2025 NBA Draft Wings Deep Dive w/ @FinnDraft

2025 NBA Draft Wings Deep Dive w/ @FinnDraft

what’s up everyone welcome to the hawks film room podcast hosted by yours truly david lee aka daily 43 yesterday i had the privilege of having ryan on to talk through some of the bigs in this class you know very in-depth deep dive on those guys and um outside of bigs the next position group that hawks fans and including myself as well are most interested in this draft that picks 13 and 22 are the winks and um i figured it was a great time to bring on my guy finn uh finn’s doing he’s done some great work throughout the draft cycle uh you participated in some of the community mocks you asked me and uh yeah how you doing today man and again thank you for taking the time yeah i’m doing good uh a lot to do a lot to figure out over the summer uh draft’s coming up so schedule’s been packed but we’re feeling good i really appreciate the opportunity man of course i think um it’s getting to that point where you want to think about where guys could be in certain ranges but there’s so much conflicting intel you don’t really know where teams are going to lie i think for the hawks in particular it’s like there’s a lot of uncertainty because we don’t necessarily know where this new front office will go what they value and so generally like my approach has been like hey let’s cover as many guys as possible you know and let’s let’s try and touch on everyone that that could be potentially in our range and um the guy that i definitely want to start with is i’d say he’s one of the hawks one of hawks fans biggest targets or preferred targets um he’s definitely someone that i’ve enjoyed a lot in terms of tracking him throughout the cycle and that’s carter bryant and i think what’s what’s so intriguing about carter bryant in a lot of different ways is that he just seems like a very seamless fit for this hawks team right and he’s a guy who i think at least can could possibly play both the three and the four at some point once he bulks up um was very impactful in the second half of this season at arizona wasn’t really considered to be a 2026 a 2025 guy but ended up playing his way into this draft um what are your overall thoughts on him uh do you think he’s a worthy pick for the hawks at 13 and uh yeah would love to start there yeah i think for me uh bryant has been a guy that i’ve been higher or lower on uh basically depending on the day um i think the cell for him is this combin combo of three-point rate and dunk rate uh the translatability for him is it’s going to be seamless right that’s something we look for all the time is like will the role that this guy’s playing in college be the same as what he’s going to be doing in the nba and i think that’s definitely going to be the case for carter um i think the questions for me pertain to like his shooting efficiency this year it’s been better than it’s been in past years and you know in high school throughout uh his past three years then um and also like everything was so low volume a lot of it wasn’t self-created a lot of it was his offense was being created for him right which is not ideal uh to be taken more at the top of the draft but like at this point in the draft like mid lottery where the hawks are at like i think this is a perfect fit i think having a creator like trey young where it just doesn’t make sense to take the ball out of his hands because he’s such a valuable offensive player like carter makes a ton of sense uh so yeah i like this fit a lot i think his defensive playmaking would be huge i think he fits um into the hawks offensive structure in a really clean easy way um it’s just about like can he scale up not really and also is he this level of shooter right like we look for volume indicators all the time um i i believe he was below 200 field goal attempts on the year which is fine like he’s a play finishing wing but at the end of the day like if you’re hoping for more i don’t think you’re going to get it i don’t think that’s very likely so um yeah i those are my bare bones thoughts i’m curious to hear what you have to say about him uh i know hawks fans as well as like raptors fans love him a lot so are you like any higher or lower on him is there something that maybe uh i’m missing yeah i think i think all your points about the subreion are definitely fair and i think it’s different for a team like versus the raptors and the hawks because you know if you look at jaylen johnson dyson and zachary reese and then you compare that to like scotty barnes and brennan ingram there’s a clear self-creation gap right and the hawks at at some to some extent they need someone to pop in terms of being able to create for themselves we’ve seen that trey can sometimes be overextended offensively and and when he’s relied upon to create everything it creates you know some redundancies in offense it’s easier for them to be defended and so you want a guy who can finish plays around them for sure but you also want someone who ideally can start there but has the the the sort of trajectory to somehow get to a point where they can create their own shot and what i did like about carter um although he barely put the ball on the floor and he didn’t generate a lot of his shots i mean even in that game against duke he took some some fadeaways over flag they weren’t the best shots but it’s like i don’t think i don’t have a question about his aggression like there’s a difference between like i don’t think this guy will ever seek out his own shot versus i don’t think he’s effective yet and he’s not affected by any means but like i don’t feel like he’s the type of guy you’d have to coach like certain um tendencies out of like being tired oh you’re muted sorry i think my mic unplugged but yeah it’s it’s it’s definitely a question mark because it’s the unfortunate thing is like at 13 like you only have so much you know leeway right you know like you can only look for self creation so much and i don’t know like i feel like better about betting on his offense in terms of like like from a day one role i think that of the younger guys he’s the most likely like translate into that play finisher earlier on but if you get later on into the draft like a 22 then i might want to look at like a knee clifford or someone like that who i’ve i’ve seen be effective offensively in a variety of different roles and even when you watch some of his high school stuff it’s not like it’s not like the typical type of high school star stuff where like you know he’s kind of catching and going with two dribbles like very decisive which i do like he makes quick decisions he’s not prone to over dribbling he’s not going to disrupt the offense but there is a level of like okay how much can he provide out of structure that i think is definitely fair and i think the measurements were super encouraging you’re talking about someone who’s i mean he’s 6’6 in shoes but he’s got a 611 wingspan so plus five 810 standing reach he’s already 215 pounds i think he can get bigger i think he could play the four at the nba level too and i mean defensively i kind of think a lot about what i loved about ryan dunn and i think about where ryan dunn was as an offensive