Tag: NBA Draft 2023

20 NBA Summer League players we can’t wait to watch, from Chet Holmgren (again) to Victor Wembanyama (of course)

Here are all the players you should be excited to watch in the NBA Summer League this year.

Basketball never stops, folks. The NBA Draft might be over, but the Summer League is right around the corner.

This is basically a sneak preview of what’s to come this season. Obviously, Summer League has no bearing on what happens when the real basketball starts this fall. But we do get to watch our favorite rookies and see all that they may have to offer their respective teams.

And, this year, it just so happens that we also have one of the best prospects to ever touch a basketball playing in some of the games, too. We’ll finally get our first look at Victor Wembanyama against NBA competition.

RELATED: Tracking all of the undrafted free agents and their new teams.

Not only that, but we’ll see how Scoot Henderson looks. We’ll see Brandon Miller’s skillset against tough competition. We’ll see the Thompson twins dunking on everything — maybe even each other!

This summer is going to be so fun. Here are all the players we’re excited to watch:

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How the NBA’s new CBA turned future draft picks into the most valuable asset in the league again

Draft picks are like gold again in the NBA

Welcome to Layup Lines, our basketball newsletter where we’ll prep you for a tip-off of tonight’s action, from what to watch to bets to make. Subscribe here to get it delivered to your inbox every afternoon

Howdy, folks. Welcome back to Layup Lines. Let’s talk about what we saw in the NBA Draft on Thursday.

Actually, you know what? Let’s talk about what we didn’t see. There were very few major trades that came across the ticker during the draft on Thursday.

Teams are hoarding their draft picks again and it’s all because of the league’s new collective bargaining agreement.

There weren’t any major players moved during the draft. Most of the picks that were exchanged were just swaps to move a couple of picks up or down. Teams were also very keen on simply acquiring future first-round picks and second-round picks to, once again, bolster their asset cupboards.

It was so strange to watch. Considering that parity is at an all-time high in the NBA, you’d think that teams would be more willing to go for the gusto and trade for talent that would help them win championships. But, honestly, we didn’t really see any of that. The closest we got to it was Damian Lillard trade rumors that went out with a whimper.

And, sure, there were a couple of moves ahead of the draft that saw title contenders adding pieces. I’m talking Chris Paul to the Warriors and Kristaps Porzignis to the Celtics. But in those deals, the picks given up were way out. The Celtics, in particular, didn’t actually give up any picks — they got two back instead.

Rewind back to as recently as last offseason and teams were ready and willing to throw picks into deals just to make something shake. Look at the Dejounte Murray trade, for example. The Hawks forfeited three first-round picks and a pick swap for a player who was named an All-Star just one time in his career.

Teams just aren’t willing to sacrifice draft picks anymore for immediate gain anymore. Moves like that can’t exist in this new NBA. The draft has always been important, but now these picks are worth a premium. Why? Because of the league’s new collective bargaining agreement.

The players agreed to a new CBA that introduced more draconian penalties for teams like the Warriors, Clippers and more who love to go deep into the luxury tax to retain their talent and keep their rosters competitive. Once teams pass a certain point in spending, they’ll lose access to key roster-building tools. The NBA will revoke their taxpayer mid-level exception, they’ll be barred from signing players on the buyout market during the season and they aren’t able to trade for more money than they send out. They’re also unable to trade draft picks seven years out.

Simply put contending teams are going to have a hard time building out their roster on the margins. One surefire way to do it, though, is through the draft. Draft picks are cheap, team-friendly contracts that keep good players with teams in the long term.

Sure, It’s hard to trust rookies to make plays on contending teams, but given the current landscape of the NBA teams aren’t going to have any choice. They won’t be able to afford more ready-made players in free agency as they’ll run up against that tax threshold quickly.

It’s why a team like the Nuggets — that’s about to get very expensive very soon — traded their way into the first round of the draft in the middle of the NBA Finals. And that’s why so many teams were keen on actually making their draft picks in the 2023 NBA Draft instead of moving off of them. We’re back to the days of teams treating draft picks like gold.

This might not last forever. Teams are still figuring out how to navigate the current landscape and, surely, someone will find a loophole. But until they do? You can expect more teams to hoard the remaining draft picks they have. It’s just good for business.

The Tip-Off

Some NBA goodness from around the USA TODAY Sports network.

I’ve seen a lot of fantastic things come across my screen here at For The Win. But I’m trying to think of something better than the Nikola Jokic All-Stars of the NBA Draft and, well, I’ve got nothing.

What are the Nikola Jokic All-Stars, you ask? A player who was drafted in the middle of a commercial break on TV like Jokic was with the infamous Taco Bell commercial.

