different level.

Doncic also has elite qualities, and it starts with his skill level. He has the vision and ball skills to run Real Madrid’s offense, and is also an elite shotmaker converting 56% 2P, 41.9% 3P, and 83.8% FT. If you append with his 16 y/o ACB + Euro samples his numbers become 59.5% 2P, 39.1% 3P, 78.4% FT. These are elite percentages for a medium volume scoring 16/17 year old, and he also has great passing ability as evidenced by his assist rate. By all indications, his skill, feel package is transcendent.

He supports his incredible skill level with a great physical profile. He is already 6’8″, and has a solid frame and athleticism. This may not sound impressive on its own, but most super skilled players are much smaller (i.e. Chris Paul) and often less athletic as well (Steve Nash, Steph Curry). His height should make it easy to translate his production to the NBA, and everything else is good enough such that there is no reason to fear that he may fail.

How Can Luka Be The Best Without Elite Athleticism?

minnesotatimberwolvesvgoldenstatewarriorszvuyb0xck0ul

 

The answer is simple– elite skill level is AT LEAST as important for upside as elite physical tools. Let’s take the example of Stephen Curry, who was so frail physically that he did not even draw major conference recruiting interest as a high school prospect. Then after nearly singlehandedly carrying Davidson to the Final 4, he still went just 7th in the NBA draft because his tools were so worrisome. He is the most polarizing example of outlier skill and poor physical tools, yet he won back to back MVP’s that were both deserved. This proves that an outlier skill level can yield elite upside with even a poor physical profile.

The polarizing example of outlier physical tools and poor basketball playing ability is Andrew Wiggins. He was the #1 RSCI recruit and was picked #1 in the draft, and in his 3rd season he is only performing at a replacement level. This proves that elite athleticism is not an automatic ticket to greatness when skill is lacking.

There are other examples of players with supreme physical profiles failing, as well as questionable physical profiles flourishing due to elite skill. I could list other examples, but these two alone are enough to disprove the notion that elite athleticism should be valued greater than elite skill. Further, they strongly suggest that skill level should be valued as the top input for upside valuation with athleticism being secondary.

One may counter that for every Curry success story, there are multiple Jimmer Fredette or Doug McDermott types who flop completely. But McDermott and Fredette had nothing resembling special skill level, they merely developed enough to dominate mid-major NCAA competition as 22 year olds– a common and trivial accomplishment. Their draft hype is a failure by NBA GM’s to identify the nuances between a commonly good skill level and outlier great. This may explain why scouts gravitate toward athleticism– because they actually can detect the nuances that separate the elite from the commonly good without any statistical expertise.

As we develop increasingly good analytics to help us predict skill level with greater confidence, we should increase the importance of skill as the most valuable input and decrease the value placed on athleticism.

Doncic vs LeBron

high20school201

LeBron is the gold standard for prospects in the lottery era, and it is sacrilegious to suggest that any young player may be on his level. At this point you may be thinking that his skill cannot possibly be that far ahead of LeBron, because LeBron is amazing at everything which is why he is the best.

But is LeBron really THAT skilled? He is a career 34% 3P 74% FT. His shooting is average, and there is no evidence that his passing touch is special either. He nevertheless makes a big impact with his passing because he has great vision as well as feel for when to attack vs. dish.

LeBron’s transcendent physical profile paired with great vision and IQ overpowered him as a player, and just having an decent skill level was enough to make him arguably the greatest player ever.

To compare him to Doncic, let’s consider the following:

  1. Is LeBron’s physical profile more transcendent than Doncic’s skill level?
  2. Is LeBron’s vision and IQ for an elite athlete rarer than Doncic’s height for a point god?
  3. Is LeBron’s skill level a stronger “weakness” than Doncic’s athleticism?

For #3 I would say no because LeBron’s shooting splits prove that his skill level is not special, and Doncic is already a decent athlete at age 17. For #2, it is hard to measure vision and basketball IQ but Doncic is approximately Magic Johnson’s height which is as tall as point gods have been made thus far. Again, no seems to be a reasonable response.

The challenging question is #1, mostly because it is difficult to isolate Doncic’s skill level from his statistics which are still a relatively small sample. And if his performance declines this season and then he does not improve at age 18, his skill level will seem less transcendent. But based on what he does so far, it is not clear that any prospect has a much better skill level than Doncic.

Granted, the top point guards such as Curry and Chris Paul are more skilled than Doncic, but that’s about as relevant as Shaq or Dwight Howard having physical tools superior to LeBron. Because Doncic’s physical profile is so far ahead of Curry and CP3 and LeBron’s skill level is so far ahead of Shaq and Dwight, it doesn’t really detract from the transcendent quality of either player involved.

Ultimately the answer to question #1 is inconclusive. And with my earlier argument that transcendent athleticism does not yield greater upside than transcendent skill, there is no clear reason to rate LeBron as the superior prospect. This is especially true without the hindsight bias of LeBron’s greatness, as he did not have any pre-draft statistical sample validating his greatness like Doncic does.

Of course this is all intuitive analysis from afar. I could be wrong, and perhaps if they were compared side by side during the draft process LeBron would clearly outshine Doncic. But it is extremely easy to argue that LeBron waffle crushes most #1 picks– you cannot assemble any compelling logical argument that Markelle Fultz, Ben Simmons, or Andrew Wiggins are superior talents.

I am not arguing that Doncic is necessarily superior, rather that he appears to be in the ballpark of LeBron’s greatness. I have no idea which one actually should be rated higher. But how many other prospects can you say that for? That is the best possible assessment for a prospect, as no teenager will ever be conclusively better than teenage LeBron.

What About Ricky Rubio?

314

As Doncic hype builds, Ricky Rubio will be a popular cautionary tale for getting too excited over Doncic’s young production. Rubio was also a great ACB player at a young age. At 8 months younger than Doncic, he posted a similar PER (18.5 vs 18.7) and then at 4 months older he had a superior PER at 20.5 as well as more pace adjusted points per 40 (17.0 vs 16.2) all while winning ACB defensive player of the year and breaking statistical models with elite steal and assist rates.

If Ricky Rubio can do all of that and not even become an NBA all-star, am I not a psychotic maniac for comparing Doncic to LeBron? Nope, I am not!

A big key of both Doncic and LeBron’s profiles are that they have no clear weaknesses, which is awesome for players with such overpowered strengths. Rubio, however had one glaring weakness that he could not put the biscuit in the basket. During his 18 y/o DPOY season, he shot 39.1% inside the arc with the next worst 2P% on his team among regulars being Jan Jagla at 48.3%. Not only did he have a weakness, but he had an scary outlier bad weakness.

 

This weakness has translated to his NBA play, as Rubio simply cannot score against NBA defenses. His passing and defense have been as great as his ACB sample implied, but there is an upper bound to the defensive impact a 6’4″ player can make to counterbalance an inability to score. Thus while he was an attractive gamble that could have panned out better, it should not be a surprise to anybody that he never came close to blossoming into a top 10 player.

