Live NBA Draft Show | Washington Wizards podcast

Live NBA Draft Show | Washington Wizards podcast

what is up Wizards fans welcome to the biggest night of the year if you’re a Wizards fan unfortunately no it’s not the NBA Championship no it’s not the NBA Finals uh it’s the NBA draft our single most important day of the year is Christmas in June uh joining me here my guy Kevin Broom kevin I’m excited i you know I still wish it was the first or the second pick but I’ll take six and 18 all things considered
yeah I agree i definitely wish it was one or two uh one especially would have been nice in this draft but we will take the the sixth as I wrote today at Bullets Forever the guy they end up picking at six might have been the guy they picked at three or four or five or seven or eight if they had conceivably moved down that far so you know same guy it’s uh once you get past the top two really the top one it’s kind of a big morass of guys who are kind of about the same in the likelihood that they’re going to become high quality NBA players
yeah that’s a very good point uh maybe before we get into actual draft stuff here a little bit which we’re just about that time just I don’t know quick thoughts on the uh Jordan pool trade uh Wizards Send and Sadique Bay and the 40th pick in this year’s draft out for CJ McCollum Kelly Olen which feels gross uh even saying out loud and a pick to be named at a future time uh so just immediate reaction to that
so my understanding is a couple of things one of them being that this is McCollum and Olen are expiring
yep
is that that correct so yeah I think it’s interesting on a lot of levels one of them being the Wizards are getting I I had seen reported there was a second round pick that they’d be getting
um and it’s pretty clear they decided that cap space and flexibility was going to be more valuable to the team long term than than Jordan Pool i mean there’s really no other way to look at that other than because that’s what they did they traded him
shocking Kevin because I spent all year hearing how amazing Jordan Pool was so I you know I I don’t know i was personally a little surprised they couldn’t get anything back for him other than essentially a salary dump i’m not mad at it in the long term i like the flexibility uh but I just thought we’d get something like I think there was a maybe something there with Sadique Bay i don’t like giving up draft picks even if they’re one for one so you’re basically it’s just it’s just a it’s a dump and that’s a little surprising to me
yeah I agree i thought that they would get something for them i really thought that he was worth a you know first round pick in the 20s and that they would be able to get that for him
and it could be that what they would have had to take back in terms of salary and stuff like that meant that um it just wasn’t worth it to them long term and you know it could be that they’re also looking at this as the first in a series of moves because
you know one of the things they’ve done now is they’ve joined Brooklyn in the hey we’ve got some cap space we can take on some salary um type type deals so maybe there are some other moves that they’ll be making where they’ll bring in some picks in exchange for their cap space
which I I hope is the case that this is a move to just continue to accumulate draft assets and and maybe not take on long-term money through the 2030s or whatever but for another year or two to give some team a blank slate and give them some cap space I I think makes a lot of sense if this is a Ted is getting impatient so now we got to start trying to win next year kind of thing with our cap space uh a little less excited or you know you’re after next kind of thing uh I I I like that a little bit less but uh we’ll we’ll see how that goes
yeah all right i I can still hear you i just need to adjust my setup here a little bit so just a second
oh good keep doing what you’re doing uh couple questions uh in the chat here already well uh one um uh good comment from from Eay i feel like I always say your name wrong i’m sorry man you’re going to have to tell me phonetically how to say it uh Bay goes wherever Troy Weaver goes that’s really been the case so far uh is that just I don’t know troy Weaver’s got a thing for Sadique Bay uh they’re they’re tight they’re boys he discovered him i don’t know what the case may be but I was excited about seeing uh Sadique Bay in a Wizards uniform just as having another uh DC guy you know here uh on the roster but that’s okay bub’s holding it down we’ll see how tonight works out uh might be a certain local guy that uh ends up on the team i I’m not uh trying to be too faced about this if if you follow the show I haven’t loved uh the Derek Queen at six to Wizards idea for for a while would love Derek Queen you know lotteryish and after so if it’s they can get him at 18 great which is what the Kevin Oconor uh intelbased mock draft had today uh that would be pretty interesting and then also uh you know we’ll see what that ultimately looks like uh if if they want to get aggressive and and try to move up and and you know having this year’s uh pick would be maybe helpful to do that in the 40s to to try to move them up uh Jose said uh Derek Queen at seven per Jonathan Gavon is a possibility that’s pretty interesting uh my guy Al I’m feeling great i hope you’re feeling great as well uh we should have lots to talk about at Hoops this year uh if they they nail this pick so we’ll see uh not really probably going to be a lot to talk about in the stream in terms of the actual draft goes i think the first two are going to be pretty close to chalk so uh ultimately uh we’ll see how that goes uh I can’t see full usernames from Twitter uh on the on Streamyard here but it says P so uh whoever that may be uh hope that New Orleans won’t leak progress for Ace by getting the number four pick yeah it’s going to be interesting to see uh who ultimately tries to do what from Farsy my hot take is the Wizards will have only one rookie this season yeah I I was definitely pretty confident they weren’t going to end up with three we’ll see yeah if they can package these two and move up or maybe they get out of 18 and roll that over for a pick in next year’s draft you know that’ll be pretty interesting uh here as well and and yeah I don’t know i I think that’s that’s really going to be like the big story of this draft i think it’s kind of less about who they take at six or 18 or 6 and 18 and more about you know if they get creative and are able to move this round and try to get uh some options here uh for them as we go uh Flicky asked who we’re taking at 18 i threw some names out there the other night i I expect it to be a guard or a wing at six personally but uh you know that could change i don’t love the Kaman Malawash pick at six personally don’t have anything against him as a prospect it’s just not the way I’d go from a team building perspective uh so I expect maybe they try to get a big at 18 you just got to have somebody else out there other than than Star and uh you know some of the other roster filler they’ll they’ll ultimately put around him hourlong Rashan Holmes and and people like that are on the roster they don’t seem to fully be invested in Tristan Vukovich as a long-term member you know of this roster which maybe changes or he has a good off season or or camp or whatever and they kind of double down on him but just given his contract situation and things like that I just you know I I’m not really seeing the love from them to him so they got to have somebody else to bolster that roster and maybe they just get a you know free a cheap free agent to kind of keep him moving forward but I do like the idea of taking somebody as a big at 18 and and we’ll see ultimately what that looks like i love Asa Newell i think he would be really really uh underrated if he drops to 18 i think that’d be a great pickup for them local guy Thomas Sorber is a name that’s drawing some some attention here and a lot of people suggesting that he probably won’t still be around at 18 you know we’ll we’ll see what that looks like there are only so many bigs uh that can go and they’ve got to have landing spots so I think I’ve heard probably 35 guys at this point in time that are all rumored to be gone by the 18th pick so you know we’ll see what that uh ultimate looks like hostway asked “What are my feelings on Ace as a prospect?” Well it’s one of those things where I like a tall guy that can shoot that’s always a good thing that’s something the Wizards haven’t had i I sort of Tommy Shepard coming in and saying first thing he was going to try to do uh was add uh you know athletic wings he could shoot and he ultimately added none of them they were either athletic and couldn’t shoot or couldn’t you know or could shoot and weren’t athletic uh so Acce is a little bit of both which I think would be nice uh but ultimately you know like he’s just got to put some of those pieces together i think it is a big swing because the upside is very real but there’s some reasons why it may not work out as well like I don’t think he’s a surefire prospect necessarily uh you know he’s got to take better shots he’s got to use that athleticism a little more functionally on the court he’s got to apply it defensively i think the defensive highlights you know the upside was there like the weak side shot blocking and things like that uh when he wanted to put it to use is great but just like any of these other guys in the top you know 10ish range uh outside of maybe the top two there’s some holes there and it just how confident are you that they’ll fill in those those holes ultimately for their for me if he’s there at six and they take him I’ve got literally no problem with that whatsoever i’d be excited about it uh like I like up a player like Trey Johnson slightly better personally if they’re both on the board that’s the direction I would go if Trey is off the board I would take ace i would take Ace over VJ Edgecomb uh the Ace versus Jeremiah Fears debate is is a little where I get I’ve got some back and forth and maybe it depends on the day here a little bit i’ve been pretty high on Fears throughout the last couple months of the process seeing him in person was really big for me when he played he didn’t look small on the court you know compared to everybody else but it was a college court but just the speed uh the ball handling the way he moved on the court the way he just kind of diced in and out of the paint like I thought that was important and I could see the way that opens up the floor for the rest of the Wizards so or that would be great longer term to have something like that but just putting uh Ace out there and letting him get some easier shots for a change would be great i think as good as Dylan Harper was he didn’t really create a ton of great looks for Ace and and maybe some of that is Ace too i do really like a big guy that can just like hit open shots and doesn’t need a ton of dribbles to do it i think that’s a nice function on this roster like ultimately I would have liked it if he was a better passer and creator but realistically if they gave him the ball on that team he knew it was going to shoot and and hopefully you see enough there with high school tape to think that uh he can shoot and create for some other guys if uh the situation necessitates it and that’s been the nice thing about all the guys this front office has taken so far they have the ability to create and play make and kind of move the ball around the ball and let’s stop with anybody so I think as long as your confident ace isn’t that kind of player you know that would be um that would be totally fine again like somebody that could score 35 points on 10 total dribbles like I love stuff like that you know he can be uh your Klay Thompson longer term great i mean that’s probably more of the type of players you’re ultimately getting if he if he does turn it around on the defensive end and really lock in that that would be awesome to see i I don’t see the the Paul George Tracy McGrady Kevin Durant type player personally but I would love to be wrong especially if he’s uh in a Wizards uniform ultimately so you know we’ll we’ll see what those things um look like here uh at the end of the day all right I’m hopefully going to have some other people popping in uh on this broadcast as we go uh I think Kevin is is trying to navigate multiple streams at the same time here and work those things out we do have a couple other members of uh the draft wizard draft wizard uh draft Twitter and Wizards Twitter content creator communities uh popping on here at different points um you know of the show so uh you’ll hear some other perspectives and some other voices uh SH says “By the way how effed up is it that Dallas ended up with the first pick same with San Antonio the second pick need to change the lottery.” Amen yeah I think that’s uh that’s tough for for bad teams like how do you expect them to get better you know if uh you can’t really build through the draft like like you got to just bank on being lucky and unfortunately for the Wizards like they get the second pick last year in a year that was ultimately a down draft whereas this year uh you know hopefully it’s a slightly better draft especially at the top and uh they’re not quite as lucky here like the Kulabali year being a few I like Kouli is a pick but being you know three four five in that draft and having all those options available to yourself would have been even better so yeah one of these years they’re just due i think next year’s draft is going to be even stronger at the top so ultimately uh if they can just parlay that into some luck next year that’d go a long way uh for them as well in uh news that’s shocking to no one here and not really news Cooper flag goes number one the Dallas I think that’s uh you know one of the most foregone conclusion picks maybe other than the women that I can remember there’s usually at least like some sort of you know fight for who could end up the number one pick ultimately but uh just just not really the uh the case with this particular uh situation here so we’ll see what Flag ultimately does for Dallas um you know just a yeah gonna be a an interesting setup between he and Kyrie and Anthony Davis although that defensive front court uh is is pretty uh is pretty interesting it just feels like the ultimate like bailout for Nico Harrison and uh you know that whole front office after doing what they did with Luca who by all accounts is now shredded and gonna be amazing this season you know which we’ll we’ll ultimately see um how goes all right we’re trying to get Kevin in here and troubleshoot through this u but looks like there’s some connection issues yeah Jean Ball mentioned uh Kyrie will not play until March they could have used a really good offensive-minded guard i don’t know like a Jordan pool perhaps in exchange for some kind of draft compensation i would have taken the first pick for it um don’t know if they’d uh been willing to do that necessarily but you know maybe there’s something uh that could have been worked out there guess we’ll never know uh Chambal also said “As a Frenchman I want more Frenchmen on the team.” Yeah I mean that doesn’t seem to scare them is loading up this team with uh with French speakers maybe we can speak different languages uh throughout so we’ll see um all righty guess we’ll just uh we’ll keep this one rolling um yeah i mean I think this is going to be interesting now like we haven’t seen a whole lot of movement uh leading right up to this but by all accounts I would imagine uh that the uh the San Antonio sports are going to keep this pick i think if that’s what I would do if it were me and build around a young core of Dylan Harper and Steph Castle that just let one sort of be the guy that breaks down the defense offensively like Castle be the guy with clamps on people as a secondary creator hit some spot up shots i think that’s just like a huge backort that makes a ton of sense and then obviously cleans up a lot for everybody here long term so you know going to be interesting to uh to see how that kind of plays itself out over the course of the next couple years and and they’ve got a big decision to make now you know with the Aaron Fox and and to me I I wouldn’t let Fox’s present in any way deter them uh from you know what they’re planning to do longer term here just he shouldn’t be I mean like obviously they traded some assets to get him but he shouldn’t be a big enough factor in their long-term plans or anything like that uh all right maybe just anybody watching along here uh audio check uh we sounded okay at least I sounding okay me as the one singular person uh streaming at the moment am I coming through okay if anybody could let me know in the comments that would be sweet um also if you are watching this on YouTube and you don’t mind hitting the like button for us uh that’s always always appreciated uh the more people that like this the better and becomes more discoverable uh you know for everybody else here as we go David thank you for the the mic check there thanks Wes appreciate you uh all right any questions any prospects you want to hear some chatter about as we uh we get a little closer here i’ll just give you guys my thoughts on what the Wizards should do ultimately at six uh you know in the moment it does obviously depend who’s on the board there i still imagine uh that somebody like a Trey Johnson’s not available to them so at the end of the day this probably comes down to picking between some combination of Jeremiah Fears Ace Bailey Khan Canipple maybe if he’s there come on Malawatch this is the one you know that the most people have mentioned to me I think in the last two days is why wouldn’t they just go get Malawatch and build this massive you know Twin Towers uh you know combo between he and Alexar and I just keep saying like look at this year’s playoffs like obviously it was great in the regular season for Cleveland to have this sort of two big approach but just at the end of the day like the spacing bogs down you have a drop coverage big and as good as a moley or somebody like that is I think ultimately when you look at the teams that made the finals right like it’s having players like him at the five and being able to go five out and let them be switchable and and that’s really sort of the best um way to compete in the modern NBA to me is the teams get a little smaller in those moments you want more shot creation you want more mobility you want to be able to switch one through five as best you can and I don’t think you can do that if you’ve got Malawash and Sar on the court together so can you really afford to take the sixth pick on a guy that as good as he may be at raising you know your defensive floor and helping you in the regular season is he going to be able to do that for you you know in the playoffs and and I just don’t see the two of them being able to play a tournament together you probably have to stagger them so is a guy going with a sixth pick a good return on investment if he ultimately you know can’t trade or can’t finish games for you uh when it ultimately matters obviously I’m I’m looking way down the road here at you know how you compete deep in the playoffs and uh just maybe somebody to raise the floor for them in the short term makes a lot of sense i also just think it’s a while for like before bigs become good defensively uh so you know that um there he is there’s my guy
hey I had to switch to the bad computer
oh okay not sure what’s going on there all right
yeah whatever
we’ll make it work uh I was just sort of giving my take on why I don’t love the too big approach and I wouldn’t take Kaman Malawatch at six i just don’t think that that’s modern team building necessarily so if you are invested in Alex Sar that’s just you know the way I I would uh try to build my team like there’s nothing wrong with him as a player if I didn’t already have presumably my big man of the future that’d be a little different but I I think we saw Sar this year was better when he was at the five as opposed to when he played the four next to uh you know Jonas Balanchunis or any of the other bigs so like longterm I I wouldn’t be spending the sixth pick on a guy who can’t play with my just most recent number two pick if you took a guy like that at 18 and you just want him to be able to like eat up some of those big man minutes that’s great and I think that would make a lot of sense here yeah I agree so I had a Malwatch seventh overall that said
I that player type I don’t I would not want to pick that high um
right exactly
and so I like I have players who are rated lower and you know I realize like there’s there’s a little like I don’t wouldn’t call it like necessarily hypocritical in this but it’s a little silliness by the way Dylan Harper just became the second pick shocking
shocking so but I I agree and I think for a lot of reasons not that I necessarily think Malawatch is going to be bad it’s just that that player type I think is a little limited his agility scores were a bit concerning also in the numbers for somebody as huge as he is to block as few shots he only averaged two and a half per 40 you know for somebody that large you would expect that to be a lot closer you know like over four over five it’s like Walker Kesler blocked way more shots than that he’s not nearly as big so um that’s a very long way of saying I agree and um I wouldn’t pick him that high um and I do also agree i think Sar is a five and the Wizards played him at five all season
and I don’t see why he would be less of a five in the future than than he was as a 19-year-old rookie now a big that can complement him and they can play a little more interchangeably together I think makes sense but when you have somebody like Malash that’s basically landlocked as a five I think that’s when you’re now pigeon holeing Sar a little bit more as your four and and I think that’s the other value he proving you know he brings to your team is that he could do a little bit of both and and he’s malleable and and stuff like that and most of the other guys they’ve taken there’s at least two positions you can see them playing functionally on a court whereas Malawatch doesn’t really kind of fit that mold for me so uh I don’t know i was told I was really stupid for not liking him he’s a no-brainer but ultimately uh you know he’s he’s one of those guys where like it’s cool but it’s also huge and there’s usually health issues and foot breakdowns and all kinds of stuff so if he’s even health slightly healthier than Mark Williams yeah sure that’s a valuable player Walker Kesler or whoever but it’s just um the upside’s just not quite a sign if he falls to 12 and they want to go back up to try to get him cool you know that doesn’t bother me quite as much but
yeah presumably
okay with them not picking Malawatch at all or I think you know rim running centers you can get and I would rather have the rim runner that’s a little more like Daniel Gaffford to be honest who’s like a little more mobile um bouncier than a more plotting type I I would prefer or Derek Lively you know somebody who maybe you can do something other than playing drop coverage
which um you teams have gotten a lot better at you look at what Oklahoma City did defensively you look at what um Indiana started to do defensively especially at times when you know Miles Turner was off the floor um there’s there’s more room and I think they’ve got the the the big man for that already alex Arc I think is somebody who is a switchable big man who can get out and play some of that Helter Skelter kind of crazy uh defense but um I don’t think Malawatch is that guy so