player and where carter bryan is as an offensive player and i’m definitely betting on carter um when you and you were talking about this a little bit earlier in the group chat but like there’s a difference between like guys who take a lot of threes as a proportion to their shots and like the types of threes they take and so i wanted you to sort of like share that point you’re making like the types of threes he took and like what that means for your comfortability projecting him as a three-point shooter yeah i think we were talking about three-point rate um and why a high three-point rate matters is important because it’s a volume indicator right but i think my i think my point got lost a bit what i was trying to say was if your three-point rate is that high it means you’re overly relying on that shot type over like so carter was i think 75% of his possessions came out of spot ups this year which is like good he’s a play finisher i don’t want him he’s inefficient on twos he’s going to finish it off the dribble i don’t really want him to do a ton more than that um but i think the the issue i have with like a lot of analytics guys really like him he’s going to pop off on some of these models um but i think the issue is like when you’re that reliant on spot up threes and the priors are a mixed bag do i trust the shooting to translate like me personally i do it’s just about the other things that i’m not so sure about like i didn’t there’s no cell on a self creation like you see like a bump midi fade that’s awesome but there wasn’t a ton of that there was a lot of that going back i know yeah and like two of them happened to duke right so like that’s great and all but even back to high school that was an inefficient play tie for him so like what is the offensive vision on the high end probably not a lot can it develop absolutely i mean he’s super young but at the same time um him relying so much on spot up threes and still having the potential to be an inefficient three-point shooter that’s just a bit concerning when he doesn’t really have any other counters like he’s an really good athlete steal and block rates are super high dunk rates are super high but a lot of that also is like any of these rate stats they’re subject to volume right everything with carter is low volume right and like just i i don’t know what the high-end cell is there and also like with the three-point rate being so high if he’s going to be super reliant on that in the nba he needs to be efficient there and will he probably but it’s not really a sure thing based off the priors yeah i think that’s that’s definitely a fair point and i think where i where i struggle with him a little bit too is like when i when i look at someone like a chris dunn or even a l dor when you saw chris dunn who’s one of the best perimeter defenders in the nba like his he was off the charts in terms of his defensive estimated plus minus he was a consequential part of that clippers team denver played him off the floor he couldn’t close against denver because of the way that denver was slanting their defense and it wasn’t just that they were daring him to shoot it was that they were daring him to shoot off the dribble or they were daring him to make decisions off the drive and you know chris dunn is pretty realized at this point in his career so it’s it’s it’s i don’t i’m not saying that carter can’t get there but i’m just saying he is a means away from that because we just haven’t seen that on the college level and i don’t think you could just be a traditional 3 and d player in today’s nba on the highest level it works fine in the regular season but like that’s the type of things that would get him cut out of player rotation if he’s not able to do that in the first couple years um so that’s that’s definitely i think it’s it’s fair i think if i’m the hawks i’m intrigued enough with the tools that i would really want to like at least take a look at him i think it’s unlikely that he gets the hawks at this point just because the way he’s been rising um but another guy i want to talk about who’s on somewhat of a different spectrum i would say as a wing like i have them in similar tiers but there are different types of like wings in this draft in my opinion you have guys like carter who are more so bets on their potential and what they could be and then there are guys who are also sort of consensus lottery or consensus you early first round where i think they’re more so u not as much potential but more so like okay they were able to produce in a in a in a different context in college and so nick clifford is a guy that like i find really interesting because he i mean his production is off the charts i mean talking about a 62 shooting percentage uh i love the defensive rebounding percentage uh the fact that he would get to the free throw line he carried a high usage rate and his assist percentage was i want to say the best in the class among wings that played uh against top 100 competition so while he isn’t like a heliocentric type of guy i think he’s very comfortably i can project him as like a tertiary decision maker someone who can drive closeouts who can read the floor understand floor balance when i watch a lot of his tape um he would often get to this he’d get to his mid-range pull-up and he’d fake pass he’d dump it off like he has a level of manipulation and skip passes and things that you don’t typically see from wings and and that’s probably because he’s 23 years old so it’s like it’s like a mixed bag like and and when i look at the frame like i almost wish he was a little bit bigger he measured at 6’5 in shoes um 68 wingspan so it’s it’s not like a the typical defensive stopper um but i feel better about his defense like when i watch him uh what do you think about taking a someone that old in the lottery because i’ll pull up the the the query once you talk about it but like the the age to draft capital tradeoff there isn’t great and the history isn’t great either like how much how much do you think you’d have to believe in his production to take him the ladder he would just have to be so elite like he’s teetering on like a 10 box plus minus which is good but you need you’d need that to be like at a 12 right for that to be a super sure thing like with edy last year the production was just so outlier and that’s why he’s going to have a top five return in that draft at that age but with nick like i don’t want to sound nitpicky but he’s going to be very old and so you have to do that because the hit rate on old wings is so low just like it is with old bigs like you wish he was a better defensive playmaker you wish he drew more fouls um as you mentioned like he he did have some pretty high usage but i wouldn’t say he’s going to project to do that the nba like that’s something you look for um with high-end role players is like being able to maintain some level of efficiency with uh increased usage but like there are just some things that you can look at with nick’s profile and you’re like you could go either way right i could definitely see an outcome where nick is like top 14 in this class i don’t think that’s out of the question at all his profile is very good um he’s an incredible