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Draft Preview: ESPN Analysts

With the 2015 Draft just more than 24 hours away, ESPN analysts Fran Fraschilla, Tom Penn and Chad Ford offered their opinions on the hopefuls waiting to make the jump to the NBA. Below is a compilation of their thoughts on many of the top prospects.

Jahlil Okafor — Duke (C)
Fraschilla:
The dilemma at No. 2 is interesting, because although the league has gone smaller, you want to swing for the fences. And I think it’s going to be awfully hard to pass up on Jahlil Okafor. … In Okafor you’re talking about about a guy that shot 66 percent from the field, had one of the best freshman years in recent years and when he’s not double-teamed in the NBA every single night, I think he’s going to be a terrific low-post scorer.

D’Angelo Russell — Ohio State (PG)
Fraschilla:
I would think (his biggest weakness) would be physical maturity at this point. He came to Ohio State not expecting to be a one-and-done guy. He wasn’t highly thought of. He was a top 25 recruit, but I don’t think anybody really expected the kind of freshman year he had.

I think just the physicalness of the game night in and night out as an NBA rookie; 82 games — one night guarding Russell Westbrook, the next night guarding Kyrie Irving, the next night guarding Chris Paul, and on and on — I think there’s going to be a little adjustment for him. Certainly the way talented point guards have adjusted to the league fairly quickly — I expect him to have an impact as a rookie, but I also think there’ll be a learning curve for him.

I would just simply say he’s the best passer. Maybe Ricky Rubio coming in from Spain would be in the same category, but (Russell) is the best passer I’ve seen in a decade. He throws passes to teammates that don’t even know they’re open, and that’s had hard to do.

Penn: He can shoot the ball, which (along with passing) is a nice combination in today’s NBA. He’s just a kid. He’s just got to tighten up and mature. But he’s got major superstar potential. Here at ESPN, we’ve got a very sophisticated advanced analytics group, and they put together a model on the best high-risk, high-reward kind of players — which is really what the top of the draft is all about — and he’s got the highest ceiling according to them.

He’s got a 15 percent chance to be an NBA superstar, which is that elite, rarest of talent. He’s also got, among the top 20 players in the draft, the highest bust potential because of concerns that his numbers are inflated based on the competition that he faced and the team that he was on. So I typically trust these analytics folks, and this is how advanced metrics sometimes come in.

If you’ve got the belief that some of these numbers make sense when you’re ranking highest-risk, highest-reward — he’s right there. And you’ve got to swing for the fences a little bit, because if you hit it, it’s a franchise-changer. And he has tremendous potential to have that happen.

Ford: The analytics are raising red flags about the fact that — as great as he is offensively — here are some concerns about him defensively and especially concerns that point to athleticism. And that’s why you’re seeing that disparity between “Could be the best player in the draft” and “Could be the biggest bust in the draft.” I don’t think he’s a bad athlete, but you look at so many great guards in this league and what terrific athletes they are. That’s going to be a big adjustment for him.

Kristaps Porzingis — Latvia (PF)
Fraschilla:
If you’re picking fourth, you’re essentially needing to roll the dice a little bit and gamble, and I don’t know how you can come up with a better gamble than a guy that’s 7-foot-1, on his way to 7-foot-2, who’s athletic, graceful, can shoot the ball from 3, block shots and is 19 years old.

I get the idea of the bust factor, but after Okafor, (Karl-Anthony) Towns and Russell are gone, you might as well gamble and draft a kid who could potentially be along the lines of a Dirk Nowitzki or a combination of Nowitzki, (Pau) Gasol and (Andrei) Kirilenko.

He’s a graceful player. His English is great. He’s a basketball junkie. There are some things about him that I think are going to translate well to the NBA. The one thing he is not is a center. He is a power forward right now.

Mario Hezonja — Croatia (SG/SF)
Fraschilla:
I’m bullish on Hezonja for sure. His effective field goal percentage on spot-up jump shots this year was 65 percent, which is outrageous. And he’s got deep range and a quick release. He was 8-for-8 in an ACB game this year, so I would say he jumps out at me right away.

Ford: He’s got a potent combination of things that NBA teams like. He’s got size for his position. He’s 6-foot-8 and can play the 2 or the 3. He’s got elite athletic ability. He’s bouncy. He jumps out of the gym. He’s quick and explosive. And he’s got a lethal 3-point shot with deep, deep range.

Those are the three things: Do you have size for your position? Check. Do you have elite athletic ability for your position? Check. Do you have at least one skill that typically translates that you can hang your hat on in the NBA? Check.

You go through this draft, and there are not that many players that you can check all three of those boxes off on. Usually we’re checking one, maybe two, of those boxes. You check all three for Hezonja. What’s the risk? I don’t think it has anything to do with him being a European. He’s playing in the second-best league in the world right now in ACB, which is better than NCAA. He’s playing on a team that made it to the ACB Finals: FC Barcelona. He’s played with pros his entire career, and he’s got minutes there.