yeah same uh also I just don’t buy the shooting i keep hearing the oh but he shot in international competition i can find no uh data to support that but this is the same as Mark Williams and some of these other guys shot really well in workouts and there was the famous one where Mark Williams came up and lit it up from three uh shooting for the Wizards and you know got himself maybe higher up on the board for Tommy Shepard now ultimately I would have still rather had injury-prone Mark Williams to to Johnny Davis from how it worked out but you know at the time I was like “Please don’t draft this guy because you think he’s ever going to shoot a bunch of threes.” And to date I don’t think he’s made a single NBA three which is sort of what I assume is is the case at least in the short term for for Malawatch as well yeah there’s no reason to think that like Malawatch is going to become even a semicompetent i mean I think if he becomes as good a three-point shooter as say Valenunis was that would be
a pleasant upset
you know
i don’t even see that i mean and with Valenunis he never really became a threat from out there not in terms of volume he just kind of let him shoot it and teams were pretty content to let him shoot it and he was pretty content to do that super exaggerated ball fate and then bring it down and do dribble handoff for the most part so
which is still valuable uh OBJ said “Ace me please.” Yeah I think that’s probably the most popular selection amongst the uh the Wizards Twitter uh uh base here so sounds like you know recent reporting he did a workout according to Kristen Peak with uh with the Wizards in secret which I always love a good secret workout so so we’ll see uh I saw someone else report that that was his only workout it’s also not true he worked out for a couple other teams as well uh but but that’s you know fine at least he got one in with the Wizards i always like them meeting a guy seeing him in person you know those kinds of things I think are a little important before you’re you’re married for the next couple years so we’ll see that means uh Eay says “What type of player works best with SAR is it a Queen or is it a Colin Murray Boils?” To me it’s it’s that kind of guy that can rebound and move a little bit defensively i I don’t think Queen is the right player for him defensively which is why I don’t like that pick uh much personally murray Boils I think is too limited offensively so wouldn’t be my guy that I I think structurally it’s it’s a new it’s a Fleming it’s one of these guys that can play some some five small ball five or some four that you expect to shoot it longer term um new didn’t show that a ton this year fleming did new’s a probably a little bulkier than Fleming fleming’s a little bouncier but you know those kind of guys and uh that that’s how I’d go get him like that kind of position
in my final Yoda rankings New came in fifth so if they pick him there Colin Murray Boils I’ve got him sixth so either one of those guys I think I would be pretty happy and then at 18 if they could somehow or 18 or somewhere in there get Rasher Fleming I think that would be that would be a lot of fun uh that would be a a long you know I think that that adds some good stuff to the um to to the team at that point you know so yeah and there’s still some upside with Fleming maybe there’s a world where he you know playing some on the wing here for you too uh which would be really even better if you get more personal positional versatility all right the 76ers pick is in uh this is uh yeah I think this is well said farzy said uh looks like ESPN ban shams yeah I was refreshing there for a minute ago and DJ said this Philly pick determines a lot them taking VJ Edgecomb i’m assuming they tried to make some deals maybe something happens later here but ultimately they just picked a guy that could come in and defend i think they obviously like Tyrese Maxi and uh Jared McCain neither of them are particularly prolific defenders uh so VJ can be your guy to just lock people up on the perimeter you know maybe he can play a little three in some situations against certain teams uh but you just saw how valuable that archetype guy is you know in the playoffs with Caruso and you know some of these dudes locking people up on the perimeter even Dort so if he’s a supercharged one of those guys and eventually does more offensively great but I think the floor is just really good perimeter defender uh good athlete um I’m not as high on him as consensus so I’m happy to see Philly take him at three and I’m happy to leave all the other options available to the Wizards uh at six if uh if possible
yeah I like uh Edgecom and I like the rebounding the assists a lot of steals so all that’s good um he looks like he should be a you know good pro and you know I don’t think this picks or breaks Philly what they need is Embiid to get healthy and stay healthy and if that happens they have a chance to be good and well they need Embiid and they need Paul George you know I think with the age and health of those those guys
they really have like a one-year window I think
and uh so I don’t think Edgecom makes that big a difference for them i wouldn’t be shocked if they end up trading him so you know we’ll see all right I’m gonna pop over to the other other stream and I will be back in just a minute
sounds good yeah Kevin’s over on the uh the playback stream for Bullets Forever if anybody wants to watch over on playback you’re welcome to do that obviously you’re welcome to stay here with us too which I love to have you here selfishly so uh keep us rolling yeah I think this is going to be pretty interesting to see what New Orle sorry New Orleans I still want to call them the New Orleans Hornets sometimes uh what the Charlotte Hornets are up to uh this is just what what some of you guys said yeah City of Oak said it too uh you draft officially starts with Philly i I I think this is um another equally big pick for for us and and Washington i’d love to see the Hornets try to get way too cute or way too creative and and reach for somebody uh you know that ultimately doesn’t make a ton of sense but I don’t know if we can get that lucky if they all these teams just do kind of wild stuff you know that that’s that’s really the question uh that presumably you know Charlotte really really liked Edgecomb throughout so maybe if you’re Philly you take Edgecomb and you force Charlotte to trade you something else and and give you another asset maybe i I don’t know uh just looking at the guys who were left you know Malawatch as a rim runner uh in the what they expected Mark Williams to be kind of category maybe uh that ultimately uh would make some sense for them again for me at four that’s a little too rich for my blood here just looking at you know consensus mock draft of who the next couple guys are you’ve got Khan Canipple again Ace Bailey Jeremiah Fears Trey Johnson Come on Malawatch uh Noah SMG Carter Bryant kind of rounding out your consensus top 10 there so you know we’ll see maybe again they get kind of cute uh the is actually someone that could make some sense for them as a penetrating guard that could play next to LaMelo lamelo is big enough to guard some twos for them provides enough floor spacing and perimeter shooting that would be uh a worthwhile name for them to consider potentially so for the Wizards fans that don’t like fears that much you know maybe that would help you guys out here a little bit but that’s yeah what what Philly does is going to be really I think super impactful uh to what the Wizards do because I could see them you know being interested in the same kind of player here ultimately uh that the Wizards are and they need an equally big swing i I mean I guess Utah does too but I don’t know just doesn’t strike me as the the type of team that does the same kind of thing the Wizards do got Danny A over there uh you know uh with uh with a track record of taking some interesting guys and somebody like a Jaylen Brown that didn’t really have the oncourt success uh was was an interesting pick you know at the time so maybe he could go for for somebody similar that could be like a I don’t know a Carter Bryant or something like that uh maybe four is a little too or five is a little too rich for for Utah but yeah really really interested to see um yeah what this Philly pick does or sorry what this Philly pick gez it’s already it’s early and I’m still already all over the place i think Charlotte is going to be uh an interesting one here too i just don’t really know what the plan is in Philly you got Embiid who’s just only going to get less healthy uh you’ve got Paul George who looked like a shell of himself and then just the two guards that are kind of small and do they fit together long term that’s um I don’t know we we’ll see what that means uh for them over overall here dj says I think Charlotte might go Khan or reach for Malawatch yeah that’d be interesting look they need shooting right like that that would actually probably help LaMelo to have some shooting around he and Brandon Miller uh Miller’s one sort of Achilles heel so far this year so I don’t think he got downhill particularly well he actually might be a better comp for Ace Bailey than than some of these other names they’ve mentioned uh although I think he’s a little better um you know passer and driver maybe not quite as athletic i don’t know we’ll see but yeah he he didn’t really get to the rim all that much this year so maybe somebody like Khan to space the floor for them uh would be interesting and again you’ve got LaMelo’s got some size on the perimeter so they could be a little more switchable here but um I don’t know again if there’s any particular uh guys you want us to talk about uh just drop them in the chat here and uh you know we’ll see how it goes uh Dan asks “How’s Ace defensively?” Yeah you know I I don’t I didn’t love it personally i thought there were just some like really bad lapses and things like that uh over the course of the year but uh again the highs were pretty high so I think you’ve just ultimately if you take him you’re you’re banking on hey we can coach defense and and that’s more of a a knowhow thing than it is an energy and effort thing so if you think he’s got the willingness supposedly the physical tools uh you know are there again I don’t think he put his functional athleticism to use as much this year as as you would hope uh for a guy that that you know looks pretty eye popping when he wants to but he did have some big time weak side blocks some chase down blocks some things like that so you know that’s um that’s the hope is that that’s the guy you see more of here uh over the course of his career byron Man 12 says Khan can play some point guard i I don’t see that a ton personally uh I don’t know um Kevin I know you didn’t get to watch a ton of them this year but uh some question about whether Khan Canipple can play some point guard i I don’t think you want that from him uh I think he’s a perfectly good secondary even better as a tertiary uh ball mover but I don’t think you want him initiating offense in the truest you know sense of things here it but again if he did it situationally or he brought the ball up from time to time or he’s got decent size so if he got some rebounds and advances the ball like if that’s what we’re calling you know point guard I think that’s okay but you don’t want him like with ball pressure against somebody’s elite defensive you know point of attack defender um trying to create for other people
yeah I agree i didn’t see anything in the numbers to make me think that he was a point guard he looks like a classic wing um you know two guard three guard or two or three in your standard one through five setup i I don’t see him as a one that doesn’t mean that he can’t bring the ball up sometimes um so
Khan Canipple the fourth pick in the NBA draft so we don’t even have to worry about that washington and that was probably the guy that was the least popular pick amongst Wizards fans overall uh so now we don’t even have to think about it uh for them I would say go watch what he did in the ACC tournament where uh Cooper Flag was was out he went absolutely supernova for a couple games there and there’s some more upside there so you know we’ll uh we’ll see how that looks but yeah Canipple off the board which means at least somebody that Wizards fans presumably will like will be available for them uh here at six so uh a lot of questions about Ace in the chat uh Money Man Stevens says “Would Ace be our number one if we draft him?” Uh no i mean I don’t think we have a legit number one on the team maybe he turns into that ultimately uh most number one offensive options create off the dribble playmake a little bit more and and can do some of that heliocentric stuff you see on some of these other teams like he’s not an SGA i think he’s a Brandon Miller on the wing play finisher type not an offense generator type yeah uh Greybeard yeah board falling as expected so far agreed city folks Fears and Johnson slot in his guards where does Bailey fit into the league to me he’s a big two guard right now uh ultimately you want him to to play some two or some three to start and sort of that’s the maybe only thing I’d compare uh to to Kevin Durant you know is the progression of starting as a as a two and moving down the lineup as he got physically stronger at 67 though he’s probably not playing a ton of uh four in the NBA but maybe he’s playing some situational small ball four just think about him like in a playoff game having to guard like Pascal Seakkum like I don’t see that uh anytime in in the immediate future here but again you know strength and and bulking up goes a long way here so I wouldn’t rule it out i just don’t see that in the short term okay
by the way you know in our mock draft that we did with Eerson the number four pick was Keniple
that’s right
yeah take that everybody uh yeah I mean that’s that’s um just it’s a smart practical move for them right like you’ve got some potential stars on that team lamelo is a really good player you know multi-time all-star level guy and I think Brandon Miller can be that so putting really good ancillary pieces around them I think is just smart to do uh they don’t have to swing as big as we need to swing at this week uh all right Kevin gun to your head uh who do the Wizards end up drafting here at six man um my guess is it’ll be Fierce or Ace Bailey that would be my guess i
think that’s the smart money here at this point in time of those
absolutely well it’ll be interesting to see who Utah picks because Utah obviously can take one of them
so um that’ll be interesting yeah honestly having an ace learn from a guy like Lori Markin wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world obviously Markin’s bigger but could you eventually you know have them have a similar shot profile and things like that you know maybe that’s uh worth a shot and Bailey maybe fits in a little bit more of what Ames has tried to do in past years was swing for guys that had big high school reputations and maybe weren’t quite as good uh in college as you know everybody initially anticipated and so uh he could see that as a bill low you know opportunity and and just take him here at five honestly I think if that’s what I would probably do if I were Danny H uh so I know Wizards fans won’t want to see him go off the board at five that’s kind of a punch uh if that’s the guy everybody likes and then he goes one right before us uh but that that would be most fitting uh for Wizards fandom there at this point i think
it would be in fitting in keeping with them getting the worst possible pick they could get in the first round so you know that would be that would be perfect by the way though that is all four of the top the top four in Yoda are all off the board now so that’s like that who’s five on the board who’s five on your board ke five uh is excuse me is Ace Newell followed by Colin Murray Boils in common Malawatch after that so
okay we’re yeah we’re in that range of the draft here there’s I mean like I say this group this I’ve got a group now from let’s see five really it’s like I’ve got seven guys who are kind of in the about the same
range so um you think the Jazz are just really bummed right now that the really good white player went right before them and they weren’t able to get him he just feels like he would fit in uh with that that group uh overall there but what can Yeah I don’t know um I suspect they don’t care but maybe maybe
uh the fans i meant more the fans than the front office
oh oh the fans maybe um
I feel like a lot of fan bases really like the white guys so
yeah it’s the Celtics you know another one they’re just going to keep taking white shooters for forever that’s fine
yeah uh all right we’re we’re coming up to the uh Utah here we’ll see what they ultimately go with um if you were Utah Kevin who would you take um if I was Utah um let me think i They’re in a situation where they they really need help just about everywhere I’d probably go Ace Bailey mhm
um well so if if it was really me making the pick I would go ahead and pick Newell because he’s next guy on my list and I think he’s going to be a good player i think guessing what I think Utah is likely to do i think they pick Bailey they could use a guard but they have small guards and I think Fears would be the next guy on the consensus list so that would be that would be my guess yeah I think I gotta be right back um I’ll be right back sorry okay uh yeah Isaiah Collier showed maybe just enough for them this year that they might find he uh and Jeremiah fears redundant i think that’s part of the the question uh for them is just how they make all those sort of pieces fit together they’ve had a couple guys that are more scoring guards like uh Keonte George and they’ve got Jordan Clarks in there obviously although he’s not going to be probably the long-term um you know option for them so it’s going to be interesting uh let’s see [Music] um yeah Jean Paul asked “What are the Nets doing with five picks?” Sure they would trade up yeah they could uh that’s certainly an interesting option uh for them overall here yeah I had a feeling that was uh going to be how that worked out unfortunately um but but Bailey just makes too much sense for them unless there’s some secret trade in the works where this is like uh you know the the draft night with Bele and the Wizards throw a couple second round picks in there to to jump up and swap this is really the question here yeah city of Oak says so Spears or Johnson to the Wizards i like both i like I’ve been saying that the whole time so I’m kind of happy uh with this outcome regardless all three of those options would have been fine with me i really really enjoy Trey Johnson and that’s that’s the guy I would give uh you know the slight preference to here personally but if they choose to go another way I’m I’m ultimately not mad I think Johnson gives you a little bit more size and a little bit more guaranteed shooting I’m not worried about fears as a shooter longer term here but uh with Johnson it’s just one guy they will have drafted that you just can bring in day one and you don’t have to worry about like basically you know improving his shot which which would be super nice um but you know that again that’s that’s a thing I’ve harped on a lot here they ultimately don’t seem all that worried about teaching guys how to shoot so we’ll see i I think uh if it were me in order of guys I would take uh at this pick i do still like a playmaking guard so I’d go Trey Johnson and Jeremiah Fears i I like Kasparus Yakashonis next of of the guards on that list i know he’s not a particularly popular name uh again amongst uh the Wizards fan base from from what I’ve gathered here but uh you know if these guys weren’t on the board he would be my next available guard for sure uh but I think these are the two they should pick between ultimately uh but I think if uh if it’s Malawatcher that that’s probably like the one reasonably on the table guy they could take that I would be disappointed by so hopefully it’s not that sorry uh for any of the Malawatch fans or Malaw watch family watching this maybe who knows um but yeah we we’ll see either way it just you’ve still got two good options and I think where we were at you know leading up into this point uh you know Kevin I I think when we saw six it was pretty doomsday for a lot of us here but just realistically having a chance at two good guards here that that could give you something and have some like potential upside you know I think that’s um it could have been a lot worse for us I guess is where I’m at no you are muted sir if you’re trying to talk
yeah I’m sorry i was talking to the other no worries that’s fine i’ll leave both open right now so I was just uh sort of recapping Wizards obviously Fears is on the table for them uh yeah Ace Bailey went fifth so Fierce you know I’ve also got um you know Fears would be a good pick uh potentially Ace Newell Colin Murray Boils Noah Essen Gay all them trey Johnson all would be pretty solid picks at this point
yeah agreed i I I’m not scrolling much on Twitter right now i I’d love to hear the reaction of the collective fan base here uh but I I gotta assume it’s pretty uh der at the moment just given how much Ace Baileying uh there there was going on here uh that’s just we called it it’s the most Wizards possible thing that could happen you know just having the guy next up for them uh go immediately after that
patrick Core asks “Is there any shot that there’s a trade in the works with the Jazz?” I would say there’s of course a shot that there’s a trade in part because you know Wizards have done this before they did this a couple drafts ago when they traded up a spot to get Balco Dali so that’s entirely possible and um I think for the Jazz with what they need this seems like a pretty logical move in that spot so yeah yeah we’ll see uh yeah Fitz Canrell just asked the same thing is a trade in the works for Ace yeah I I can’t rule it out right like just for the reasons that that Kevin just mentioned there I I would kind of doubt it just because I do think Ace makes sense for their team whereas like I didn’t think Cool Bali made as much sense and it was pretty you know well uh reported that they like Jarus Walker just would like to remind you this live stream during that Cool Bali draft was the first place anybody publicly reported that Kulabali was going to be the pick for the Wizards uh Matt Babcock came on here and said uh he was their guy and that was not out in the ether uh before this so you know we did break that particular uh story live on the pod here so we’ll we’ll see uh you know what that uh ends up looking like for them all right just need this
i see Robert Chang in the comments here says Malawatch that would honestly be I think one of the guys that would surprise me a bit he just does not seem like a Will Dawkins kind of pick
yeah be one of the few guys that would disappoint me personally um to take him at six honestly and that that’s not shade on him as a player because I do think he’ll be a valuable productive NBA player it just it just boxes you in a little bit more than than I’d like to see them go that’s been sort of the nice you know thing about this front office is that presumably the guys they’ve drafted that you can’t put them in sort of a neat box necessarily now maybe they ultimately end up a little bit more limited but at least the theoretical upside of all those guys uh gives you some more options so you know we’ll see
yeah so I think it’s kind of rude to be honest that ESPN’s at a commercial as the Wizards are on the clock
our next great superstar gets drafted during a Fantastic Four commercial well he could be our superhero combined with the other rookies and make a Fantastic Five maybe i don’t know we’ll
