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Post by scully19 on Jan 24, 2024 20:10:47 GMT -5
Yes, and the top player in 2025 appears to be ... a forward, much like Siakam or Scottie. Lol. So if we were ever to get top pick, 2024 would be so much better than 2025. I get avoiding duplication at positions again, but by all extents right now Flagg looks like an extremely good pick. Easy take if we get the first pick next year.
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Post by haisan on Jan 24, 2024 20:19:06 GMT -5
Sure, talent is most important. Just would be funny to be back in the same problem again.
Actually, NBADraft.net has Sarr as the 5th pick now. And their new No. 1, Cody Williams, is ... wait for it ... a 6'8" forward who can't shoot from 3!
Anyhow, way too early and too many variables to worry too much. But it's fun imagining.
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Post by scully19 on Jan 25, 2024 10:24:12 GMT -5
Sure, talent is most important. Just would be funny to be back in the same problem again. Actually, NBADraft.net has Sarr as the 5th pick now. And their new No. 1, Cody Williams, is ... wait for it ... a 6'8" forward who can't shoot from 3! Anyhow, way too early and too many variables to worry too much. But it's fun imagining. And who is also brother to Jalen Williams from OKC who is on his way to a max contract real soon and a steal draft. I think that has influenced this brothers value a bit (of course, i know literally nothing so this means next to nothing). Side note though, do you trust nbadraft.net? Back in the Raptors high draft pick every year days i would research a bunch of players using largely draftexpress and nbadraft and i just lost faith in nbadraft to be any good. Can't remember a specific reason just where I'm at with them so i don't even look at what they think. Givony is generally the go to i think, and I like some of the stuff coming from The Athletic, Vecenie is good enough but i like Hollinger a lot and prob 2nd go to because he seems to veer against the grain and never give a shit, and really is just look at it from a math place differently. He had Scottie way higher than anyone else for example, I think he was 2nd. Vecenie board - theathletic.com/5009208/2023/11/13/nba-mock-draft-2024-alexandre-sarr/
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Post by Pseudonym on Jan 25, 2024 13:20:04 GMT -5
Back in those days, I trusted DraftExpress WAY more than NBA Draft. Givony even pointed out all of Ben Simmons' future issues in a scouting report, iirc.
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Post by scully19 on Jan 25, 2024 20:37:58 GMT -5
www.reddit.com/r/torontoraptors/s/Iu4MQ0IBG8Picture of Poeltl comments in that thread, the gist of it is he was asked if he's disappointed with signing here because of their change in direction. His response was basically no, that he just wants to play on a competitive team and not outright tank...I don't think he realizes what's happening around him.
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Post by haisan on Jan 25, 2024 20:44:27 GMT -5
Givony was the draft GOAT ... but he also didn't care that much about the top of the draft. He felt it had been done to death and people were mostly repeating each other, so he was more interested in going deep and finding the people at the end of the draft. That's why he spent so much time in Europe, scouting just about everythere. ... Or that's what he told me, the one time we hung out a bit.
But I don't take any of the draft rankings/reports terribly seriously, at least in terms of identifying the best players. Look at the All-Star lineup this year — ONE No. 1 pick. And he was picked 20 years ago (LeBron) and one No. 2 (Durant). Then a bunch of guys in the 3-6 range ... But you also have Giannis and Jokic. But I still enjoy reading those rankings, regardless.
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Post by scully19 on Jan 25, 2024 21:10:12 GMT -5
Ya it's pretty crazy more people don't ignore the consensus. The Raptors are one of a few teams that keep picking off the board and every year you get people confused by it. The best player is almost always not the first pick. Cade is really struggling to keep up, might not be top 5 from the class. And yet when people reach the experts all act like their crazy to go against their perfect list.
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Post by haisan on Jan 25, 2024 22:35:21 GMT -5
If OG keeps up these crazy on/off numbers for the Knicks (and they keep winning), his standing among the 2017 draft class is going to go way up. And his next payday, too.