The counter would be that statistics do not prove that Doncic is bereft of weakness. Maybe in spite of his good but not great rebound, steal, and block rates, he proves to be an awful defensive player. Let’s go as far as to say he is as bad defensively as James Harden. Is that really a terrifying flag? Harden is shorter and showed much less skill at the same age, yet is performing at an MVP level in spite of the mixtapes of bad defense that exist. If significant defensive flags for Doncic arise prior to his draft, it would diminish his value as a LeBron type prospect but he would still be the clear choice at #1 overall.

Doncic’s strengths are so special that he needs some extremely negative gravity to preclude him from becoming great. Even if he has a poor work ethic, Tracy McGrady is an example of natural super talent with poor work ethic and he still had an excellent prime.

Perhaps I am missing some key perspective here, but I cannot envision a single rational reason why Doncic may fail to become great. The best argument against is that he is 17 years old and there is plenty of time for things to go wrong. But that can be said for any prospect, and there is nothing specific to his profile that inspires a sliver of doubt for his ability to achieve greatness. At this juncture, all signs point toward piles and piles of upside and not much downside.

Bottom Line

It may seem like a hyperbolic question to ask if a 17 year old could be the greatest prospect of all time, but the same narrative arose for LeBron at the same age. So why not Doncic? It is because the people who drive the consensus wrongfully give athleticism a significant edge over skill and statistical production, when the latter is likely more important.

And the fact of the matter is that we NEED to ask ourselves hyperbolic questions about prospects to gauge how they should be valued. Most of the value of draft picks is packed into the upside tail, and any analysis should start with whether the answer to a hyperbolic question might be yes.

If the Chicago Bulls have the opportunity to trade Jimmy Butler for the Nets 2018 1st round pick, the difference between Doncic being in the ballpark of LeBron vs an average top 3 pick makes the difference at to whether they should accept a trade with the 2018 Nets pick as a centerpiece. The difference between expecting an average #1 and a possible LeBron type prospect immensely swings the value of that pick. My take is that it would be a clear mistake to pass up a 5-10% chance of Doncic for 2.5 more underpriced years of Butler based on signals thus far.

It is possible that I am wrong, as I have only watched Doncic sparingly in highlights and he is only 17. Also it is possible that I will change my position between now and the 2018 draft, as there will be an abundance of new information to have a clearer grasp on his goodness. But based on current information, it is not an absurd question to ponder whether Luka Doncic is a transcendent prospect on the level of LeBron James, and there is no clear logical reason why he cannot blossom into the greatest basketball player we have ever seen.

How Good Is This International Class? Part 2

22 Sunday Jun 2014

Posted by in International

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

Yesterday I wrote about Dante Exum, Jusuf Nurkic, and Clint Capela in part one of my international analysis. Now onto the next tier of international players in part 2:

Damien Inglis
Inglis checks in at the 6th highest international WARP and 23rd overall, and he offers reasons to be liked beyond the box score.  At the Nike Hoop Summit, he measured 6’8.5″ with a 7’3″ wingspan and 240 pounds.  For comparison, LeBron James measured 6’8″ 7’0.25″ wingspan 245 pounds pre-draft.  For a 19 year old SF prospect, Inglis has an absolutely stellar body.  Weight is not precisely descriptive of strength, but based on his defense of Jahlil Okafor who is 6’10.75″ 272 pounds, it appears that his strength is good.  His combination of strength, height, and length advantage give him the flexibility to comfortably defend PFs.

The area where he trails LeBron physically is his athleticism, which is only average as opposed to freakish. But if your tools all range from average to great, you net have good tools.  Further, DraftExpress believes that he moves well laterally and has good defensive fundamentals.  I wouldn’t take this as an absolute truth, but DX is accurate more often than not.  Leaving some margin for error on his lateral movement and defensive acumen, Inglis still has quite a bit of intrigue.  Size, length, quicks, and defensive instincts collectively offer a ton of upside and versatility defensively. He has the tools to guard either forward position and seems custom built to match up 1 on 1 with star wings such as LeBron.  Before getting too excited it’s worth noting that his steal rate was solid but not great (1.6 per 40 pace adjusted) and his block rate was surprisingly low (0.4 per 40 pace adjusted), so he’s far from a guarantee to be a stud defensively.  But based on his physical tools and scouting, there is quite a bit more to like about his D than stats suggest, and WARP already likes him as a 1st round pick.

Offensively Inglis shows why he is not receiving 1st round consideration, as he only averaged 4.6 pts per game in 15.3 minutes and is turnover prone.  But he doesn’t appear to be a complete zero offensively.  He shot well in a small sample making 12/31 3P (38.7%) and 21/29 FT (72.4%).  The small samples likely overstate his shooting ability as he is reportedly streaky and his form needs work, but he appears competent enough for his age to be a solid bet to develop into a capable NBA floor spacer.  He also has a good assist rate, posting 2.7 assists per 40 pace adjusted.

Layne Vashro has hypothesized that assist:turnover ratio is especially important for projecting 3/4 tweeners to translate to the NBA, and I find that hypothesis to be compelling.  Undersized PF’s such as Michael Beasley and Derrick Williams have dominated undersized NCAA competition, and then lacked the basketball IQ to thrive vs. NBA competition that can physically match up versus them. Here are some examples of assist:turnover rate from that mold, and Inglis checks in at a solid 0.84.  Note that not all of the players listed were freshmen, and Inglis is the age of an NCAA freshman playing in a tougher league.

Inglis is a bit of mystery box because of his age and limited sample, but add everything up and you have a toolsy 3/4 who offers plenty of defensive upside and versatility as well as the ability to likely space the floor and move the ball.  Even though he likely won’t be a big time scorer, his pace adjusted scoring is only a shade under Nic Batum’s first season in France (12.1 vs 12.3).  It seems his handles are a work in progress but he has some handling ability to work with nevertheless.  If he develops well, he could become an awesome 3 + D role player who fits into almost any lineup.  His physical profile and skill set are similar to those of Kawhi Leonard.  Even though he is a clear underdog to become as good as Kawhi, he is not drawing dead and is a painfully obvious 1st round value to me.

So why is he rated as a 2nd round pick (36th DX, 37th ESPN)?  As far as I can tell it’s because bulk scoring is overrated and French prospects are underrated.  If the San Antonio Spurs showed us anything in their demolition of the Heat, it’s that off the dribble scoring isn’t all that important when you move the ball, space the floor, and play intelligent team basketball.  Incidentally, the Spurs have drafted three French players in round 1 since 2000 (Tony Parker, Ian Mahinmi, Livio Jean-Charles) as well as Nando de Colo in round 2. They also signed Boris Diaw as a FA after he was released by the Bobcats. Damien Inglis appears to be completely in their wheelhouse. With the Spurs picking last in round 1, I believe he is an underdog to slide past them into round 2.

Nikola Jokic
The 4th member of the super statistical international quartet, Nikola Jokic is an exceptionally skilled, but slow and unathletic big man.  His lack of mobility or explosiveness mean that his stats should be de-valued as he projects to become a defensive liability and poor athleticism casts doubt on his ability to translate offensively, but there is still plenty to like.