just saying the pick is in yeah Robert Chang I do know how where he scores in Yoda i also wrote in that article that I personally would not want to pick him this high it’s just and it’s a really a player type issue we talked about him a little bit earlier but it is a player type issue talking about Malawatch and I would I think that the Wizards want more scheme versatility than a guy who has to play drop uh drop coverage as big and also did not block many shots as uh somebody as big as he is so um I think a rim running shot blocker you can get those in various spots in the draft i don’t think you need to use the six pick overall to get somebody like that
yeah and I don’t think that he really does enough to distinguish himself and also he’s agility tested very poorly at the combine so I would just for all those reasons even though he was productive even though he shot 75% on twos I would not pick him here i would pick other guys and I’ve got you know two or three guys rated ahead of him and a few other guys that are kind of like in that same score and so I’d be perfectly fine picking somebody else even people who are rated a little like behind him they’re ranked behind him but I think I would prefer that player type i think that player type’s got better odds that’s one of the things I’m looking at as I always tinker with Yoda that’s one of the things I’m looking at is like is there a way that I can tease out or do some things to um get at player types that’s a little bit better so all right who’s the pick yeah I’d rather just have like a Ryan Culp Brener at 30 than I would Malaw at six just for a drop coverage big that that at least I know can shoot it a little bit because I’ve seen him do it but uh again I hope it’s Trey Johnson that would be the move here if it’s
That is the Trey Johnson is the pick
cool i’ve got it up behind me on the TV as you can maybe see in the background there and I’m watching it on an iPad which is 10 seconds behind that so that that’s great uh we’ll take this man let’s rock uh you know could this be our uh our next big uh you know high volume high-scoring guard that hopefully does so a little bit more efficiently there’s a lot to like about Trey Johnson this is a dude that took a a really dysfunctional Texas team their better players were holdovers uh you know from a previous coach that got dismissed that a lot of them decided to stick around with Rodney Terry they brought in Trey Johnson anyway because Terry had been their top recruiter for him and they had a relationship but he joined a like again not very good uh Texas team got them to the tournament was really good in that tournament game didn’t let them you know kind of like fall out of that game against a you know a high power Xavier offense he shot a ton of threes and made a ton of threes on a team where he was literally the only spacing so I’ve seen concerns about him getting to the rim and things like that but put him on an NBA court you know even the Wizards with not much spacing it’s still more room to operate than a college court with a packed lane and things like that so I’m not worried about that ultimately I have heard from multiple people uh just in the draft community here that have talked to people around him and things like that that that don’t have anything to gain by saying this uh that he is like a crazy crazy hard worker and I think that fits the the Dawkins MO of just like head down you know just gonna do my thing he’s got a good personality i got to do the media with them at the NCAA tournament after like he he just seemed like a nice kid and and I I think that’s pretty cool he’s also rocking the are they like are they shorts are they pants uh and I always respect somebody willing to make a bold fashion choice on draft night so um I love this i could not be happier uh with this is you know this is the guy had three on my board so getting him uh at six I feel great about
yeah so I I like uh Johnson i you know obviously terrific shooter um concerns you know when I say terrific shooter we’re talking almost 40% on threes 87% from the free throw line that’s all good concerns the low two-point percentage 44.9% and um Yoda also didn’t care for the lack of non-scoring production meaning uh not many rebounds not many assists not many steals or blocks so um he good shooter and that translates and um his size and his athleticism is pretty decent too so you know I I think it’s a solid pick at six and he should be able to fit right in into that lineup uh especially since they’re down Jordan Pulma
that’s right yeah i mean I I think could he come in and be a a Jordan Pool replacement in year one i I mean that in like a good way of just a guy that can soak up some of that that creation and production he’s not like you know prime John Stockton or Isaiah Thomas or one of those guys but but he I think he is a good passer like a like a legitimately good mover of the ball he kicked out created uh you know for for other people here uh throughout the course of the year they just again they had nobody that could knock down perimeter shots all their guys that shot a decent percentage took like one a game so they weren’t really a threat to uh to do a whole lot there so I think you know again I’m not as worried about him as a passer or a play maker initiator or things like that and yeah he doesn’t rebound a ton but I’m not too worried about that overall I think he makes a pretty good back court next to Bub Carrington where they can be a little more interchangeable who’s on ball who’s off ball uh that’ll that’ll be good but I think he’s probably slightly better as a two where I think Bub this year was was better as a one so play them together next year in the back court from day one and and just let him rock and play through those mistakes uh just a couple comments here farsy said fears was a massive smoke screen i guess I don’t think that’s true like they they clearly did their due diligence on Fars and and that was probably with the expectation that somebody like Johnson wasn’t available to them like so if maybe you had Johnson higher but you thought he was going to go three through five then yeah do your due diligence on on fears uh but yeah there’s obviously smoke screens out there with the reporting of oh they’d move up and take fears at two like that was never a realistic uh option anyway so I I wouldn’t have put much stock into that uh at the time um Robert Chang happy with the pick didn’t think we had a chance to get him I agree Addison I don’t think we have a player in the rotation shorter than six foot five should get some fun lineups yeah again I think that’s that makes a lot of sense for them and and hopefully again these guys all have theoretical upside as shooters but ultimately if a few of them work out you become a pretty dangerous um team to to guard eay says he’s a basketball fanatic eats drinks and lives basketball yeah again I I have heard that from from people in that circle that that believe that as well so that’s pretty awesome um yeah this is this is cool i’m I’m hyped man like again I I I feel bad for the uh the people that were so locked in on Ace Bailey to get the rug pulled out from under him at the last minute here but hopefully this is a good consolation prize for you uh Fitz asks “What’s the pros and cons of of Ace versus Trey?” Uh well I mean I I think Ace’s best value is as a big wing shooter right now but the percentages are actually aren’t that good uh whereas Trey is a little smaller but he is a better shooter he’s got a better handle i talked about this a lot on the pod here recently but I think that’s the hardest thing for a player to get marketkedly better at is as a ball handler and I didn’t really see that you know much there uh with with Ace this year maybe he’s got a better handle than he was able to show but um you know Ace I think is a better handler of the ball he’s not as explosive as an athlete he’s a little smaller but I do think he’ll he’ll play make more for people so I think he’s more of a guard and ace is more of a wing and I think the typical pros and cons that come with both of those positions
you can weigh the two of them here but this makes sense to me at least i have them basically right together with Trey Johnson so I have Trey Johnson 11 and and Ace Bailey 12 and Yoda big board or little board or whatever the size board um pretty comparable you know Bailey a little on the low side on two-point percentage for a wing especially for somebody who’s supposed to be a long and athletic wing um lower three-point percentage lower free throw percentage rebounded better but fewer assists and you know blocked a few more shots which makes sense because he’s bigger also a few more turnovers and a few more fouls so I think overall you know it’s they’re they’re pretty comparable in terms of overall impact it is interesting that Bailey was um Jeremiah Fears by the way goes seventh that Bailey was um on a bad team
and that you know he’s supposed to be a really good player he’s supposed to be elevating that and he’s also you know on a bad team despite being also with a top two pick you know number two overall pick on that team so
I think there were definitely NBA front offices that couldn’t rule that out right and and the same question probably should have been asked of Dylan Harper as well but when you looked at their onoff numbers it was more you know favorable to to Harper and his contributions to the team
all right let’s bring in another uh a voice here and uh let’s just get their their perspective on it uh the man himself uh Greg Finnberg greg how are we feeling after the uh the Trey Johnson
i’m gonna duck over to the playback so um I’ll catch you guys
feeling great feeling great trying to get the the camera centered um I I mean Johnson I know you you like Trey Johnson i’m a big fan of Trey Johnson we talked at length about him
he’s a number three guy on my board you know someone that can put the ball in the bucket led the SEC in scoring as a freshman nearly 40% from three on a high volume good really good movement shooter as well which is which is really nice in order to play off ball um someone who led his team to the tournament like he has all the traits and and from what I heard and I’m not an insider but but from all the stuff I’ve read he killed it in his pregaf workouts i was surprised Utah passed on him because I heard he had a really good workout in Utah but clearly Utah takes Bailey i think that’s shocking i mean if you asked me 10 minutes ago I would have said Ace Bailey is a wizard i guess not you know Utah takes a flyer on him but I think Trey Johnson is the better player than Ace Bailey maybe not as high of an upside as him but you know someone that can score the ball the Wizards have been dead last in offensive rating and efficiency each of the last two seasons they need someone that can put the ball in the hoop and and Johnson’s just that so I’m I’m I’m pretty thrilled with it um you know I could have lived with Bailey i I would have understood it um but I I wouldn’t have been able to understand fears over over Johnson i’m glad that the Wizards front office is smart and they know what they’re doing so I’m I’m pretty happy pretty home run pick in my book
yeah same here i I think you nailed it i mentioned this on on a pod after seeing him at the time if anybody wants to scroll back through uh but but seeing Johnson in person at Dayton in like a good way I don’t want this to come off the wrong way but like he was the guy who had it going late for them and the only one actually like generating offense so when a few other guys took like Trayvon Mars took an absolutely terrible shot like Johnson was like “What are you doing like I’m you know like like I’m the dude here.” and and to be able to be that guy on the team as a freshman and be successful and productive doing it you know I think says a lot about where he’s uh at overall greg how do you feel about his ability to like run an offense do you see him being able to play you know as an as an onball creator essentially for people um
you you were you were someone that got to watch him up close and personal so you probably have a better you know perception than me who who’s only watched highlights um I feel like the role he was forced into at Texas is pretty different than maybe what he’ll be forced to do in the NBA i mean he had to do a lot for that offense to to go and he had to do a lot to get them through the SEC into the tournament um and that’s one of the reasons I thought the Wizards should pick him because you know I don’t think he he’s going to be this guy that that completely commands an offense like he did at Texas but you know if you ask him to do a little bit less than that just kind of be a guy that can space the floor can play on ball at times but I think could complement a guy like Bub Carrington pretty well you know I would be confident and comfortable if you had Trey bring the ball up a couple times a game i don’t know if he’s necessarily projecting as a lead guard um but but somebody that can shoot the way that he can shoot on the move set shots that can kind of fit in a lot of in a lot of places it’s a similar reason why you know Charlotte had to take a nipple he’s so good in so many different areas and I think you know Trey’s upside is very high but I think his his floor is also very high i think he’s just gonna be a really solid player and and it depends on on the role so I don’t know about lead guard role for Johnson i’m curious what you think but I certainly think he can he can be a combo guard if you need him to play on ball I wouldn’t be too afraid of those minutes if I’m being real i think he can um I I I think you know not the truest sense of the word like point guard in the way we think of old school point guard but
but a can he be a bigger you know Dame Lullard type guy where he’s a scoring threat first and then can generate some offense second you know I heard a lot of like oh he’s he’s like a buddy heal type and it’s from from people whose opinion I respect but I just think there’s a lot more uh creation there to do that like we don’t see Buddy he much as an onball guy and he just shoots the out of which is great too but I think that’s that’s the floor for Johnson as a player is at least he comes in and is just going to drill shots for you and and I think that’s great uh you know like Hosway said as highest ceiling is Ray Allen Desmond Bane
those are two very different players especially way I know you’re a little younger so you maybe don’t remember uh like prime Ray Allen but he was like crossing dudes up and dunking on them like that’s
that’s a little bit of a a different player than I think what we get from Desmond Bane again I think there’s more there offensively and I think that’s what you’re hoping on if you take him at three if you get him at six you can live a little bit more with maybe that kind of stuff you know doesn’t fully come around uh Greg where are you with the defense overall do you think he can at least be a plus defender long term
i’ll say this like I I like in his pre-draft interviews that he they were like “What’s your biggest weakness?” And he said “You know my defense.” He’s like “That’s that’s fine you know I know at least where I can improve.” He said “You can always improve on on defense it’s not like anything like like height or measurables you you can’t teach you know he has decent size for a guard you know I’m pretty comfortable with with playing if he wants to be a two i think he can can defend multiple positions you know I don’t think it’s a guy like fears that you throw the ball in if you have a mismatch like I don’t necessarily see teams looking for it in that case um but in terms of defense like he wasn’t great on that end i think he I think he’s better than some people have been saying than he is you know he’s not a liability by any means and like I’m fine you he can shoot he has the size he can really get you a bucket create for himself which is something the Wizards lack um and this is clearly a group that wants to play good team defense i think anybody in that system can buy into it i mean Steph Curry was a a quote bad defender for most of his career he got stronger he kind of bought in on that end they won the championship he was good on that end so you know I think anybody can be a good defender it’s a lot about effort and IQ as much as it is about defensive skill in my opinion so I think it’s a little overblown it’s definitely warranted and Trey knows that as well but I like the fact that he’s self-aware i like the fact that he knows yeah I’m not good at it but I’m clearly someone that wants to improve on and that’s kind of what I like
yeah i think that just speaks to to an approach too of treating your interviews that way and really answering those honestly and it’s there were certain other people you know that the fan base liked who I don’t think would have answered that question maybe quite the same way based on on what we’re hearing about their interview so it’s just sort of what you like i think he showed on the court you know a willingness to to attack people uh Bullets Nation asked “Is it true that he’s a ball hog?” I don’t know he averaged three assists per game on a team with not a lot of other you know featured scorers around him and and not a lot of guys that were capable of knocking down shots at a high level so uh I didn’t think that um but like I said he was willing to take over you know a game when they needed someone to step up and do that and and that’s pretty rare for a freshman in arguably the greatest conference you know that college basketball’s ever seen which that applied to Fierce here as well so you know I feel pretty good about it yeah likewise and if I can if I can just add like the ball hog stuff like
I like to see the system that they play in i like to see how much they’re like being asked to do because in college these guys are being asked to do a lot more than they’ll be asked to do with NBA players in an NBA system and Trey was asked to do quite a bit on offense um so I I I think those are a little bit overblown he had to do a lot he did good led the SEC in scoring decent percentages led him to the tournament winning basketball um so you know I really like the pick i think it’s a really good pick
yeah couldn’t agree more with you here too uh interesting next pick here Jagor Deon goes eight
uh to Brooklyn i think I tried telling some people this guy was going to be a top 10 pick for the team that he shot
uh well in warm-ups for so I’m not too surprised and and he’s a little bit of a flyer especially at eight but if you have five first round picks
yeah you might as well take a chance
yeah take take the biggest swing you can and and if you believe he shoots it I think you just got yourself a pretty special player here but but that’s really the if I think for him overall
yeah definitely the shooting i I mean I saw some people even having him you know today in the outside the lottery which I thought was pretty crazy um you know I could have seen maybe a top 10 fall but um I think a team that knows that they can use him as as a ball handler and kind of put the ball in his hands makes sense that’s why the Wizards didn’t make much sense to him you know I thought especially before they trade a pool and even after like they have guys that they want the ball in their hands and I don’t know necessarily they want Demond to be that guy but Brooklyn certainly has the the opening so I think that could be a good spot for him
yeah again if if you’re Washington like if you thought he could shoot he made some sense for you and if you didn’t it becomes a little tougher just at some point
they’re gonna have to end up with some space and if they’re still
in on you know Keshan as a playmaker or B or Bel is a playmaker here as well you know that’d be great i I I can’t say this uh too strongly here because I I don’t want to offend anybody here but like I’m not as sold on Bub as like a long-term really good starter on a playoff team
i I think there’s definitely potential for that i just don’t know that it’s like I’ve seen enough yet to like set it in stone here
longer term so I I think anybody that’s worried is he redundant at all with Trey again I think this is an accumulation of assets they can play together in the short term and then you worry about long term is the fit you know ideal or is it conducive for them to play like the best brand of winning basketball you can build and that sort of thing yeah I mean certainly you mentioned talent accumulation that’s kind of the the name of the game like just get talent when you can get it i think Trey was the the most talented player on the board um even if they took fears again if they thought he was the most talented on the board I wouldn’t have liked the pick as much as Trey Johnson but I understand that they’re looking for talent and again they’re not they’re not doing plugandplay like a team like OKC can do like they have talent needs everywhere they are not a good basketball roster not a good basketball team and they’re drafting good basketball players and I think you know Trey and and Bub is an interesting and intriguing front court i certainly think you know playing behind a guy like C.J mccullum if you’re Trey Johnson could be a pretty intriguing vet to play behind for as long as he’s in DC um but but certainly I I’m intrigued by by the pick i think he’s a great shooter and and I think he’s going to thrive in DC gonna get minutes too which is big
yeah absolutely and and that’s again I wasn’t as immediately enamored uh with with the trade yesterday just because I thought they should have been able to get something for pool but this is a thing that if you thought you were going to take somebody like Trey Johnson that’s maybe the person he was redundant with in the short term so hopefully you freed him up a little bit there uh Jose mentions in the chat I I think the Wizards trade from 18 now 100% um Kevin maybe first uh crack to you any sense for how this pick you know changes what they do for the rest of the first round here at all uh for me it wouldn’t change much except maybe you want to move up a couple spots if you can uh the the guys I still like at the for 18 are are on the board and probably still will be so uh Deon I was I had rated much much much lower so uh you know I’m I would would be happy to be completely wrong about uh Demond uh because I do like the playmaking but you know obviously shot really poorly from three committed a ton of turnovers didn’t make free throws i’d love the non-scoring production um he he kind of maybe like the the young Josh Giddy i don’t know yeah that’s
if I’m the Wizards I I mean the guys that I still like at at uh 18 are guys like you know Rashier Fleming um and I think Cedric Coward there there’s still a pretty good possibility that those guys will be there so
agreed uh Greg any thoughts on that
i wouldn’t be moving out of that pick um I I I saw I saw your mock earlier today with with a Sang at at 18 like I think that’d be pretty cool um I think it it’s a it makes sense for a guy like Will Dawkins to kind of take a swing on on that lanky build a French guy as well overseas um I doubt he did any pre-draft stuff again he the finals I believe is still going on and Saraf stayed at Si went um but again that’s a big swing pick and and you if you were to take a guy like Bailey at at six maybe you know don’t take a similar build in a sen but you got Trey Johnson I think everything’s on the table um certainly front court is something they might look for you know you brought in Olen guilt is on non-g guaranteed holmes non-g guaranteed for the most part you have Sar and Olen now there’s going to be some good forwards at that spot i think Thomas Sorbber would be great for the Wizards there that’s someone I’m targeting um Kevin mentioned Fleming i really like his ability to stretch the floor i like his size and wingspan so like those are two bigs that I would really like um I’ve seen a lot of people say Danny Wolf i I would prefer to go a different direction i think the Wizards you know Barass has been going in different directions from guys like Danny Wolf um so I think if they go big Sor Fleming that’d be great a Senate if he falls and maybe a trade up i mean Derek Queen’s been floating a lot that’s kind of what Wizards fans want for a trade-up whether you’re a Maryland fan and that’s bias or you actually think he’s a really good player um you know I know no matter what like he he’s had top 10 grades top five grades from some a guy like that’s there at 1415 it’s tremendous value and if you can trade up and and get them you know I certainly think that they should they should consider it yeah 100% rico EUA asked “Will Queen fall enough for the Wizards to move up for him?” That’s really the question i’m sure he’s somebody they’d kick the tires on at the very least because they like guys with you know a little untapped potential relative to where they’re they’re able to pick so that would be uh worth you know keeping an eye on if you’re them uh a couple other names here getting mentioned jean Paul says “I want Noah Pender.” Noah Penda or um Behringer at Baron sorry at 18 now uh of the two I watch more of Baron i think he’s a little more interesting to me as a guy that could come in and protect the rim as a shot blocker and something they could use uh Merl asked about Malawatch yeah we we’ll see if he’s there if he somehow falls to 18 I’m I’m definitely more open to it