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Post by Pseudonym on Jan 26, 2024 11:52:58 GMT -5
As I've grown up and matured as a person, I understand the massive role one's environment plays in your development, or lack thereof.
If Wemby is a bust, for example, it would all be on him, as being paired with Pop is so perfect it brings conspiracy theories.
Where as Darko likely would have had a much better career if he wasn't on the Pistons. Hell, you can probably say that for Cade! His center rotation are 2 generational busts.
I doubt FVV or Siakam would be nearly the players they are without Toronto's infrastructure. That entire bench mob...
But then you have players like Wiggins and Ayton. And on a whole nother level....Ben Simmons.
On a broader note, if you want something to change in your personal life, tweak your environment. Doesn't take much, each decision ripples like pebbles thrown in a pond. Simply adding a houseplant can put you in a better mood, which makes you more receptive to opportunities.
When Toronto picked Barnes, I was surprised but not upset. I knew the mechanics of the draft, that is, the FO has WAY more knowledge than us laypeople have and have likely been watching whoever they draft for YEARS. We comparatively, have talking heads of wildly varying quality telling us what to think and....mixtapes, along with some college games.
The prospect I've watched most was by far JV, who has carved out a good career. He'd probably be much better if he kept skinny and bouncy in his rookie year. The absurdity of trying to be like Roy Hibbert..
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Post by sutureself on Jan 27, 2024 15:12:53 GMT -5
Back in those days, I trusted DraftExpress WAY more than NBA Draft. Givony even pointed out all of Ben Simmons' future issues in a scouting report, iirc. I still miss DraftExpress. I think NBA Draft has gotten a bit better lately but back in the day, some of their player comparisons used to be pretty ridiculous, and the video game style ratings for athleticism/potential/etc. were always a bit goofy. One thing that always made me roll my eyes is they'd always use a player comparison that 'looked' like the player, even if their games weren't remotely similar. So their player comparison for Jan Veseley was Andrei Kirilenko because, tall skinny white Euro guy, close enough right? Or their comparison for Jonas Valanciunas was Primoz Brezic. You'd see that all the time where it was more like, does the comparison players face and body look kind of similar, even if their play style was nothing alike. I much preferred DraftExpress even though it still steered me wrong occasionally. They hyped up Roko Ukic so much that I was fist pumping when he fell to us in the 2nd round, because I was convinced we got the next Ginobili. And this next article wasn't written by Givony so I guess can't totally take it as DraftExpress 'canon', but Rob Parker's article for DraftExpress about how Andrea Bargnani was a cold blooded killer with the perfect mentality to be a superstar is pretty funny in retrospect. The article claims that Bosh and Bargnani had both done some sort of pre-draft psychological testing to demonstrate their coolness under pressure and ability to stay 'in the zone' and Bosh had scored poorly, while Bargnani 'scored so high that Bryan Colangelo dropped the phone when he found out the result'. Pretty funny stuff. Goes on and on in flowery language about how Bargnani had the killer instinct of Kobe mixed in with a bunch of weird references to the paintings of Italian Renaissance masters www.draftexpress.com/article/Finding-the-%91It--Factor-Andrea-Bargnani-1884/
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Post by scully19 on Jan 27, 2024 21:17:35 GMT -5
I remember that cool as a cucumber diagnosis. They talked about that as soon as possible, it was clearly their selling point and it's clearly crap.
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Post by zugzwang on Jan 27, 2024 21:40:24 GMT -5
The tale of Bargnani's psyche score has almost reached mythical proportions.
Bargnani *did* have a near perfect score.
The test was flawed.
The idea was to identify a player who, when the game was completely on the line, in the final seconds, would have the stones to take that shot. Someone who would have a Jordan-like self-belief with the courage to stave off the fear of failure, the fear of a hostile crowd, and put it all on the line to win for his team. Someone fearless.