Jokic is 6’11” with a 7’3″ wingspan and weighs 253 pounds, which gives him acceptable size to play center.  What stands out about Jokic is his incredible assist to turnover ratio at 3.0 vs 2.3 pace adjusted per 40.  That is absolutely stellar for a 19 year old center playing in a professional league.  In Marc Gasol’s final season of European play, he turned 23 midseason and posted 3.0 pace adjusted assists vs. 2.4 turnovers in the ACB and 3.7 vs 3.4 in a smaller Eurocup sample.  ACB is a tougher league than the Adriatic, but the discrepancy between leagues is completely dwarfed by Gasol’s 4 year age advantage at the time, and Gasol is arguably the best passing big man in the NBA.  Nikola Jokic’s passing is an outlier level of good for a big prospect, and it gives him his own unique form of upside.

Beyond his passing, Jokic is a capable shooter although it didn’t show in his Adriatic sample as he only converted 15/68 3PA (22.1%).  By all accounts this is not reflective of his shooting ability and the low % should be chalked up to poor variance.  He seems to have a solid shot of becoming a competent NBA floor spacer.  His struggles from 3 were atoned for by his dominance from 2, where he converted 63.6% of his attempts.  I am not sure he necessarily projects to be a great interior scorer in the NBA since he lacks the explosiveness to finish around the rim with dunks, and it is possible that his 2p% is padded by good variance on mid-range and short jumpers.  But he also may have succeeded due to high IQ, good post moves, and touch around the rim.  I imagine his interior scoring is translatable to some extent based on his size and skill level, but his lack of athleticism also casts some doubt.

The problem for Jokic is that his poor tools outside of size will likely cause him to struggle defensively. Nate Duncan confirms this narrative with his eye test, although I am not nearly as bearish as Duncan on the implications of Jokic’s physical deficiencies.  The fact of the matter is that size is a tool, and a prospect with center height and length and guard skill level cannot be written off due to poor athleticism.  He doesn’t need to jump a mile in the air to get his shot or passes off over the defense.  When I see DX and ESPN both rate him as 42nd on their big boards, I can’t help but think of Brad Miller who was a statistical beast in college but went undrafted due to being slow, white, and unathletic.

I buy that his poor athleticism drops Jokic out of the top 10 in spite of having top 5 stats.  I do not buy that it pushes him out of round 1, as I have him as a clear top 20 value.  And frankly I can’t fathom why anybody should rather have Julius Randle than Jokic.  Randle is just as slow mentally as Jokic is physically, except instead of being center sized he’s an undersized PF.  It shows in steal + block rates, with Jokic’s per 40 rates crushing Randle’s (1.1/1.4 vs 0.6/1.0) in spite of playing in a tougher league.  Randle is a much better rebounder (13.5 vs 9.5 per 40), but that is clearly less important than Jokic’s edges in size, skill, and basketball IQ.  Randle’s outlier skill is bullying players who are too small to play in the NBA, Jokic’s is one that correlates strongly with NBA success.  A similar comparison would also demonstrate that Jokic has superior potential on both sides of the ball to Doug McDermott, yet both McDermott and Randle are projected as lotto picks and Jokic is slated to go in round 2.

Dario Saric
I don’t have much to say about Saric.  His translated stats are solid but not great as they put him 20th in the WARP rankings.  That’s roughly what I anticipated, and outside of his 6’10” height he doesn’t have a single tool that is average or better.  I simply don’t see how he has the physical package to thrive as a primary ball handler in the NBA.  The scouting narrative is that he has a virtuoso passing ability that gives him unique upside, which doesn’t strike me as quite enough to override his deficiencies.  I could see him being a Boris Diaw stretch 4 type who can move the ball and occasionally knock down 3’s or create a little of his own offense.  Or he could be an Evan Turner who cannot translate his ball dominant ways to the NBA as he faces tougher defenses.  He seems like a fine flier in the late 1st round, but I don’t see how he’s worth a gamble in the lottery.  It appears that Nate Duncan agrees with my assessment, which is enough to make me feel comfortable that I’m not missing any details of integral importance with my assessment from afar.

Even though Saric is hyped as the 2nd best international prospect in this class, I believe he’s only the 6th or 7th best in the class.

Vasilije Micic
Micic only rates as an early 2nd rounder according to WARP, but based on Duncan’s scouting report WARP may underrate him.  Duncan is especially impressed with Micic’s handling and passing ability, and those skills are not always fully captured by statistics.  That is the primary reason why I am comfortable rating Nik Stauskas higher than statistical models, so I do not see any reason why it should not apply to Micic.  Also WARP appears to value high assist rates less so than other models, as Kyle Anderson ranks as the 14th best NCAA prospect by WARP whereas he ranks 2nd according to Layne Vashro’s EWP model.

The biggest strike against Micic is that he’s not exceptionally athletic which inhibits his upside.  But he has a solid 2p% and DX notes that he finishes surprisingly well in their situational stats.  Also his jump shot is mediocre, as he shot 22/76 (28.9%) from 3 and (60/86) 69.8% on FT’s.  But shooting is also a skill where prospects are capable of making significant leaps, and that sample hardly seems condemning of Micic’s upside.

Defense is also a concern, but given his strong steal rate (2.1 per 40 pace adjusted), good size (6’5.75″ height 6’7″ wingspan 202 pounds), and the fact that he is not woefully slow or unathletic, I wouldn’t say he’s guaranteed to be a sieve.  Also he has the size to guard SG’s at least part time, which opens the door for a wide range of back-court pairings and mitigates the fact that he plays the current deepest position in the NBA.

People tend to associate athleticism with upside, but certain skill sets can buck that trend.  I doubt anybody pegged John Stockton or Steve Nash as high upside prospects when they were drafted in the mid 1st round, but they went on to become two of the best offensive players of all-time.  That level of greatness may not be within grasp for Micic, but if he’s as crafty as Duncan suggests it’s fair to say he has an outside shot of becoming great.  Even if it’s only 2% that’s worth enough to make him a 1st round value.  There are so many good PG’s in the draft and the league already that it naturally depresses the value of players at the position, but I buy Micic as somebody who should get drafted in the 20’s instead of the 30’s as consensus suggests.  I also believe there is a fair case to be made that he’s a more valuable prospect than Saric.

2nd rounders
Walter Tavares has appeal as an Omer Asik type of prospect who thrives off size, defense, and rebounding, and is a complete zero offensively.  He is already 22 and still making up for a late start, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he simply started playing too late to make a big impact.  I think he’s likely worth an early 2nd or maybe even a late 1st based on his body and mobility, but he’s going to be a drag offensively no matter what so I’ll likely rate him in the 30’s on my final big board.

Bogdan Bogdanovic rates as an early-mid 2nd rounder according to DX and ESPN, and a mid-late 2nd rounder based on most statistical models.  I don’t have a strong opinion on him one way or the other– he seems like a fairly balanced prospect without any sharp strengths or weaknesses that make me inclined to doubt models or scouting.  He’s a 2nd round flier who might become a decent role player or might not.

