Posted by EnySpree:

Posted by McK1:

Still analyzing point-guard talent, the Knicks are trying to bring in UCLA freshman point guard Jrue Holiday for a second workout, The Post has learned.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/06182009/sports/knicks/knicks__holiday_in_for_another_look_174801.htm

Not to be over looked...can't have a guy come back if he wasn't high on the list. Maybe another guard looked good and they needed to re-evaluate Holiday again....interesting

The Nets are "said to be willing to part with point guard Devin Harris" to land the second overall pick in next Thursday's NBA Draft.

Posted by djsunyc:

Posted by nyk4ever:

Are the Nets angling for Rubio?

From RealGM:
http://realgm.com/src_wiretap_archives/59918/20090619/nets_offering_harris_for_2nd_pick/

The Nets are "said to be willing to part with point guard Devin Harris" to land the second overall pick in next Thursday's NBA Draft.

the nets probably received no bump in ratings or attendance with harris. so if they make a move for rubio, they will make alot more money. makes sense.

The Memphis Grizzlies are trying to talk tough, saying they’re unafraid to draft Ricky Rubio with the No. 2 pick in the NBA draft, but no one believes them.

Nevertheless, Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace finds himself in a tough spot. He has a volatile owner, Michael Heisley, puffing out his chest, and a player agent, Dan Fegan, threatening to embarrass the franchise should it try to take Rubio.

Apparently, Heisley has been as impatient as ever with Wallace. This ebbs and flows, but league sources say Pau Gasol’s(notes) marvelous play in the Los Angeles Lakers’ championship run has Heisley coming down on Wallace all over again for last year’s trade. Of course, Heisley pushed for the lousy Lakers deal, but that’s been lost in the revisionist history.

The Sacramento Kings had been the most likely team to cut a deal with Memphis to move into the second spot to take Rubio, but league sources say the Kings’ motivation to do so has waned. The Kings don’t want to give up Jason Thompson(notes) and their fourth pick to get to No. 2, especially considering there’s a chance Rubio could drop to Sacramento anyway. Fegan has no issues with Rubio in Oklahoma City or Sacramento, but he’ll be difficult if the point guard ends up in Memphis.

Minnesota’s offer of a package that includes Kevin Love(notes) and a first-round pick intrigues Wallace too, sources say.

Wallace is enamored with University of Memphis freshman Tyreke Evans but thinks he could move down and still draft him. Nothing happens in this draft until the Grizzlies make a decision; then the dominos will start to fall.

The Chicago Bulls are trying to convince the New Jersey Nets to take their 16th and 26th picks to move to No. 11, and one Eastern Conference executive says Chicago’s target is Wake Forest forward James Johnson.

Some say Johnson has been slipping and could be available at No. 16, but no one seems sure about anything in this draft.

The Nets are considering the proposal. They’ve been intrigued by Louisville shooting guard Terrence Williams at No. 11, but could be willing to drop down with the belief that North Carolina’s Tyler Hansbrough could be available at 16.

As for Johnson, if he somehow drops to No. 21, you can count on the New Orleans Hornets letting him pass. After playing pick-up ball with Johnson in Winston-Salem the past two summers, Hornets star Chris Paul(notes) has no use for him, several league sources said.

“He talked way too much trash to Chris,” one source insisted. “Bad idea.”

Hollinger highlights two players the Knicks have brought in for pre-draft workouts. The first, Ty Lawson, he has statistically ranked as the top player in the draft:

Two players are neck and neck for the top spot in this year's Draft Rater. You could easily guess that one of them is Blake Griffin, but most folks never would have guessed that the other is Lawson.

Lawson, who is coming off an electric performance in leading North Carolina to the championship, grades out highly for several reasons: Although he's short for a point guard, his shooting numbers (47.1 percent on 3-pointers), strong assist rate and microscopic turnover ratio (9.1, first among point guard prospects) all point to him as an NBA keeper.

The Draft Rater puts Lawson slightly ahead of Griffin for first, but this doesn't mean a team should take Lawson first. The standard error in the projections for point guards is higher than it is for big men, which means random noise could be putting Lawson ahead just as easily as on-the-court performance. If the consensus is that Griffin is the better player, I don't think Lawson's statistical record alone is strong enough evidence to refute it. Additionally, we've heard questions about Lawson's work ethic and injuries.

But the rating is emphatic enough for me to say Lawson should be at the top of the college point guard ladder, ahead of Jonny Flynn, Jrue Holiday, Jeff Teague & Co. (If you're wondering about Ricky Rubio, I'll have more on him next week.)

The second is DeMar DeRozan, whom the Knicks saw on Thursday up at the MSG Training Center. From what I know, DeRozan, who worked out alone, showed off athleticism and a decent shooting ability. All the necessary skills to be a good pro. But according to Hollinger's formula, DeRozan has bust written all over him:

I'd be hard-pressed to name a potential high lottery pick throughout the years about whom the Draft Rater has been less excited. I rated 90 prospects for this draft, and DeRozan ranked 54th among them. Two of his USC teammates -- Daniel Hackett and Taj Gibson -- outranked him, as did assorted other nonentities such as Kevin Rogers, Chinemelu Elonu and Ben Woodside. I'll wait here while you Google them.