passer at his size as you mentioned the eye manipulation like being able to man manipulate the backline defense with your with where your face is pointing is a huge deal and i’m sure you like i’m sure we’ll touch on that with a few other guys in this like uh in this group but there are just some things that you’d want out of nick that he doesn’t have currently and you can’t really project any further improvements because he’s so old yeah i think what’s what i was in initially attracted to though is like the across the spectrum production and like i was a huge fan of joshua jefferson and yak before they i think i can’t remember if joshua declared but like when yaka returned it’s like oh like that’s a guy that i would have definitely you know yes for the context and who he played but like that’s a guy who i feel almost as confident about translating as nick clifford and when you like it’s if you don’t i mean obviously there’s only going to be one team that gets flagged but there’s very few combinations of like efficiency rebounding production and then like some level of defensive activity and he at least hit those baselines and i think the the issue is though when i look at him is like i don’t think the shoot the shooting is concerning for me too because like at no point throughout his career was he consistent like i think in his junior year sophomore year he was like 27% junior year he had some very hot stretches he had some very cold stretches even this year same thing it’s like it’s okay to be streaky but i think that people have kind of like jumped a gun with some of the comparisons like i’ve seen like jdub talks or you know guys like that and i think he’s more so like a a twitchier josh hart which is still you know a very valuable player he’s going to provide that guard rebounding that’s really important like you see with the pacers right now they can switch their bigs on the perimeter no problem because you’ve got guys like seakum crashing the glass you’ve got tj crashing the glass like they’re able to secure the glass even when they have their bigs on the perimeter and i think he’ll provide a lot of value there i think it really comes down to how much you believe in the shooting and just from from what you’ve seen like in some of his prior like how do you feel about his overall shooting profile because i think that’s i mean shooting is always a swing skill for most guys but i think particularly for him um because i feel good about some of like the the creation on like not for like not directly out of iso but like his iso numbers were great for his size i think he had the best iso numbers above 66 in the class very decisive can get to multiple parts on the floor but like where do you think his shooting is in terms of like projection to the nba i mean i’ll start with the positives like nick’s play type distribution is pretty favorable like a he was doing a lot as a p&r ball handler a lot of it out not a lot of it out of spot up so like that speaks to the amount of shot versatility that he displayed this year and that’s really it’s a positive data point for him where i struggle as you mentioned was with the prior like it didn’t really come into it didn’t really come into fruition till his senior season um and that’s just a bit concerning like we’re looking at that with rashier fleming like age is so important development curve is so important those 18 to 21 year old seasons are the ones that matter because there’s so much development that is happening and with nick while he’s good like there are freshman profiles that are just as complete if not more complete than his and it’s just about you know weighing the pros and cons um like in his junior season he was at you know around 50 a 50 minutes percentage and he shot like a 42.3 effective field goal percentage that’s just not as efficient as you need him to be especially in his like junior year so it i think he’s a shooter and i think he shoots it’s just like there’s a chance it just really flops unfortunately which i hate to be like pessimistic about guys but like we just have to be realistic about you know where he’s at at like age what is he on draft day like 23 yeah 23.3 so he’s he’s old so we got to be realistic um i think you mentioned the josh r comparison like he’d need to be a really elite offensive and defensive rebounder at the college level to forecast that um but i think like yeah from a contract or valuation perspective i think you could definitely reach like a good player that makes 12 to 14 million a year like i think that’s more than possible it’s just about how likely is it and it’s it it’s not really likely for any guy in the draft out of all 60 guys to reach that level of outcome 12 to 14 mil like that’s probably going to be nothing in two years so i should probably not speak about that but like where that is right now like that’s a really good nba player making that amount of money most of the time so we’ll see yeah i mean if he’s talking in percentage of the cap i think it makes sense too you know if you’re not going to talk about the actual dollar value if you’re talking about somebody who’s like 10 to 15% of the cap then i think it makes sense and he could definitely get there i know you mentioned that there’s some freshman you feel like have a profile that’s similarly complete uh which which wing would you say like as a freshman you you feel like has a similar profile to as complete as a profile well like where where i’m saying complete right like i consider khan a wing like i personally consider him less like he is wings sized he’s taller than meek so like him for me is one um edgecom i consider a wing like he’s not going to have a majority ball handling responsibilities he improved at attacking closeouts this year but that’s another guy that just like better steal and block percentages than nick was doing it three years younger like that’s another one where i just consider him more as a sure thing at his age to be productive to some extent um another guy like i don’t know where people go with this like i’ve been getting higher on cmbb and i think the reason for that is his drive numbers are more comparable to that of wings and i think like the shot is i wouldn’t say he’s more complete than nick because nick meets a bunch of prerequisites in a bunch of different areas he’s extremely well-rounded cmbb’s profile is more intriguing for me just overall because he’s elite in most areas outside of shooting so yeah i’m and that’s why i love him so much and just in general for the class for the hawks as well like i’ve said it multiple times but if he’s if he’s at 13 i don’t even care like i’m not calling anyone i’m not taking the full five minutes i would just go to the podium and take them but i found what i was looking for basically like guys who were seniors that were taking in the lottery and it’s not a great hit rate i mean i think edy as long as the ankles are fine like he’ll he’ll be fine at number nine uh buddy heield is fine cam johnson is is probably one of the better outcomes but a lot of these guys i do think we’re just bet they were beating up on bad collins competition and i do think the college landscape is different right like because