Artem Klimenko is a complete and utter mystery box who doesn’t have any translatable stats.  If nothing else his physical profile and the fact that he made 74% of his FT’s seems to make him worth an early-mid 2nd round flier.  Maybe he has no clue how to play basketball, or maybe he turns out to be a good defensive piece who isn’t a trainwreck offensively.  It’s difficult to assign probabilities without a baseline performance against legitimate competition, but I think it’s correct to err on the side of pessimism and gamble on him once the available known quantities are unlikely to amount to anything of substance.

Ioannis Papapetrou also seems draftable as a skilled role playing SF who will likely be a defensive liability.  Beyond that I’m not sure if anybody merits a pick– perhaps Alessandro Gentile but he sounds like more of a undrafted FA.

Conclusions
While WARP rating internationals as 4 of the top 5 players in the draft slightly overstates the goodness of this international class, I believe it is closer to correct than the scouting consensus.  In my estimation, there are 7 internationals who are worthy of a 1st round selection. 6 of those players are underrated by ESPN and DX big boards, most of them by comfortable margins. Dario Saric is the lone overrated international. There are another 3-5 players who merit a look in round 2 who all seem rated roughly appropriately by DX and ESPN. This international class is loaded, and with enough luck it may measure up to the 2008 class that included Danilo Gallinari, Serge Ibaka, Nicolas Batum, Nikola Pekovic, Omer Asik, and Goran Dragic.

The funny thing is that the draft at first was pitched to be the best NCAA class ever.  But then Wiggins, Randle, and Parker all started to look like possible busts, and the class was salvaged by the emergence of Joel Embiid as a possible superstar.  Now Embiid has a frightening injury narrative, and there may not be a single player in the class who makes for an above average #1 overall pick.  At this point, the NCAA crop has a number of solidly good prospects but overall is unspectacular, and the international class is responsible for keeping this draft afloat.  While Jabari Parker and Andrew Wiggins are currently projected as the top two picks in the draft, I would not be at all surprised if a handful of internationals end up developing into better pros than one or both of them.

I believe that colossal international busts like Darko Milicic and Nikoloz Tzkitishvili frightened scouts into taking a more conservative approach in evaluating internationals, but after the success of the 2008 class and Giannis Antetokoumpo appearing to be the steal of the 2013 draft it’s worth wondering when that trend is due to reverse.  Given the strong statistical crop this year as well as the increased emphasis on analytics across the NBA, I am fascinated to see how many of the top internationals go above their expected slot this season.

How Good Is This International Class? Part 1

21 Saturday Jun 2014

Posted by in International

≈ 26 Comments

Tags

, ,

The most challenging aspect of the draft for me is evaluating the international crop.  NCAA players are easy for me to work with since I’m intimately familiar with all of the players, coaches, and systems.  On the other hand, I am lacking in expertise in overseas leagues so solving the internationals involves quite a bit of thin slicing and guesswork.  But as I have tried to piece together the value of the respective internationals in this class, I have become increasingly high on the crop being especially strong.  This was reinforced when Kevin Pelton released his WARP ranking with 4 of his top 5 prospects being internationals.  Further, Dario Saric, Damien Inglis, and Walter Tavares rank as late 1st rounders and Vasilije Micic is an early 2nd according to WARP.  This not only aligns with my suspicion that the class is strong, but suggests that it is historically good.  That said his WARP formula also ranks Jordan Adams ahead of Joel Embiid, which is a friendly reminder that stats do not tell the entire story.  So let’s dive in to each player and discuss how scouting narratives may affect their value implied by statistical performances.

Dante Exum
I have already raved about Exum’s FIBA performance, where his statistics ranked him 4th according to WARP.  This seems correct to me, and WARP may even underrate his performance.  Most of the players used for translation analysis played in USA’s pressing defense, where they posted high steal rates which weighs heavily into the WARP formula.  Aaron Gordon looks significantly better according to his FIBA stats than he did playing in Arizona’s non-gambly shot prevention defense.  He had significantly better steal rate in the press (and suggests that he is underrated by his NCAA stats).  On the other hand, Tyler Ennis’s statistical performance was much weaker than his at Syracuse.  This is the most apples to apples comparison as he had to carry team Canada the same way Exum was forced to carry Australia.

On the other hand, Dario Saric was forced to carry team Croatia and performed on Exum’s level whereas he is ranked far lower according to his translated Adriatic stats.  This is a reminder that FIBA stats are only a 9 game sample, which is far too small to take at face value.  But Exum nevertheless posted a significantly better assist:turnover ratio (34:21 vs 44:43) in spite of having a bad game vs team USA, who Saric never faced.  His ability to carry the offense while protecting the ball so well at such a young age is both highly impressive and less prone to sample size variance than shooting percentages, for instance.  If nothing else, his vision and ability to protect the ball while creating loads of offense offer enough promise in tandem with his physical profile to justify the top 4 hype.

What the stats don’t show is that Exum hardly moves off the ball.  I don’t know if this is because he lacks stamina, competitiveness, or simply hasn’t been pushed to develop this aspect of his game yet.  It’s not a fatal flaw since he clearly has enough offensive upside to become an all-star even if he subscribes to the James Harden school of defense.  And with his tools and personality, it wouldn’t be shocking to see him eventually develop into a good defender anyway.  But this does give me enough pause to not instantly elevate him to #1 now that Joel Embiid’s injury concern has been heightened, and it does open the door for an argument that Marcus Smart is a superior prospect since Smart is such a safe commodity on defense.  I still have Exum locked in as a top 3 prospect and am considering him as the #1 prospect in the draft, but if there is a subtle reason to be skeptical of him this would be it.

Jusuf Nurkic
I wrote about Nurkic’s impressive Adriatic stats earlier in the season, and now that is supported by Pelton ranking him #3 in terms of WARP.  Nate Duncan (who seems to have a good eye test) recently shared a great scouting report on Nurkic, which I find encouraging for his prospect value beyond the stats for 2 reasons:

1) Duncan claims that Nurkic passes well out of double teams.  This bodes well for his ability to score efficiently against higher levels of competitions and not be a black hole of turnovers.
2) His quick feet allowed him to stop Dario Saric in their 1 on 1 matchups on multiple occasions.  The concern with Nurkic is that he doesn’t have the length or athleticism to be a traditional shot blocking rim protector.  But given his quick feet, strength, and size, it sounds like he can certainly be a defensive presence in his own rite.

Between his stats, physical profile, and scouting reports, I feel comfortable locking Nurkic in as a top 5 prospect.  There aren’t any scouting narratives that cast doubt on his potential outside of his poor leaping ability, which doesn’t seem particularly debilitating given his strengths.