Bargnani's score displayed a character who was completely immune to external pressure.
Unfortunately, (so the story goes) it wasn't just because Bargnani was immune to external pressure, it was because he simply didn't give a crap.
Bargnani didn't care if he succeeded or failed, because he didn't particularly care about basketball or an NBA career. He was quite willing to take and miss that final shot. He was good either way.
It was a flawed test. They didn't anticipate for, or screen against, the remarkable similarity between courage and indifference.
True story? Or humorous internet anecdote full of slander? We'll never know.
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Post by sutureself on Jan 27, 2024 22:34:08 GMT -5
The history of pre-draft psychological testing is pretty interesting. In the NFL, before last year's draft, CJ Stroud famously scored extremely poorly on an S2 cognition test that was supposed to represent how quickly he could read and react mentally, similar to reading a defence. He went on to have to have one of the best rookie QB seasons in a long time precisely because of his ability to read defences, and the creators of the test came out a full year later and claimed his test score was likely 'invalid' because he had been too tired or distracted when he took the test. You know if Stroud had played poorly or looked like a bust they would've just kept their mouths shut and took credit for predicting the future.
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Post by haisan on Jan 28, 2024 18:29:28 GMT -5
So, today's game versus the Hawks has no Quickley, no Barrett, no Poeltl and god knows who else. Looks like we’re at the part of season where we’re not tanking, but every boo-boo keeps key players out of action for a week or more at a time. Fun times for the bench guys, I guess.
Fun times for Gary, too, who doesn’t have to worry about sharing at all. Just fire away!
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Post by Pseudonym on Jan 28, 2024 19:30:11 GMT -5
Back in those days, I trusted DraftExpress WAY more than NBA Draft. Givony even pointed out all of Ben Simmons' future issues in a scouting report, iirc. I still miss DraftExpress. I think NBA Draft has gotten a bit better lately but back in the day, some of their player comparisons used to be pretty ridiculous, and the video game style ratings for athleticism/potential/etc. were always a bit goofy. One thing that always made me roll my eyes is they'd always use a player comparison that 'looked' like the player, even if their games weren't remotely similar. So their player comparison for Jan Veseley was Andrei Kirilenko because, tall skinny white Euro guy, close enough right? Or their comparison for Jonas Valanciunas was Primoz Brezic. You'd see that all the time where it was more like, does the comparison players face and body look kind of similar, even if their play style was nothing alike. I much preferred DraftExpress even though it still steered me wrong occasionally. They hyped up Roko Ukic so much that I was fist pumping when he fell to us in the 2nd round, because I was convinced we got the next Ginobili. And this next article wasn't written by Givony so I guess can't totally take it as DraftExpress 'canon', but Rob Parker's article for DraftExpress about how Andrea Bargnani was a cold blooded killer with the perfect mentality to be a superstar is pretty funny in retrospect. The article claims that Bosh and Bargnani had both done some sort of pre-draft psychological testing to demonstrate their coolness under pressure and ability to stay 'in the zone' and Bosh had scored poorly, while Bargnani 'scored so high that Bryan Colangelo dropped the phone when he found out the result'. Pretty funny stuff. Goes on and on in flowery language about how Bargnani had the killer instinct of Kobe mixed in with a bunch of weird references to the paintings of Italian Renaissance masters www.draftexpress.com/article/Finding-the-%91It--Factor-Andrea-Bargnani-1884/I remember that. The caliper test. Turns out that the difference between complete apathy and psychopathy (being an absolute killer) on the court, is very thin.
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Post by haisan on Jan 29, 2024 1:20:09 GMT -5
Toronto: 1-9 over the past 10 games. Worst in the NBA. Charlotte and Washington are 2-8. Detroit and Portland are 3-7. The Spurs are 4-6! So ... yeah ... we're pretty tanky.
