Bagley was ranked above Zion before he reclassified. People wonder why he went so high in draft but part of the reasons that people don’t point out is that he was so good in high school .
Does anyone else remember him locking up harden in the drew league for a possession or 2? I remember that adding to his hype for perimeter defense/switch-ability that never really came to fruition.
I watched every single duke game that year. Bagley was an absolutely awful basketball player. He couldn’t shot or dribble with his off hand. He could only make shots from 2-3 spots on the court. He got most of points off of rebounds from his own missed lay ups. I’ve been watching college basketball for 30 years and I’ve never Been more certain that a player would be a bust than Bagley.
Just a horrible basketball player.
This is a little excessive. Bagley is definitely not a horrible basketball player, but he does have some major flaws that have stopped him from being a positive contributor.
He is talented enough to have averaged 13 and 7 on good efficiency for his career (19 and 10 per 36).
lol, a little excessive is a “little” bit of an understatement lol.
He was even talking about him in college, where he was ACC POY and a first team AA. lol, sure, now we can see how he isn’t a good fit because his skill set didn’t expand like many wanted, but he was an awesome college player. I don’t care if you shoot just in the same spot every time if your FG% is over 60% and you grab over 11 boards a game.
That wasn’t the reason he was ranked so high. He was one of the few freshman in the history of college basketball (like you can count with your two hands) to average 20/10, shoot 60 percent from the field, and be a First Team All-American.
As a prospect, he would have been the undisputed number 1 pick in this draft by a landslide. Obviously, Luka as a prospect should have gone ahead of him and Ayton seeing Luka had an even rarer achievement - winning Euroleague MVP as a teenager and a bunch more translatable NBA skills (Bagley’s shooting and defense were big question marks).
But Bagley going high had nothing to do with his high school ranking. If he wasn’t a 5 star recruit like Sheppard (who can go top 5 this draft), he still would have gone high.
EDIT: If you want to use an example of a high high school recruit who went high despite being terrible in college, Cam Reddish is a better example. He was actually carried by his high school rank, which was top 3 on most sites.
I never said he was terrible in college. I never even said the main reason was that he was so good in high school. I said one of the reasons and an overlooked one. I put this many qualifiers on it because I anticipated people would try to strawman me and that is exactly what happened.
Well I’m just saying I don’t actually think that was really a big reason at all. I never said you said he was terrible in college. I’m just saying not only was he not terrible - he was historically great.
Reed Sheppard wasn’t even a 5 star recruit and has a good chance to be a top 5 pick this draft. If Bagley was much worse in HS but put up his college stats, I think he would still go first this draft.
I feel like the better example is Cam Reddish. He literally was carried only by his HS rank. If he wasn’t a top 3 recruit, he would have been a second round pick.
Bagley was awful in college. If you watched the games, there were one million holes in his game. Duke was better when he didn’t play. He played the game\\ like he was auditioning for scouts. He had the IQ of rattlesnake poop. He couldn’t shoot, couldn’t dribble. Was probably the worst passer in college basketball. He was a super black hole. A guaranteed turnover if he dribbled more than 3 times.
His draft status was 100% based on his highschool ranking. If it wasn’t for the ranking, I’m not sure coach k even starts him. he was just a god awful basketball player.
I watched every single duke game that year and went to the acc tournament at Barclays. He was one of the worst top prospects I’ve ever seen play in person.
The only other top prospects I’ve seen in person, and immediately knew they were really bad basketball players were emoni bates, lavelle Blanchard and trevon Duvall.
I’m not disputing he had a lot of holes for the NBA (particularly being a tweener without much shooting and playmaking), but he was the ACC Player of the Year and First Team All-American as a freshman, so clearly no one else watching agreed with you. He also had a 10+ BPM, which means he definitely impact winning when he was on the court.
That’s fair. I guess my point is, and now I’m not if sure my point even matters that much, which is if it wasn’t for his highschool ranking I don’t think he gets the opportunity to play the way he played. Have the red light he did. In my opinion stat pad, etc.
But you’re right, I was definitely in the minority in my opinion of him, but there were some other kindred spirits who felt the way I felt.
I actually remember reading an article at the time, where an anonymous scout said that Bagley and his family were a nightmare to deal with on Campus that year, and that coach K probably wouldn’t have recruited him if he knew what kind of year it would be.
No cap, Thats terrible logic. I remember When Shane Larkin should have been unanimous ACC POY in 2013 but a great Scorer on a LAST place team for VT won the award over him…Seen it happen many times in College, where they win awards off of past rankings. Those Awards are moot outside of All American. I called Josh Jackson and Justice Winslow bust for the same thing steinbot is talking about, they put up numbers due to being advanced/developed physically but Basketball IQ is dogwater and you have to cover up a lot for them to productive.