Clint Capela
Capela ranks as the top international in the class according to WARP, ranking #2 behind only Marcus Smart.  Every statistical model I have seen ranks Capela exceptionally high, and he often appears ahead of Nurkic.  Further, he has good tools to translate his abilities to the NBA as he offers good length, athleticism, and quicks.  His weak tool physically is strength as he only weighs 222, but that shouldn’t preclude him from being a top end defensive center.  How his pre-draft measurements compare to those of other players who have recently served as good defensive centers:

Player Height Length Weight
Chris Bosh 6’11.5″ 7’3.5″ 225
Tyson Chandler 7’0.5″ 7’3″ 224
Joakim Noah 7’0″ 7’1.25″ 223
Clint Capela 6’11” 7’4.5″ 222
Kevin Garnett 6’11 ? 217

The fact of the matter is that once you have great height, length, athleticism, and mobility, you don’t need a world of strength to make a big impact defensively. After all, there aren’t any Shaq level bullies at center that must be stopped in order to win a title these days.  DX and ESPN list him as a PF, and I vehemently disagree: Capela is a center all the way.

Capela thrives as a shot blocker, rebounder, and finisher, as his skill set seems similar to that of Tyson Chandler.  Further, he posted 2.2 assists vs 2.6 turnovers pace adjusted per 40 this past season in French play (it was only 0.6 vs 2.9 in the smaller Eurocup sample where he had an excuse to not pass w/ his whopping 71.8% FG%), which is excellent for a center of his age and implies that he may be able to develop into a Joakim Noah level playmaker.  If nothing else he should be able to move the ball within the offense as opposed to being a Bismack Biyombo who never touches it.  Assist to turnover also correlates with feel for the game, and in tandem with his finishing ability it seems like he offers enough offensively to make it worth getting his defense and rebounding on the floor.

Based on his stats and tools Capela seems to offer a world of upside.  If scouts loved him and ESPN/DX were clamoring for him to go #1 overall, I don’t think I’d take a strong stance against that sentiment.  But in reality the sentiment is quite the opposite, DX ranks him 17th, ESPN 27th, and Nate Duncan thinks he belongs in round 2 after watching him at the Nike Hoop Summit (I like Duncan’s scouting reports but he is drastically underselling Capela’s strengths with that conclusion).

The common scouting narratives are that Capela has poor basketball IQ, poor feel for the game, and is lazy.  It is hard for me to reconcile how these narratives may be completely true in spite of the stats he posted, but they likely aren’t completely made up either.  So let’s start by examining Duncan’s critiques.  He starts by mentioning Capela’s poor jump shot (which is a viable flaw) and goes on to note:

He looks like his skill level is always going to be more center than power forward, and that is a problem given how thin he is.

I agree that his skill set mandates that he plays center. Do not agree it’s a significant problem given his weight with so many thin players succeeding as defensive centers.

Most concerning is Capela’s lack of feel overall. He was the most likely World player to make mental errors, although there may have been a bit of a language barrier involved there as well. During the game, he picked up four fouls in the first half with some silly over the backs. Throughout the week he did not prove particularly adept at finding creases for guards to give him dumpoffs, and his few postups invariably resulted in wild misses or turnovers.

I would have found this disconcerting if his lack of feel resulted in a number of defensive lapses. Let’s tackle each critique point by point:

-A few over the back fouls for a young big hardly sound indicting.
-DX noted in their situational stats that Capela finished an amazing 73.8% of his shot attempts off of cuts. Perhaps this is a minor indictment for his feel, but a larger indictment on the lack of structure of a hastily whipped together all-star team.
-He’s bad at posting up: who cares? It’s not part of his repertoire and he likely should never be used as a post-up player in the NBA.

Duncan then mentions that his strength is lacking and he struggled to even post up guards in 2 on 2 drills. It is unclear whether this is a greater indictment on his lack of strength or post up skill, but I assume it’s a bit of both.

And that’s all Duncan has to offer.  There’s nothing there that strongly pokes holes in my hypothesis that he may be Tyson Chandler 2.0.  I believe the worst than can be concluded is that Capela is a deeply dependent scorer, and he will suffer if he plays in a poorly coached offense with poor ball movement.  French teams typically have good ball movement (which is why the Spurs always draft French players) so it is likely that playing in France accentuated his offensive production.  His 2 point scoring stats are not that different from those of Joel Embiid.  But in terms of footwork, shooting touch, and offensive upside Embiid completely blows him away.  Stat models cannot fully detect the disparity in footwork and overall skill level, so this is one reason to take his stats at less than face value.

DX shares similar critiques with his feel for the game and also notes that he has questionable intangibles and defensive fundamentals.  I’d say there are enough red flag narratives from people who are competent at scouting to throw some cold water on his upside implied by tools and stats.

Overall, scouting narratives strike me as less discouraging than his positives are encouraging.  If there is one position where skill and intelligence flaws can be overcome to produce at an elite level, it’s center.  Nobody ever accused Dwight Howard of having good basketball IQ or feel for the game, but he was the 2nd most valuable player in the league when he had Stan Van Gundy coaching him. Everybody questioned Andre Drummond’s passion and basketball IQ and he slid too far and instantly smashed expectations as a rookie.  I have no idea how DeAndre Jordan slid to the 2nd round with his physical tools, but he didn’t even have good stats in college and he’s become a useful NBA player anyway.  Even Javale McGee convinced Masai Ujiri to gamble on him at 4/44, and he is responsible for some of the most inexplicably dumb plays in NBA history.  Athletic bigs are capable of such a significant defensive impact that they have quite a bit of margin for error in their skill and basketball IQ in order to still be productive.

My closing caveat is that I have compared Capela to two groups of athletic bigs: skinny and smart (KG, Bosh, Noah, Chandler) and strong and not smart/skilled (DAJ, Dwight, Drummond, Javale).  There are not many examples of skinny and not smart/skilled, so it’s possible that he simply does not become good at all.  But his French stats suggest that he has some “je ne sais quoi” that gives him his own form of unique upside (it wouldn’t be surprising if he’s smarter than scouts think he is), and I believe that’s worth gambling on in the 6-10 range.

Capela is a truly fascinating prospect given his polarizing features, and it makes me a bit sad that I’m closing by citing his “je ne sais quoi,” because that was a really long writeup to conclude with “I don’t know” in French.

That’s all for part 1.  I’m going to split this up into 2 or 3 pieces in order to address the international class in its entirety.

