{"id":703775,"date":"2026-04-07T17:50:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T17:50:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/703775\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T17:50:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T17:50:18","slug":"mikel-brown-jr-declares-for-2026-nba-draft-latest-b-r-mock-draft-landing-spot-for-louisville-star","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/703775\/","title":{"rendered":"Mikel Brown Jr. Declares for 2026 NBA Draft, Latest B\/R Mock Draft Landing Spot for Louisville Star"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Projected top-10 pick Mikel Brown Jr. has declared for the 2026 NBA draft after one season at Louisville.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Brown announced his intention to enter the draft in a Tuesday post on Instagram.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Brown averaged 18.2 points, 4.7 assists and 3.3 rebounds through 21 games while battling a recurring back injury during his freshman college season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">He is projected as the No. 8 pick in Bleacher Report&#8217;s latest 2026 <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/bleacherreport.com\/articles\/25262746-2026-nba-mock-draft\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">NBA mock draft<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Brown played his final game for Louisville on Feb. 28. He was sidelined for the Cardinals&#8217; last six games of the season, including two ACC Tournament contests and two NCAA Tournament games, with his lower back injury.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">He missed a total of 14 games his freshman season with the injury, which Bleacher Report&#8217;s <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/bleacherreport.com\/articles\/25262746-2026-nba-mock-draft\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Jonathan Wasserman<\/a> noted teams &#8220;will have to investigate&#8221; when considering him as a draft target.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">&#8220;Just evaluating his play alone this season, the results were mixed, though he showcased clear NBA type shotmaking and creativity,&#8221; Wasserman wrote.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">He added: &#8220;Between a shot diet consisting of a lot of rushed deep or contested jump shots, and a poor assist-to-turnover ratio, he may have teams picturing more of offensive spark or specialist, rather than a lead guard\/decision-maker.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Wasserman noted Brown recorded 20 points in nine games last season, including a 45-point outing against NC State and back-to-back 29-point games against Baylor and SMU.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Brown was also held below 10 points five times, however, as his shooting rates varied down the stretch of his freshman season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">How highly NBA scouts rate the high points of Brown&#8217;s freshman season, as well as how his injury is evaluated, could both impact how high he lands on boards when the 2026 NBA draft kicks off June 24.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Before then, the order of the top 14 picks will be determined in the May 10 NBA draft lottery. <\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">The Dallas Mavericks currently have the <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tankathon.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">best odds<\/a> to pick at No. 8, although the Mavs&#8217; jump to the top of the 2025 draft despite just 1.8 percent odds show that could change drastically by next month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Projected top-10 pick Mikel Brown Jr. has declared for the 2026 NBA draft after one season at Louisville.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703776,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,6,12],"class_list":{"0":"post-703775","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-draft","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-nba-draft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116364694305584902","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}