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Post by scully19 on Jan 29, 2024 8:54:43 GMT -5
Toronto: 1-9 over the past 10 games. Worst in the NBA. Charlotte and Washington are 2-8. Detroit and Portland are 3-7. The Spurs are 4-6! So ... yeah ... we're pretty tanky. Now we just need to move Poeltl, Schroder and Brown before they contribute to winning. I'm very on board with full tank mode and try to sneak to 5th worst record and the odds go from 45% to 63.9% that we keep the pick this year. Following that i hope they do 1 more year of full tank to cash in on the quality of next year's draft too and then go hard towards climbing the standings so we don't lose Scottie and Quickley to apathy.
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Post by sutureself on Jan 30, 2024 1:45:52 GMT -5
Toronto: 1-9 over the past 10 games. Worst in the NBA. Charlotte and Washington are 2-8. Detroit and Portland are 3-7. The Spurs are 4-6! So ... yeah ... we're pretty tanky. Now we just need to move Poeltl, Schroder and Brown before they contribute to winning. I'm very on board with full tank mode and try to sneak to 5th worst record and the odds go from 45% to 63.9% that we keep the pick this year. Following that i hope they do 1 more year of full tank to cash in on the quality of next year's draft too and then go hard towards climbing the standings so we don't lose Scottie and Quickley to apathy. The tricky part is if we tank and keep our pick this year the pick we owe to San Antonio rolls over to top-6 protected in 2025, and then top-6 protected in 2026. I can't find any more info beyond that. Maybe if we somehow picked top-6 three years in a row it would just become fully unprotected in 2027? Either way there's a chance we fully tank this year, are bad next year and then still owe a top-10 pick to San Antonio if it's outside the top 6
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Post by zugzwang on Jan 30, 2024 7:20:28 GMT -5
I've been reading that after 2026, the pick turns into two second round picks with no protection.
If you're a San Antonio fan, don't you cheer for the Raptor's tank? If you believe the draft reports, you'd rather the pick convey next year, I would think.
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Post by scully19 on Jan 30, 2024 9:45:11 GMT -5
Correct it goes to a 2026 2nd and a 2027 2nd.
I'm guessing that San Antonio is pretty happy about where the Raptors are this year, but it sure seems like a this point if it carries over to next year the Raptors might be fighting for the bottom. I guess that does depend on the assumptions for who gets traded this year.
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Post by haisan on Jan 31, 2024 2:18:59 GMT -5
Just found this 2020 draft tweet from Mr. Givony — Toronto now has the top two 3-point shooters from the 2020 draft (well, by one test):
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Post by haisan on Jan 31, 2024 2:22:34 GMT -5
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Post by scully19 on Feb 1, 2024 19:55:18 GMT -5
No all star for Scottie, which sucks obviously but you either need massive numbers or a winning team to get there and he doesn't have either yet...
Although he might be about to get there, it's expected Randle will miss the game and now Embiid will too. So seems like he's got a shot between Allen, Butler, Trae, Kristaps, Derrick White (good player but man would this be bullshit) and Scottie. Am I missing anyone?
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Post by Pseudonym on Feb 2, 2024 19:00:54 GMT -5
No all star for Scottie, which sucks obviously but you either need massive numbers or a winning team to get there and he doesn't have either yet... Although he might be about to get there, it's expected Randle will miss the game and now Embiid will too. So seems like he's got a shot between Allen, Butler, Trae, Kristaps, Derrick White (good player but man would this be bullshit) and Scottie. Am I missing anyone? You'd likely have to go with Porzings or Jimmy have Barnes, although he has a shot. His general struggles post-trade aren't helping him either.