The Meaning Of Tweener

21 Friday Feb 2014

Posted by in International, NCAA

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

, , , ,

The word “tweener” has become a common draft lexicon to describe players who are stuck between positions.  It normally carries a negative connotation, but is not always fleshed out.  And not all tweeners are created equally, in some cases it can be a strength.  It largely depends on how each player’s offensive fit meshes with his defensive fit.  I’ll run through some examples from this draft to demonstrate my interpretation of a few players’ tweener relevance:

Good Tweener: Jabari Parker

Parker’s concern is that he is too small to play PF and too slow to play SF.  This is valid to an extent, but nobody is projecting him to be a positive defensively.  He only needs to not be a sieve so teams can get his offense in the lineup, and I believe he certainly has the tools for that.  I quite like him as a PF, he’s 6’8 235 lbs with a 7’0 wingspan.  He plays like he weighs 300 lbs, as he doesn’t mind getting physical in the post and rebounds well for his size.  Further, his length enables him to average 1.7 blocks per 40 minutes.  Playing at PF mitigates the impact of his lack of quickness, as he will spend less time defending wings on the perimeter.  He is listed as having an 8’8 standing reach at DraftExpress, which is lower than you’d expect for a player with his height + length and is a mild concern.  But I’d like to see how he measures at the combine before harping on this too loudly, as reach measurements are not always done with precision.  For reference Carmelo Anthony is half an inch shorter with the same wingspan and measured with a 8’9.5 reach, and he has performed extremely well as a small PF paired with Tyson Chandler at C.  Parker shows similar potential to be an elite stretch 4, as if you surround him with a strong defensive center and three shooters, you have a synergistic NBA lineup.

While I would err on the side of giving Jabari PF minutes, he also does have the capacity to play SF.  He has the perimeter skills to play on the wing offensively, and his size and length may atone to prevent his quickness issues from holding him back too much.  Further, it is possible that he proves to be more adept at defending the perimeter than the post, so this gives an alternative means of success if his lack of reach causes him to struggle to defend bigger PF’s.

Although he’s not a perfect fit at either position, the fact that Parker can fit in well enough at either position to get his offense into the lineup is a bit of a bonus.  And even if he doesn’t find a niche where he can play solid defense, his offense still may outweigh his defensive shortcomings as is the case for his upside comparison Carmelo Anthony.

Bad Tweener: Aaron Gordon.

Earlier I wrote about Aaron Gordon’s shooting woes.  He almost certainly will not be able to play the wing offensively in the pros, and needs to focus on adding strength and developing a post game.  PF is clearly going to be his niche offensively, but his main appeal is the defensive upside that his tools offer.  And as far as I can tell, he has much better tools to be a perimeter stopper than a post presence.  He is listed at 6’9 with a  6’11.5 wingspan and an 8’10.5 reach, which is adequate to play PF, especially with his athleticism.  But he only weighs 212 pounds, and being below average in all of length, reach, or strength it makes it a bit more daunting of a proposition.  Further, using him at SF does not capitalize on his lateral quickness that offer promise for his potential as a perimeter defender.  His ideal situation would be to pair him with a perimeter shooting PF such as Ryan Anderson, and play him in the post offensively and on the perimeter defensively.  But that makes it a pain to build around him as an integral part of your core, as it disqualifies the majority of starting PF’s as plausible pairings and precludes an offense from ever being perfectly spaced with 4 shooters.  His synergy between his offensive and defensive skill sets are quite messy, and frankly he doesn’t offer enough upside promise to be worth the hassle as a top 20 pick.

Tweener comparison: Kyle Anderson vs Dario Saric

I have mentioned that these players strike me as similar, as they are both tall ball handlers who lack burst.  They also both have questionable outside shots, and offer much more appeal playing as primary ball handlers than complementary pieces on offense.  They are both best served to play PF, since it is easier to pair them with a SF who can shoot than it is to find a floor spacing PF.  It also is ideal to mitigate the defensive issues caused by their lack of quickness.  There is quite a bit of value to these two players fitting into NBA lineups at PF.  Saric is 1.5 inches taller (6’10 vs 6’8.5) and DX lists him as a possible SF/PF whereas Anderson is listed as a possible SF, so one may initially be inclined to give the edge to Saric.  But Anderson has a much longer wingspan at 7’2.25 vs 6’10, and his 9’0 standing reach is likely greater than that of Saric as well.  Further he is listed at 233 vs 223 and is possibly slightly stronger.  It’s not by an enormous margin, but if Anderson does indeed have the edge in all of length, strength, and reach it is a significant advantage over Saric.  Ability to defend bigger positions is always a bonus, but it is especially helpful for players in their offensive mold.

Bad Tweener That Isn’t Too Bad: Nick Johnson

Johnson is the classic SG in a PG’s body.  He has good tools and defensive acumen defending the perimeter for the best defense in the nation, but he is just a bit small to regularly defend SG’s.  DraftExpress lists his height at 6’2.5″ with a 6.5.5″ wingspan, which makes him big enough to only situationally defend SG’s.  But since he doesn’t have the PG skills to run an offense, he will likely be available in the 2nd round.  But that doesn’t make him necessarily difficult to fit into NBA lineups.  If his outside shot develops well he can be a 3 + D PG in a lineup where a taller player runs the offense.  A team with a big PG such as John Wall, Deron Williams, Michael Carter-Williams, Marcus Smart, or Dante Exum could pair him with their bigger point guard and cross match accordingly.  He also fits well alongside ball dominant stars such as Dwyane Wade and LeBron James, as he could fill the Mario Chalmers role in Miami.  There is a common perception that the smaller player on the court should necessarily run the offense, and this isn’t true.  He’d be a significantly more appealing prospect if he was 2-3 inches taller + longer, but he remains an appealing 2nd round flier for a team that has a bigger ball-handler to pair him with.

Jusuf Nurkic: The Bosnian Boogie

19 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by in International

≈ 11 Comments

Tags

, , ,

What happens when an unstoppable force meets Adriatic League big men?  You get Jusuf Nurkic (25th DX, 33rd ESPN), a 19 year old big man prospect who is currently terrorizing European basketball.  He is still raw as he has only been playing basketball since 2009, but his stats per 40 minutes closely parallel those of DeMarcus Cousins as a college freshman:

Player PTS FGA eFG% FTA FT%
Cousins 25.8 16.5 0.56 12 0.604
Nurkic 28.4 17.6 0.559 11.7 0.705
Player TRB AST STL BLK TOV PF
Cousins 16.8 1.7 1.7 3 3.5 5.5
Nurkic 12.8 1.6 2.5 2.2 3.7 8

Nurkic is a better FT shooter and gets more steals, Cousins is a better rebounder and gets more blocks, and other than that they are statistically dead ringers for one another.  Nurkic also fouls more as he only plays 16.1 mpg vs Cousins’s 23.5.

Physically they are both massive human beings as Cousins weighed in at 292 at the draft and Nurkic is listed at 280.  They are both 6’11, but Cousins has longer arms with a 7’5.5″ wingspan vs 7’2″, 9.5″ reach vs 9’1.5″.  Nurkic atones for this with a significant advantage in quickness, and neither of them are explosive athletes.  It’s arguable that Cousins has superior tools overall, but if so it’s likely by a slim margin.  And they are going to share the same draft night age if Nurkic declares, as their birthdays are 10 days apart.

You may be wondering how the Adriatic League compares to the SEC, and whether we can trust such a small sample from Nurkic (the stats were posted in 322 minutes).  First to address the latter, these stats are somewhat cherry picked.  Nurkic’s Eurocup stats are far worse, as his PER falls off from a mammoth 35.0 down to a humane 22.2 in 210 minutes.  His turnovers rise, his rebounds plummet, and he scores less.  He also gets fewer steals, but on the bright side he gets more blocks at 3.5 per 40, which is a sign that his lack of athleticism doesn’t cripple him.  The split is likely due to both sample size variance and Nurkic facing (literally) stronger competition in Eurocup.  It could be argued that his translation to matching up against stronger post players bodes ill for his NBA future, but then again his numbers still aren’t bad for an inexperienced 19 year old going against adult men.

