For those confused by what they saw in the draft, here's my non-expert understanding of the situation ...
There is a large pool of talented, but generally undifferentiated players that teams can dip into to fill out their roster each year. The goal of the draft is to take risks in order to obtain what you cannot otherwise obtain from this pool. Basically, that translates to one of two things:
(1) A player with an all-NBA ceiling ...
NBA teams simply do not win championships without at least one all-nba player. Teams will therefore pass on sure bets to be decent, or even above average, if there's the opportunity to grab a high ceiling guy, even those they know have a high risk of flaming out.
You might think to yourself, "Ayo could be all-nba!" Well, maybe, but you probably shouldn't trust your heart over the opinions of NBA scouts and GMs, even though your heart tells you they're idiots. The evidence ...
53 distinct players have made a
1st, 2nd, or 3rd team all-nba in the past 10 seasons. Here's a breakdown of where they went in the draft ...
- 25/53 were top 5 picks ... 9x 1st, 4x 2nd, 7x 3rd, 2x 4th, 3x 5th
- 40/53 were top 15 picks ... continuing the above list, 1x 6th, 2x 7th, 5x 9th, 2x 10th, 1x 11th, 1x 13th, 3x 15th
- Of the 13 who went later than the 15th pick, 5 were international players.
- Of the 8 domestic players who went later than the 15th pick, only 3 were taken after the 1st round (DeAndre Jordan C, Draymond Green F, Isaiah Thomas G).
These numbers don't mean that every high pick works out. It just means that the vast majority of guys who really, really work out come from the upper parts of the draft. Many of the exceptions are internationals, and only a trivial number of exceptions are from beyond the first round.
Something else I noticed when reviewing this sample - a healthy proportion were identified as elite talents while still in high school. Using RSCI rankings meant I had to shrink the sample from 53 to 42 - 10 guys attended high school outside of the states, and 1 (Kobe Bryant) pre-dated RSCI, though surely would have been top 3, if not 1. Actually, Tim Duncan failed on both counts - pre-dated RSCI and attended HS outside of the states. In any case ...
- 18/42 were top 6 RSCI
- 27/42 were top 21 RSCI
- Of the other 15/42, 5 were ranked, but lower (29, 48, 58, 72, 95), while 10 were unranked.
I find it interesting that there were twice as many unranked guys, as guys ranked below 21. Of the 10 guys that were unranked, here's where they were drafted: 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 27, 30, 60. Personally, I interpret that to mean that some guys just don't get sufficiently scouted before college, though I guess at least some could have developed while in college.
For context, Ayo's RSCI was 32.
If you're an NBA GM looking at the above numbers and your goal is to take a big swing, you might just reach for a guy who has always had the gifts, even if he hasn't yet performed to his full potential.
(2) A player who possesses a rare, but critical ingredient in today's game, even at the expense of being a well-rounded player ...
This one is more fluid as trends come and go, but presently, this might mean ...
- 3-point specialists who are long enough to not be complete defensive liabilities,
- long wings with elite athleticism who they hope to teach to be impact defenders,
- quick-twitch bigs who can switch pick-and-rolls and rim run,
- etc.
Ayo doesn't fit either profile. That doesn't mean he won't succeed in the NBA, but it does mean he's viewed as an easier to find commodity.