at that point in time uh Kevin and I are both higher on Asa Newell who ain’t no half Steph and asked him out so I’d love that at 18 that that would be the ideal Madno draft uh you know if if we walked out of here with Trey and Asa um so so we’ll see but yeah just there’s a lot of options here if I were them I I’d be calling other teams right now i’d be calling Brooklyn i think Brooklyn may have a couple picks right before them if I remember uh correctly here it’s sort of hard to keep track of h of where they ended up in the first round because it seems like they’re half the picks of the first round but uh yeah there’s like I don’t know calling up Atlanta at 13 or does San Antonio really want another rookie at 14 maybe that’s somebody you could make some moves with i I lied brooklyn does not pick between now and then
um
so real quick Toronto just selected Colin Murray Boils who was sixth in Yoda so yeah good pick
not bad
shooting shooting
so real quick just to um pop through some of these names that have popped up Derek Queen is somebody that I have rated um as like a second round pick um you know he’s small he’s slow he doesn’t jump well and um the production wasn’t like elite it was you know pretty good but not a lot of assists and not a lot of the kind of markers of like a really high skill crafty player maybe there’s some stuff that popped to the eye that um I wouldn’t see because I don’t watch i I use the numbers but players like him tend not to do that great at the NBA level so um hold on there was a couple others oh Panda is another guy that I’ve got rated pretty low same thing with um I think uh I don’t know how you say the name Behringer got him a little
um but yeah those are guys that I probably would just not you know not take uh Greg anybody for you that you absolutely do not want to see them take at 18 that’s a realistic option for them like this is a guy you are totally out on that that maybe
you know Jace Richardson i’ve seen a lot of people like him i do i I think he’s really gifted but he’s just small and like I I don’t think the Wizards are like they they’re pretty go they’re going in the opposite direction they like size they like wings like I wouldn’t even understand it from a Wizards perspective especially with how many guards you have you just took a guard um you traded for McCullum obviously that’s not a staple there in your in your backboard but you have Johnson you have Bub you know you just took the other Johnson i wouldn’t understand it you know size alone you know defensive liability possibilities that’s something I wouldn’t understand from a a Dawkins and Wizards philosophy but from like a Greg philosophy in terms of my draft board I wouldn’t get it at all um so that that that would probably be my my one other than that I don’t know if I have too many can’t get i I would understand a lot of the guys that that they take
yeah that’s a really good one he didn’t immediately pop to mind but I think that would be a guy I would answer with as well for that reason i’m not even out on him as a player it’s just you know uh largely for for all the reasons you mentioned there and if people were really been out of shape about Fier’s size I don’t have the measurements handy but I want to say Richardson was considerably
uh you know shorter of the two of them or at least an inch and a half something like that so you know we could um
uh yeah we can kind of talk through what that looks like here too uh the Murray Bulls one is is really interesting he’s a guy I’ve just been lower on he’s been so productive i just curious about how it ultimately translates again mentioned how much I like Ace Newell murray Bole’s like punked him in one of their matchups uh at the very least uh but he’s a year older you know so so maybe that’s something here just a dude that like plays really hard and is going to super defend and I see how he absolutely fits like the Messiah Vajiri model of just guys that are like you know like a little undersized like everybody on their team is 6’8 and they’re just going to switch everyone i I guess is the plan here but at some point you also have to be able to score like baskets on an NBA court and
uh I just I wonder how he does that and and some of the other guys that aren’t you know great shooters right now I think at least have like projectable upside to me the Murray Boils jump shot is like broken broken and I just don’t see him being a shooter uh with that form as is there’s like a weird kind of hitch in the middle
so I I don’t know i don’t really get that one as much at nine at the very least
yeah certainly i mean you mentioned like switchability is great you know they they have another really good defender you know a lot of people have said he’s the best defender in this class i He’s very good you know he’s very talented the shot is the issue and I mean in the NBA nowadays you got sevenfooters that are pretty reliable three-point shooters it’s kind of you know known that the league wants to be able to shoot you know one through five um it’s certainly possible to develop a shot you know Lou Dort wasn’t like a great three-point shooter i mean that first playoffs they had in the bubble they were just leaving them open that Houston versus OK series OKC series from three and now you look at it he probably saved them in game five against Denver with the three threes he made made a couple huge threes in game seven for the Thunder like they can develop it’s going to take time that took him what four or five years to get a good three-point shot i don’t know if you’re Toronto you have the patience that maybe OKC did um but but like at the end of the day that’s someone that I guess I’m glad it’s off the board i didn’t think he’d fall 18 but um you know I wouldn’t have at 18 I would have understood the value point of view but but but like for the Wizards you know I’ve seen some people had him at three or four i just it makes no sense to me you got to be able to shoot the ball in today’s NBA and the fact that he can’t you mentioned it’s broken like it it probably it’s like Johnny Davis levels with the Wizards um he’s gonna have to you know take a while to rebuild it and I just
at least as is yeah that that’s not
I don’t know if certain teams have that that patience maybe Toronto clearly does but you know they know best
yeah there are guys where like if the form’s ugly and they just you think they can rep it out but it goes in you can you can live with that but if it just doesn’t go in and it’s ugly
uh you’re probably talking about a rehaul here so uh Jay Bellis’s top available guys uh you know there’s there’s some dudes here he’s got five dudes next they’re picking for 10 right now ultimately some of these guys are probably going to be available here uh for Washington greg we talked a lot about sort of positional fit here would would the Trey Johnson pick at all change what you do from a positional standpoint or are the guys you had you know available or or top of the wish list for you at 18 still the same guys regardless of what the pick was like if they had taken an ace would you have a different list at 18 i guess
I would I would I we talked about this earlier like a sen and ace kind of I don’t know why you’d take both and again I’m always BPA over over pretty much everything but like if you were to take Malawak at six and you come back and you take silver or new and you have SAR something isn’t really calculating and like I said like they have holes everywhere but they have bigger holes than some especially you address the guard position with a guy like Trey Johnson um I think forward makes sense again or s like you need front court depth you can’t just have Alex Sar on an island there especially if you if you view him as a four you know maybe you want to go out there and get your five or get your your big to play alongside him in the front court your your bruising center you know I think Ace Newell is is I think 11 on my final board like I know you really like him i just I I think that would be so cool to have a a guy of his caliber playing with a guy of SARS skill set i think Sorber would be a good combo as well um you know Fleming it kind of screams you know he can stretch the floor as well maybe I’m looking for more interior presence from a guy next to Sar um but but certainly I would be looking forward i think it works out because it was very guard heavy at that spot you know Fierce Johnson um Canipple that they kind of dominated that alongside Bailey and it’s kind of forward dominant um you know towards that part I I’d say with small forwards power forwards some centers littered in there so I think forward makes more sense now and I think it makes it works because there there’s going to be a lot of good forward talent there at 18
yeah I’m a little more open to some of the wings that might fall to that range than I would have been originally like I just at some point one of these guys is probably going to fall between a Carter Bryant or a Cedric Coward or someone like that and at 18 I think you would just take the talent at that point if you could get him uh Dan asked “Do you think CJ or Trey start the year at the two?” Uh by the way common malwatch just went uh to Houston uh
also um I just saw Mark Williams dealt to uh Phoenix for the 29th pick and a 2029 first round pick wow okay he got a he got a first two first essentially first i don’t know what the Suns just do what the Suns do i guess
somehow he passed the physical this time like I actually think he makes sense for them but you better believe he’s healthy uh if you’re going to if you’re going to go that route otherwise that’s sort of wild
yeah interesting sorry go ahead with uh CJ and um and Trey starting is that the question
yeah uh I’ll bring Kevin back in here too for for this one uh as well we’ll start with you Greg do Do you see CJ or Trey starting the year as the the shooting guard for this team
i think CJ like I think Trey would be fun but the Wizards have have shown time and time again like they they will put out the best lineup for for the most part and as you get later in the season you know you’ll start to see your all rookie lineups um you know obviously they’re going to try I would assume to build up trade value with Middleton Smart McCullum and so maybe they’ll play over some of the younger guys i certainly think CJ McCullum’s a million times the player right now than Trey Johnson is i mean McCullum averaged 21 points per game last year on the on the Pelicans um you know and and he also was on a tanking team so I think that could be similar production similar role on another tanking team in Washington um and I think again like the Wizards you know they’re not just going to go full tank try to lose every game um they’re going to put out the best lineup they can for the most part especially early on and I think CJ gives them the best chance to win so I think they’ll go with him early on yeah that makes sense to me too but I do like the idea of like a healthy open competition and if Trey Johnson goes out and wins it I think that’s a really good sign for it kevin any thoughts on starting uh positions for next year already i’m very much a let’s let’s wait and see you know if Trey Johnson is somebody who is precocious I’m perfectly happy to start him um but I think it should be very much open competition and um I mean obviously Trey Johnson will play a lot of minutes the Wizards forcefed a bunch of minutes to Keshan George and Bub Carrington um you know and and even early in the season I mean Keshan had really a rough start to the season got better as the year went on uh Bub had rough moments throughout the season so I would say see what happens uh it would be good if Trey Johnson can be precoaches and you know win a job that would be cool but like I said he’s going to play a lot I think coming on whether he starts or comes off the bench um I wouldn’t be surprised also if the Wizards have some some veterans moving on and to create some some minutes yeah we talked about like Brogden with Bub last year being a really good mentor uh at least for some portion of the year which I keep forgetting Malcolm Brogden exists and is technically you know still around in the NBA uh but but CJ is actually like a pretty good mentor for a Trey Johnson uh so I think that’s nice just a small random anecdote but my probably like one of my all-time favorite basketball memories I went with a buddy to an NCAA tournament in Greensboro North Carolina and both Duke and uh UNCC were in that tournament my buddy was a UNCC fan and we got to see uh a CJ McCollum Lehi team eliminate Duke in person and then it was St patrick’s Day weekend too which was awesome where everybody was like liquored up and uh so CJ went nuts beats Duke all the UNCC fans are going nuts then UNCC won it was just like maybe the uh best all-time uh basketball nut weekend so I will always love CJ for that so full circle uh him ending up a member of the Wizards here so I like it uh and and yeah good point here uh again from Jean Paul that this Malash pick is for the Suns i don’t have the volume on so I’d kind of forgotten that but that’s a part of the the actual trade here uh going on the uh Kevin Durant trade there so Malawatch now going uh to Phoenix alongside Mark Williams as Greg mentioned that’s sort of the Spider-Man meme I think uh put one of them in a cast maybe and then do the Spider-Man meme and it’s basically the same thing but yeah um that’s that’s an interesting fit here at the least i would love to see them just play the two of them together and just say like F spacing and just get gigantic
and uh and see how
one of one of them can play guard right
yeah exactly let’s see who can I I mean I keep hearing Malwatch can shoot it so maybe he’s the shooting guard for this team
uh ultimately if if they’re going to rely on Bradley Beal to play point guard I guess stranger things uh have happened here uh money man Steven says the starting lineup of Bub Trey Bow Keshan and Star would be really uh fun the size is crazy agreed uh David Anavine says “I like Noah SN gay power forward with upside is multiple skills speaks French and is very young all things this front office likes.” Agreed ain’t no half Stephan said Duke Lehigh in person Super Bowl yeah that one was awesome uh and then David asked uh would this front office do a trade with OKC uh to get this and give up future pick uh you know ideally Golden States in 2029 yeah I mean that pick may not even convey anyway here yeah I I don’t know what what’s on the table for them like we’ve seen them be aggressive in the past so ultimately what they do here I think is is anybody’s game but I think all things should probably be on the table we could still also see a veteran move on uh could be a Marcus Smart makes some sense for somebody a Cory Kiss maybe gets moved you know there’s there’s a whole bunch of things that are uh in the range of possibilities here overall if you guys are watching on YouTube hit that like button for us we definitely appreciate that um make this more discoverable for for other people here uh according to the eyeball tracker we’re we’re approaching 4,000 views on the stream here so far so uh that’s pretty cool over the course of the uh the hour and a half so far that’ll keep us going here uh past the the 18th pick at the very least i’m in the West Coast and not have had not had dinner yet tonight so we’ll we’ll see if I if I make it through the full uh 30 pics at this point but that is the plan as of now unless it somehow goes on into the Wii hours essentially but um
don’t see how it could it’s on it’s it’s a timed event you know it’s gota it’s got to end i
I said the same thing but somehow these things take uh longer than they should and I don’t know there’s only so many I guess Taco Bell commercials they can ultimately splice in here interesting interesting pick yeah uh also it says proposed trade is that is that
Memphis yeah i wonder what they gave up wow to Portland portland’s trying to contend I guess with Holiday so I don’t know what that deal was maybe I doubt Jiren or Jaw but like Stant Dama i don’t I guess we’ll see
yeah let’s
The pinky by the way is Cedric Coward
yeah coward at 11 yeah and trading him to Memphis
and it looks like he’s headed to Memphis rerouted
but they’re gonna have him put the Blazers hat on which just is annoying but
yeah right i know we got to fix that at some point here like it the NBA does need to fix that and really all recordeping in the NBA needs to needs to be fixed in terms of that because there are picks if you go through like which GM picked you know trying to grade their draft picks it’s impossible because they have picks that they’re traded that were traded i mean the Wizards for example they they list Oh I can’t even remember the second round guard who ended up playing several years in Washington the Lakers uh draft drafted him gruntfeld sold the pick and uh the Lakers picked him and the guy stuck around for like eight years in the NBA had a good productive career
yeah he got credit
and that that goes on Gruntfeld no it’s he sold the pick that belongs to the the Lakers so
the same applies to Wizards second round legend Lazar Hayward out of Marquette because obviously everybody remembers him in a Wizards jersey yet but you go back and look and it’s like I I wanted to look who were the actual successful second round picks and they listed all these guys that never played or the Wizards never were intended to be uh you know member of the Wizards like people still mention like I can’t believe the Wizards ever traded away Jordan Clarkson after seeing how good he was it’s like no they gave up that pick a long time before he ultimately you know ended up um on the Wizards air quote but uh Kevin where was Yoda with respect to Cedric Coward i probably imagine he was a hard eval he didn’t play much power five
yeah so I had him lower down a little lower down um let me see where did I have him i had him I mean 17th so this isn’t like an insane reach um he’s big guard a big wing
and with you know decent decent athleticism um the one of the reasons I didn’t like push him down because he missed so many games is that his overall production in the six games he played this year was pretty consistent with what he had done previously in his college career and so there really wasn’t a reason to move him nudge him down if it had been you know he shot 75% on threes through six games this year I would have you know figured out I would have done some work to try to assess him more accurately but because he was pretty consistent with what he had been previously I just kind of let it ride
uh Greg I can’t remember how are you on Coward
i like him uh I’ve seen the Kawaii comps a lot of people say like Kawaii which is pretty pretty interesting um I mean the the evolution of his game that’s something that I like to look at as well like how good did you get and it’s tough for these freshman that are one and done that are 18 19 but for someone that really went through the collegiate system the way he did and progressed the way he did you know I I don’t know why a team wouldn’t think he could do the same you know it’s it’s an insane story it’s really shows the the level of work that he’s put in to be the the player that that he is going up each each each year to to higher levels of basketball so I just I understand the pick and I understand Memphis wanting to move up five spots giving up a future one because they’re like you know what he’s already pretty good you know really good player and we we only think he can get better and I don’t know why they wouldn’t think that because he continues to get better so I was pretty high on him i had him at I think closed at 16 like I a little higher kevin had him at 17 um but I can certainly understand the upside of of a team like Memphis that that has the assets from the Bane trade and and wants to get the guy that they like so I get it this seems like the kind of guy they’ve been missing from their team for the last couple years too just like that really legitimate three and D wing it was either a three or a D and never both so
uh that that definitely makes some sense uh hey to Luke Feldman thanks for joining us in the chat uh he says Gay Beinger Baron i got to keep doing that uh Fleming at 18 again we’ve talked about a couple of these names i think they’re all certainly on the table uh ain’t no half Stephen said new probably won’t get past the Hawks pick yeah they’re they’re coming up here uh two picks from now so he could make some sense for them yeah I don’t know i I think that’s a guy people are sleeping on you’ve seen the Warriors have some success with this over the years of buying in on guys that were higher level high school recruits than they ultimately you know showed production wise as college players but he was still productive on a Georgia team that made the tournament and it you know I don’t think a ton of people had you know Georgia um on their early uh surprise list to make the tournament there and you know they featuring two guys like from Mount St mary’s like it’s not like they were they were loaded with all this other like SEC caliber depth i think he was a real piece and them getting so far so um that would be an interesting one for me and and that is a guy to me that fits the Dawkins model you know pretty good positional size especially if you think he can play the four theoretical upside as a shooter can do a little playmaking and things like that as well has some pedigree so it’d be cool to at least get one of the guys from this vaunted Montver class so if they’re going to have four guys go in the first round here we got to get one of them i I think for maybe the best high school team of all time
yeah i mean Queen Queen’s still there and then I think this was kind of expected towards the end mop drafts kind of had him slipping towards the back end of the lottery i’d be fascinated to see you know I don’t think Chicago makes too much sense like Atlanta
i was just thinking Greg like I I I think um Queen to Chicago would be one I would keep an eye on i just
Oh you like you like that how come what do you like about that fit only because at some point Bukovich has to move on right or Yeah like it’s just Veovich not Bukovich i got to get that my Eastern European pronunciations right there but uh they they’ve had some success using like a skilled big man uh that’s not necessarily like a prototypical rim protector so could you bring queen in let him learn from uh Vuvich for a little bit here and then maybe slowly phase him out or or trade him um so they don’t seem to to just necessarily be like locked in on the um it has to be only this like big room protecting guy and and like they have other positional size at other positions so maybe they think they can be switchable and I I’m just saying I wouldn’t rule it out here and that’s where he starts to get interesting on the board I think