of guys eligibility getting extended from covid and like the incentives to stay in the into college and compete you’re seeing teams that like like for example houston was built around classmen intentionally and that’s why they got to the to the the final game because it’s like they have such a strength and and an experience advance so i do think we’ll see guys staying longer but i don’t feel good enough about like i like nick wouldn’t be my first pick but like if like personally i kind of want to go wing at 13ish i want to go big at 22 so like if if it came down to it i’d have to think about it but i still will probably go with one of the bigs um also for anyone who’s watching on live feel free to to ask any questions we’ll be happy to answer in real time as well um but i want to ask you about cedric coward because you know there’s there’s inevitably a guy who’s going to rise late in the class and he was a guy that i’d seen on like draft radars i didn’t pay any attention to him quite honestly like earlier on um you know i just wasn’t watching east easter washington but like i had him in like my second round at my first board and there’s always going to be a guy who tests well there’s always going to be a guy who interviews well and it seems like he’s hitting every check mark and i do think in a lot of ways he is embodying like a new sort of wave in the nba and that’s betting on size that isn’t the traditional sense of size and that’s something that i think the thunder have done exceptionally well um it’s i’ve read like nick’s article about it and i’ll just pull it up again so people who who may have not seen me talk about it but like cedric coward is 6’5 but he has a nine plus nine wingspan and so guys who have a uh like almost a seven two wingspan are typically about 610 and so that’s that’s a really big difference in terms of his ability to like cover ground but also uh be really versatile defensively because of the way that he’s going to be able to move and he’s going to be faster than the guys that he’s going to be tked to defend with things like that um how do like because i feel like he’s tough he’s a tough evaluation in general you know obviously he didn’t play that many games um he has a large sample size of being a shooter but that’s pretty much it uh for those not familiar i mean he started in d3 um was not really someone who um was on any sort of radars early on and what’s weird is like when you watch him play or even like when i looked at like his play style data like he plays closer to a center like he’s backing down guys on drives um a lot of great statistical indicators but he’s someone that i’ve i’ve kind of struggled with in terms of like where i would value certain parts of his career and so i’d love to hear your thoughts on him in general i mean he’s a weird one because i’ve gotten pretty like physical tools filled i’m sure people know this based off of where i have guys like theiero and his sengu um i guess i haven’t really been that high on the my passport but we’ll get to that um he’s really interesting because as you mentioned and i think you and mo you have that awesome graph that you showed um pertaining to okc like their height wingspan differential like i really like that like that that is the modern idea of what length is in the nba you calculate standing reach you look at height in conjunction with wingspan um that’s what the good teams are going for and i think part of that is like guys that are shorter have a lower center of gravity and they’re just more naturally able to move laterally like it’s pretty undisputed why it matters that these smaller guys like coward like 65 and a half 65 or 66 in shoes with a 73 wingspan or 72 wingspan sorry he’s able to cover so much more ground than someone who’s like 610 with a 72 wingspan guys that have lateral movement at 610 are extremely rare that’s why a senu is such like an awesome bet this here um but with coward his ability to cover ground at that size 66 is still big like you can still cross match him with the opposing team’s five at times i think if you if he starts to gain weight coward is extremely strong and like there’s been some crazy workout intel and like articles written about him like he physically dominates people he overwhelms them with his size he overwhelms overwhelms him with his speed i think having that amount of length makes him intriguing on its own it’s just about him not really playing real competition i think he like he didn’t play much this year he was injured right so you have to factor that in last year he had a good stretch of games against good teams but like outside of that he was really like really questionable like he had a negative 4.7 bpm against top 50 teams last year and also like with that you can have these stretches where like he didn’t have a good stretch last year sorry he had a good stretch the year before i believe he had a stretch of like three high division d1 teams where he played well and got him on radars but there’s just no real priors like i would understand fading him just off of that because you don’t really know what the precedent is for a guy that didn’t really play much d1 competition but with the physical tools and just with the touch like that’s an intriguing enough com combination like where people could get this really wrong like there’s a henry nba draft in our chat compared him to jaylen wells because he reaches all these prerequisites as like an offensive rebounder he reachs all these athletic he reaches all these athletic thresholds and as a spacer with this amount of length like he could be really intriguing but we just don’t have a precedent for how to evaluate a guy like this so yeah and it’s like even when i was trying to pull his numbers for some of the team specific things i was looking at it’s like all career stuff and it’s on a decent like we’re talking about almost 600 field goals and he’s at nearly he’s at big level efficiency which caveat for the comp he was facing but he definitely does have a level of touch that’s not typical for a guy of his size and i think i i if i had to pick between like him or clifford in terms of shooting then i think it i definitely would make the bet for cedric and i think his his physical tools alone would like put me over nick in terms of like for the hawks in particular but he is he is scary and i think he’s someone that you have to see him in a workout environment you’d have to have all the intel from speaking with him and speaking to his coaches to really feel comfortable about him but he’s definitely someone that like a lot more unknowns than some guys you would prefer to take in the lottery that’s everything about his story is really fascinating and like bodess well for his translation if he is that level of like competitor and hard worker but it’s also the types of things that typically drop guys in the in the draft you know what i mean so it’s it’s a it’s a tough line to toe um you mentioned noah noah sengu now i kind of have like oh actually let’s let’s answer uh feder rico’s question real quick he asked about carter bryant so he said “how worrying is carter bryant’s lack of first step?” and i think that for in general if you have