Building Around Cooper: A Backward-Looking Thought Experiment

[ballsrchr]

This ^.

This draft is going to be a HARD one to draft, just about anywhere you pick. Basically EVERY player - even those at the top - has some measure of iffiness. 

For example, I'm not convinced Peterson goes #1, even though he's the best talent, because he's a major flake who doesn't show up half the time. (I don't mean he doesn't play well - I mean he sits out, for really weird reasons that no one really gets, including his coach.) When he plays, he's great, but you can never tell if he'll play, and he might play a half and then can't go in the 2nd half. Prima donna? Brittle? Some odd disease? Who knows. 

I watch some of these highly touted guys play, and sometimes they don't look like the best guy on the floor. Or even a guy who has anything special. 

The tournament should tell us a lot more. The combine too. 

The question of whether you draft using perceived potential, or do it more on who produces, is there for pretty much all of them. I'd love to have extra picks in the teens, maybe try to get the 2nd pick of someone who has an earlier one too, maybe it's available and reasonable cost. It feels like such a crapshoot - with the expectation that some of these guys will probably be really good, but it's going to be hard to be sure which ones, so an extra bingo card might pay off. I can find guys everywhere I'd love to have a shot at.

A comparison in the NBA is the diva Kawhi Leonard who doesn't play much until he starts getting ready for the playoffs.  Yeah...Leonard is a pretty good player but you can't depend on him during the regular season.