yeah another trade atlanta traded uh the number 13 pick to the Pelicans for 23 and an unprotected 2026 first
wow unprotected so they are really banking on like a a Zion comeback here i guess
whoever I guess yeah they’re going in whoever’s there at 13 that I guess fell past Chicago they clearly
really like them i mean they’re not good they were really bad this year and they’re giving up unprotected ones next year
wow
any thoughts on who it might be somebody that makes sense to you
um I mean like I know that they need some front court in in Nola they have P they they they obviously um you know went with fears there so I don’t know if guard makes too much sense like maybe they really like Sorber and and they want him to be the anchor i hope not like I hope he falls i hope New falls too um I don’t know if I don’t know if Queen goes if Queen maybe didn’t go to Chicago and they’re like the value is just too good here at 13 i guess we’ll see um I
I did mention this to to both our our fellow uh uh Wizards Twitter members Oz and Will that uh and didn’t say this publicly but Queen did have a workout for New Orleans that apparently went really well and there they were very interested in him
at the time and and that was something that the the Maryland coaching staff former Maryland coaching staff that’s now at Villanova was even mentioning is hey keep an eye on New Orleans as a guy
uh for Queen so obviously seven was a little too rich for their blood but you know maybe they thought hey we can we can get him on the back end here and move up to 13 so
if he’s not not a guy you know we’ll see
i guess this Bulls fan doesn’t like it he probably I mean he probably doesn’t know him but um I like him i think he can be they have they have a type you know they took Matas last year
they’re going with Sen here um but I guess me maybe maybe maybe you are right that Queen killed that that Pelicans workout because giving up next year’s unprotected one um in order to move up and get them like they clearly like him so
that makes sense yeah I I uh again it’s just from from trickling down from the coaching staff that they got some feedback that that he was wellreceived there but
whether or not that’s um enough to to make them want to put some assets in to go get him is
is a totally different story
uh I’m gonna um I’m gonna I’m gonna butt out here but I appreciate you for for having me on i I really I really appreciate the show’s great obviously and if you’re listening subscribe to Matt he does everything great um all the Maryland coverage is elite as well so please please please show him some love he does awesome work and again thanks for for having me Matt i appreciate it
yeah thank you Greg for chopping it up with us for a bit enjoy the rest of the draft fingers crossed for 18 buddy
yep i’m excited to see what you think have a good one man
you too peace uh all right we’ll uh we’ll keep this thing rolling here obviously Noah SN going uh 12 here to Chicago is interesting uh thought they’d take a big thought could have been an option obviously they go a slightly different route there uh with uh with Noah who you know is um is a guy with some untapped upside obviously not having as strong a playoff run uh as as people would have liked to hear at the back end kevin I I am a crusty old man at heart here so uh curious for your perspective on this i really don’t like that Noah bailed on his team in the playoffs to go be at the draft uh like uh whereas his other teammate Ben Saraf is still there playing with them right now uh and chose you know he obviously he’s not a green room invite so it’s maybe a little different but uh you know I I guess it’s a once in a-lifetime thing and maybe that’s always been the dream but I I kind of don’t like stuff like that i want dudes that are going to like die on the court for their team and and be super loyal
yeah I hear you i and I agree with what you’re saying uh I’m torn because like you say I’ I’d kind of rather see him just be there to fight for his team you know that kind of stuff but this is you know this is the the biggest event of his life and uh
you know on a personal level and this is really what he’s doing this all for is to try to get to the NBA level so um yeah you got to cut him a break it just it’s like it’s kind of a tough look like the year um Vince
is he going to miss a game though that’s the question
i I think that is the expectation that by doing it he’ll have to miss a game somewhere in the process here i don’t know if it’s like I think it’s this upcoming you know day for them is is when the next game is so I don’t think he could turn it around here uh
you know I think it would be worse if he was like uh you know took a month off and was going to work out for teams and stuff yeah that’s totally fair uh it just reminds me a little bit of like when Vince Carter like missed a playoff game to go to like his college graduation or whatever like everybody gave him
Didn’t think he missed the game he just went and it was like was he going to be tired you know that kind of stuff and it’s like
that’s right oh yeah yeah you’re right yeah
yeah either way I just remember that being like a a thing at the time this is like a little worse to me because it’s just not
I don’t know but uh we’ll see it may not ultimately matter for him long term he may just say f playing in in Europe and who you know I didn’t want to be there anyway it was a stepping stone and the NBA is where I want to be so we’ll see a couple
Yeah i I will say I missed my own college graduation i just skipped it so I didn’t I mean it wasn’t I knew I was graduated so going to the actual ceremony didn’t really do much for me so
I did go for my kids but yeah
yeah it’s a little more important to to go for the kiddos I think
uh couple good quotes being passed along here uh from ETH said of uh Trey Johnson “Will Dawkins showed me clips of me taking place off most definitely that’s not the player I want to be especially in the NBA that’s certainly something I wouldn’t want my legacy to be.” And then also a quote coming from Ban Todd i appreciated him i needed that uh so that’s cool i’m taking some accountability and I actually like Will Dawkins and them just like putting it in front of him during the interview and just being like you know let’s see how you react to it and you know obviously it’s all lip service at this point but I’d still rather you say the right things and um it’s a good first step yeah i mean if you’re going to say something at least say the right things all right
atlanta’s Oh this is a trade is going to the Pelicans okay
correct and I I mentioned this um before you jump back on Kevin i had heard some rumblings beforehand that uh Derrick Queen had a very good uh workout uh with the Pelicans so thought this could have been you know a guy that they uh they could they could do some things to to go back and get here but let’s see who the the pick ultimately is yeah they’re having some kind of ceremony over there right now
yeah the pick is in but it will have to wait for a second let’s see so Atlanta they trade the number 13th pick to New Orleans for the number 23 pick and an unprotected 2026 first i still can’t get over that like they’re basically banking on being good uh well it’s most favorable of New Orleans and Milwaukee so yeah they’re that’s a pretty valuable pick so they must have really uh been sold on on getting back up here um so Atlanta for moving back 10 spots you know they get what could could end up being like a monster pick if things don’t break right uh
for New Orleans you know uh next season essentially oh New Orleans is acquiring Derek Queen at number 13 sources said from Shams you heard here first folks just just remember that that’s our next uh great breaking news uh from Live Draft Night podcast history yeah um okay good good luck to them i mean um like I said I I earlier not not a not a Dair Queen fan uh that’s not to say that he can’t be a good player you know i it’s entirely possible that uh you know the numbers are wrong in their assessment of him it’s entirely possible that um you know the eyeball scouts see something with him um you know as I wrote it I think about it more in terms of probability and I think with what he’s done with his
size with the lack of agility with the um relative groundboundness of his uh leaping that he’s not he’s less probable to become a good pro than than some other guys so that said you know good luck it’ll it’ll be interesting to see this Pelicans team see if he can they can figure something out with him how to fit him with Zion if Zion can stay on the floor trey Murphy and Herb Jones and all
and they they’re very happy with big playmakers I guess you know Trey K um Trey can create a little bit I guess but but Herb is essentially a good uh playmaker for a wing and then point Zion was pretty effective for them you know when they ultimately um ultimately did that so maybe they think some point forward Derek Queen will work out for them too uh yeah let’s check up on the chat here jay random yo am I tripping or does Noah kind of favor Trail Dawkins uh I guess I What are you doing i’m going to duck over
yeah sounds good
so uh let’s see eay what are the Pelicans doing yeah it’s it’s an interesting one it’s a lot to give up um and then Far as he said why has he been letting Sham spoil the picks yeah guess they can’t really control it i think what he’s getting intel-wise is from the agents so uh you know that’s it’s in their best interest to keep their their insider happy because he uses some of his intel for leverage and things that help them along the way here too so when they get a call from a team they’re probably letting Shams know and that’s why he reports that at this point adam McGinness says “Good move by Atlanta they don’t have their pick next season.” Yeah I agree from Atlanta’s perspective if you didn’t love a guy at 13 and you can maybe get the same caliber guy you know uh 10 picks later and you get again what could be a crazy good pick next year granted they the pool and some of these other guys but it still stops and and and ends with Zion I think uh if you’re them and and if he can’t stay healthy uh that’s at the very least you know could be a fringe lottery pick so I I I don’t really personally get it they must just really believe in in what they’re building yeah Eay is um the pick for Queen is is insane for an unprotected 2026 pick i agree far as the Pel trading the pick is insane yeah I think insane is the consensus word here uh from the group i I truly don’t understand the thinking but hey you know good more power to they’re they’re new for an office down there they got they got Troy Weaver former uh Wizards front office member so um maybe he saw something i did uh actually see Troy at multiple Maryland games this year again he was close working for the Wizards and he loves centers i can never forget how many centers Troy Weaver took as the GM of the Detroit Pistons so him ultimately uh you know trading the farm here essentially to to move back up and get Derek Queen is the least surprising thing um just yeah Troy Weaver stay drafted centers I guess uh is is kind of wild here yeah far as he said uh Zion better play 70 games next season agreed jean Paul when is Summer League i believe it starts uh July 10th and goes through the 21st or the 22nd i don’t have it in front of me but it’s somewhere in that general ballpark here so I don’t know might have to make it out to Vegas here just seeing uh how the the Trey Johnson pick worked out if they if they nail another Maderno favorite here at 18 um that that might have to to change the calculus a little bit omar says “Forget the draft dennis Villan Noe is uh directing the next Bond movie that’s huge curious who the next Bond ultimately is heard some stuff about Aaron Taylor Johnson but won’t pretend to to know just as much about that as some of the NBA stuff here but love a good Bond movie so we we’ll see how that works out here um happy for Derek Queen man just just by all accounts a really nice dude uh multiple players on the Maryland team here were asked who their favorite player on the team was this year and they all answered Derrick Queen so when you’re everybody else’s favorite teammate as a freshman uh that says a lot he’s funny on Twitter so shout out to him you know again didn’t love him for six for the Wizards but this is right around the range i thought he made a lot of sense and hey going to New Orleans I think he could be a guy that that contributes on a playoff team here sooner rather than later so we’ll see that looks like San Antonio picks Carter Bryant feels like a very uh you know Spursy uh kind of pick oh rocking the suit jacket with no dress shirt um that’s a bold fashion statement here gotta gotta dig that yeah um that’s a that’s a choice that’s a choice and then got the got the uh the monogrammed um cufflink looking thing there too so all right fair enough uh Amomar uh well thanks man appreciate the nice words um Adam McInness Queen has such positive energy rooting for him yeah I think that’s you’re going to get into that people are going to like and having a likable teammate is uh is never a bad thing ano Half Stefen Brian to the Spurs great pick agreed uh Amar feels like the Wizards won’t be trading up the price seems too high yeah it takes issue an unprotected pick in next year’s draft um I would have traded a lot to get another pick in next year’s draft so you know that’s um that would have been too rich for my blood here so yeah let’s let’s see i think there’s got to be plenty of good dudes here left at 18 so uh I feel pretty good about that one too all right we’ll bring Kevin back in here as
Yeah I just had to come back in because uh Carter Bryant I I love this pick for San Antonio
yeah um he’s the only player in the draft to have two two steals and two blocks per 40 minutes average
um
and he rebounds and he makes his twos you know and he shot from three pretty well too so um this is I like this kid and uh you know it would have been great if he could have slipped a few more spots but um I think I love this pick for San Antonio and um like you said I think there’s still going to be some really good players available at 18 right now i mean Rasheir Fleming is one of my favorites he’s still sitting there asa Newell is still on the board he’s I’ve got him fifth overall um Jace Richardson I know you don’t like him so much but 18 I’d be okay with uh with that Dutiero still there um Drake Powell I’ve got him 19th overall um I don’t love his production with his athleticism you kind of wonder why did what’s in his production better but um he’s long and he is a freakishly good athlete so I’d be willing to just take a shot
does Carter Bryant not being able to contribute more than like six and four on a co a good college basketball team bother you at all Kevin uh is that what are those his per game stats because um yeah he just couldn’t find couldn’t carve out enough you know minutes on that team uh I wonder I don’t know weird because he averaged Oh I’m looking at the wrong guy
he was productive when he played just
only 19 minutes a game
who Who was on that team that they would play him over
that That’s the thing like they they didn’t really have a wing that um you know like should have justified like keeping him off the court as much as they did uh they had a lot of guards and a couple bigs uh and then ultimately one of their bigs got hurt and I thought they would maybe use Bryant more as like a small ball four uh and let him kind of play some uh in
I don’t know so I evaluate based on uh per 40 minute
and uh I would need to look a little deeper into that team construction but this is what this reminds me of um I retroactively ran numbers one time on Danny Green
um you know who what was he 50 something pick or something like that in the draft and when I did I came out with like a it was a top I believe it was like a top seven grade for his draft year and you know consistent with like a top 10 most years um and I’ve done the same with a few other players that are like that and this you know these guys who maybe they don’t play as much but you know end up being good pros uh although Danny Green did play a lot for the he was just six man so yeah green
he looks good to me
yeah same same yeah all all he was a guy that while they were playing you were like damn why is that guy coming out as much as he is and um Tommy Lloyd knows more about basketball than than I will obviously so there must have been something there but I it seemed weird at the time because he was productive so yeah I I find it odd i will say there’s some other guys that you know didn’t play a lot like well I mean SN makes sense Malawatch only played 21 minutes a game
which makes sense you know the the bigs they often play play less and they had a good center rotation and things like that though Arizona one was weird just because there wasn’t really they were a bunch of 6’4 guys that that took a spot you know like 63 6’4 kind of guys
maybe the coach just felt like hey it’s uh it’s time to go small and be be innovative or he was trying to to hide him and keep him around for next year to keep his job you know um
to roll and then have him be the star of this year’s team maybe
or maybe just didn’t like him that’s always a possibility you know you get somebody in and you just you like are watching him play and you just don’t like his game
yeah they were much happier watching uh Caleb Love just shoot every time he touched it uh let’s see all right uh catch up some of the comments yeah David Anivine threw in the actual summer league dates july 10th through 20th for most teams utah and Golden State both have their smaller ones before that uh Jean Paul said “The Sun swap is 90% useless for us why don’t we trade it?” I think for the same reason you just said it’s useless so I don’t know what the value is trading something like that amar said “Uh Carter Brown had very similar stats to Keshan George in college.” Um I think in terms of like per game averages yeah sounds about right uh low usage for sure uh brother BKL Contreres uh shout out to everyone in the chat including the Department of Hoops keep the good work on the channel appreciate it oh thanks man uh very nice of you to do that and um that’s awesome shout from the South Bronx all right i like it very cool uh Lawrence Lyles who’s the most Will Dawkins player left i I still don’t know what a Will Dawkins player is i’ve been listening to to the rest of the Wizards fan base tell me for months what a Will Dawkins player is but I think there’s enough variance between all these guys at this point i don’t I don’t really know what that is i would say things like positional size seem to stand out but you know if you think Trey Johnson’s a two he’s not necessarily like the biggest two um so between Bel and and Keshan maybe one of them has to play some four eventually you know even so I don’t know that either of them have size at that position so um
I would say uh if you think you know positional size athleticism uh versatility maybe yeah
you know maybe so you’d be thinking of guys like probably Rashir Fleming Drake Pal you know those kinds of guys maybe but I don’t think I think that Will Dawkins kind of player is is the kind of guy who can just play you know
hardworking guys who Yeah well hard to argue with that let’s see so uh yeah Phoenix traded for uh Come on Malwatch well they they yeah got Kam Malwatch with the other trade ultimately and traded for Mark Williams which is interesting and uh
that’s a trade I I just do not get giving up apparently two firsts two first is crazy drafting Malawatch at the same time
yeah let’s let’s draft your understudy completely right after we took you
two first so they spent three firsts on two drop coverage bigs and it’s like okay so you’re going to always have a drop coverage big on the floor yeah and they get uh Charlotte also gets Bili Michich in the trade as well and I think he’s like an actual serviceable rotation player too so
yeah so real quick OKC just made their selection and they picked uh Sorber Thomas Sorber from Georgetown
yeah Sorber seems like a really good uh Oklahoma City kind of guy right but they Sorry I’m right next to a a naval base here so I don’t know if you can hear the airplanes taking off about above me in the background here but uh they actually could yeah
yeah they’re they’re working it uh yeah Sorber makes sense right he’s just a very different guy than Chad so he gives them a totally different look and and I think that’s uh that’s a smart way to build a team is just put as many different looking dudes up there as possible obviously Sorbber not from the DMV but played at Georgetown so I’m counting him as one of our own so nice to see him go to a really interesting uh situation for him you know as they’re looking to reload you know on some of these guys like they probably can’t keep Hardenstein and chat longer term so can Sorber be like the cheaper you know replacement um for for somebody like Hardenstein i think that’s um just a really smart way to go about it
yeah yeah I agree um so still likely to be let’s see we’re now 16 Wizards only two more picks there’s a possibility Ace Newell could still be there um but they should be able to get like New Rashir Fleming one of those guys um so that’s uh pretty pretty exciting
yeah I I I’m just kind of surprised there’s always a couple guys that fall here too and I think the interesting one right now is also Kaspar Yakonis from uh Illinois by all accounts sort of u uh let’s see he was uh 10th on consensus big board here uh the most recent one I had pulled up so this is already a little bit of a fall i I know they just took a guard uh he’s a guy I would definitely strongly consider taking as another guard if you were there at 18 just because I I I have him a lot higher than that i know you were lower on him Kevin but that that’s a top 10 pick for me for sure um I have Yeah sixth overall i had him 21st
okay
so I mean but picking him 18 I wouldn’t wouldn’t object to it
sure
yeah that’s always same
especially if like New if the next picks are like you know Newell and Rashier Fleming I’d be okay with going that um I’d probably personally I’d probably go Jace Richardson at that point even though he’s little because I I do love the production but
I just can’t do it i’m done watching Shrimp point guards the days of watching How W Neetto and Isaiah Thomas and Ish Smith and and all those guys
hal How Neetto was a was Yeah he’s a small fort i understand he’s a very short small fort no one’s 6′ one and under we’re just those days are behind us just so uh
Yeah no when when I’m sorry i was just because I think you were glitching there for a second but anyway I was just hearkening back to the days when Denny got hurt and Scott Brooks got the team to the to the playoffs by uh playing uh Westbrook Beal and uh Al Meadow as their small forward and uh that’s when they had the three-headed monster at center and you know Captain Hook and uh all that kind of stuff gaffford and uh the kid from Maryland um who’s now a very old
Yeah alex Len and somehow or another they went like what was it like 18 and seven to finish out the season and and made the playoffs like legit made the playoffs they actually got the eight seed so um I mean they got houseed but as expected but still that was actually it was funny that’s when everyone was screaming about firing Scott Brooks and and he actually did a good job i kind of got forced into it
but um it turned out to be a pretty good job keeping that team together and stuff so
I actually think that was his best coaching job the whole time he was here right like he Yeah
