March 20, 2008

Draft Watching - Thursday Games


Supposedly the NCAA tournament begins tonight, but since this web log is concerned with the NBA, perhaps you’d be interested in the draft prospects you can get a chance to look at today.

12:25 EST – Portland State vs. Kansas
Kansas features two projected first round picks in Darrell Arthur and Mario Chalmers, plus two second round picks in Brandon Rush and Darnell Jackson. Portland State is named after a state that isn’t really a state.

4:40 EST – Cornell vs. Stanford
Brook Lopez is a likely lottery pick, but his twin brother Robin isn’t projected anywhere in the draft, plus he has the girlier name. However, Robin sports a lot of curly hair, which the ladies love (trust me). You win some, you lose some I guess.

7:10 EST – Kansas State vs. USC
This is big like Oprah off her diet. Michael Beasley, 2008’s presumed number one pick, faces OJ Mayo, another likely lottery selection. Even though these guys won’t guard each other unless they switch off their man during a possession, expect everybody to go crazy over this match-up of freshman phenoms. Also watch for KSU’s Bill Walker and USC’s Taj Gibson, possible second round picks.

7:10 EST – Belmont vs. Duke
DeMarcus Nelson is maybe, kinda, sorta a second round pick. But he’s a random Duke swingman, so he’ll do nothing in the NBA (see Chris Carrawell, Roshown McLeod, and Dahntay Jones).

7:20 EST – Winthrop vs. Washington State
Washington State’s guards (Kyle Weaver and Derrick Low) are each expected to be chosen in the first and second round respectively. There are a lot of Ws in this entry.

7:25 EST – Texas A&M vs. BYU
With the amazing success of recent draft selections Acie Law IV (A&M) and Rafael Araujo (BYU), teams will be falling all over themselves to draft the stars from these two teams. A&M’s DeAndre Jordan is projected as a lottery pick while his foil Trent Plaisted is expected to be chosen in the second round.

9:30 EST – Arizona vs. West Virginia
Point guard Jerryd Bayless of Arizona is probably going top 10, despite the horrific spelling of his first name. For some reason, fellow name casualty Chase Budinger dropped off NBADraft.net’s board while still being top 15 at Draft Express. Possibly because of his goatee.

9:40 EST Mississippi Valley State vs. UCLA
Blowtorch endorsed UCLA features 4 future NBAsters, 3 of which (Kevin Love, Russell Westbrook, Darren Collison) could go in the first round. Luc Richard Mbah a Moute is projected as a second round draft pick, but his name should vault him in to the lottery.



The picture? One of the first Google image results for "draft watching." I don't get it either.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I see you only checked the 2008 draft on both draftexpress and nbadraft. There are players going today that are listed on the 2009 list (those sites think they won't come out until then) like Robin Lopez and Joe Alexander.

Good effort and I hope you check both lists tomorrow. The safest thing to do is to check under the 'school' section under draft express. You won't go wrong doing that.

Trey said...

I did only check this year. Thanks for the heads up.

Unknown said...

Nice post, very useful.

FYI: Robin was voted SML's #1 "Most Gender Ambigious Name" of the year, beating out Leslie, Terry and Sidney. It's not "girly", it's "gender neutral".

Anonymous said...

On NBADraft.net, it has Budinger and Robin Lopez going in the lottery of the 09 draft. Just giving you a heads up.