Workout 5: Tyree Appleby, Charles Bediako, Mike Bothwell, Chris Livingston, Nathan Mensah, and Courtney Ramey

2 Comments

1. 

   Bigdeacenergy 3 years ago

   As a huge Wake fan, I’d love to see us take Appleby in the second round. He’s an older prospect for sure but dude is a gamer.

2. 

   jaynay1 3 years ago

   1. Charles Bediako

   If you thought it was easy to rank Nikola Djurisic #1 in his workout, then holy crap does Bediako stand out in this workout. Bediako is a guy that got severely underrated by even his own coach. He’s a fairly high level drop defense defender with good tools. He’s mostly a rim running dunker on offense, but has shown some flashes of being, at minimum, an above average passer, primarily out of the short roll. I personally think Bediako’s a top 40 guy (and the 2nd best prospect on Bama), so I’d be happy to take him with any of our 2nds, but the league seems to view him more as a two-way guy.

   2. Nathan Mensah?

   6’10” defense only big. The offense is a total wash — he’s not even a particularly good threat around the rim — but the defense is good enough to matter. Might even be better than Bediako in the short run, though in the long run the difference in age probably wins out. There are worse uses of a two-way, but I wouldn’t exactly be running to the phones to call that one in.

   3. Courtney Ramey

   Ignoring that Ramey should not have been eligible to play college basketball this season and the NCAA just ignored their own rules because his family is basketball royalty, Ramey is a 6’3″, 5th year senior, shooting guard. He’s acceptable as a shooter, and probably a slightly above average passer for a college shooting guard, though the passing feels fairly non-functional to me (i.e. it’s the product of getting a lot of touches rather than consistently making great reads). Again, this is a case where a low end two-way might be appropriate, but I think he’s probably tending into E10 territory because the upside just isn’t there.

   4. Mike Bothwell

   6’3″ guard. Wasn’t really asked to pass like a lead guy, but I’m comfortable enough with him as a driver, where he shows good understanding of how to use his body to shield his ball and get into the look that he wants, to expect him to play some on-ball reps at the NBA level. There’s some definite mechanical holes in the jumper, but he takes them confidently enough to support the rest of his play. I’m eternally skeptical of Furman guys (their system is really good at generating numbers), but I think he’s probably got the most variance of any guy on this list. There’s a chance he’s just not even a good G League player (but still better than Livingston), and also a serious chance he’s as high as 2nd on this list. Probably E10, but I would not complain about being aggressive with him given that the cost for cutting a two-way player is basically still nonexistent and teams get a 3rd one now.

   5. Tyree Appleby

   6’1″ 6th year senior whose main positive trait is his first step. Was actively detrimental at UF, but when going from Mike White to Steve Forbes, which is about as big a coaching upgrade as you can get, he took major steps forward. He’s still too small and too old, and while his first step is great it’s not at the Devon Dotson/Ish Smith level where you’d bet on him for it alone. Overall, probably a weak E10 guy.

   6. Chris Livingston

   Literally nothing but physical tools. 0 understanding of how to operate on a basketball court. Basically, remember when we had Khalil Whitney on an E10 a few years back only for him to not even be able to be a bad G League player? Livingston is marginally better than Whitney, but they’ve been repeatedly comped to eachother for years for a reason.