On the heels of Monday’s Most Underrated Prospects post, I couldn’t resist writing this companion piece. Consider it my personal Do-Not-Draft list.
When evaluating prospects, I like to differentiate between NBA Draft Combine athleticism, or measurable athleticism, and what I term functional athleticism. Functional athleticism refers to in-game athletic contributions that are best reflected by steals, blocks, and offensive rebounds. These stats tend to translate well from college to the NBA, as players that collect steals, blocks, and offensive rebounds typically possess some combination of quickness, agility, and timing that’s difficult to measure but critical to succeeding at the next level, particularly defensively.
In my opinion, overvalued prospects often look very impressive by measurable athleticism—most notably in the form of wingspan, standing reach, and vertical leap—but don’t stand out according to the functional athleticism stats.
With this in mind, here’s a look at a few draft prospects that I rank lower than most, including the consensus draft tier and my personal draft tier for each prospect.
Malachi Richardson – 20.4 years old, 6’6” 200 pounds, 7’0” wingspan
Mock Draft Consensus: Mid- First Round
My Draft Tier: Mid- to Late Second Round
Comp: Marshon Brooks, with worse shot selection
Every time I read that his stock is rising and he’s a potential lottery pick or mid- first rounder, I look back at his college stats and nothing makes sense anymore. What if I told you that one of the oldest freshmen in college basketball shot 39% from 2, had more turnovers than assists, and barely grabbed any offensive rebounds or blocked any shots despite being bigger and more athletic than his opponents? How confident would you be that he’ll have a smooth transition to the NBA?
Richardson’s rapid ascension up draft boards seems to be based on his massive 7’0” wingspan, ability to shoot really well from NBA 3-point range in workouts, and strong performances as a scorer in his final 2 tournament games. But what about his woefully inconsistent and inefficient first 35 games at Syracuse? He doesn’t seem to have any grasp of what’s a good shot and what’s a bad shot to take. Even looking solely at the NCAA tournament, Richardson shot 4-21 over the 2 games preceding that strong finish. And I feel like I can’t stress enough how old he is for a freshman. He’s 20 months older than Brandon Ingram! And nearly a year older than sophomore Chinanu Onuaku!!
Since I can’t seem to find video of Richardson broken down into individual plays, click here for his DraftExpress weaknesses video and see why I fear that any team drafting him in the middle of the first round will regret it.
Skal Labissiere – 20.2 years old, 7’0” 216 pounds, 7’2.5” wingspan
Mock Draft Consensus: Late Lottery
My Draft Tier: Mid- to Late Second Round
Comp: Steven Hunter (DePaul ’01 for those who may have forgotten)
I hope I’m wrong about this because Labissiere is an easy guy to root for. I highly recommend reading the article he wrote for the Players Tribune earlier this week, in which he describes his childhood in Haiti, surviving the devastating earthquake in 2010, and his journey to Kentucky and the NBA draft.
The problem I see with Labissiere is that he just doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do on the court much of the time. He’s constantly out of position and jumping at almost random times, resulting in very low rebound totals for his size and so, so many fouls. On four occasions this year he fouled out of a game in less than 15 minutes. Here are a couple examples of his lack of awareness as a defender:
In the first clip he commits a silly foul after twice biting on pump fakes on the perimeter. In the second clip he gets away with a foul on an ill-fated leaping block attempt, and in doing so he allows his man an easy put-back dunk.
That lack of awareness also manifests itself on offense, where Labissiere totaled just 11 assists all season. Even if Kentucky’s scheme depresses big man offense and his outside jumper is as promising as many scouts seem to believe, Labissiere will need some phenomenal coaching and development to become a productive NBA player.
Jaylen Brown – 19.6 years old, 6’7” 223 pounds, 6’11.75” wingspan
Mock Draft Consensus: Early to Mid- Lottery
My Draft Tier: Mid- First Round
Comp: a more assertive Gerald Henderson
Brown is different from Richardson and Labissiere in that I don’t doubt his ability to be a useful rotation player. Rather I expect him to reach the level of a good bench player or serviceable starter when his draft position suggests he should be more than that.
Jaylen Brown is an outstanding athlete in the abstract, with an exceptionally strong and long frame, speed, and explosive leaping ability, but his functional athleticism stats are mediocre across the board, suggesting that he lacks some measure of agility and timing or basketball instincts that the best NBA players seem to possess. Brown also tends to dribble with his head down, which limits his ability to read the defense or change direction and, combined with his poor decision-making, gets him into some bad situations, as you can see here:
These aren’t just isolated incidents. DraftExpress offers this take on Brown’s flaws:
Brown’s fairly loose handle, lack of craftiness around the basket, and tendency to get tunnel vision and force shots into traffic led to his 45% shooting around the rim in the half court and top-100 leading per-40 minute pace adjusted turnover rate. While Cal’s insistence on surrounding him with two to four non-shooters at all times didn’t do him any favors, there’s no doubt that his feel for the game is underdeveloped at this stage in his career, as evidenced by his poor -6.48 PPR, which is by far the worst passing metric among any non-big man in this draft.
If Brown could space the floor as a catch-and-shoot threat, his rough handle and poor vision would be less of a concern, but to this point his jumper is best categorized as a liability rather than an asset. He shot 30% on both 2-point and 3-point jumpers, and his 65% free throw shooting doesn’t exactly inspire confidence that those low marks are an aberration.
On balance I do like the fact that Brown took on a lot of playmaking responsibility as a freshman, though Brown’s aggressiveness as a ball handler is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it results in a lot of free throws and the potential to be a high-usage scorer with some refinement. On the other hand, it also leads to a lot of turnovers or simply poor possessions given the weaknesses outlined above.
For me, Brown’s weaknesses seem too ingrained to risk a top pick on him. I suspect that at least one front office drafting in the early to mid- lottery disagrees.
Leave a Reply