he zigged when he when everybody else zagged largely like you said because he had to that um he didn’t put that roster together and he found a way to to push the right buttons for a bit so
I think he actually got a little fortunate that Abia got hurt because um Denny at that point in his career was a selfch check he couldn’t shoot he could only drive right um you know he had really no left hand he’s really improved his skills and you know in his time in the league so Abia getting hurt forced him into playing Neto who was more skilled you know Neto could shoot the three he could do some playmaking um gave up a lot on defense of course but um I think he really boosted the offense just because they replaced a selfch check with somebody who could at least catch kickouts and make threes you know and then could also drive closeouts and stuff so
um you know anyway we don’t need to continue rehashing that was five years ago four years ago good old days feels like a lifetime uh all right in response to me saying I still don’t fully know who a Will Dawkins guy is uh Lawrence Lyles decided to be a smartass in the chat and said I must be a new Wizards fan then so uh he said Will Dawkins types of players refer to guys that can defend shoot playmake and taller than their position uh taller than average at their position so um Bob Carrington did not guard anyone in college so that’s a check against you uh Tristan Vukovich can’t guard anyone now so that doesn’t count uh did you see the shooting percentages of literally their entire team this year so don’t really know that any of those guys can shoot so that’s a question mark and really none of them showed above average playmaking uh for their position in the college ranks either and you can go back and look that up too uh before you decide to say dumb like I must be new to the fan base so keep it moving uh all right what else we got here david Anivine uh Sorber makes perfect sense okay see he’s from Philly I think yeah that that’s that’s correct sorber is a guy I got to talk to uh at the first time at Georgetown media day before I knew he was going to be really good and he was so humble and people asked him about being the next in the long line of Georgetown centers that were you know drafted and great and things like that and uh he was just really complimentary and knew his history which I thought was cool so I like that for him uh Adam McInness thoughts on Liam McNeely for the Wizards at 18 again I’m really big on them uh you know taking a guy that that makes some sense uh and add some shooting and McNeely would certainly do that so he and Trey Johnson would be a big boost uh in the shooting department so you know I I wouldn’t be mad at um at a guy like that i like McNeely i think he was a little miscast and uh a little underwhelmed by the lack of playmaking they had at Yukon this year so they asked him to do some of those things but he’s really more the guy like I thought there were a lot of lazy conaniple uh to Cory Kispert you know comps but I think McNeely is probably like a little more along those lines because you don’t want him doing you know a ton uh right away here and getting out over his skis i think that’s what hurt him uh this season so I I don’t I wouldn’t dislike that pick and he’s from that stacked Montver team i just want one guy from that team Kevin just one guy from from this elite uh college basketball team would be cool or elite high school basketball team would be cool uh all right hansen Yang goes 16 to Portland probably one of the dumbest picks I think I’ve ever seen personally and no disrespect to Mr yang although I don’t know how I can say that and have it not be
hansen Yang is a surprise [Music] interesting uh um I don’t know if you can hear me um it looked like uh the page reloaded um I have Hansen Yang 67th on my board
yeah I wouldn’t have had him in draftable range either so that’s a little surprising to me um
that’s um Wow uh All right yeah doing something a little different um so that’s a that’s a choice um but hey more power to them uh that’s frees up another guy that’s available for for Washington take at 18 yeah seriously um well wow so they’re guaranteed to get at least either Ace New or Rashir Fleming so if if they want to go by the Yoda big board they got them there
yeah i mean wow all right uh yeah Jean Paul mentioned that that Raphael and James Barlo said that Hansen Yang was really climbing since the combine i I had heard that from them as well i don’t know that fringe lottery was uh exactly what we were talking about there uh this is a guy that you know showed off or showed out in one of those combine games really well showed a lot of touch and skill and more than each shown in actual game settings to this point but uh that’s just uh that one’s a little too rich for my blood in the CBA last year he averaged about 17 points and 10 rebounds three assists two and a half blocks but it’s a considerably more athletic league here in the NBA um so we’ll see how much the the rim protecting carries over um yeah
it doesn’t jump well um you know he he tested out okay overall
but I don’t know that’s I I wouldn’t make that pick a lot of turnovers
at at 36 uh I’d be a little more interested you know like I could at least see it um 16 is is pretty wild uh but hey could end up being wrong i You and I both have historically liked more of the Memphis picks uh than than not so uh they they zigged uh for for a change here so um wow yeah I’m a little thrown by by that one personally but again this this is really cool for for Washington i think you’ve got your choice of a lot more guys and we’ll see you ultimately what Minnesota does uh Rashier Fleming is a guy that I would be strongly interested in if I were Minnesota ultimately like you know some some people have comped him to like a Nasreed type player and you know that’s um that’s something that they’re going to be uh having to keep an eye on here longer term like you probably can’t keep goar at that price tag for forever to keep Julius Randle around can you keep Nas Reed around long term
so at some point they’re going to need some reinforcements in the front court uh so yeah Fleming will be um be one of those guys here Yeah so the pick is in uh over for Minnesota that so it’ll get announced pretty soon
minnesota seems to like those little guards lately so maybe they’ll pick Jace
yeah that could be an interesting one i mean they’ve got to find like a real Mike Conley replacement at some point and maybe Jace is the guy to do that uh all right Kevin other than Asa Newell or Rashir Fleming who and and Jace Richardson who is next on your um your board
so let’s see uh Adutierro uh let’s see Drake Powell um Yakushonis Nick Clifford you know we got some guys like that in in in the list here i wouldn’t go too too much further down than that so um one fun guy he popped up pretty high uh for me in in in Yoda and it’s just he’s such a weirdo but uh I’ll just talk about him briefly anyway because he we’re not going to mention him again tonight or tomorrow caleb Grill from Missouri he’s 25 um
shoots a shot he can really shoot it like really shoot it and so I I would love to see him go someplace like Denver and you know have like four guys have very minor injuries or illnesses and so they have to play him like 38 minutes and he’s going to knock down like 11 you know 11 of 19 from three with Jokic just feeding him the ball in every which every way imaginable so uh the pick is in and Minnesota selected Baron
so Baron J yeah Baron Jay so again another big dude that you know eventually um can slot into that front court for them longer term uh far as you mentioned it many just got their Go Bear prot I’m sure this is somebody who looked up to Rudy Goar a decent amount uh growing up so you know from Davidson is on the clock and Asa Newell I’ve got him fifth he’s he’s on the board and Rashier Fleming is on the board so I’d be happy with either of those guys yeah agreed um yeah I’ve got in order uh left on my board Yakosonus Asa Newell and Rashier Fleming like um so I I feel pretty happy uh with with any of the above here any of those above guys uh at this point in draft but
so over at the uh frozen [Music] All right we’ll uh we’ll keep this one rolling here while we wait for for Kevin here is a little glitchy there uh when he’s uh ready we’ll we’ll bring him back in yeah definitely some uh interesting names here let’s let’s try this again kevin audio check
yep I’m ready can you hear me
okay now I got you cool yeah just it was chopping up a little bit there so uh yeah I think both of us would would be really happy with with Asa as a as a pick and and again not that they should be worried about fit but I do think the fit is really good i would love to see him next to uh you know a guy like Sar longer term here and just kind of build them out um so
who knows
tell me how tall is new he’s not like 6’8 610 right
yeah he’s somewhere in between right i think he measured at like 69 and a quarter uh knot in shoes so I think that’s decent enough height to uh be able to play both the four and the five let’s see ace of New Combine
yeah I have him basically you know he he didn’t get any any bonuses or so you know in Yoda for for his size so okay so this is really rude espn went to a commercial when the Wizards were on the clock at six and now they’re at a commercial when they’re on the clock at 18 come on this is Yeah this is the most uh ESPN thing here of all time although showing uh an alien earth commercial i am very much excited about that hopefully we can get an alien on the basketball court uh with our pick so maybe this is a good omen we can always remember this alien commercial fondly from uh producer creator Noah Holly who did a couple other really good shows too
so um real quick uh I just let me plug a show while they’re doing a commercial let’s do a let’s do a commercial
so I think this is on uh Max HBO Max uh I think that’s where I saw it anyway it’s called The Swarm
and it’s based on a book it’s it’s a German production but it’s done in English
and my wife and I put it on you know like Sunday morning thinking we’re going to watch like one episode maybe two just sort of kill time we ended up binging six episodes and then I had to stop because the NBA finals were going to start but uh we watched we binged six episodes we stopped just basically like eat and that kind of stuff and the show was really good so it’s this German production it’s actually the most expensive TV show in the in German history okay
and they spent more than $50 million making it and
we just loved it so anyway if you get a chance check it out
is it the one about the whales
uh sort of that’s what’s on the um
poster movie jacket yeah
yeah but
Jack it’s much more complex than that and much more interesting than that and it it looks when you look at it you think at the the little thumbnail you think this is going to be Jaws but with orcas and it’s not that at all
okay
well that’s a good taste
it’s pretty good and they the way they leave it it seems like it invites a second season but apparently
it didn’t do well enough with audiences at least not yet to um
justify that price tag is probably hard for them yeah
so which is it but the quality is good the acting is really good the writing is really good
okay i dig it folks you got something to listen to once uh Summer League is over here want something to go watch after Summer League
they got eight episodes well worth your time
let’s get up catch up on the chat a bit davidine said “Kevin you were always picking someone as old as the average chat age.” I said that in response to Caleb Grill that’s not true we like He’s got Jace coming up here he’s young matt Matt’s the one who likes the old guys i just mentioned them because we’re not going to talk about him any any other time
i like the silver foxes of NBA basketball here with my draft prospects uh business booming says “Why don’t you like Wolf he plays like Jokic.” No um uh if by you mean he is big and he’s been allowed to throw a pass or two for sure uh I think asking um Danny Wolf to come to the NBA and be uh basically a pick and roll playmaker uh is is a tougher ask um but hey I’ I’d happily be wrong i I’ve got receipts from him at Yale of him being a guy I would take in the first round last year and I’d still take him in the first round this year i just it’s not the guy I would want to build the Wizards around personally
i would not take him in the first round i mean when I look at him the the offensive efficiency was very poor yeah lot of turnovers just in part because there’s so many turnovers he’s almost one to one and he didn’t shoot it very well
i don’t buy the shooting either that’s my biggest gripe to be honest with you is just it’s a very weird release and
yeah when I I ran the numbers on Joic uh you know retroactively he he came on before I did Yoda when I ran the numbers on him he graded out like a top five pick in any draft so um and Wolf got in the 50s so I I don’t I don’t see that comp that’s not to say he can’t get there because as I’ve said a number of times Wizards pick is in by the way
baby
we got some breaking news let’s see what it is the suspense wow we just took Walter Clayton Jr at 18 and are trading him to Utah
yeah it’s going to be so so okay
very interesting um
Oh speaking of Dallas in the
Clayton so but where do the Wizards Where are the Wizards now what are they What are they getting
i I wouldn’t mind seeing them even roll it over into next year’s draft to be honest I like that a little better at this point although there are still plenty of guys here that I did like so I don’t know we’ll see uh did Utah have any other first round picks i don’t think so utah’s 21 so maybe it’s just a flip
and we got something i wouldn’t be mad at for the the favor I don’t mind that pick at all i mean I I’ve got Clayton 20th so not much of a reach you know and he’s good shooter he plays hard let’s see did I have Walter Clayton um I had Clayton 24 so not crazy far off of this either same kind of range um but yeah we’ll get to have the everlasting picture of Walter Clayton in a Wizards hat on draft night and then never see him
yeah this is again
come on get this right they made the trade just the pick is moved don’t make him wear the Wizards hat uh over on ESPN by the way they’re showing Walter Clayton’s football uh highlights I guess from high school which to be honest looked pretty impressive
yeah yeah how he I mean that that’s that’s the reason he ended up at Iona in the first place is he was a much more serious uh football prospect and then ultimately
so other over in the uh in the playback Rocky Boy comes in with the if the Jazz needed to play corner they’re set
yeah exactly i mean that’s that’s great
got him covered but that that did ultimately like derail his basketball recruitment a good amount and uh he was this football guy that was a lower heralded high school recruit and Rick Patino saw him play and was like “Holy who is this kid that’s the guy we should be watching.” He ends up at Iona plays really well and then obviously makes it uh to Florida for a for a big boost in salary he wins a championship and and now here he is in the first round here again
he looks pretty dead banned so maybe he isn’t quite sure where he’s going to end up yeah that’s either oh I think I’m about to go to Washington or uh I just don’t know what’s happening uh with me in general um Anthony Shaw said “Damn stayed up watching for nothing.” I wouldn’t say that yet let’s see what the details of the trade are yeah like Utah has um has that pick at 21 so you know could be interesting um okay Silver is announcing the pick let’s see if he does a trade no he did it uh Wizards are selecting Walter Clayton Jr he’s on the phone yeah Per Shams were getting uh the 21st pick and second round picks plural so I’m not mad at it if the Wizards think they can get whoever they were going to take at 18 at 21 then then okay
i mean it it clearly wasn’t Walter Clayton Jr so you know or they I got to imagine that’s the first call well if we give you 18 who are you going to take uh uh so that’s that’s a nice moment for him getting hug from mom couple tears a lot of tears this draft I’m noticing uh but that’s okay i don’t u don’t blame them for that it’s a big moment so more power to him uh yeah this is big Kevin i think if you could get a couple extra second round picks we Yeah we had to replenish our stock uh we were down to only 21 of them I think over the next three years so this should help us uh in the long term here
look if somebody needs a second round pick at some point they have to come to the Wizards pretty much because nobody else is going to have them uh yeah that’s a good point we could just own the second round um EJ says the Wizards get number 43 uh that would be interesting yeah my my guess is if they did get 43 that pick will probably be on the move or the 40 will be on the move i will say if we will Dawkins pattern through the you know what this is his third draft with the team is that he shuffles those picks second round picks around quite a bit yeah we’ve been saying for a while here I can’t imagine um you know they they would want three rookies from this class again this year but I also didn’t think that last year either and they were aggressive with it so Amomar said why trade down two second round picks or second round picks aren’t that much capital i would remind you that second round picks have been nice filler for them in in some trades and that was also the thing that allowed them uh to move up and and get cool the other year too so I think just a sweetener in some deals to help you be aggressive to get the guys you want you know it’s worth it so if you were convinced the guy you really want at 18 is still there at 21 then why not do it john Paul says Utah sends uh the number 43 pick and second rounders in 2031 and 2032 to Washington in this deal so we’ll see like you said Kevin if they ultimately want to pick a third time here
uh in
there’s a seventh grader that Will Dawkins already has Yeah he’s been at some DMV middle schools watching uh for the next round of elite elite talent
did you see that kid that kid’s got the ball on a string right yep well it’s actually a screen but
good um yeah this is interesting uh I I just curious who their guy is that they felt confident that nobody else was going to try to get we know it’s not Hansen Yang so we don’t have to worry about that one all that much but
look when Hansen Yang came off the board the Wizards like “Damn it yep we don’t even need the draft anymore it’s just over for us.” Uh it would be interesting to see if they take a stash at 43 could they get one of these European guys and and similar to what they did with Fukovvich you know wait a while to bring him over until some of these veterans are cleared out
that wouldn’t surprise me a ton at this point especially if that guy speaks French as we’ve talked about at length here so do they feel like they could get you know a Benra or a Noapenda or one of these kind of guys you know later in that range uh wouldn’t be you know wouldn’t wouldn’t be crazy look I I just want him to pick uh is if they’re gonna move back pick Yannik Conan Neerhauser
there you go luke Feldman in the chat same thing
number one in in the allname draft
it’s pretty good yeah i mean we we talked about him in one of these pre-draft shows but I I’m I would not be mad at that at 43 either and I think by virtue of being on an underwhelming Penn State team he’s probably going a little late like later than than he ultimately should uh as always if you’re watching the YouTube folks hit that like button for us we always appreciate it here uh hopefully more people will find this and be discoverable and we can continue uh you know doing this as a draft thing eay said “Speaks French or Australian.” Love that yes those Australians in their weird language um yeah that that was my guy I liked at 40 for them if they did want to take a big at some point and get a like a Roco Zakarsski uh from from Brisbane Bullets if he’s there at 43 I think that’d be another guy I like
well I thought you were going back to Neerhouser if if he’s there at 40 I wouldn’t be upset if the Wizards took him and that that by the way Neerhouser is exactly the kind of guy I’m talking about when you talk about a athletic rim runner um he’s the kind of guy that I think you can get in the you know various spots in the draft i don’t think you need to use like the six pick to take a guy like Malawatch who’s not as athletic you know maybe he’s going to be a better player but anyway that I’m just saying
i mean I for folks listening this I told Kevin this one already but the first time I saw them them being Penn State play this year I went “Holy who is this guy?” Like what uh it was just one of those things where he was like dunking on people and like almost blocked a guy out two hands and I was just like “All right um this dude’s incredible.” And and they just they weren’t good this year in a good league they couldn’t shoot it the only other player of like noticeable value on their team was Ace Baldwin and uh I think he’s a guy that if he’d have come back uh it probably wouldn’t have gone back to Penn State unfortunately uh for our guy Greg a Penn State um attendee uh but he could have blown up somewhere you know on an SEC school or something like that I think and really moved his way up in the draft so if you can get him at 43 this year I’m all for that too
yeah he reminds me a lot of um Jav McGee I don’t know anything about his personality but All right Nets are picking theyar wow okay one less Frenchman on the board here um I gotta say I I love it in part because the guys that I want the Wizards they’re still there
and Trayori is a guy that I had rated in the 60s so which I I’m perfectly content to be completely wrong with that um but he just did not pop yeah it it didn’t really do it for me watching him play either i mean I think somewhere in the late first would have been fine uh but this seems like a little bit of u a reach for me personally city of Oaks mentioned the Illinois kid is driving a lot i I much prefer Yakashonis of the two uh and say I don’t know well
yeah very much the same we’ll see yeah I’m I’m a little surprised by it but um hey you know the number 43 pick and second rounders in 2031 and 2032 it’s just really funny to me to keep reading that because who knows what that team will look like you know seven years from now or like it’s just could be the 30th pick or maybe it’s protected I guess or it could be the 58th pick if Utah’s good by then who who knows it’s gonna be Will Dawkins and son making that pick
right yeah exactly uh in a family business with some nepotism you never know here um David Anivine mentioned Noah Penda at 21 i think you know we’ll see there’s only a handful of European guys left uh that could be an option for them so
yeah now I’m laughing right now at uh Scott Borland’s uh posted 21 yeah ESPN at this point they need to go ahead and go on go to commercial when the Wizards are on the clock at 21
that’d be hilarious if that was just their bit from now until the next couple years especially in the second round just a commercial every three or four picks uh David Anine said uh is Kevin surprised as Newell is still on the board i think we both are i mean like that it’s top 10 guy for both of us being here at 20 is kind of wild it wouldn’t surprise me if someone like Miami took him because he kind of fits that KO wear
sort of vibe uh
the consensus mock had him had Ace Newell 18th you and I were both higher on him than Conensus that said
