We are only days away from the 2024 NBA Draft. This annual spectacle is always full of smokescreens, fear, uncertainty, doubt and a general lack of insight from laymen who do not no picks on draft night.
This year, however, all that is true and more. The top of the draft is full of players largely unknown to the general public. There is no consensus on the top pick, and the highest echelon of players is considered largely uninspiring compared to recent years.
And yet we continue.
Athleticism Draft sage Sam Vecenie sat down with Mike Vorkunov to discuss some general topics and take an overall look at the 2024 draft. If you want player evaluations and mock drafts, discover Sam’s work.
Vorkunov: The NBA Finals are over. This means our nation turns its lonely eyes on you, Sam. I have a few questions for you ahead of this project, which may be one of the most uncertain projects in over a decade. You have graciously agreed to respond. I don’t know much about this project, so I decided to live by a maxim for this company: I ask stupid questions and you give intelligent answers.
I don’t want to ask you about individual players yet, but I have a few more structural questions. I noticed that this draft has more older players than usual who could go higher in the draft. I counted six that have a chance of getting into the top 20 based on your mockery And large painting.
But recent history shows that drafting older players at this level, over the age of 22 at the time of the draft, will generally not bring good results to this team. I wrote last month that the recent history of older players being included in the top 20 is pretty awful.
Should teams avoid them again, or are there good reasons why older players have been pushed higher in the rankings this year?
Vecénie: I understand the idea of recruiting younger players and I think overall it’s a good idea if the players are there. Age and general developmental curves are important when it comes to assessing prospects. But there are a number of reasons why, in this particular class, I think the normal rules are disappearing.
First, with the advent of the market for names, images and likenesses and the addition of free college transfers without having to sit out a year, players are staying in school and developing more long than ever. Players are no longer under the same financial pressure as before, and there is no longer pressure to leave your school early to turn professional if you are unhappy with your situation. You can get paid well – much more than many of these players in the international market would – to try a new environment and thus accelerate your development. I would expect draft classes to age a bit on average over the next few years while these rules are still in effect.
Second, recruiting classes are, often by nature, quite cyclical when it comes to talent availability. You just don’t always get the same level of eligible teenagers as freshmen. Unfortunately, this season is a bad season in that regard. The draft most comparable to 2013 was similar when it came to talent at the top. In this class, only five one-and-dones were won in the lottery: Anthony Bennett, Nerlens Noel, Ben McLemore, Steven Adams and Shabazz Muhammad. Based on draft position, only one of those five ended up returning value (Adams). The two best players in this lottery, Victor Oladipo and CJ McCollum, were upper class men. Two of the three All-Stars from this class – Oladipo and Rudy Gobert – were one year away from being automatically eligible. (The other All-Star, Giannis Antetokounmpowas eligible in first year.)
I’m also not bringing this up to say that the 2024 class should necessarily be drafted older. Five of my top six players are first-year eligible players. However, I believe you just need to evaluate the talent that comes your way at a certain level and make the choice that you feel most comfortable with, regardless of your age. Age is a factor and should be considered important. Someone who is 19 and is as good as a 22 year old will likely have a better long term career, even if the development is not linear. But it is not the ultimate solution in this process.
Vorkunov: Mock drafts and big boards, like yours, have become very good indicators and predictors of where players will go, especially in the first round. Very few choices fall outside the general bounds of expectations. Why do you think this is the case? Have you and your peers become really good at evaluating talent, or are teams less willing to make a choice that doesn’t align with public perception? Do you think this is the draft where that can change (and maybe give GMs the ability to do what they want)?
Vecénie: That’s a great question. More than anything, I think the walls have come down when it comes to the availability of information, allowing people in the public sphere to access it more than ever before. In the mid-2000s, it was much more difficult for people in my situation to gain access to cassettes to browse and review players. Now I can stand in line at Synergy Sports and thoroughly analyze every possession a player saw the field for in a given season. Back then, teams had to spend a lot of time managing the logistics of getting their hands on the tape as it was sent through the mail. I always love hearing some of the stories Mel Kiper tells about sending out a tape while he was in the process of putting together the written version of his draft guide.
People in the public sphere have improved. I don’t think there’s a “fear” factor among teams, but I wonder if there’s a little more potential for groupthink to flow throughout the league as we all become more interconnected as a society with our phones and internet access. NBA Front offices are a very insular group that travel together across the league and the world to find new talent. Everyone gets to know everyone. I wonder if there is an effect when opinions equalize across the board, so people like me end up being part of that process because we constantly talk to people around the league and rate players the same manner.
Vorkunov: The descriptor often used this year is that it’s a bad draft. What does that mean? Is it just the top players who are below the top prospects from other years, or does the entire draft compare poorly to normal years?
Vecénie: I think this project will end up bringing in lower than average proportional value, but it’s worth noting that this is primarily something the public is interested in. NBA teams only have to find between one to four players depending on the year and the number of picks they have. Their job is very different from mine.
I think there isn’t the huge level of talent at the top that you usually see in a draft. I don’t have any Tier 1 or Tier 2 players in this class in my rating scale, and I’m generally not stingy with those ratings. I’ve had 16 in the last four years. There are players coming out of Tiers 3 and 4 to become All-Stars – I would expect there to be a few in this class. However, I don’t know if there is a single prospect that I will look at what his median value can be projected and say I’m confident in saying he will become an All-Star.
That said, I like talent ranging from, say, #8 to #20. This group is, at the very least, on par with a normal draft, if not a bit stronger. Starting around issue 25, I have fewer guaranteed notes but more two-way notes than usual in a typical project.
Vorkunov: One thing I’ve heard from a few team leaders over the last month is the belief that there might be some good talent later in the first round, but it might also take longer to that these players become good players.
How would you compare Alexandre Sarr, Zaccharie Risacher and anyone else who you think has a chance of being a top-two pick to other recent top-two picks? Can you do my favorite project analysis exercise: where would this perspective go in other years?
Vecénie: In a normal draft, I would have my best player, Sarr, in the range of numbers 6 to 10. I don’t see him as a typical top-five pick because I worry a little too much about his offensive form. Last year I think I would have had it #7. In 2022, I would have ranked him sixth. In 2021, I think I would have ranked him ninth behind Alperen Sengünwho was one of the most productive players in Europe during his pre-draft season.
Again, that’s not to say there won’t be any All-Stars here. A number of players have real potential, but many of them are much more reliant on fitness and long-term development than others we’ve seen in the past.
Vorkunov: What’s the most chaotic top three you can imagine but still feels real?
Vecénie: I think this would involve a team trading for Sarr to take him #1 ahead of Wizards of Washington. This would really create a circumstance where we would have a No. 1 overall pick trade, followed by everyone scrambling to try to figure out what exactly the Wizards would do. They might even consider trading their pick. Another team could try to move up to select Risacher or Donovan Clingan. Then at number 3, the Rockets have certainly responded to offers and could easily opt out of the choice.
It’s like a 1 percent or less result, because it would force teams to actually want to pay the price to advance and make the picks, but let’s go crazy and say the most chaos would be all top three. picks move on draft night.
My best guess as to what’s actually happening is that all three teams currently in their slot stay there and make picks.
Required reading
(Photo by Zaccharie Risacher: Aurélien Meunier / Getty Images)
