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

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.

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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