Kiki Vandeweghe: "All I can say is that Coach Karl is going to make our draft look very good."

George Karl: "I'm changing my ways. Coaching younger players, energizing, changing the theory that I don't like young players."

Question: Was Hodge the guys that you had targeted, or did he just fall to you at No. 20?

Hodge (20th Pick)

Kleiza (27th Pick)

Sanchez (35th Pick)

Hervelle (52nd Pick)

Kiki: "You know I think that Hodge was definitely one of the guys that we had targeted. He was somebody that provides a lot of things for you. He is a multiple position player and a very, very good defender, very good open court player. Obviously the one thing that he wants to work on and we want him to work on is his outside shooting, which I think is much better then people think. I think he's going to be a very effective player for us and I think in Coach Karl's system he's going to be very interesting."

Question: Speaking of younger players, did the fact that (Hodge) was a college senior and a more mature player, even at the age of 21, have anything to do with taking him over a guy who could shoot, like (Francisco) Garcia?

Kiki: "Well both of them, for the Draft, were older players. We had both of them in. A very tough choice. I think Garcia is going to be a very fine NBA player. We just happen to really, really like Julius Hodge."

Question: What separated them?

Kiki: "That's always difficult. They just brought different things. I would say they're different types of players. The one thing that Julius Hodge can do, he can play a little point guard for you. So that would mean we wouldn't have to carry three point guards if we were there."

Question: George, what do you think about the knock on Julius that he's not much of a shooter?

George: "There's a lot of guys playing on our team already that are pretty damn good players that supposedly can't shoot. I think for me, Hodge reminds me a little bit of Nate McMillan. He's a big guy that likes to handle the ball, that makes good basketball decisions. And almost every player in this draft, although I didn't see Sanchez play, has the personality, that Kiki has done a great job on . . . I don't know where these guys fit into our team, but they're all very hard workers. They're very serious players, very angry-type of intense players, with talent. Hodge was one of the more competitive guys that I saw workout, as was Kleiza . . . I'm going to have trouble with (pronouncing) that name . . . with 'Lenny' or 'LK'. And this (Ricky) Sanchez kid is a great talent, a young athletic talent that we're hoping can go over seas for a year or two. And the (Axel) Harvelle kid is . . . the scouting report compares him to Bo Outlaw. So I just think it is going to be a fun summer. It gives us a camp that we can evaluate in addition to free agency. The month of July is going to be a ball. It's going to be a lot of fun. I think at the end of July we will know a little bit more exactly how we're going to shape things. But, from a standpoint of getting good players that play the game the right way, I think we did a great job."

Question: Could you just talk a little about the deal with Portland?

Kiki: "First of all, moving back and getting two picks . . . if we didn't have somebody that we were absolutely in love with, right at that time was the right move to do. We really wanted a mid-30s pick. That was important to us for Sanchez. So, I'd have to say Kleiza came in here and surprised us all. He was a sleeper in the draft, somebody who lost 20 pounds. I can say that Stan Kroenke's son played with him at Missouri, so we had a little bit of insight there, which factored in. It was somebody that we thought we could get at 27, and 35 made a lot of sense for us -- a very valuable pick. Early second round picks have become, because of all the rules, extremely valuable."

Question: George, what was your role during this Draft? What kind of exchanges did you guys have?

Kiki: "Just to be a part of the philosophy of how you want to build your team. The most exciting thing for me right now is that every player, from the standpoint of the scouting report, kind of has an attitude of playing the game very hard and very intense. And subtly this tells all of my players that this is how we're going to try and play. We're going to play with tremendous intensity and it's going to be an unwritten rule that that's the way we're going to draft and play. I think teams like San Antonio and Detroit have shown that you can build great championship teams that way. I think we have great talent, and now if we can add some character and some intensity and some guys that can push our starters to play a little extra and demand a little bit more of themselves, it's all a process of making a championship team."