My guy Blake Schuster will plug you in.

“Not only was Nikola Jokic — a now two-time MVP, NBA champion and NBA Finals MVP — drafted by the Denver Nuggets, but the Quesarito appeared on the menu at Taco Bells everywhere. And in one of the most magical moments in fast food/basketball history, the two icons overlapped with the league announcing Jokic’s selection during a commercial for the quesadilla-burrito hybrid and linked them forever.

Perhaps the next Jokic — or Quesarito — is among them. There’s certainly the potential for a sponsorship deal if any of these players become All-Stars. So to memorialize the biggest night of their lives, we humbly present the 2023 Nikola Jokic All-Taco Bell Team.“

You need to tap into this.

Shootaround

— Our draft guru Bryan Kalbrosky is tracking where the top undrafted free agents are going.

— Mikal Bridges on what his next step in Brooklyn is going to look like.

— NBA bettors are livid with Shams Charania for moving the line on the No. 2 overall pick with a tweet. Our Prince Grimes has more.

— Here’s Kalbrosky again on why Cam Whitmore fell so far in the NBA Draft.

Enjoy the weekend, folks.

Q&A: Mikal Bridges is ready to take the next step into stardom for the Brooklyn Nets

The Brooklyn Nets believe Mikal Bridges is a star and he’s ready to prove them right

After the Brooklyn Nets traded away Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant, many were ready to just write the team off.

Supposedly devoid of a star-level talent on the roster, it looked like the Nets were primed and ready to start a rebuild. That’s how most of the NBA world saw it. But the Nets read the situation completely differently.

Sure, they gave up a couple of high-level players in two separate trades. But they absolutely got one back in Mikal Bridges.

The Nets value Bridges just as they would a superstar player and the team has already proven that by turning down two incredible offers for their up-and-coming swingman. One came shortly after they traded for him when Brooklyn received an offer of four (!!!!!) first-round picks in an effort to pry Bridges away. The other came in a reported offer from the Portland Trail Blazers for the No. 3 overall pick and Anfernee Simons.

It’s clear: Brooklyn believes Bridges is a star. And in the 2022-23 season, he proved the team right. He averaged 26.1 points in Brooklyn while shooting 47 percent from the floor and 37 percent from 3-point range. And he was still guarding the opposing team’s best players on the perimeter.

Ahead of the NBA Draft, Bridges partnered with eBay to promote their new Collectors Camp — a program created to teach collectors about the trading card marketplace, particularly in the sports world.

Participants in the camp receive actual training from industry experts provided by eBay who teach things like trading strategy, how to read the marketplace and industry insights. The aim is to turn casual collectors into legitimate investors and professional sellers.

The camp will travel throughout the summer, including to the MLB All-Star game in Seattle this July. Brooklyn, however, was its first stop — Bridges’ new stomping grounds.

For The Win got a chance to chat with Bridges about the camp, his time in Phoenix with the Suns, his move to Brooklyn and other fun moments from the NBA season.

What follows is our conversation. Enjoy.

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This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Hornets GM Mitch Kupchak was woefully unprepared to defend drafting Brandon Miller

Mitch Kupchak wanted to say something about Brandon Miller but he have no clue what that something is

The biggest question leading up to the NBA Draft was surrounding the mystique of what the Hornets would do with the No. 2 overall pick. Would they go with Brandon Miller, as many mock drafts — including our own — predicted? Or would they take a swing on Scoot Henderson?

As it turns out, the Hornets went the Miller route. It wasn’t totally unexpected, obviously, but considering that Henderson was considered a can’t-miss prospect just a few months ago it’s a bit jarring seeing him fall down to No. 3.

Obviously, there were questions surrounding Miller leading up to this process. Not just basketball questions, either.

RELATED: Some Hornets fans are upset over the Brandon Miller pick

He was allegedly tied to a shooting that turned deadly during his time in Alabama. Miller hasn’t been charged in the case, but his involvement became a specter over his freshman season in Tuscaloosa this year for obvious reasons.

So, naturally, Hornets GM Mitch Kupchak was asked what made the Hornets comfortable with taking Miller, considering both his play on the court and the things transpiring off of it.

And, well, let’s just say his answer probably won’t leave Hornets fans confident.

“Every answer we got to every question…I would say, he is a freshman, right? So he’s a little bit, I would say younger than…Excuse me I wouldn’t even say younger — Nah, I better not even go in that direction actually. I’ll just back off.”

 

Well, alright then, Mitch. That’s a pretty weird response to what amounted to a pretty simple question. And, if you’re taking the guy, you’d think that you’d be able to answer something like this.

