smackeddog wrote:So has WCS

Yup, you would have to accept the vertical increase we heard about Stein, although he was a superior athlete already- you already think about him jumping high.

Kaminsky might have more room for improvement if he is changing things around with his workouts because his body has never been on par with a guy like Stein.

The real difference is the way they play on the court. There has never been any knock against Stein's athleticism, only his BB skills, especially on the offensive end.

There are certain things these guys do which require athletic ability. You can have the instinct to do something, but if you don't have the athleticism, you can't do it. In this case, you can build up the body and your game automatically improves.

My big issue with the guys who feel Stein is destined to be some kind of offensive juggernaut, is that showing something in the gym or even in practice, is meaningless if you don't do it on the court. This makes him a gamble

Kaminsky becoming a more athletic big man is significant, because he has already proven that skill-wise, he is probably the most all-around skilled big man in this draft...and he has proven this on the court during the season and in the tournament. If he shows a more athletic body, I would think this should bump up his value dramatically.

I'd be more concerned with quickness- esp. lateral. He can jump. Great. He is still part croc & giraffe.

franco12 wrote:and their first knee injury and there goes the extra inches of vertical.

I'd be more concerned with quickness- esp. lateral. He can jump. Great. He is still part croc & giraffe.

BRIGGS wrote:I would just look at it as a way for Frank to grab rebounds a little better maybe enhances his shot blocking finish higher and stronger at the rim and perhaps he is quicker laterally--rally just an enhancement to what he has. If he can do the same things and adds nearly a 1/2 foot vertical lift that s pretty significant. I dont get why someone would call him a 7 footer who is just a 3 point shooter. Hes got a post game mid range and dribble drive game. I think that Franks is as close to Pau Gasol as you are going to get for a bit here--I mean this skilled this big. I know Pau helped LA win two titles and I would expect that Frank can produce similar numbers. Lets call his vertical going from perhaps 29 to 33. Certainly hes no Dwight Howard but that 4 inches of lift for him is a lot.

crzymdups wrote:How is this a great sign for Kaminsky but when the same news comes out for Stein you wonder if he's "doing it naturally"...

man, this draft can't come soon enough.

6/7/2015 11:13 AM
Bonn1997 wrote:
smackeddog wrote:
Ilovestarks wrote:
I love WCS, but it think some of his advantages will be faded if he gain weight , his a quick/agille 7' fotter mainly due to his physical shape , if he becomes a tank he will no longer be that quick/agile which may be what make him such elite defender
well they said he's gained 20lbs of muscle and increased his vertical since the season ended. Could just be the usual pre-draft tall tales though!

20 lbs of muscle in 2 months?

Oddly enough, it could hurt him in some ways.
First thing that comes to mind is PEDs.
Second would be whether this is something a player can continue to maintain.
I actually hope there is nothing to the rumor, and the guys who want him on the Knicks should feel the same way, because it's a red flag, if true.

Even Briggs said that if Stein was really over 260, he would have to reevaluate him at 4:

6/5/2015 6:45 PM LAST EDITED: 6/5/2015 7:00 PM
Well WCS is working out for the Knicks June 16th. It stated he has put on 22 thats TWENTY two pounds and has added 5 inches to his vertical to 42 inches. If he honestly weighs 265 pounds now--Id change opinion on him. That would be someone who should do the pushing and not pushed around.

Willie Cauley-Stein will work out for the Knicks on June 16, a source told SNY.tv.
The 6-foot-11 former Kentucky big man has added 22 pounds of muscle and his vertical is up to 42 inches, the source said.

Kind of fighting the laws of gravity if you are a guy his size and you gain 20 pounds and the vertical inches in an extremely short time. His body fat was already low at his UK Pro Day

Stein's advantage has always been his quickness, along with his wingspan and jumping ability. Your lateral movement will take a hit at some point if you put on too much weight. There is always a cutoff point where the added weight causes your game to suffer in other ways. This happens to be how gravity and the laws of physics work, although it has been pretty much established by some around here that these laws and other traditional ways of evaluating a player don't apply to Stein on this forum.

