So... Draft Prospects?

Yeah it's not looking like we'll follow that arc. You need a semi competent coach and tons of time for the kids to develop to follow that arc. Instead our guys are still playing in below 30 minutes a game.

 

Dammit, I'm trying hard not to even think about the draft and get my hopes up for keeping that pick. We suck so bad though, it seems we WILL end up with the 2nd worst record at LEAST. I'm not rooting for tanking, I'm rooting for wins, but we suck so bad we lose no matter what I root for, and if we get that #2 pick, Ingram is a seemingly easy choice if we keep it, and then we also have the option of trading it for a nice player.

 

Check out his player comparison on Draft.net. Hint: both players are ridiculously good.

 

For what it's worth Simmons is getting compared to LeBron James/Lamar Odom. I think Nbadraft.net has Simmons' jumper too highly rated as well. Simmons' jumper is about as nonexistent as Julius Randle's.

 

LBJ/Odom

Or

Gervin/Durant

I'll take the latter!

 

Now I'm spending time reading up on Ingram. He's at 16.6 per game, but over his last 10 it's 19.9. I'm looking to see him have a breakout game.

FWIW when I was in grad school I had a friend who did his undergrad at Oklahoma State. He once picked up Tony Allen as a hitchhiker on campus during a rain storm. We watched a lot of Big 12 basketball, and I ended up watching Kevin Durant a good bit (I was living in TX). Durant had a ridiculous run in which he posted six straight games of 20+ points and 10+ boards. He averaged 30 points and 14 rebounds over that stretch, and his team lost only one of those games - against OKSU. That run happened right around this point in the season.

Ingram hasn't hit 30 yet, and he has been under 20 points in six of his last nine games. I won't put him in the same breath with KD until he can rattle off some big games.

I'll say this about him: he can score however he wants, he moves well off the ball, and even when he's working toward a bucket, he is a willing passer. Seems like a great teammate, always praising guys who score off his passes, and his release is impressive. A lot more fire than I would've thought from such a scrawny dude.

 

I still like the comparison to Durant, but he obviously isn't popping off the page the same way. I don't think he'll be as effective as Durant, but he's still got the potential to be a very, very good player in the NBA. He's got the perfect skill set offensively to fit in with what we've got going on. He's a willing defender even if we can't expect much from a kid his size.

In a few years to me he projects as a very competent and perhaps better than that SF from what will end up being a pretty underwhelming draft class.

 

Simmons to me is still the number one pick even without a jumper. His ability to get to the rim and find open players is truly impressive. He never takes a jumper so it's hard for me to tell how broken it is, but he's got the kind of size and strength to LeBron at the rim by today's NBA defensive standards.

Still if we got #1 and couldn't find a trade partner and got Ingram instead of Simmons, I don't think it'd be the end of the world.

 

Those are his two main comparisons and I tend to agree with them. I'm not saying he's LeBron just like I'm not saying Ingram is Durant BUT their games are similar in style. Where LeBron could rise up over the top of you, I see Simmons struggling with that at the next level. Where Ingram has a tremendous shooting stroke, I don't see him being able to do what Durant does on a regular basis off the bounce.

I think the point is though that they're very solid prospects and they're maybe the only real solid prospects in the draft. Labissiere is wholly unimpressive. Jaylen Brown looks like a copy of Winslow or Stan Johnson. Dragan Bender could be Bargnani or he could be Porzingis, it's almost impossible to tell.

 

I think if we get the #1 pick and Simmons, we will look to trade Randle. The two of them together would get ugly. If we get Ingram though, Randle will work well with him. That #1 pick would really help our rebuild possibly spring into high gear, as in contenders next season. If Boogie continues to be pissed in Sactown, Randle, Clarkson and maybe Swaggy for cap filler isn't a bad haul. Russell, Boogie and Simmons is an awfully nice core to tempt Durant with. Especially if we can get another free agent like Derozen to kind of talk to Durant and maybe come in a package together.