I mean he’s still there i’d love to see if the Wizards can take him to 21 hey that’s great uh Amomar says “Seems like the Wizards knew who was being picked at and after 18 to feel comfortable moving down.” You had to have some sense for what these teams were going to do uh you know with what these picks said Demond going eight eight eighth New Orleans trading 22nd 2026 unprotected 10 spots hen Yang at 16 this draft is crazy yeah there’s been a lot more uh movement than I would expected eay said Demon and Trayor what a combo hoseway said “I would be a fan of Will Riley.” I don’t know about you guys but uh yeah I I was thinking Will Riley actually makes some sense to me as a Dawkins kind of pick i have him 21 actually on my board so I be fine with that you know at that point that’s the range I valued him in i have a couple uh guys ahead of him again yakosonis New Fleming I have Liam McNeely at 19 so Will Riley at 21 wouldn’t be a total
um change so it wouldn’t be like a massive reach but like I said I would rather have new Fleming at this uh at 21 yeah it’s funny like he and Yakones were both hurt by kind of the the makeup of that team i think we talked about this pre-draft but you know they the stat was like when they shot more than 28% from three they won like every single game they played and when they didn’t they lost every single game they played so uh just the spacing was abysmal and and these guys had something to do with it obviously but uh Will Riley was really productive as a freshman despite being you know not physically ready to be productive as a freshman I think so he’s a little maybe ahead of schedule here and more of a long-term play i I could see him um you know being similar to what they valued uh with with someone like Keshan George so wouldn’t surprise me a ton hostway also said Kasperus uh falling is in the Cam Whitmore territory of what’s going on yeah this this one’s weird to me too i think this is a guy all year um you know that that was in the top lottery top 10 lotteryish range and and now all of a sudden we’re we’re 21 i think the shooting again is is sort of the big indicator he’s got to shoot it to be productive but I think you can easily explain his lack of shooting uh just based on you know um one his own forearm injury to the lack of shooting on the rest of the team you know being a freshman in the Big 10 in front of the team let’s hear it [Music] okay
uh not good at TV
yeah it’s different um report on uh Hansen Yang there was concern among other teams in his range were going to take him if the Blazers didn’t pick him at 16 and the Blazers loved him mike Schmidz former ESPN uh uh draft guru there moves up to to get his guy as the assistant GM of uh Portland still a little surprised by that one personally um uh me too and I would I was also surprised with Hansen Yang um so I’m going to repeat that for the playback group that there was a report the Blazers were concerned that uh somebody else was going to pick Hansen Yang around that spot and so they traded in so they could get him um and as Matt pointed out Mike Schmidz former ESPN draft guru is working in the Portland front office and made you know they made that move to get him obviously um I’m not a fan of that pick i had him in the 60s so like seriously a don’t draft uh great so you know for whatever that’s worth yeah just just weird uh but but there’s a lot of dudes here like Anique Clifford is a guy that could play NBA minutes right now i’m not opposed to a guy that could come in and actually be productive for the Wizards here day one again taking a dude that that can actually shoot uh right be nice
jackonis is off the list uh off the list miami just picked him
yeah that that seems like the perfect Miami pick and when he’s their starting point guard in like two years we’re gonna be like uh so he must not have been the guy for the Wizards you know i I don’t know if they they felt confident enough to do it but again Kevin the two guys we we were liking the most here uh again I had him high but also Newell and Sorber or sorry Newell and Fleming immediately next those were your next two guys so
either way we’re gonna get some dudes richardson those would be my next guys yeah
uh Al says Drake Powell or Fleming going to be the next pick we heard it here first um yeah you Kevin’s been on the Drake Powell bandwagon uh for a long time um Dave Vanivine seems to like that idea
yeah so let me just uh real quick Drake Powell his his combined So I use combined vertical that’s standing vertical plus uh you know I guess running vertical and he he measured it uh his verticals together measured 80 inches which is just freakish that’s more than two standard deviations better than uh your average wing so and then he also tested a full standard deviation better in terms of the agility drills the way I I score them anyway and he was a standard deviation better uh in terms of length so um you know Drake Powell is interesting now uh it does call into question why he wasn’t more productive with all of those tools but you know if he can if the Wizard’s coaching staff could or some coaching staff could unlock those tools and get him to harness those tools into actual productive basketball play then you know he could be a really good player he could shoot um he could do some things on the court it’s just he didn’t do enough of them and so maybe there’s a motor issue i don’t I don’t know what the issue is but um it’s at least worth the question but those athletic tools are really outstanding yeah for for UNCC they had three guards essentially and then the two freshman in Powell and Ian Jackson and they were actually better I thought when those guys Powell and Jackson played but uh they didn’t seem you know to to actually want to play them together which really hurt that team so I didn’t really understand real quick uh David if you can always come over to playback on playback most of the time I’m I’m running I do most of the Wizards playbacks for their games and when they do I’m usually listening to the opposing team’s broadcast uh in part because Chris Miller is a real challenge to listen to and so Drew Gooden is a little bit less of a challenge but uh the two of them together are are pretty rough uh I say this as a uh connoisseur of NBA league pass uh the Wizards have the worst broadcast in the league and uh I don’t think it’s very close so please come on over we’ll give you a VIP and we’ll we’ll hook you up you can come in and watch with me
there you go yeah Kevin does a great job over there i think that’s a fun way to watch the game too because it’s a little more interactive and you can actually kind of hear reactions to your questions and you know comments and things like that too so good call
we do have fun
and that’s what’s important this is a game ultimately right should be enjoyable uh hearing he hotter than fish grease or he shot from Poolsville and things like that not not my favorite far as he said commercial again yes the Wizards are on the board and we’re going to commercial you literally cannot make this up espn streak is unbroken
that’s crazy
i will just say this having uh at least they’re not showing Tyrese Halbert getting hurt again yeah please don’t need to see any more clips of that thank you
yeah that was frustrating
uh City of Oak says Wizards going to trade down again they obviously didn’t love anyone at 18 to stay there maybe pick up more future picks how many more second round picks do we need at this point you know that that’ll be the Wizards round of the draft uh Al says he thinks he goes with a nice complimentary guy and either of those two fit and if they are better than that uh just that role that’s even better yeah I agree um David said “Uh sign me up for playback i will try that.” Yeah definitely uh I would strongly recommend that if you go over to Bullets Forever we’ll post a bunch of stuff before the season too about you know how you can get to that easily and all that kind of stuff
uh Al said I think uh the Wizards are sponsored by every commercial yeah it seems that way and Bruno V says “Ace New has to be the pick right?” Hey man uh I I would very much uh like that to be the case and Scott Borland said commercial i told you Scott you nailed it you were 100% right each of our second round picks we better still take commercials in 2032 or wherever those picks were as well but yeah uh just hey getting getting Asa would be big i think that’d be like an alltime uh alltime draft we did talk about um some of the other guys will Riley came up here as a guy that you know the Wizards could ultimately like i did see him being um you know a guy that uh that would make some sense for Will Dawkins scott Borland said Wizards took Will Riley i don’t see that anywhere yet personally but
hasn’t been announced yet um so there’s still a commercial but they say the Yeah I don’t see that coming through here yet uh if anybody else wants to confirm that feel free but again it fits sort of what they did with Keshan George on draft night of a freshman guy there that’s gotten more than he got to show based on the situational context of the team and I’m always in favor of taking um young bouncy wings and and I think Riley’s got some upside there so again I had him exactly uh 21 on the board here so um you know we’ll see uh what that that looks like um H okay so where are we at yeah still nothing from Shams right now yeah they’re saying in the in the in the comments here that apparently Greg is saying it’s Will Riley is the pick
huh so um and then Adam said it is Will Riley and I see somebody saying it’s a trash pick i don’t still don’t see the pick coming through yet so maybe uh it’s going to come through uh shortly see this is the problem with them taking a commercial break
i know right that’s just to make us have to wait it out here longer um very very interesting any not familiar with Will Riley again was freshman at Illinois this year they they made a decent run in the NCAA tournament uh 6 foot7ish uh player again averaged 12 and a half and four rebounds two assists on a Big 10 team didn’t do much from a stock steals perspective it was a little just under size like underbulked uh only started nine of 35 games but a decent shooter overall i I I think long term he’s got touch um but only shot 32% from three only 72% from the free free throw line didn’t get there a lot but but I do buy the shooting uh longer term according to the the chat here thanks Adam that Jeff Goodman reported it uh we’ll see um Jeff is pretty locked in on college basketball so if he’s saying it I would imagine uh you know that he he knows what’s up so uh City of Oaks he’s been weaknesses he’s skinny and lacks physicality which hurts him defensively those things are very much true he got kind of bullied uh this year but you can always add strength so I’m not worried about that much
yeah all right adam Silver is making the announcement 21st pick in the 2025 NBA yeah I’m I’m not mad at it i I talk about this all the time from a team building perspective like wings are the hardest guys to get in free agency because if they’re good they never become available because they make a ton of money and the not so good ones uh you just you know you need more of those um so I think the question with Riley is just like if he bulks up and adds some strength what does he turn into and and again that just positional value you can never have too many wings we just saw that in the playoffs so can he be this team’s Aaron Wiggins or something like that you know I think that’s um not a bad
Yeah I mean I don’t hate to pick um I I mean I I think you know he’s a
solid guy you know I had him uh looks like his final spot was around 20 so it’s not not terrible like I said I would have still preferred like New Rashir Fleming one of those guys but um you know I don’t I don’t hate it don’t love it but it’s okay uh we could package all of our second round picks and somehow maybe get back up into the first round again if we wanted to do that this is again man they already reported the trade and so but they’re out here he’s got the Jazz hat on the pretending he’s going to the Jazz don’t love it yeah it’s just it’s just sort of lame when even he’s already probably heard that he’s not going to ultimately up there um Al said if he’s offensively sound day one I’ll be happy with it because have to get more guys who don’t have to teach offense i mean he shot very poorly this year across the board i’m not too worried about the shooting because again I thought he showed some decent touch uh around the rim here but um it’s kind of a little bit out in front of his face the the jump shot and just you’re betting on the tools and he’s a decent athlete he’s just he’s skinny i think if you can get a big wing though it’s not you know the worst thing to uh to go for here adam said “I remember this guy being super skinny in Illinois games.” Yep that is sort of the takeaway here uh I would have rather moved up one pick to get his teammate fellow freshman Kasparak Jonas and Yakonis is like the guy that if you look at his European accolades like those are the kind of guys that end up successful in the NBA when they’re really good internationally like he was so um think that’s a bit of a bummer uh let’s see can we actually get some guys uh with some muscle all these guys are so skinny yeah I mean at some point they’re going to have to play grown men to to start winning games here but uh that’s okay for
I will say that the skinny thing is you know you that’s a lot of times that’s what you’re going to get with 19 20 year olds
especially if you take a freshman
yeah you get them into the NBA and you get them with the professional you know strength coaches and nutritionists and all that kind of stuff they’ll they’ll fill out you saw with the Wizards a lot of those young guys were adding muscle and definition during the season uh last year so um you know their bodies should be able to transform and uh get stronger as they go so
yeah I’ I’ve yet to see a guy and I just keep saying this that who’s his career totally didn’t work out solely because he didn’t add strength it it’s usually one of a series of issues but it’s it’s rare that that’s uh the challenge uh you know for for a player like that is like oh the shooting came around the handball handling came around oh but he just he never got strong enough so like I I think if you trust your strength and conditioning thing that’s one of the easiest things to add like if you put in the work you will get strong and obviously different frames have a limit on on how much mass they can add and things like that but um you know at least functional strength uh won’t won’t be a limiting factor for him longer term I don’t think
yeah and to your point about strength you know you think even I mean go back a few years guys like Richard Hamilton for example who was skinny weak I mean that didn’t deter him from being a very effective player on a championship team
uh you know being an important offensive player i mean I I’ve talked about this before but I’ve I had a great conversation with Rick Carile back when he was coach of the Pistons and it started with me asking the question why was Richard Hamilton a you know bad defender in Washington but he’s a good one for you guys
and you know Carlile went through a very long explanation but part of it was just talking about how you know he he’d gotten stronger and so was better able to execute um but also Hamilton was just following their rules their defensive rules their force rules and uh so he you know Carlile’s point was that virtually anyone could be a good defender in their system if they would just play with effort and follow their rules and Hamilton played hard and got stronger and followed their rules so he became an effective defender and Carlile explained they he had built his defense around um uh you know Ben Wallace and
they had another guy Clifford Robinson I think at the time um but he had he put the defense together around those guys and then later they got Rasheed Wallace in there too although that was with Larry Brown so still it was that was a heck of a team
they asked uh Rip about it one time the same question like why did you defend in Portland and he said “Well one I didn’t defend in Washington because no one in Washington asked me to play any defense and two once I got to Portland or sorry once I got to Detroit uh Ben Wallace and a couple other guys cornered me in the locker room and said “That won’t fly here you will do whatever you have to do like fight tooth and nail you know claw scratch kick to at least make people work uh on the offensive end.” and he said “So I used to not cut his fingernails to uh to at least make guys think twice about um you know work on him a little bit.” All right
you know that was a story that was a story by the way about Daryl Walker that one reason he had some effect on Jordan was that and other players around the league was that he he his fingernails were long and apparently uh really hard
and he would scratch people and when uh Daryl Walker ended up with on the Bulls team with Jordan and Jordan insisted that he cut his fingernails and he was never never the same again i suspect it was probably for other reasons but still it is a funny story
it’s bad enough if you’re getting you’re scratching up Jordan a couple times a year but now you got to do it every day in practice he probably just wanted to survive his practices uh Eay says not a bad pick of Riley at 21 yeah I I agree luke said “So many young perimeter players literally only won big.” Uh Al asked “Any of Asa Fleming or Powell available at 43?” Uh you never know i mean I I would doubt it personally and I would think that’d be a miss from other teams but um not against it luke Felman said “The only thing thinner than our young big men depth is is Will Riley.” That’s a good one it’s a good line i like it um you know I Here’s the thing i’m not worried about their their big man depth and all that because I think you can find backup centers i I don’t think that that’s too big a concern and they still um potentially could have Rishon Holmes under under contract but I think also they still have a second round pick they still have undrafted free agents you can find guys so I’m not too too concerned about that uh let’s see there’s pick in go get Alex Len if we wanted to run through and um so it looks like he might be going to Atlanta oh there’s a proposed trade apparently might end up in Brooklyn
wow all right he seems like a Brooklyny pick so I’m I’m not too shocked by that i will be very curious to see what he’s able to do and become in the uh in the NBA we’ve we’ve talked about them a bit already so I’m not going to just repeat it yeah they’re they’re a blank slate team so I I don’t mind um swinging swinging big for a guy with some upside uh see Al said Jiren Jackson should be our target next year’s free agency could be an interesting one uh Thomas R said we had the chance to draft for Sheer Fleming or Danny Wolf to good power forward that a two good power forwards that averaged eight and a half rebounds a game and he chose Will Riley who the hell is he again skinny wing uh freshman for Illinois i I would say like we we’ve already talked about the skinny thing but if a guy can average 12 and four in the Big 12 or Big 12 in the Big 10 as a freshman imagine what he’ll do when he actually bulks up so I think that’s not the thing I would worry about as he was desp you know productive despite um you know being undersized so uh we’ll be fine uh let’s see uh Luke Feldman said “Really needs to make a move for Neerhouser wonder if they’ll pick for Riley has any implications on beile’s future he hasn’t really developed all that much i I just think this is a every good team needs wings so we’ll just stockpile as many of them as we can i would think is more competition is somebody like Keshan than it is Kulabali personally
yeah also I would say you when we talk about Kula Bali’s development um I’ve mentioned I’ve done a few things with this talking about you know projecting players out in terms of their career trajectories and all that kind of stuff and Koul Bali actually is right on schedule a little ahead of schedule in terms of his development it’s I agree with some that his he didn’t make as much of a leap as I hoped he would make but he did play better than he did as a rookie and the the amount that he played better was actually a little above average for uh players uh of his age when he came into the league so in other words you know if Koulali can continues on the trajectory that he’s on he he should still be a really good player i I’ve talked about this before but Koulali you know his career forecast it forecasts a high for him uh that would be you know like probably you know a multi-time all-star you know at least level of player and potentially you know cracking all NBA for a couple years sar his where his rookie year landed if he just develops has a normal career trajectory from this point he would have multiple years being an allNBA level player not necessarily first team but second third something like that is certainly very quite quite reasonable so you know it’s possible that the Wizards have a couple of really solid building blocks already and it’s just hard to say because they’re so young
and so much of it depends on how much work they’re going to do so um you know to me Kali is at least an all defense kind of calibered you know one of the two teams at some point in his career and if he does more than that for you and is just more than a serviceable off offensive player I think that’s that’s a really really good player like you just said and we saw some flashes of that there was a little stretch of the season here like a couple games in a row like maybe six or seven of them were like “Oh okay.” Like this is the jump and it just wasn’t sustainable different you know vets moved in and out of the lineup and then ultimately uh you know he got injured and and we didn’t get to see the full scope i think this year is the year you know we should expect to see that that big jump i think third years are always big for guys so um that’ll be interesting yeah that this would be the year where we I would expect Kulabali to you know make a leap above average in his first season he was a little bit better than replacement level um last season he made a solid jump up to being like a useful NBA player and this would be the year when you’d want him to continue on the trajectory being being better than average and like I said SAR is already you know kind of ahead of schedule if you will but he’s he’s potentially potentially if he does the work if he develops blah blah blah um you know he could be really good uh City of Oak says I think the concern with skinny guys is that a skinny guy is unlikely to be an MFer which we know Matt talks a lot about the Wizards needing i would like to see that i would like to see it be in the front court as well like an Iss Stewart just to be who’s our brawler enforcer type but I don’t think skinny means you can’t be an effort personally just a different
Yeah i think mindset thing yeah
but a skinny guy can’t be i mean Chad Holgrren is as skinny as they come and he’s got plenty of MFer in him
he’s not strong but he is combative he’s feisty he he battles i mean I saw multiple times in the uh finals where he got just blasted off his spot by Pacers and he just kept recovering and coming back into it and you know that the toughness and the the willing to battle it’s not you don’t necessarily need much you can be skinny and be willing to fight in battle um so you know I think about um I don’t know if you remember um I think it was Tyrone Hill very skinny guy and he just he was total Mfer i mean he he battled um was physical and tough and all those kinds of things um so yeah you can be skinny and still be still have that in you i I think sometimes it’s the smaller guys or the skinnier guys that have had to you know people pick on them and like that on the court because of those things that that have the attitude that that we’re talking about here because they’ve had to you know to compensate for that uh DC Onion says “I effing hate Danny H for stealing our guy Ace Bailey so painful for being a Wizards fan uh gut-wrenching and is out on the draft that’s a bummer.”