enough shooting gravity you don’t have to be extremely explosive in terms of a first step because you’ll you’ll demand those types of aggressive closeouts to be able to rip through or stampede on the catch whatever it may be so i’m not particularly super worried as long as the shooting is translatable but we we spent some time talking about how it may not be projectable but i’m curious on your thoughts as well i think it’s much less that he’s a lack of functional first step as it is he has a lack of functional handle i think those are intertwined to such a massive degree like guys that can’t leverage a first step are so much more common than guys that just don’t have one like i don’t think khan has a great first step whereas i think carter has a good first step that he showed in high school tape that he just hasn’t been able to leverage against better competition because he has no handle yeah so much of like the stuff where he’s like attacking guys or or even getting downhill is like one move um it may be like he’ll stop it like halfway through his drive and pull up or he’ll he’ll do like a jab step and step to his left so it’s like it’s not a it’s not a huge amount of like like to your point like where we can feel like he could do that on an nba level um so i want to bring up the sangu graphic he’s kind of someone that like i have thought for a long time is going to be out of the hawks range just because and i think sometimes like when you’re on draft twitter a lot you know you kind of get i get a little dis like you know disillusion in terms of like where guys really ranked like by nba teams you know what i mean and i know it’s like a huge draft twitter darling but it makes sense because he’s he’s got all these tools i’m a believer in his upside like i have him seven or or something like that and i think that like if you had to if you see what obi toppin is doing is like a quick decision maker who feast in transition but also is very active both defensively and offensively in the half court i you can see him translating and somewhat similar to like rashir fleming and i i love the production in a in a professional league even if it isn’t the best sort of overseas league i love that he’s a 94th percentile transition score i love that his points per shot is like 1.7 despite the fact that he isn’t a reliable three-point shooter right now um i don’t know if he’s there for the hawks necessarily um if you like do you see him because the other thing is too like his team they like m uses him as a center which is kind of i don’t think is necessarily what he’ll do immediately in the nba and then it’s like okay is he gonna be a smaller five is he gonna be playing a four like what do you think about his role and his positional i think he has a lot of versatility like i don’t really know if he has like this is what he’s going to play in the nba yeah i mean i’ve faded him in recent weeks just because of the half court translation it’s a bit muckier than what i would have thought um sorry i should get the mic um a lot of his shots in the half court came out of spot ups which is why it like tanked his half court true shooting but that’s a that’s a bad thing you can’t like you can’t capitalize off of not being closed out on and that’s sort of unattainable for most like players like players like asenu don’t really function well in the playoffs we just have no precedent for guys that can’t force the defense to rotate force them to make decisions like with the pacers this year um i talked about this this morning like they they replace and fill a ton and the reason that it works is that the defense has to overcorrect there is no guy on the court that isn’t constantly in motion that doesn’t draw a close out off the ball like this is the next iteration of nba offenses it’s like teams that outpace the turnover battle they they force the defense to like okay they have a ton of length they have a ton of like it’s not really a zone it’s it’s man but they just have so many hole there there’s so many places where defenses can recover to now with the amount of length we’re seeing in the nba the only real way to beat that is like forcing teams to over rotate or under rotate and the way that you do that is having five guys on the court or four guys out in the court that can shoot that can attack a closeout and that are that can be relied upon to make decisions on the ball and you need to do all three like with cmbb i think he’s a good enough driver out of spot up situations in the half court to make it work i think he showed enough touch with his counters in the mid-range to project like some amount of utility in the half court as much as people like get on him about the shot i think that can really work but the reason he’s able to do that is because he has a functional handle whereas a senue doesn’t really have that he’s not making a ton of live dribble reads he’s not he’s not forcing the opposing defense to make decisions he’s a good passer but he’s not capitalizing on like the the tightest windows right he’ll make the occasional um bounce pass or pass over the like throw a skip pass with his right hand over his opposite shoulder like he has those impressive passing reads but like what is the halfcourt translation and there’s really nothing right now to be like projecting a top five outcome where i think it could get scary with the sengu is he grew he grew an inch and a half since basketball without borders and i told this to people in the chat like if his growth plates are still open this is a real guy and i don’t know what to do with him now because if his growth plates are still open that means he’s gonna gain some amount of size like just weight through his core and through his base and he may be able to just leverage his size against these weak closeouts in a way that’s like i don’t want to be hyperbolic but like you probably know who i’m going to say like some highlevel drivers who are extremely physical imposing let’s just put it that way right the lack of functional handle might be just it might just not matter if he’s a high enough field guy with this amount of length so like while i think that is possible the more i think about it the more i just think that a segue isn’t going to gain that much weight it’s very rare that this amount of like he’s just so slight at this current moment you need to be able to project like either get him on like the big mac a day diet or like g like or there would need to be some outlier growth and i just don’t know if he’s going to be able to reach that and if that’s not the case like he could be a really concerning player in the half court if you’re trying to have an offense like that where there’s a lot of movement a lot of offball screens a lot of flares like i think he’s a fast enough decision maker and i think he’s big enough um to be a problem for the opposing defense but is it enough to be like a super functional offensive player in high leverage games probably not yeah now and here’s the thing too like they they kept a very tight leash on him throughout the playoffs like i was watching this game live and i was like i mean they they barely were playing him but there were moments where i felt like he