This good news is that the leagues Nurkic is playing in offer a much higher level of competition than the NCAA.  He currently plays on a team with 3 former major conference NCAA stars who are now in the prime of their careers.  I took their Adriatic League PER, Eurocup PER, a minute weighted average of the two, and compared it to their senior year PER:

Age Adriatic Eurocup Average NCAA Senior
Nolan Smith 25 16.5 18.8 17.5 26
Allan Ray 29 10.1 12.4 11.2 21.7
Goran Suton 28 11.5 17.9 14.1 23.3

Granted, this quick and simple analysis may overstate the gap between NCAA and the European competition that Nurkic is facing, as Ray had a PER in the low 20’s in 12-13 as did Suton in 11-12.  But the fact remains that players who starred for college programs during their developmental years generally fail to exceed their college production at this level of competition in the prime of their careers.  For inquiring minds: Nurkic’s weighted PER is 29.8 and leads the team.  Second is Miro Bilan at 21.8 and Nolan Smith is 3rd.  Their team is fairly successful as they have a 15-5 Adriatic Record and a +3.6 point differential, and are 8-7 in Eurocup with a +2.7 PD.

For a quick and dirty comparison: consensus lottery prospect Dario Saric (11th DX, 9th ESPN) plays in the same leagues, and he has posted a 24.1 Adriatic PER and a 16.5 Eurocup PER while being several months older.  As usual PER doesn’t tell the full story, as Saric is in a different mold.  Saric accrues an Evan Turner-esque combination of points, rebounds, assists, and turnovers as the primary ballhandler, with a questionable shot and tools that cause translation concerns.   We have already seen Evan Turner erroneously get selected before DeMarcus Cousins before, so the fact that history may be repeating itself with Saric and Nurkic is delightfully juicy to me.

The most similar NBA prospect to Nurkic who has come from the Adriatic League is Nikola Pekovic.  Pekovic was the 1st pick in the 2nd round in 2008, but in reality his draft stock was higher.  Teams refrained from selecting him in round 1 due to the belief that he was unwilling to come to the NBA for a mid-1st round salary, and by selecting him in round 2 the Timberwolves were able to offer him a 3 year $13.3 million contract to entice him across the ocean.  Later Pekovic returned to the Adriatic League for 10 games during the 2011 NBA lockout at age 25 before returning to the NBA to have his breakout season.  Let’s compare each sample as well as Pek’s 19 year old season (where he was really 8.5 months older than Nurkic is currently) to that of Nurkic (all statistics per 40 mins):

Player PTS FGA eFG% FTA FT%
Nurkic 28.4 17.6 0.559 11.7 0.705
19 y/o Pek 17.6 9.8 0.615 7.3 0.765
21 y/o Pek 24.6 13 0.684 8.6 0.797
25 y/o Pek 27.1 12.9 0.692 12.9 0.723
Player TRB AST STL BLK TOV PF
Nurkic 12.8 1.6 2.5 2.2 3.7 8
19 y/o Pek 8.6 0.4 1.6 1.5 3 7.9
21 y/o Pek 8.9 1.2 1.4 1.4 2.4 5
25 y/o Pek 10.9 1.2 1.2 1.6 3.4 3.4

First note how incredibly distant from Nurkic’s production Pek was at a similar age.  He also shared Nurkic’s exorbitant foul rate, which is a sign that we should likely not fret too much over this.  By the time he declared for the draft, Pek was a much more polished prospect as reflected in his shooting percentages and foul rate, but Nurkic clearly has much more upside.  He accrues points, rebounds, assists, steals, and blocks at a faster rate in spite of being far younger.  The blocks and steals are especially encouraging since Pek’s defense strongly inhibits his value as an NBA player.  It doesn’t mean that Nurkic will necessarily be better on defense as his defensive fundamentals need work, but his potential is clear.

Again, this is somewhat of a cherry pick since we aren’t including Nurkic’s Eurocup stats.  But Pek’s stats also fell off in Eurocup play.  He has a career 25.2 Adriatic PER and in those seasons in which he played in the Adriatic he averaged a 20.9 Eurocup PER.  It’s not as pronounced as Nurkic’s dropoff, but even if you combine the two leagues Nurkic stands out as the more exciting prospect.  Pekovic’s weighted PER between the two leagues pre-lockout was 27.9 (Nurkic’s is 29.8), and then he went on to drop a 21.4 NBA PER.

The undeniable conclusion from this analysis is that Nurkic is posting outliery good statistics for a 19 year old European prospect.  I am still acquainting myself with the world of European basketball to glean the meaning of this, but at a glance I cannot find many busts who statistically dominated similar competition.  Really I am struggling to find any international prospects at all who posted Nurkic level statistics.  Jonas Valanciunas seems to be on par, as he posted a 25.2 Eurocup PER at age 18 and 27.0 at age 19.  Valanciunas also has better tools, so it makes sense to qualify Nurkic as an inferior prospect.  But that also sets the bar awfully high, as Valanciunas posted a strong 20 year old rookie season and has plenty of room to grow; he was clearly the best prospect other than Kyrie in the 2011 draft and I believe he would merit top 3 consideration in this draft.

So why does Nurkic not merit top 5 consideration?  On one hand he is raw and needs to cut his fouls and turnovers as well as improve his basketball IQ.  But that description also applies to Joel Embiid, and it has not prevented scouts, GM’s, and myself from drooling all over him.  Nurkic may have more translation concerns than Embiid since he’s so reliant on his strength, and that’s a topic that I will explore before anointing him as a future stud at a loud volume.  But he’s playing at an inordinately high level for such a young and inexperienced player, and it does seem that his tools will enable him to translate enough of his production to become a good NBA player.  If he proves to excel at learning and developing, he might provide a monstrous return for whatever team gambles on him.

If nothing else, Nurkic is one of the more unique and intriguing prospects in this class.  I ranked him 11th on my recent big board, which was a semi-conservative ranking pending further investigation.  I still have plenty of analysis to do before arriving at a confident assessment, since the Adriatic League is much less familiar territory for me than the NCAA.  But the more digging I have done, the more captivated I have become with Nurkic, and at this point I cannot fathom how he is not worth a lottery selection.

Video

The Exum Factor: How High is Dante’s Peak?

05 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by in International

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

, , , ,

Now that Dante Exum has officially declared for the draft, I figured it’s time to put him under the microscope to see whether his hype is justified.  I analyzed his performance vs Spain in the FIBA u19 games this summer to try to get a feel for what he brings to the table as a prospective NBA player.  Note that this game occurred the week before he turned 18:

This was Exum’s best scoring game, so perhaps not all of his weaknesses were fully exposed.  I looked at DraftExpress’s scouting report to see if they listed any weaknesses that may not have been on display.  Their list:

-Perimeter shooting- this is the one that everybody acknowledges
-TO Prone/PG Skills- this took my by surprise- I’ll touch on this below
-Shot selection- easy to see why, although I don’t think it is a significant weakness.
-Strength- this is the other obvious one on top of shooting.

