After watching NBCSports Boston's JB mini documentary, it had me curious about the talk around him when he was drafted. I don't follow college ball or drafts ever. I was familiar with fans booing him and was unsurprised by Jeff Goodman not being a fan of the pick at the time when watching the doc, but I wanted to learn more and came across this article from Chris Forsberg from 2016 which was an overview of the data and analysis.
And wow. I wasn't expecting the metrics to be so low on JB considering Danny did draft him at #3. His maturity and his build were what many deemed his upsides, but the numbers weren't super great. I screenshot & highlighted some of the main points here for the tl;dr crowd.
I mean, hot damn, an 8% chance of being an All-Star and an almost 72% chance of being a bench player or bust?!
Big, big ups to JB for always coming back from each offseason having improved an aspect of his game and for all the hard-work he puts in. Genuinely. We wouldn't have had all the success we've had over the last nine seasons without him nor Banner 18. 💐💐💐
In the Starting 5, he said, "The pressure is crazy. If I make one mistake or have one bad game, it's like 'should have never been FMVP', 'should have never been an All-Star', 'get him out of here, 'trade him'." Which made me feel for him a bit.
For anyone who followed all the draft stuff that closely then, what did you think of the pick at the time?
6 comments
I remember being the only one that actually wanted him and celebrating the pick. The key things I remember were size and athleticism at a time none of our players really had either but I knew it was very much a wild card, but the only other guys that made sense with the pick were Josh Jackson (who I also wanted so not trying to sound like I’m so smart here,) Dragon Bender, Buddy Hield who I’d have liked but felt too low ceiling for 3, or a couple guards (Murray and Dunn) who were not what we needed with IT, Marcus, and I think still Avery. People also mocked Marquis Chriss in that are but that’s another spot we didn’t need as much and was just a springy 4 that seemed to not actually know how to play ball, like a less successful in college Tyrus Thomas.
He’s never really been an analytics darling in the league either, so this isn’t super surprising. His shooting coming out of college was a major concern as was his passing. He was regarded as being a super raw prospect as his only plusses at the time were athleticism and motor. Definitely a high strikeout rate on that type of player, which is why a lot of people wanted Hield, Murray, or Dunn. Jaylen has got to be like 95th or better percentile result for a player of his general draft profile.
Not super surprising.. this was considered quite a bad draft after 1 and 2 (and even that didn’t pan out over the long term.)
His jumper, passing and finishing at the rim outside of transition were all quite poor at Cal, and it didn’t help that’s where he chose to play with them not being known as being in a strong conference or producing many notable NBA guys outside of Jason Kidd and I think Abdur-Rahim.
He did come in and improved significantly and almost immediately as a shooter though but that #3 position seemed like a rock and a hard place at the time which obviously contributed to people just being mad we weren’t able to trade it for Butler or whoever else may have been available at the time.
Two key factors about JB’s college year:
1. He picked an academic school. He was a top recruit in High School, but instead of going to a top basketball program (like a Duke or Kansas), he went to Berkeley.
2. He played out of position. They had injuries and Brown was running point quite a bit and his game suffered as a result.
He had been a top high school recruit, but the college numbers disappointed and his team didn’t really accomplish much.
He was seen as a big reach. Most mock boards had him ~9th and we picked him 3rd.
Dragan Bender and Kriss Dunn were the two guys most people expected to see drafted 3rd. Bender was thrown in because the scouts said so, but as a European, most fans hadn’t seen him play. Dunn was a couple of years older and had shone in college, he was often the fan favourite.
And because Simmons and Ingram were far and away the consensus #1 and #2 picks, the story of draft night was “Danny Ainge Dunn fucked up”, which was the meme that spread around because Ainge didn’t go with the fan favourite Kris Dunn.
Comments saying “Danny Ainge Dunn fucked up” flooded a lot of the draft threads on r/nba.
Then Dunn had a Summer League or Preseason highlight where he nutmegged a player, further pushing the narrative Boston had made a mistake.
From the guys projected in that range I liked Murray the most, JB/Bender were about the same at 2/3 and I was a hard out on Dunn and Buddy
I think a lot of people didn’t like it was there was a ton of smoke around trading it for an All Star … so instead of maybe competing in the East the next year, they took a 19 year old project
Ended up we got our All Star in Free Agency a week later
If memory serves correctly, there was lots of conjecture about moving the pick(and then future Brooklyn picks) for an established star; Paul George and Jimmy Butler being a couple names being thrown out there. I think a lot of fans were convinced those moves were likely and then once we drafted a player it shut the door on that happening.