You can see how his weight has gone over the years. Read that there were criticism about his strength when he first came up, but he worked on getting stronger, and added 20 lbs.

The date of the combine was May 12-17, 2015, at which time he weighted 242 lbs...It is now June 9th 2015. Briggs mentioned That 20 lb muscle gain/vertical increase rumor on June 5th. As mentioned above, his body fat was very low earlier in the year, and did not decrease significantly at the Combine.

So do you think he really put on 20lbs of muscle in 3 weeks, after taking 4 years to put on 21 lbs? Either that rumor is BS, or something else is going on.

Predraft Measurements
Year	Source	Height w/o Shoes	Height w/shoes	Weight	Wingspan	Standing Reach	Body Fat	No Step Vert	Max Vert
2015	NBA Combine	6' 11.25"	7' 0.5"	        242	7' 3"	         9' 3"	        6.3	        NA	        NA
2014	UK Pro Day	6' 11.25"	7' 0.25"	240	7' 2"	         9' 2"	        6.4	        31.0	        37.0
2013	Big Man	        NA	        7' 0.5"	        240	7' 2.5"	         NA	        NA	        NA	        NA
2011	James Camp	NA	        7' 1.25"	221	7' 2"	         NA	        NA	        NA	        NA
2011	Stoudemire Camp	NA	        7' 1.25"	221	7' 2"	         NA	        NA	        NA	        NA

Don't think we ever had combine numbers on Kaminsky's vertical, by the way. He also had about 3% more fat on his body at the Combine. Always easier for a guy who is not at the top of the class athletically to show gains if he starts working out in a way he has not done so before.

There are limits for any body, though.

I'd appreciate it if you actually use a past post if you are going to comment on what I said.

BRIGGS wrote:I have any immediate argument that Frank Kamnisky is BETTER than ANY free agent we have the possibility of getting(or just as good) and his cost will be 1/6 of theirs.

7. ... the most under-appreciated part of Kaminsky's game: Playmaking. As Grantland's Zach Lowe wrote this week, defensive evolutions in the NBA are making "playmaking fours"—guys who can spot-up shoot but also make things happen off the bounce—more in-demand. Which bodes well for Frank, because it's exactly what he did this season at Wisconsin.

Among the power forwards and centers likely to be drafted in 2015, Kaminsky had the most assists per 40 minutes, pace-adjusted, and he was the only big man with a positive Pure Point Rating—a John Hollinger-developed stat that assesses playmaking with this formula: 100 x (National Pace/Team Pace) x ([(Assists x 2/3)-Turnovers] / Minutes

How rare is it for an elite big man to come out of college with a positive Pure Point Rating? Well, in the past 10 drafts, there's only been one first-round pick 6'10" or taller with a PPR better than negative-1: Kentucky's Anthony Davis (-0.59 in '11-12), who's on a trajectory to win an MVP in the next 2-3 years. And there's been just one draftee 6'10" or taller with a better college PPR than Kaminsky's +0.47: Florida's Chandler Parsons (+0.82 in '10-11), who was a second-round steal by the Rockets and functions as a small forward

6. Feel free to call Kaminsky the most efficient shooting and posting big man in the draft. His 1.051 PPP on post-ups this season was the best of any potential draftee with at least 100 post-up possessions in Synergy Sports Technology's database—and well ahead of Okafor and Towns:

I still regard Okafor as this draft's best long-range prospect in the post. What he accomplished at his age and at that volume—posting up 8.4 times per game compared to Kaminsky's 4.7, with reasonable efficiency—leads me to believe that Jah will be a low-block monster in the NBA. But that's not the point of this chart. The point is to offer further proof that Kaminsky's value goes well beyond shooting. And the point of the next chart is to show that his value also extends into …

You don't have to convince me about him but...

I would bet a nice sum that Popovich would probably take Kaminsky at this spot if SA was picking #4 and Towns, Russell, and OK4 were off the board.

Couple of years learning the post-up game from Duncan would do wonders for him.

Winslow would be his second choice, I expect.