kind of flashed ability to attack right so here it’s not really a handle related thing he’s just going to like immediately off the catch and then he’s using that that length and that size to eat up space and i think he could do that fine um there’s another one in here where he put the ball on the floor for a little bit longer and i think the other thing is too like he’s been and this is somewhat of a similar issue with reza sha but like he was a complimentary player his whole career and so it’s like there’s only so many reads you get to make when you’re in this type of role but i like seeing how quick he was to make this decision like seeing that you know they’re going to commit a lot of help to him although you know if you just spin and drop step this you know like you’re getting to the rim but i like that he was able to understand where the defense was tilting and get it out to the shooter um what kind of concerns me too is like he was always almost always the biggest guy on the floor and so i don’t really feel like he saw a lot of like size resistance but here you see him a more functional handle right so he’s going to drive with his left out of a standstill and gather here and finish around and through the defense and it’s it’s the moments like that where it’s like man like if if he can if he can tighten it up then i think he has all the physical tools and i think you know we we’ve got some folks in the chat asking i think it’s it’s a fair question to say like how much can it handle improve and i honestly think a lot of it is about biomechanics right like guys who are upright players which asenu is 100% an upright player it’s a lot harder to get twitchier and and you’re never going to have a good handle if you can’t get low to the ball if you can’t get your your shoulders sort of like square if you can’t drive the ball and i see it with jaylen johnson a lot where it’s like he’s too upright so his handle is loose and he doesn’t generate enough power because he’s not containing himself on those drives and i think that there’s there’s there’s a level of okay what does your frame look like and then what is your like play style and then how much experience do you have with a live handle against defenses and i think that he’s more functional with this handle than someone like carter bryant but then he has he doesn’t have the shooting history he doesn’t have the the other different types of touch indicators maybe like the the offball stuff so it’s like if i don’t know it’s i don’t think his handle will ever be like i mean even like i guess giannis would be an example like giannis’s handle was never tight but he just got so physically imposing it didn’t matter i think siaka would be probably like a better example of someone’s handle improving really well like i think saka has one of the better functional handles in the league and he did not come into the league that way so it’s like it’s possible it’s not always it you have to have like a realistic starting point though and i don’t think he has a starting point to have like a super tight handover or what are your thoughts on that no i think you’re totally right i think it has to do a lot with your biomechanics i think handle can improve and you can add counters you can add certain things to your bag like i think a big thing about bigger players is how they leverage hesitation dribbles is super important um and i think that’s something that’s just you can add that manually you can’t you can’t leverage like a really deep crossover at that height if your center of gravity isn’t like an outlier low and that’s what i think you’re talking about is like a lot of it is biomechanical a lot of your handle is how low is your center of gravity um some hand eye stuff like it just can’t really be taught i think handle can improve for certain guys but it’s rare for people to not have a handle in college not have a handle at lower levels and then suddenly develop one because a lot of the time it’s just bigger players and if every big player could you know at some point have a substantial development in their handles like we would just put a bunch of 610 guys in our top 10 and not worry about it so yeah um so i want i want to move on to a dude because i think um i find him pretty fascinating and i kind of think of like him and drake powell as similar players but but generally though i feel like a dude’s biggest difference of course is like he i was surprised to see that powell tested so well with the vertical explosion because i feel like we didn’t see it much at at uncc but these two guys are very clear athletic bets like i think they belong athletically in the nba there’s no question about it um do of course more of a shooting concern but i think he has a i think if we’re talking functional handles in a power frame he has that and the defensive stuff is really impressive too um do you have him top 20 and i guess like what would be your biggest concern about him in general because i think i’m i am very much in on him but i also love these off the wings so much i moved him ahead of noah he’s in my top five oh wow oh yeah i got i got to hear this case for sure so i ask you what does a dude do and don’t say shooting i’m going to say don’t say shooting um what does he do worse than bj edge is there is there something that ado doesn’t have that bj does outside of a shot that’s a good question um i think there are moments where vj’s vision like on the inside it’s a little bit better like vj sometimes drives with a plan a little bit better and i think that he’s a more but then i think about like the some of the rim numbers with vj and it’s like it’s not close there and and i i see the argument for sure i think um the shoot the shooting is a big thing though like i i can’t dismiss that i know you’re not asking me to but if you’re talking just from like a p like we’re betting on athletes who can who are absolute havoc creators then i by all means i’m in it’s it’s a dumb question because like oh ignore the biggest part of his pro yeah no that’s obviously like pigeon holing you into an answer but just like and you’re so right like the the playmaking feel on drives is a big data point for the reason i’m so high on him is because i think he’s the best athlete in the draft sure i think i think he is he might be first but he’s top three in dunk rate on the year and the handle is good enough in the half court in transition like on drives to project like there’s a star outcome here is basically what my bet is mhm and then also i’m anticipating some sort of touch development based off of his touch on floaters this year um i believe he shot let’s see yeah he shot like close to 60% on runners this year on like pretty decent volume i think like that is a huge deal for him i think he’s a highle driver with some good counters i think the handle is more functional than he gets credit for i think he’s had two years in the past as well as his uh his high school career where he was at like a 2 to1 assist to turnover ratio i think like he is in like the potential to have he he’s in the group of guys that have a potential to be like allstar level wings i i don’t think that’s insane to say i think he’s much more