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Post by scully19 on Feb 6, 2024 17:37:38 GMT -5
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Post by scully19 on Feb 6, 2024 17:54:28 GMT -5
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Post by sutureself on Feb 8, 2024 10:51:16 GMT -5
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Post by sutureself on Feb 8, 2024 10:58:57 GMT -5
Don't like this trade. Olynyk's a good player but he's 32 and expiring so either we buy him out so he can play for a contender, or we have to pay in offseason to keep a guy who doesn't fit the timeline. From Raptors perspective they must think Agbaji who went 14th overall in 2022 is better than whoever is available late 1st in this round. But once again timeline, Agbaji was an older prospect, hasn't stood out much in two years and is already turning 24 this season. Maybe he turns into a decent role player with a bigger role now but we only have two more years of team control. If getting a bunch of 1sts was the main draw of the Siakam trade, it feels extremely anticlimactic to already start selling those off for spare parts and role players rather than hoping one of those picks gets you a diamond in the rough/potential star.
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Post by Pseudonym on Feb 8, 2024 11:27:03 GMT -5
Don't like this trade. Olynyk's a good player but he's 32 and expiring so either we buy him out so he can play for a contender, or we have to pay in offseason to keep a guy who doesn't fit the timeline. From Raptors perspective they must think Agbaji who went 14th overall in 2022 is better than whoever is available late 1st in this round. But once again timeline, Agbaji was an older prospect, hasn't stood out much in two years and is already turning 24 this season. Maybe he turns into a decent role player with a bigger role now but we only have two more years of team control. If getting a bunch of 1sts was the main draw of the Siakam trade, it feels extremely anticlimactic to already start selling those off for spare parts and role players rather than hoping one of those picks gets you a diamond in the rough/potential star. If Olynyk were 27, instead of 32, I'd love it, but he ain't. Even as he ages, if re-signed, he should be fine, perhaps even good for a backup center. However, I don't know a thing about Agbaji. It is said to be a weak draft, so he could be feasibly better than a pick in that range. But as you said, he's already 24 and hasn't done much on a team that isn't really trying to win like that.
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Post by sutureself on Feb 8, 2024 11:43:57 GMT -5
Don't like this trade. Olynyk's a good player but he's 32 and expiring so either we buy him out so he can play for a contender, or we have to pay in offseason to keep a guy who doesn't fit the timeline. From Raptors perspective they must think Agbaji who went 14th overall in 2022 is better than whoever is available late 1st in this round. But once again timeline, Agbaji was an older prospect, hasn't stood out much in two years and is already turning 24 this season. Maybe he turns into a decent role player with a bigger role now but we only have two more years of team control. If getting a bunch of 1sts was the main draw of the Siakam trade, it feels extremely anticlimactic to already start selling those off for spare parts and role players rather than hoping one of those picks gets you a diamond in the rough/potential star. If Olynyk were 27, instead of 32, I'd love it, but he ain't. Even as he ages, if re-signed, he should be fine, perhaps even good for a backup center. However, I don't know a thing about Agbaji. It is said to be a weak draft, so he could be feasibly better than a pick in that range. But as you said, he's already 24 and hasn't done much on a team that isn't really trying to win like that. Agbaji reminds me of Joey Graham. 4 year college player, pretty jacked, plays stiff, doesn't rebound as well as you'd think for his size/physical build. Profiles as a defensive wing but is a bit slow laterally on defense and doesn't generate many turnovers. The potential is there for him to be a good 3 point shooter because he shot 41% from 3 his senior year from college. He's been okay from 3 in the NBA but you want your 3 and D specialist to be shooting better than 34% so far first two years in NBA. Hasn't shown much ability to dribble or create off the bounce. Had a career high 28 point game last season but the numbers aren't pretty, 10 of 25 from the field, 3 of 11 from 3, 4 TOs vs 3 assists, got to the line 5 times. I'm sure Masai loves him because he's another 'late bloomer' prospect who mainly played soccer and committed to basketball late in HS. I know I'm listing negatives but he did also win a national championship with Kansas as basically their best player. You can't take that away from him, although the reason he probably wasn't drafted higher was because he was more or less a grown ass man playing against kids so scouts didn't project as much upside.
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