Um Oz says Riley and Keshan George are the same player i don’t agree with Oz that they’re the same player i I do think they’re probably the kind of guys that are competing for you know similar rotation spots here longer term that that 68 switchable guy i think Keshan profiles more as a as a ball mover um shooter i think Riley was better as a slasher uh you know hopefully finisher so I’m not really uh totally in lock step with him but there new finally selected um by New Orleans but apparently that pick is being traded to Atlanta
i swear to God I feel like Atlanta has been involved with every pick so far
yeah right that they’re moving around a good amount here but that’s a that’s a really good fit for them uh like you know Clint Capella can’t be there forever and they need somebody else other than a Kongwoo who they’re going to have to probably pay at some point in time uh so yeah we’ll we’ll see um Yousef Riscala said time to riot uh um I’m not I’m not out on it i again I had guys higher than Riley but this is exactly where I had him on the board so not a bad thing uh new the guy who just went I think is going to make us uh regret this one a little bit personally but you know that’s um that’s ultimately how it goes at sleeper wizards that’s a lot of emojis yeah somebody is fired up here in the chat we’ll we’ll keep it positive here uh I think uh this front office has done enough to engender some some goodwill from us uh in terms of their draft picks i think more of them than not have showed promise so we’ll continue to just assume they know what they’re doing until proven otherwise um which hopefully uh is never the case uh all right let’s see uh Al good night buddy appreciate you for tuning in here yeah we’ll we’ll see how it goes uh and then City of Oaks ultimately this draft will be defined by the Johnson pick yeah agreed i think absolutely it’s it’s nice if you’re a guy at um you know uh 21 uh turns into something but I think feel reasonably confident all three of guys last year are at least serviceable NBA players and and rotational um level guys keshan has to shoot the ball at some point but uh you know if he does that I think um you know that that shouldn’t be a problem so if he can get three guys in a in a relatively weak draft you know he gets a little um slack in this year’s draft here for for me as well if uh if Trey’s good and we don’t get much uh you know from Riley like that’s not the worst thing in the world for you
yeah yeah i mean when you’re picking in that 18 to 20ome range if you get something you know that’s good but you know you’re still the odds are not great that you’re going to get like a really good player in those spots if you can get a guy who plays you know 12 to 15 minutes a game you’ve done okay
sure
so if they get that with Will Riley fine i I do think that Asa Newell is a guy who has a chance to be very good and to be you know a significant player so um you know I’m a little disappointed Wizards didn’t pick him i think they might end up I don’t know if they they will regret it but uh I will right yeah same same yeah i think Yeah as ASA and Rashier were the two very clear next guys left up on
I feel like OKC who apparently is going to be picking that that they’re going to take Rashir Fleming i’m just going to be like come on come on we’ll just let the rich get richer here that’s that’s sort of uh you know how
I could see them also taking somebody like you know Boja Marovich just as a stash um you know I could see that i could see uh them I I can’t The one guy I don’t see them really picking would be like a Jace Richardson
although I think he he’d be a nice player for them but I I just don’t see that happening he’s small for for the position so I don’t think they do that hugo Gonzalez would be an interesting one another European guy that I think wants to come over but they could probably talk themselves into it although just Shams just said the Kings are trading for the number 24 pick
to take Nick Clifford
okay interesting um Hugo Gonzalez I have like he’s one of the lowest rated players in this year’s draft uh I’ve got him in the 70s
oh okay there you go so and that which again does not mean that he couldn’t be because I I’ve wrote about this you know Alex Caruso is another guy who you know rated pretty far down and
he didn’t do anything in college in terms of production
yeah well it’s funny you know I look back at his at his numbers and he actually had a surprising number of assists for uh for his position and of course a lot of steals which you would expect for the guy that he became but um you know overall I thought he deserved to be undrafted and um you know but obviously he turned out to be a really good pro because he he got to the right spot and it took him like three years of uh you know Gile play before he became a full-time NBA player it took him a while
uh to develop to work to figure out what his role was going to be
yeah he was clearly a guy that just you can’t judge the mindset at all right and he’s he said all the right things about you know people are drafting the janitor not the CEO so had to prepare for that and like he he gets it you’ve heard a couple other guys say similar things but he knew what was up and just circling back to this to like Desand said in the chat what was the point of taking Will Riley when we already have Keshan George they’re the exact same player in what way other than the same height i I just don’t really fully get that uh necessarily like with Will Riley you got a guy that averaged almost 18 points per 36 minutes six rebounds uh Keshan averaged 11 points four and a half rebounds so um not really the same keshan was much better from a steals perspective uh he also had a lot more turnovers he fouled a lot more uh Will Riley assists a little less um but the stocks aren’t very good i would imagine that’s probably the shooting percentages lowered him the most on on Kevin’s overall metrics he was a shot better from the field than Keshan did keshan shot a lot better from three and the free throw line um but but Keshan profiled as a better shooter uh pretty much from day one but Riley was a more productive college player he had better offensive win shares better peer it’s just I don’t think they even play similarly personally other than they’re the same height so if every player that’s the same height is the same player yeah i mean I guess they have the same player then like you know I don’t even if they are similar that’s really okay i mean teams play you know both three wings together i mean so we might as well we we have a second here so why don’t we go I I my view on positions is there really isn’t such thing as you know point guard shooting guard small forward power forward center that’s that used to be the way things were i think now what there are are there there are guards there are wings there are forwards and there are centers the guards are like the smaller guys that can’t really guard up to like a six seven you know wing the the true wings the wings are the guys who are like the twos and the two threes can’t really play point guard not really big enough to play against bigs but um they’re they’re the wings so if you’re looking at the Wizards like Bub Carrington and Jordan Pool or guards right
um wings would be guys like Bal Kulabali Cory Kissper Keshan George those are those are wings forwards are more like the the the they could play either three or four you know three or four and could even slide up to potentially the center so for the Wizards you get a guy like um Kusma is a forward right um uh I’m just trying to think of who else um but but Koozma is kind of the prototypical forward where he’s got some of the skills of a of a wing he’s also got more size and if you even stuck him in as a small ball center or he switched on to a center you wouldn’t feel like okay he’s totally overmatched in the post right and then you’ve got your bigs and your bigs are guys like probably Sar is going to be a big you know Joic obviously Valenunis Embiid those are guys who really have to play inside they’re more of the rim protector rebounder type so I think you got really four positions and you don’t have to play uh somebody from all those so you can have lineups with a guard and three wings and a forward right you can you can do all kinds of different things and we saw that plenty with uh OKC in the finals with Indiana did the same i mean
they like four guards in a big you know like certain
I mean Nemhart and Nmith were very similar players and they played just fine together and uh I think the key is that you just have certain kinds of work that needs to get done and if you team up if you work as a team you can get those things done so if you play you’re playing four guy four guys who are 67 and a guy who’s 6’3 you know you’ve got to get back and crash the boards and you know do the defensive rebounding do some rim protection it’s got to be some gang defense or if you’re playing you know three guys who are 610 uh then you you know you’ve got to to work together to pass the ball up maybe against pressure or something like that so because you may not have like the pure break the pressure kind of ball handler so anyway the point being that having multiple guys who have similar games is perfectly fine having guys who are about the same size same physical profile is also fine because you can then play uh really aggressive switching defense and uh you know really rain terror and you saw again OKC did that they had plenty of guys who could fight through but then they also had lineups where they switched everything kept everything in front of them uh swarmed when somebody did dribble penetrate and uh you know really made things difficult on opposing defense on opposing offenses and I think that you could see uh very much the same thing uh with with the Wizards so yeah agreed i I have no problem with them literally drafting all the wings in the world uh but they don’t play the same so um to Money Man Stevens point apparently I’m I’m coping because they quote have the same skill sets and same height uh they don’t because uh one was drafted as a shooter secondary playmaker except he had a lot of high turnovers because he didn’t really have that good a feel for the game
i’m sorry i’m I’m chuckling right now at Ben’s little grenade throws very funny
they’re both exactly like Antoine Carr it’s great
hey Jace Richardson got picked and it looks like he’s going to Orlando which I freaking love for him uh yeah they needed a guard so I mean that’s they needed guards plural uh so he might actually play some meaningful minutes for them
right away and honestly they have the positional size to make up for him being a little smaller too so I think that’s a particularly smart pick um you know for uh for the squad
if I play General Zod yes i wish uh yeah wouldn’t mind the paycheck from that right yeah so Jace Richardson you know he’s little he doesn’t have his dad’s athleticism um yet he was really productive at Michigan State and I had him I think 10th overall um I think this is a a great pick for Orlando and I really hope he gets a chance to to play there because uh I think he can definitely really shoot it and Orlando really needs some shooting especially after they blew that pick on Jet Howard yeah that one didn’t work out particularly well for them so it is uh what it is but yeah this is um it’s been an overall fun draft so
yeah they’re showing right now on ESPN highlights of his dad winning duck contests and his dad was a spectacular athlete
yeah we talked about this before but keep an eye on Jackson Richardson uh his 16year-old brother here who is like 6’5 and already dunk contest caliber athlete so poor Jace uh got maybe got mom’s jeans there or something um all right Kevin
we got a question here if any of our guys are still left on the board strong favorites so uh you want to go first on that
uh yeah let’s see here uh I mean we we both have talked at length about Rashir Fleming he’s the highest guy left on my board here i do wonder if the limited playmaking uh is you know is what ultimately holding him back um I have Liam McNeely 19 i have John Tan 25 i have Eric Dixon 28 danny Wolf 29 jir Watkins 30 so uh plenty of guys that if they took uh in the first round here if they had another pick you know wouldn’t be uh wouldn’t be the worst in the world how about you Ken
yeah so Rasher Fleming for sure dude Tiierro from Arkansas i liked him uh somebody I not necessarily that I would want the Wizards to pick but just somebody I think could is going to make a good pro at least for a few years is John Broom uh he’s still still available um yeah uh Marovich I mentioned earlier he looks pretty interesting chaz Laneir um athletic wing from Tennessee again a little um pretty interesting i like John Tan as well um you know Elijah Martin
as long as we’re talking about these older guys uh so and then uh this is he’s gonna he won’t even be picked in round two um but I do like this kid and I hope the Wizards can pick him up uh as an undrafted free agent that’s Kobe Johnson we talked about him a bit um on a previous podcast Matt and I did but um Kobe Johnson is a guy I think he reminds me of Alex Caruso in that uh Kobe Johnson was a three-time uh allconerence defender in two different cont conferences the big one big ones I think it was Big 10 and the Pack 12 um I don’t remember which order but um he doesn’t he’s low usage so but the shots go in and he’s got some playmaking and he’s terrific defender and I just would love to see him get a shot somewhere it might take him a couple years but I do wonder if he can translate that defense to the NBA
yeah it’s it’s worth a shot and again um younger brother of Jaylen Johnson so everybody loves NBA pedigree in a family so we’ll see how it goes yeah uh Kevin I have not eaten yet and the Wizards are not going to pick again we’re at three hours i think we’re probably pretty safe to call this one maybe we can circle up after tomorrow’s pick and see what we think of the guy they take 43rd or if they do other crazy things
in the second round here any parting thoughts uh just summing up how you feel about this overall draft for the Wizards so far
so overall I mean uh I think the Wizards have done pretty well trey Johnson seems like a solid pick and Will Riley also seems okay so I have no concerns about either of those well I wouldn’t say no concerns but uh I’m I’m okay they both seem like they have a chance to become solid pros and so we’ll see what the Wizards do in round two i’m going to stick around on uh playback for till the end of the first round so if guys want to pop over there uh I’ I’d welcome the company and um but also understand if you prefer not to stick around I I I object to that at all um I may take a short break because I had a slice of pizza but I could use some more food here
uh I think that’s reasonable you’ve more than earned it after three hours great work as always it was fun getting prepped for this draft with you so thanks for making as much time as you did go over to playback.tv if you search bullets forever uh it’ll come up it’ll take you right to Kevin and the rest of the stream there uh where you can really lock in and we’ll do more sort of post uh draft breakdown here obviously Kevin I appreciate your time chat i appreciate you guys for sticking with us a lot of you have been on here from the start uh your troopers thank you guys so much for doing that uh didn’t do any um charity fundraising aspect this year just because I had didn’t have time to set it up this year but maybe we’ll do something after summer league or whatever to uh to you throw a little goodwill back into the universe from the Wizards fan base here but thanks for checking in with us everybody again read rate review subscribe but please hit that like button for us down in the comments if you don’t mind here um Kevin thanks man talk to you soon
hey this is so much fun i love doing this every year so
yeah we we’ll be back next year i’m already committing Kevin again uh hopefully it’s with a a top three pick uh in a loaded top couple picks to talk about here
i know i’m hoping the Wizards pick 30th there you go all right because we’ve won the championship i I wouldn’t be mad about that either either way uh we’ll take it all right everybody you know the drill peace out we’ll catch y’all next time

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