none of these top picks beyond rose and beasly really look so great. It makes too much sense to try to trade down and get multiple picks. Chalmers is a champ. He's a great defender and he's quick, he can create his own shot... and he is a champ, a leader. A WINNER ... who on this Knicks team has ever won anything, or, forget winning, how about just even getting close to competing for anything ??? Who??? Malik Rose, yeah. David Lee's florida teams made early round exits. The next best thing is QRich on the Phoenix squad... what else...Nate at Washington... c'mon.

Chad Ford says Chalmers stock is rising, has him going as high at 12.

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/draft2008/insider/columns/story?columnist=hollinger_john&page=DraftRater-080622

Solid first-rounders


D.J. Augustin, Texas (14.88); Derrick Rose, Memphis (14.69); Mario Chalmers, Kansas (14.03); Jerryd Bayless, Arizona (14.03).



Surprisingly, nobody rates as a slam-dunk lottery pick, not even Derrick Rose. In fact, Rose came in only second here, partly because he had such a slow start to his freshman season before picking up steam at the end.



Is this enough reason to draft Augustin ahead of Rose? No, because the margin between them is miniscule, and even if their career PERs end up the same, Rose will have far more defensive value given his superior size.



The bigger question is whether a team can justify taking Rose ahead of Michael Beasley, whose 19.19 is the best mark by anyone in the six years for which I have data. Yes, Beasley appears to be a space cadet and that's troubling, but what these numbers say to me is that the talent disparity is simply too big. That is, unless Beasley is such a train wreck off the court that he sabotages his own career, he's probably going to have much better results than Rose. In fact, you can make a strong case that Kevin Love should rank ahead of Rose on draft boards, as well.



Here's another interesting fact: Rose rated slightly higher as a wing (15.34) than as a point guard. That seems crazy, but he has the size to play the 2 if he has to. Just humor me and store that in the recesses of your brain in case you need to access it in a few years.

Finally, it's notable that Chalmers, though widely presumed to be a fringe first-rounder, rates even with Bayless and pretty close to Rose and Augustin.

i like Chalmers.