The thing about Hezonja is he has this unusual confidence. There are players that are confident, and then there are players that are borderline crazy confident, and Hezonja’s right there. My comparison for him is J.R. Smith. J.R. Smith checked off (all three skills). It’s just that his decision-making, shot selection and decision-making off the court about what he was going to focus on and whether he was going to put this all into basketball — that was all the shaky part for J.R. Smith.

I don’t think I have any of the off-the-court issues with Hezonja. But I do have some concerns with his shot selection, his confidence and if he thinks he’s better than he is. If he’s comparing himself to Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan, that’s delusional, and you can get into problems when you get to the NBA if you don’t know what lane you’re in. If he understands he’s in a J.R. Smith lane … then great. If he thinks he’s Kobe or Michael Jordan, it’s going to be a rude awakening for him when he gets to the NBA.

Devin Booker — Kentucky (SG)
Fraschilla:
Certainly Devin Booker has been talked about as a young guard with the potential to be a good shooter. He struggled late in the year, but he’s the youngest guy in the draft. He’s got that positional size.

Ford: Booker’s so easy (to pick), because he’s one of the two or three best shooters in this draft, and you know he’s going to hit open shots. You have a league that is now emphasizing 3-point shooting, and you have several teams in the lottery that are desperately in need of shooters. It’s just easy. Whether he does anything else or not is a bit irrelevant. I’m not sure that Devin Booker won’t turn out to be a fairly one-dimensional player, like maybe a Kyle Korver. But if he does that one thing really, really well, he’s going to have a long career in the NBA. And I think teams don’t see a lot of risk with Devin Booker.

Kelly Oubre — Kansas (SF)
Ford:
Kelly Oubre is one of the most fascinating prospects in this draft because he checks boxes for size for his position — he has a 7-foot-2 wingspan and he can be a two-guard; that’s freaky. He checks boxes for his skill; I don’t think he’s an elite athlete, but I call him a smooth athlete. And he can shoot the basketball. He’s not an elite shooter, but it’s clearly one of his skill sets. And he has the ability to defend. He has all the physical tools to do it.

One general manager referred to him as “basketball illiterate,” and I think that’s the issue with Kelly Oubre right now. The physical tools are there, and even some instincts of the game are there. But his understanding of the game and anticipating what’s happening, especially on the defensive end … he just doesn’t have a great feel of what’s actually happening on the court. And it’s very difficult to play anything other than on-the-ball defense when a player doesn’t really understand what’s happening with the offense.

And I think Kelly’s just been able to survive, like so many kids are able to in the AAU culture, by being a good athlete and being talented physically. Then he got to Kansas and had to understand the game of basketball. And I just don’t think he’s been really coached. Unfortunately in the college game, there’s just not a lot of time for that.

(Kansas head coach) Bill Self did a good job. I think he forced Kelly to learn how to play defense, but there’s just so much more that Kelly needs to learn. … You can see Oubre’s getting better. He’s starting to figure things out. The training’s there. If he keeps working hard and he keeps learning and he keeps hungry, he can be one of the 10 best players in this draft hands down.

Sam Dekker — Wisconsin (SF)
Ford:
With Sam Dekker, there are a lot more appealing things about Dekker (in comparison to Booker). He’s got great size for a position — much better than Booker does. He’s a great athlete — a much better athlete than Booker is. He has more experience. He’s stronger and he’s more versatile than Booker.

The question is: Do you think he’s going to be able to knock down 3-point shots? He was very streaky at Wisconsin. Sometimes he looked like he was a shooter, and other times he didn’t. He had a pretty strong workout, and I think that’s really the interesting thing.

His narrative is: With Bo Ryan as your coach, who was incredibly critical of Dekker and had a quick hook for Dekker, that messes with a shooter’s confidence. So every time Dekker was shooting the ball, he was thinking too much about it. In a more open system with a coach that gives him more leeway, he’ll be more confident and better. That’s up to every coach and team to decide: “Am I going to buy that? Is that true? Is this guy saying that he can’t be coached?”

Kevon Looney — UCLA (PF)
Fraschilla:
Kevon Looney is a project. There are a number of guys in this draft like him: a young big man — in this case a power forward — who is, in my opinion, not going to play major minutes for a team early in his career. And that’s OK, because the further he slides in the first round, the more likely he’s going to end up on a team that’s already pretty good — a playoff team that can nurture him.

And what I like about him is his rebounding instincts for sure. There is some possibility of him being a pick-and-pop guy down the road. I was a little surprised he came out early but he did, and so we’re talking about strictly potential. (He’s) a big kid you want to have on your roster but is going to be a work in progress.