projectable as a driver in the half court than a segue he’s incredible defensively as you mentioned just a havoc record the vertical athleticism his ability to take up space and help like he has all of the star wing traits outside of touch and obviously touch is a big deal but i think there’s some touch indicators as i mentioned with the floater um just with the processing like i think if you’re a high field guy there’s more uh room for you to improve as far as your touch goes i i don’t know like what the data is on that but that’s more of an aesthetic thing for me like i think if you’re smart and you know what you need to improve on i think there’s a a a way that you can um improve on it on an at an outlier rate um so yeah i think there’s just there’s not enough things in his profile for me to think like he’s worse than some of these other wing bets that people have there yeah i mean there’s i don’t think there’s a guy in the class that like i saw like i watched and i was like this is a one percentile type play like the amount of ground he covers here and yeah you know there’s there’s a load up here but like he just he just has like certain traits that are impossible for any other guys to unlock and that’s why you know i don’t think it’s crazy to say that he’s like he’s not thompson twin level but like he’s their cousin you know like he he got at least some of the genes you know what i mean where it’s like this is these are just level defensive plays that most guys don’t have the ability they they can’t get into that gear to make plays like this and i i love guys who like try to make up for their mistakes and um he he’s so much fun and i i think we got someone asking like who does he play like um i saw a lot of gerald wallace in him but i also have down um i’ve got down christian braum kind of like i can see that too as like a transition guy in terms of like if he plays like that sort of playmaker who you know hopefully he can it and maybe won’t be the shooting but more so like the closeout driving and the overall like like the drive and kickability like where he’ll provide that offensive value but he’s going to be someone who’s flying all around defensively christian brown doesn’t have anywhere this level athleticism but he does have those sort of traits where like he wants to be involved defensively he’s going to try and fill up gaps he’s gonna do his best to protect the rim so i i see some christian brown some with jared wallace like rocket boosters or or do you see like what would you sort of give him as an nba comp no i like jar i like that comp a lot actually i’m not the greatest with comps but like what i would say is i’d recommend going on bartovvic and looking at jimmy butler’s college profile next to the arrows like if there’s some if that floater touch translates and he’s able to extend his range maybe fix some stuff in his base like i’m not saying he’s going to be jimmy butler but as you mentioned like he’s not the thompson twins but he’s he’s in the family and there’s real substantial signs of like offensive utility like he’s at like near a 70 free throw rate he draws fouls at an incredible rate like you’re seeing in these clips like his burst in traffic is absurd guys like this is the way that he gets off the ground off two feet on a whim like even his second jump is like super outlier like i don’t have a comp but what you say just think of any of the 0.1% out like think of the the top one percentile of athletes in the nba think of just the value they have on day one because they have that athleticism i think he could do a faximile of that and i think there’s there’s potential for him to be more on offense as like a as a handler he’s obviously never going to be a primary i don’t forecast that the thompson twins are incredible ball handlers at their size and with their athleticism but yeah i think it’s totally possible that he’s like a an all-star level player at some point and um you got a question about like his defensive ability and i i definitely me personally like i want to go back and watch like a little bit closer certain games like he was kind of tasked to defend some guys that i think like gave him some trouble at times um do you think i think he could be an on ball type of guy um or what do you think about his defensive role i think but then you see like the weak side rip section it’s like maybe that might be the the most valuable aspect for um i mean he’s at like roughly three steal and block rates right like i i think and he’s a better he’s better on the ball than he is off and he’s incredible off ball so like yeah i think it’s totally possible that he fends up to three like i think he almost overwhelms most of the threes in the league like i can’t think of a person who has the functional like the functional strength and speed to beat him off the dribble other than guys that are like you know monsters like paulo and tatum like i i definitely think like theoro theoro has a chance to be a wrecking ball defender across the the positional spectrum so yeah i think that’s totally possible uh the the other guy is uh noah penda and so um he’s like he’s such a big dude so he he measures at 67 and a half so about an inch and a quarter bigger than a dude uh but 611 and a half wingspan um 225 pounds he’s pretty functionally a four i think um he has i what i love about him is how he moves and how he maps the court but uh there’s a i have to find the clip whenever i find it but like there was a spain picker roll he was guarding the the strong side corner or the weak side corner and he’s paying so much attention to the play that he sees his two of his teammates go with the with the um with the the lifting shooter or with with the drop sorry with the with the person who was diving not the and then the shooter was going to pop open free and he flew over from the corner and took the ball away from that from that pass to the shooter and then like converts it with a dunk and it’s it’s like that level of like understanding certain plays where the ball is going mapping out the court i think with his physical tools like he could be a really special defender as well i don’t think he’s nearly as athletic as i do or even some other wings in this class but um i think that he has legit like point forward potential um he grab grab and goes from time to time the assist turnover ratio is pretty good for his size um i think what i’d be worried about is like the the rim finishing like you’re he’s that big but he’s that bad at the rim and it’s not that good of a league in terms of like the protection and the size of the rim so like that’d be my biggest concerns with him like what what are your overall thoughts on penda yeah i think the scoring limitations are understated while i think that the defense is understated as well like i think the defense needs to be talked about more there’s like you mentioned with that play there’s a ton of plays where he gets matched up on a big he’ll just completely wall them up like just stop them from doing whatever dumb post up they want to do and then he’ll read they’ll have an action off the ball where like it’s not really an elevator play but they’ll they’ll do a screen up to the top of the