Why? Because there really isn't anything in DeRozan's statistical profile that makes you think "NBA star." He rarely took or made 3-pointers, and he had a strongly negative pure point rating, which are two powerful indicators for a wing player. His numbers in other areas were unimpressive, too. In particular, he was a bad free throw shooter, which indicates that his outside shot might never be a strong suit.

Some scouts I have talked to have compared DeRozan to Rudy Gay in terms of being an NBA athlete but having a questionable motor. But that comparison falls flat, according to the Draft Rater: Gay was the top-rated player in his draft class, while DeRozan is nowhere close. And although he's supposed to be a great athlete, he didn't show it on the court often enough: His rebound, block and steal totals were all very ordinary.

As I mentioned above, one-and-done players sometimes fool the system -- they're the youngest, least experienced guys in the pool, and thus, a major factor is how much they improve post-draft rather than just how good they are pre-draft.

Nonetheless, I would back away from DeRozan if the 12 relatively safe guys at the top of the Draft Rater are still on the board.

Here is Hollinger's top 12:
1. Lawson
2. Blake Griffin
3. Tyreke Evans
4. Austin Daye
5. Stephen Curry
6. Nick Calathes
7. DeJuan Blair
8. Danny Green
9. Jonny Flynn
10. James Harden
11. Hasheem Thabeet
12. Earl Clark
Other notables: Jrue Holiday was 13th, Terrence Williams was 19th, Jordan Hill was 26th and DeRozan 54th.

Hollinger admits that last season his rating system didn't fare well, with poor marks for Derrick Rose, OJ Mayo and Eric Gordon, all of whom performed well as rookies. But between 2002-2007, it had been on the mark:

From 2002 to 2007, 15 players were (a) among the first 10 collegians drafted and (b) excluded from the top 12 by the Draft Rater. In other words, these were the college players the Draft Rater thought were drafted too high. Of those 15, not one has played in an All-Star Game. The only two who have started a significant number of games in the long term have been Kirk Hinrich (who was 13th in the Draft Rater in 2003) and Charlie Villanueva.

Who were the other top-10 picks not favored by the Draft Rater? Spencer Hawes, Acie Law, Fred Jones, Melvin Ely, Marcus Haislip, Jarvis Hayes, Rafael Araujo, Ike Diogu, Channing Frye, Randy Foye, J.J. Redick and Patrick O'Bryant.

In other words, when the Draft Rater has suggested avoiding a player, that has turned out to be good advice.[/i]

Posted by TMS:

when it comes to Demar Derozan, u have to watch him play in games to see how good he can be... basing your opinions about him on his stats & the way he worked out for teams is meaningless... i'll take a guy who can notch it up during big games & be the go to guy for his team than one who shrinks when the pressure is on in those same games, i don't care how much better player B's stats & workout #'s were than player A's.

Ty Lawson with the #1 pick over Griffin... yeah, ok.

Running down the Top-5 of the Draft

Today came word from the Associated Press that Hasheem Thabeet canceled his workout with the Memphis Grizzlies, citing a shoulder injury.

"Thabeet was a combination of he's had some shoulder situations and he wanted to talk to some other teams," Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace said of the 7-foot-3 center out of Connecticut. "It's also what goes on this time of the year with guys showing, not showing, that type of thing. The gamesmanship of the draft."

A quick call to Thabeet’s agent, Ugo Udezue, seems to indicate differently. “He has scheduling issues,” Udezue told us. “He has to come to New York to see his family real quick.”

Digging a bit deeper, though, it simply seems like Thabeet just isn’t interested in working out for anyone at this point, since he does not feel like that setting is conducive to his strengths. “He’s not going to block shots in a workout, and that’s what he’s going to do in the NBA,” Udezue told us. “What are they going to do, have Hasheem shoot 3-pointers? Ricky Rubio is not doing any workouts either.”

Speaking of Rubio, do we have a second player openly telling the Grizzlies that they aren’t interested in playing in Memphis? From what we can gather, it doesn’t seem like Thabeet’s camp is all that enamored with the direction Memphis is heading in, and there seems to be strong indications that he feels very good about his chances of being drafted by Oklahoma City, with one NBA source going as far as to say that the chances of him being picked there if available are “100%.”

That would probably be news to Ricky Rubio, who Oklahoma City spent the last day and a half with in Los Angeles meeting with alongside his family. Sam Presti also took time out on Sunday evening to meet with James Harden, which is Oklahoma City’s third meeting with him so far, including his workout at their facility and an interview at the NBA combine in Chicago.

While Harden may not have helped himself with his poor workout in Memphis, he may be the last man standing at this point—the only player in the elite tier of prospects that actually is interested in playing there. The fact that highly influential Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley flew into Memphis to watch Thabeet, only to have him cancel his workout at the last minute, could bode very well for Harden.