There’s a lot to love about Brandon Miller, man. He’s a 6-foot-9 guard with an incredible jump shot and a ton of upside. Kupchak seemed uncomfortable talking about his age for some reason. But he’s not wrong — Miller is young. If he wanted to make a point about that, he probably should’ve just done it.

Now, everyone is just a bit confused about what’s going on here.

2023 NBA Draft: Tracking and grading every major trade from the NBA Draft

Grading every major trade from the NBA draft

The NBA’s trade machine is already going strong.

The Wizards got Jordan Poole. The Celtics got Kristaps Porzingis. The Warriors got Chris Paul. Somehow, the night has only just begun. There’s still a whole draft that needs to play out and plenty of trades to come from that.

With the NBA’s new collective bargaining agreement rules encouraging teams to find cheaper contracts, we should see a ton of player and pick movement during Thursday night’s action.

We’re here to track it all. Here are the trade grades for every major trade in the draft. Keep it on lock here as we update the tracker throughout draft night.

Why Duke forward Dariq Whitehead could slide to the end of the first round in the 2023 NBA Draft

Duke’s Dariq Whitehead might have to wait a while before finding an NBA home

Once upon a time, Duke’s Dariq Whitehead was considered one of the best prospects in basketball. Coming into the 2022 NCAA season, the forward was ranked as the third-best prospect in the nation by 24/7 Sports.

Whitehead was named Mr. Basketball USA and the Naismith Prep Player of the Year in 2022. He also took home the MVP trophy at the McDonald’s All-American Game. The talent is very clearly there. And at 18 years old, he is still very young — the third-youngest player in this year’s draft class.

Yet you would be hard-pressed to find an NBA mock draft today that has Whitehead getting drafted inside of the 20s — we have Whitehead going at No. 22 in our latest mock draft.

The question is why? You typically don’t see this sort of drop coming from such a talented prospect.

But, in Whitehead’s case, the answer is obvious. It’s injuries. Whitehead has been dealing with a foot injury that flipped his only season at Duke on its head.

Whitehead was able to return and play this season, but he certainly didn’t seem to be as explosive as he once was. He had just two dunks while at Duke.

Despite that, Whitehead still put up respectable numbers. He averaged 8.3 points per game this season and shot 42.9% on 3-pointers while nearly half of his shot attempts were coming from beyond the arch in 28 games played.

This stat from our latest mock draft makes that a bit more impressive; it shows that Whitehead has legit NBA range.

“The freshman was 24-for-48 (50.0 percent) on 3-pointers attempted from NBA distance, per Stats Perform, which ranked second-best among consensus top-100 prospects with at least 25 attempts tracked.”

With that said, though, he’s had another setback. His foot didn’t heal properly and he had to have another surgery to correct it, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Even as one of the youngest players in the draft, that’s a bit concerning.

There’s still NBA talent there with Whitehead. Teams will see that. But his injuries will ultimately be the reason why he’ll fall far deeper in the draft than anyone initially anticipated before his collegiate career began.

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Why Nick Smith Jr. might fall a bit further in the 1st round of the NBA Draft than expected

Don’t be shocked if Nick Smith Jr. falls in the NBA draft

Nick Smith Jr. is one of the more tantalizing talents in the NBA draft at guard.

When he’s at his best, he’s fast and explosive. He can score with the best of them in this draft class.

The problem is, we just haven’t seen that much of Smith at his best this year. Those glimpses have come few and far between. That’s why you shouldn’t be surprised if Smith slips a bit in the 2023 NBA draft.

RELATED: Nick Smith Jr. thinks he’ll be one of the NBA’s best passers someday. 

Now, to be clear, Smith is a surefire first-round talent in this draft class. But there are a lot of ways teams could potentially poke at his game.

The numbers aren’t big. He only averaged 12.5 points and 1.7 assists per game this season. To make things worse, the efficiency wasn’t there, either. He shot 37 percent from the floor and had a true shooting percentage of 47 percent, according to Sports Reference.

There’s also the fact that Smith has battled injury all year long. He missed the first six games of his career at Arkansas behind a knee injury and didn’t actually play until late November. After 5 games, he was sidelined indefinitely after aggravating the injury.

Knees are a big deal. Medical red flags like this one can be concerning for NBA teams long-term. It wouldn’t be shocking if his injury history knocks him down a few spots.

At the same time, though, Smith is still a first-round talent. There’s no disputing that. In our latest mock draft, we’ve got Smith going No. 14 overall to the New Orleans Pelicans — that’s lottery range. There’s a reason for that.

Even with the injuries, he was still an incredible player on the break. Our Bryan Kalbrosky dug this stat up from CBB Analytics.

