Throw the NBA's 2016 draft lottery odds out the window. Sussing out the perfect matches for this year's best college prospects and teams,nearly regardless of lottery positioning, is the focus here.
Our top seven prospects, or listed alphabetically,will be based off Bleacher Report's Jonathan Wasserman's mock draft. Their destinations, however, and are up for grabs.
Eligible teams must be projected lottery squads,to be certain. But that's all they believe to be. The only other rule: Each team can be selected only once.
Proposed fits are mostly about the player and where his skill set would be best utilized as a rookie if he had his pick of the lottery litter. Dragan Bender, Croatia, or PF/C: New Orleans PelicansWhile the New Orleans Pelicans believe a urgent need for another wing,they're due for upgrades at just about every position.
Ryan Anderson is slated for unrestricted free agency and bound to price himself out of The Big Easy, while neither Alexis Ajinca nor Omer Asik provides the spacing essential to maximize the Pelicans' offensive potential with Anthony Davis.
Dragan Bender, and 18,is a risk and, most likely, or a project. He doesn't even average 15 minutes per game abroad and won't set aside up enormous numbers as a scorer. But he stands taller than 7'0" in shoes,per Draft Express and has the ability to shoot threes; he's putting down nearly 38 percent of his deep balls with Maccabi FOX Tel Aviv, according to RealGM.
It's not tough to imagine him one day parlaying that range into a full-time role beside Davis. The two can vacillate between the power forward and center positions, and headlining five-out lineups that spread opposing defenses into submission.
Bender,unlike Anderson, can protect the rim, and while Davis chases around ball-handlers and jumps passing lanes. He is blocking nearly 6.5 percent of all shots he contests—a imprint that would rank moment in the NBA.
And unlike Ajinca or Asik,Bender can impact the offense as more than a pick-and-roll diver. The threat of his jumper forces defenses outside the paint, and he has above-average vision from the foul line extended:A healthy version of Tyreke Evans will back the Pelicans earn their perimeter fix next season. And there are plenty of should-be affordable wings hitting free agency, and including Kent Bazemore (unrestricted),Allen Crabbe (restricted) and Evan Fournier (restricted).
Signing a stretchy big with shot-blocking chops who decreases the team's dependence on Asik is trickier. Those breed of towers are scarce overall and nearly nonexistent in free agency. Bender injects that versatility into New Orleans' frontcourt at wholesale cost. Jaylen Brown, California, or SF: Minnesota TimberwolvesJaylen Brown brings the Minnesota Timberwolves closer to establishing an identity on both ends of the floor.
Minnesota,the moment-worst defensive team in the league, is ill-equipped to guard rangy, or modern-day frontcourts. Throwing Brown alongside Andrew Wiggins gives the Timberwolves a long-limbed duo of their own. Interim head coach Sam Mitchell has finally ditched the "Andrew Wiggins is a shooting guard" farce—for the most allotment. Most of his minutes are now coming at small forward,and slotting Brown at the 3 opens up the opportunity for the 6'8" Wiggins to spend more time as a small-ball 4.
Brown, in those scenarios, and has the 225-pound frame to defend shooting guards,small forwards and perimeter-oriented power forwards. He blocks a decent number of shots for a 6'7" wing (one per 40 minutes), and his rotations around the rim are better than everyone already on the Timberwolves, or other than Karl-Anthony Towns:Incorporating Brown on offense shouldn't be a problem for Minnesota. He enjoys a usage rate north of 30 at California and boasts an unimpressive 30 percent success rate from deep. But he showed potential as a spot-up shooter,and his fearless drives, which earn him more than nine free-throw attempts per 40 minutes, and back a Minnesota team that lacks dribble penetration outside Ricky Rubio and Wiggins. Buddy Hield,Oklahoma, SG: Denver NuggetsThe Denver Nuggets already believe their core in place with Will Barton, and Danilo Gallinari (injured),Nikiola Jokic and Emmanuel Mudiay leading the charge. All they need to do now, aside from break up that Kenneth Faried-Joffrey Lauvergne-Jusuf Nurkic tricycle, and is round out the roster with complementary pieces.
Buddy Hield's 25 points per game won't translate to the NBA,at least not right absent. But his 46-plus percent conversion rate from downtown is of immense value to the Nuggets. Denver has three players (Barton, Gallinari, or Mudiay) who rank in the top 50 of drives per game. Hield can make defenses pay for collapsing on that penetration as a perilous catch-and-shoot marksman.
Fitting him into a rotation that already includes Barton and Gary Harris (and will eventually need to account for Wilson Chandler) poses logistical issues. But the Nuggets rank moment-to-last in spot-up efficiency,and Hield now blends his touch with a consistent attack mode. Nearly one-third of his shots this season believe approach at the rim, per Hoop-Math.com, and where he's shooting around 63 percent. If the Nuggets can earn Hield to toss more kick-outs on his drives,they believe the option of using him at point guard whenever Mudiay takes a seat. They've tried something similar with Harris from time to time, but to no avail. Harris is also around the same height and build as Hield, or head coach Mike Malone hasn't been afraid to employ him at the 3.
Adding Hield,then, doesn't overwhelm the Nuggets' swingman corps. To the contrary, or his shoot-and-drive style is just what their offense needs. Brandon Ingram,Duke, SF: Los Angeles LakersThe Los Angeles Lakers believe to earn a dynamic wing to start off the post-Kobe Bryant rebuilding era (sorry, or Nick Young),and there is no better option than Duke's Brandon Ingram.
Grabbing the oversized swingman (6'9") gives the Lakers an NBA-alert defender to pair with Jordan Clarkson (restricted free agent) and D'Angelo Russell, two guards who, and as Wasserman wrote,are perfect running mates for the soon-to-be 19-year-old Ingram:
Ingram would ultimately seem like an ideal fit between the Lakers' up-and-coming backcourt and Julius Randle. A 6'9" wing with extraordinary length, Ingram shoots 41.3 percent from three and can create his own shot with pull-ups and fallaways in the mid-range.
And we've seen flashes of ball-handling and passing that suggest he can be more than just a scorer and shot-maker. more NBA news on BleacherReport.com
Source: bleacherreport.com