three-point line on the opposite wing and then someone will cut downhill and he’ll just swipe down on the ball on that roller so like he’ll know that he’s had this big he has this big stopped in place and then he’ll read the the offside offense and he’ll have the dexterity and the processing ability to be able to swipe down fast on the ball and not contest them vertically but like he’s just so fast with his hands and so fast with his processing that like he is one of the best defenders in the class i’ll give him that like um i think thyel less athletic thyball is what i think the defense is going to end up being but like what it could be like thybel’s an all world defender i don’t think it gets enough credit for how good his defense is actually but like his offense is pretty questionable his free throw touch was a lot worse than what you’d think based off of how some people talk about him as a shooter um i think some people talk about him as like a kyle anderson like i’m a timberwolves fan i got to watch kyle and i was a kyle hater for a while but like kyle’s functional handle at his size and processing is just otherworldly and he’s top seven in his class and warp like that’s a really valuable player because of how big he is and how fast of a processor he is i don’t think penda reaches that threshold i also think that like while kyle’s shot is so slow he was efficient he didn’t turn over the ball and he could be your primary offensively i don’t think that’s a crazy thing to say like especially in reserve units or bench units like kyle was running actions bringing the ball up the floor um a lot of the responsibility was put on him to handle that wolves second unit and you saw that in the playoffs this year like they really needed another ball handler i don’t think penda can do that and if that’s not the case what is the offensive vision on the high end and or or really on the low end um i believe the hawks have had spacing questions no like it’s been better this year but it was better after the trade deadline once we got nang and lever in but i mean it was it was pretty bad the guy i’ve kind of seen him is like nicole yoic and i think that yovic is a very unique player so it’s not a one to one but like a guy who and of course he needs a shot to make it work too but like a guy that you can trust to grab and go can make some of those ancillary reads in the half court but he isn’t going to be like to your point entrusted to like operate as the primary decision maker um and those guys are additive and i think there’s there’s roles for those guys but he’s one of those guys where i don’t think he’s as special as he he looks sometimes defensively i think the offensive concerns are enough for me to where like i think he needs to shoot as opposed to like a dude i think is explosive and functional enough as a defender to i don’t think he has to shoot like you it’d be more so like that would be the next step for him to be a star versus that would be the step i think penna needs to take to be a rotational player is is kind of like the way i look at it um go ahead sorry yeah yeah and i also think that like all the guys that we comp these defensive first wings with a lack of offensive vision or translatability rather like we do this every year and they just suck so like i don’t think penda is that bad i think penda’s like a good processor and his hype but like what i was getting to with kyle is you need to be an outlier processor at your size if you’re not going to have the touch and penda’s touch is a mixed bag at on the high end so like how value how valuable can that be and also like with the hawks in particular the goal of any team building vision is to have enough guys on the floor that don’t limit the actions and coverages you can do on either end m and with nyang you’re limited defensively but you have the spacing he’s also a really high level processor at his size as well and he makes some boneheaded decisions but it’s also like most of the time it’s pretty good for how big he is um and then with man i’m not the biggest man guy i don’t think hawks fans are the biggest man people but like he limits you offensively because you can kind of just let him do what he wants to do and he’ll have games like against the jazz two years ago that like made his entire career and has made him $36 million or whatever his contract was but um that’s just not ideal you want to be able to rely on your reserves for extended minutes in the case of injury in the case of guys just not hitting their shots and i don’t really think penda accomplishes that and i think it’s just a rehash of the guys that hawks fans want to get rid of like you’re thinking of consolidating uh man and yang i believe right like that’s the plan for them their salaries uh probably i think nang would be more likely to retain just because like we really need his shooting um and i think at this point man may not be a a positive contract unfortunately um so it’s it’s tough um i do want to just wrap with like just rapid fire thoughts about like these last couple guys guys who are um someone in the same tier for me but i’m curious like if you had to pick one out the hat and said like you feel best about them um drake pal alex tui jamir watkins hugo gonzalez like of those four guys like who do you feel the best about in terms of like nba translation yeah definitely drake um really good high school prior really solid athlete testing was really good touch is okay it’s fine not high volume but the percentages were good enough to take a bet on the late mid first round um not mid sorry but you know what i mean uh again not a really not really a guy you can rely upon to you know shift defenses in the way that you wish some of your wings would but um i think out of those guys that’s definitely the best bet just based off age athleticism priors yeah just basic stuff sounds good well finn i appreciate you taking the time man uh you know it’s always good to get a different sort of perspective in terms of what we should be valuing for wings uh for the hawks and um yeah definitely want to make sure you plug the stuff you’re doing yeah go check out the center hub draft guide that just came out i did barely anything and the team carried me all the way so that was great um we’ll have some more long form pieces out hopefully before the draft if not after uh when i decide to lock in um go follow me on twitter findraft go follow d um just incredible stuff on his part data visualizations are awesome keep tuning in to the streams uh yeah just really great stuff on his part and i i really appreciate everyone tuning in this has been awesome thank you of course thank you all thank you to everyone asking questions this will be up on the podcast stream in the morning for those who missed it again thank you all for joining in and uh tapping with finn appreciate y’all

The Atlanta Hawks Film Room Podcast: a Hawks-centric series hosted by David Lee that brings fans from opposing teams to breakdown film and talk through the numbers that defined each and every game.

Episode 53 is a deep dive into some of the most prominent wings in the 2025 NBA Draft class.

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