“Even hampered by injury, Smith used his quickness to average 3.6 fastbreak points per 40 minutes. According to CBB Analytics, that ranked in the 93rd percentile among all Division I men’s college basketball players.”

That’s impressive. It’s even more impressive when you consider that he played with an ailing knee.

And, what’s more, the squad around him at Arkansas wasn’t really built the best for his game. The team had talent, of course. But there wasn’t much shooting to go around. The team shot 31% from deep as a whole. The spacing was made even worse when stretch big Trevon Brazile suffered a torn ACL and was lost for the season.

Bad spacing in college basketball makes offense hard. But Smith still found ways to be productive when healthy.

Sure, Smith didn’t have his best season. But there’s still a lot to like about him and his game. Some team will take a flyer on him — the only question is when. It might be later on. But even if it is, that’s alright. He’ll still be an NBA player at the end of the day.

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What is Overtime Elite? Explaining the league that will have Amen and Ausar Thompson become its first NBA draft picks

The Thompson twins are about to make the first NBA leap from the OTE league

There have been lots of out-of-the-box ways the NBA’s players have made their way into the league.

The most common way, obviously, is by attending college and getting drafted. That’s how Brandon Miller made his way. Victor Wembanyama, obviously, falls into the overseas pro route. Scoot Henderson took the G League Ignite route.

But no one has ever come from Overtime Elite — a relatively new operation giving high schoolers another path to the NBA. Amen and Ausar Thompson are going to be the first to actually complete it when they’re drafted in the 2023 NBA Draft.

Let’s talk a bit about how we got here.

The Hornets are reportedly ‘preparing to select’ Brandon Miller at No. 2 in the draft, but don’t book it just yet

Woj says the Hornets are preparing to take Brandon Miller, but take that with a grain of salt

The most intriguing storyline of the 2023 NBA Draft has pretty easily been what the story is on the No. 2 overall pick.

For so long, it seemed like Scoot Henderson was a lock to go behind Victor Wembanyama as the No. 1 overall pick. He’s got lots of talent and athleticism at point guard. He doesn’t dunk on people — he dunks through them. In a regular draft, it feels like he’d probably have gone No. 1 overall.

But as we’ve gotten closer and closer to the draft, it’s felt more likely that Brandon Miller will end up in Charlotte as the No. 2 pick. Almost every mock on the internet — including our own — has Miller going No. 2.

And, now, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski is saying the Hornets are preparing to take Miller at 2.

Late on Tuesday night, Woj reported that Miller impressed the Hornets in a second workout and the team thinks he’ll be a better fit next to LaMelo Ball than Henderson.

While it definitely seems like Miller to Charlotte is almost a done deal at this point, I wouldn’t lock the pick in just yet. Everything we get just a day or so ahead of the NBA draft should be taken with a grain of salt.

We were in this same spot last year with the No. 1 overall pick. Remember when Adrian Wojnarowski reported that it was “increasingly firm” that Jabari Smith would go to the Magic at No. 1?

We see how that worked out. The Magic shocked everyone with their Paolo Banchero pick and ended up with the Rookie of the Year.

So, yeah, Miller might be a Charlotte Hornet. But don’t be shocked if this is just yet another smokescreen coming for the second year in a row.

Florida losing forward Alex Fudge to NBA draft

Todd Golden has one more roster spot to fill thorough the transfer portal this offseason now that forward Alex Fudge is going pro.

After just one year with the Florida Gators, forward [autotag]Alex Fudge[/autotag] is leaving the college ranks and entering his name into the 2023 NBA draft pool as he pursues a professional career.

Swamp247’s Jacob Rudner first reported the news Thursday night at the tail end of the football team’s Orange and Blue Game, and Fudge’s departure caught plenty of fans off guard. That might not be the case for those who pay close attention to the team’s transfer portal movement, though.

Florida is in the process of replacing all but five members of its scholarship roster from a season ago, and there’s been a heavy focus on frontcourt depth. Todd Golden and Co. have already secured center [autotag]Micah Handlogten[/autotag] and forward [autotag]EJ Jarvis[/autotag] through the portal, but they have continued to schedule official visits with big men that would not have found much playing time with Fudge on the roster.

While it’s unclear whether Golden knew that Fudge was seriously considering leaving or not, he’s been putting together a plan to deal with another lost player from the 2022-23 team.

Fudge started just 11 games for Florida during the middle of the season before going down with a concussion. By the time he got healthy again, Golden had switched to a small ball lineup with [autotag]Riley Kugel[/autotag] and [autotag]Will Richard[/autotag] starting at the three and four.

The LSU transfer finished his only year at Florida averaging 5.8 points and 4.5 rebounds in 19.4 minutes per game.

Florida has four scholarship spots open now that Fudge is off the roster.

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