The wildcard in all this are the Minnesota Timberwolves, who could throw a wrench in things by trading up to #2 to take Ricky Rubio. Sources say that Rubio’s camp has warmed up significantly to David Kahn and the Timberwolves organization as of late, and that they would not be opposed to him landing there. The catch is that the rookie scale salary slot of the #6 pick would not be sufficient in terms of satisfying Rubio’s gigantic buyout from DKV Joventut, so Kahn would have to trade into the top three to make that happen.

At this point, Kahn is holding firm on not putting Kevin Love on the table for the right to move up in the draft, and is instead trying to acquire another pick to entice Memphis to swap with them. As other media outlets have reported, they are targeting Washington’s #5 pick, but are only offering some combination of Randy Foye, Mike Miller and the #18 pick, which probably won’t get it done.

The Wizards have been bombarded with trade offers as of late, some of them more realistic than others, but it’s not a given that they will decide to trade the pick. If Rubio is on the board, all indications are that the Wizards would take him, and worst comes to worse, deal with the repercussions of him staying in Europe for another year or two until his buyout situation gets resolved. There aren’t many teams that are higher on Rubio’s upside than Washington.

As messy as the rest of the top five sounds, Sacramento’s situation might be the most confusing. It’s looking more and more clear that the Kings are not nearly as enamored with Ricky Rubio as they once were, for a number of reasons. The official party line is that Sacramento is concerned that Rubio will struggle to assert his leadership ability on the group of players they currently have in place, due to the fact that he’s only 18 years old and not a native English speaker. One of the biggest issues Sacramento had last year was with the culture of their team lockerroom. On top of that, the Kings are worried that will Rubio will have a huge target on his chest coming into the NBA, and that other players will “try to go at him every single night.”

Something important to keep in mind is that long-time Kings General Manager Geoff Petrie has just one year left on his contract, and that ownership is putting a great deal of pressure on him to ensure that they don’t go through as painful a season as they just did in 08-09, winning just 17 games. With that in mind, they may opt to just put a Band-Aid on the problem and draft a more ready player, such as Tyreke Evans or Jonny Flynn—who is very attractive due to his outgoing personality and terrific leadership skills-- and hope that things magically get better next season.

This is a situation that seemed almost unfathomable a few months ago, as the Kings were supposedly so enamored with Rubio’s talent that they were strongly considering drafting him with the #1 pick before falling to the #4 slot in the lottery. Considering what we know about all these prospects, it’s tough not to think that Sacramento would be making a colossal mistake letting a playmaker of Rubio’s caliber get by them, as his upside is substantially higher than that of Evans or Flynn.

Jonny Flynn happened to work out in Sacramento this weekend, alongside other Kings favorite Tyreke Evans, as well as Stephen Curry, Nick Calathes. It’s well known at this point that Flynn is not getting past Milwaukee’s pick at #10 at worst, but his chances of going 4th seem to be improving by the day. It’s too early to rule out Evans at Sacramento’s pick either, even though Rubio is still very much in the picture as well.

Rubio is reportedly returning to Sacramento tomorrow for a workout, which should ease one of the concerns the team has about being unable to watch him last week.

Scattered Rumors

-B.J. Mullens worked out for the Philadelphia 76ers (#17) on Sunday, and is scheduled to work out for Chicago (#16) on Tuesday. While many NBA teams we spoke with have picked up on the rumor that he may have a promise from Detroit at 15, things don’t really seem to add up here. If anything, the Pistons seem to be most interested in Earl Clark, and have reportedly told him as much, as have the Phoenix Suns, drafting 14th. On the other hand, Detroit continues to be very active in trade-talk, though, and could very well decide to move the pick, which would make all of this moot. Would Mullens really turn down his Green Room invite if he definitely knew he was going 15th? Clark on the other hand just passed up a workout with Chicago this week in order to be with his newborn baby, as he seems to be feeling very good about where’s currently at in this draft.

-Golden State appears to be exploring possibilities to improve on the defensive end in hopes of making a strong run to the playoffs next season. One trade that has reportedly been offered by the Charlotte Bobcats that may help on that front would involve packaging Kelenna Azubuike and Marco Belinelli in exchange for Raja Bell. The Warriors are pondering the offer, but would have to get Azubuike’s consent to make the trade unless they decided to wait until July 24th.

In other Warriors news, it appears that despite not having worked him out, Stephen Curry is the team’s main target should he be available with the 7th pick. Other options include Jordan Hill, Tyreke Evans and James Johnson.

-According to an NBA source, super active Minnesota Timberwolves GM David Kahn has offered Mike Miller to the Los Angeles Clippers in exchange for Chris Kaman. The Clippers shot down that trade, but countered with Marcus Camby.

-A few players that could shake things up on draft night…Taj Gibson to Utah at 20? Wayne Ellington to Philadelphia at 17? Tyler Hansbrough to New Jersey at 11? Ty Lawson to Indiana at 13?