With respect to turnovers, they claimed that he sometimes plays out of control which is true to an extent- one or two of his turnovers this game could have been qualified as such.  Also against the US he was benched due to playing out of control after committing 4 turnovers in 11 minutes, as Australia went on to lose 94-51.  But he still only had 21 total turnovers in 9 games over the tournament, which is excellent.

Let’s compare his FIBA stats to those of Tyler Ennis.  Ennis played for Canada which was a similar caliber team (Canada finished 6th, Australia finished 4th, the teams shared a 4-5 record, and Australia had a slightly better PD +1.8 vs +0.6).  Differences of note are that Australia played a tougher schedule (both teams played the US once, but Australia played the second best team in Serbia twice while Canada didn’t play them at all), and Ennis had Trey Lyles on his team as a second big time scorer to draw defensive attention.  Ennis led the u19 games scoring 20.9 points per game, Lyles was third with 20.3.  Australia’s second leading scorer was Dane Pineau who averaged 11.8 pts/game.  Also Australia was slightly better defensively (97.2 D-Rating vs 98.2) so it’s not like Exum had the benefit of a hugely pro-offense team construction that Ennis did not:

Mins FG FGA FT FTA Ast TOVs Pts
Ennis 279 74 159 36 51 25 24 188
Exum 266 54 121 39 64 34 21 164

As a freshman at Syracuse, Ennis is averaging 34.4 mpg 12.1 ppg 5.6 apg 1.5 topg playing as more of a distributor than scorer.  That is an excellent turnover rate for any point guard, let alone a college freshman and it will be a large reason why he is likely a lottery pick.  Yet at the FIBAs, Exum had more assists and fewer turnovers against a tougher schedule with just a slightly larger scoring load, and DraftExpress gleaned that turnovers and PG skills is a weakness!

On one hand they are doing their due diligence to list everything that can be perceived as inadequate for an unproven player vying for such a high draft slot.  And it’s possible that he got lucky to have a low number, as 9 games is a small sample and I noted in the video that the scorekeeper miscredited one of his turnovers vs Spain.  But even after you add up the out of control possessions and the lazy low leverage passes that went awry, his bottom line result was excellent.  He clearly is doing something correct to avoid them, and I believe it is a testament to his ball handling, passing, and basketball IQ.  Against Spain he repeatedly got into the lane and made beautiful passes to his teammates, but of his pile of turnovers only one of them came on a drive and kick when his pass was deflected.

DX’s qualm with his PG skills is that sometimes he misses teammates and forces shots, which is a perspective I understand after seeing some of his forced shots in the paint vs Spain.  But in that game, he did much more finding teammates than he did missing them.  I’m not sure if it was an above average distribution game where his teammates did a below average job of converting.  But he was credited with 4 assists and averaged 3.8 for the tournament, and it’s inevitable that his teammates failed to convert some significant amount of quality looks created by Exum in other games.

With respect to shot selection, I again do not think he was particularly bad.  He should inevitably attempt some bad shots with such a great disparity between his talent and that of his teammates, and his intelligence inspires confidence that he will learn to improve his shot selection with better NBA teammates.  Also DX takes exception to his volume of 3 point attempts, but he shot 33.3% for the tournament so again the bottom line does not look bad.  It would be more upsetting if he instead insisted on launching long 2 pointers.

Taken altogether, I’d qualify all things efficiency and basketball IQ related (turnovers, PG skills, shot selection) to be a distinct positive.  The fact that DraftExpress listed this as a weakness is a testament to the fact that there’s so little to dislike about Exum.   His actual weaknesses are his shot and strength, and he is reportedly investing significant effort to improve both.  My next biggest qualm is that while he is a fluid athlete, he is not particularly explosive.

Even without great strength or explosiveness, his tools are decidedly positive as he brings elite speed, quicks, height, and length to the PG position.  Even without a great shot, his combination of ball handling, passing, and touch around the rim offer promise as a future offensive centerpiece, especially if surround by good shooting.  He projects to be a positive defensively as well.  The only thing that could prevent him from becoming good is poor development, but he reputedly has an excellent work ethic.

Exum idolizes Derrick Rose, which is sensible as the players offer similar value.  They both have a great combination of size and speed for the PG position.  Rose is stronger and more explosive, but Exum is taller and longer as he is 6’6 with a 6’9 wingspan vs Rose’s 6’2.5 with a 6’8 wingspan.  They share questionable shooting as their weakness, as Rose’s shooting improvement played a large role in his winning MVP in his 3rd season in the league.  While Rose’s freshman season was good, his ability to grow was what made him such an appealing prospect and successful NBA player until derailed by injury.  While Exum’s future growth rate is a mystery, his work ethic and intelligence are two strong points in favor of it being good.  Even his college stats parallel closely to Exum’s FIBA stats:

MPG PPG APG TOPG SPG 2p% 3p% FT%
Rose 29.2 14.9 4.7 2.7 1.2 52.1% 33.7% 71.2%
Exum 29.6 18.2 3.8 2.3 1.7 52.9% 33.3% 60.9%

This is not an apples to apples comparison by any stretch, but you can see the similarities in their mold.  It’s possible that Exum would have been worse than Rose with a season in college, but he also may have been better and I don’t think he would be at risk of being as bad as Andrew Harrison.  Also Exum will be a year younger on draft night than Rose was.  It’s fair to give Rose the edge as an overall prospect due to his edge in athleticism and his excellent performance in the NCAA tournament, but I do not believe Exum is particularly far behind.

Exum’s value largely hinges on his performance in workouts. If he is as working as hard on his shot and body as people around him indicate, he will likely boost his stock and vault into the top 3.  Exum is perceived as the mystery box of the draft, but with Andrew Wiggins’ underwhelming freshman performance he is no longer a can’t miss star.  Even if you assign a Marvin Williams level floor to Wiggins, that’s hardly much consolation for a top 3 pick.  I doubt that Williams becoming a semi-useful pro makes Billy Knight feel particularly better about selecting him over Chris Paul.  Especially at the top of the lottery, a player’s value is almost entirely driven by his upside and his odds of achieving it.  While Wiggins has shown better outside touch and more potential as a complementary piece on offense, Exum’s upside as an offensive centerpiece is more attractive.  I don’t think Wiggins has a significant enough (if any) defensive edge to offset this.  As of right now, I rate Exum as the 2nd best prospect overall in this draft, with Jabari Parker having the best shot of supplanting him with a strong finish to his season.

The worst thing that can be said about Exum is that he is young and needs to spend time developing before making a large impact as a pro.  But I believe in his upside, and I believe that he is unlikely to flop completely.  Indications are that this mystery box just might contain a boat after all, and you know how much we wanted one of those.