Draft Dodging

I will not bore you with yet another mock draft. I took a shot at picking the order, just to see what I could come up with, but its really just no more than some combination of what everyone else is saying. So I’ll spare you that. What I will do is offer some thoughts on the mocks that I’ve seen and what they could mean if they hold any reality.

First of all every draft has a few drop-offs. Typically there is the upper crust (the first 2-3 picks), the solid lottos (4-10), and then its all a crapshoot. This draft seems no different, its just harder to see the lines since we have so little actual information on anyone in the draft. I see Okafor and Howard as the top 2 with Livingston having a shot to be better than both of them. Deng and Iguodala seem to be the best of the rest and the top 10 is rounded out by Gordon, Harris, Childress, Biedrins, and maybe Podkolzine. Then what?

Well, much is being made of Luke Jackson’s meteoric rise to lotto-land. Kirk Snyder has been talked up a lot lately as well. So for the sake of argument, pencil those two in to round us up to 12. Skip forward, and we all know Monya goes to the Jazz and Swift to the Celtics. After that, there is a slew of players that could go anywhere from 16 to 20. Everything is neat and tidy. Except that I skipped number 13. What are the Blazers going to do? The answer is "whatever they want" because they now have 3 picks and don’t have to focus on need. So if the Blazers take a flyer on Monya, will the Jazz take Swift? Will Danny fall all over himself trying to trade up to secure Carrot Top?

Never fear, every year a couple of guys get picked way before they were projected (see Bell, Troy) and push some guys back. JR Smith, Al Jefferson, and Josh Smith are all good candidates for this. Swift will be there when we pick. But if a few of these guys do jump up, that means someone like Snyder or Jackson could slip to us too. I could see Podkolzine slipping too, but who knows if Danny would bite that hook.

Don’t even get me started on the late picks. I kind of hope Wright slips to us at 24, but I’m starting to doubt it. I haven’t read much to get me excited about Khryapa and I’ve never even heard of Kevin Martin, but what do I know? I’m really feeling like Danny will end up with 2 first rounders by the end of the night. And that would suit me just fine.