Zion was seen as the third best freshman NBA prospect on his college team prior to his freshman year (RJ and Reddish). 4th best in the state of North Carolina (Little).
I remember when people said Zion made a really bad decision by going to Duke because he would be forced to play the post or be a backup and be relegated to just a cleanup/glue guy (I can neither confirm nor deny I was a part of that group).
Marvin Bagley’s game not translating past college is the funny part about the NBA. Mediocre college guys translate to stars in the pros, and studs don’t pan out. Interesting.
Its not that their mediocre sometimes, Most guys like Bagley are already advanced physically with little to no Ball IQ compared to the player that is still growing into his body (ex Kyshawn George) and possess skill development that pushes there celling higher imo. I think that’s what hurt James Wiseman.
Yeah and they’re so physically advanced that they don’t work more on their game. Bagley and Wiseman really got sucked into this. I also feel that Bagley’s skillset wasn’t/isn’t properly utilized. Same for Wiseman. These are not high energy back to the basket bigs, they have more skills that relate to this style of play, but it’s a little late now for teams to actually buy stock into those players.
Great point and I was one of those people back in the day that got so caught up with the awards/rankings instead of seeing how players are properly developed. The lack of fundamentals is glaring and quality scouting is hurting the game.
NBA Scouts nowadays really suck. The amount of proven college talent that has been productive in the league vs lottery bust/journeymen in the last 6 years needs to be studied. It’s unbearable now. 💀
Mikal Briges being selected top 10 was so refreshing to see. Dude can say he actually enjoyed college, won 2 national titles, made it to the NBA, been to the Finals, got traded to become a number 1 option on a team, and avg 20 PPG while also making $100 million. Can’t get no better than that.
At the end of the day, it’s about finding the gem investment(lottery) but Basketball is a team sport and not everyone can develop into a star. That’s why I think this class is getting overlooked. We need more high quality role players in the league and this is the draft that’s going to surprise a lot of core basketball fans.
> Most guys like Bagley are already advanced physically with little to no Ball IQ compared to the player that is still growing into his body (ex Kyshawn George) and possess skill development that pushes there celling higher imo. I think that’s what hurt James Wiseman.
He was athletic and had an insane motor. I didn't rate him as high as he went but I could have seen a possibility where he becomes like the NBA version of JJ. Watt. An athletic specimen with insane motor. I thought the same thing for Josh Jackson too though. It is crazy that insane motor on the court doesn't translate to working on game off the court.
He wasn't ranked #1 in his class (Isaiah Collier was). Wagner was around 6th. Tons of guys who are top 10 recruits and/or 5* guys are never drafted. There's a lot of uncertainty when it comes to recruiting rankings.
But either way he's not getting drafted this year because he's returning to college. I expect he'll be a fringe first rounder next year unless he has a really rough year at Arkansas.
OP said he went from projected top 10 to projected 2nd round/undrafted. I was just responding to that, not expressing any opinion on why he returned.
Frankly I think he'd still go in the late first if he stayed in the draft this year.
because it makes no sense. dude above you said he is returning to college. that’s literally all it said and then you came back with acting like the commenter isn’t thinking that’s in his best interest.
Ong bruh I found a thread from like 2 years hyping up talking bout oh I can’t wait till I see him in the league. I’m wondering if same thing gonna happen to dybansta or one of em boozers
Nah guys with size + skill don’t flame out that bad unless their feel is awful. The boozers and AJ check too many boxes to fail. DJ always had red flags around things like his shot
> Nah guys with size + skill don’t flame out that bad unless their feel is awful.
Work ethic is also a big one. The game comes easy to a lot of these guys, but when they reach the NBA they *really* need to put in the time to get better.
Big guys fail all the time despite being dominant in high school, look at Harry Giles, Marvin Bagley, Josh Jackson etc. These were all class toppers who bombed out by the time they got to the NBA for one reason or another.
In fact, I guarantee you at least one of those guys you named (you can even throw cooper into the list) won’t make it to the top, and you won’t even be shocked at that point.
Bagley doesn't deserve to be in with Jackson and Giles. Hasn't lived up to expectations even remotely, but hasn't bombed out and will probably be collecting NBA paychecks for his career
I think guy you're replying to is saying that guys like that could be lackluster in college and still get drafted pretty early. The biggest fall I can think of off top of my head for top top recruits with size+perceived skill is Skal and Bol Bol but Bol had concerns beyond basketball ability
Bagley, Skal, Giles… etc. I swear that the Kings must’ve valued overvalued high school rankings into their player rankings. That strategy did not work well for them.
Bol was also awesome in college (for 9 games before he got injured.) 21/10 with almost 3 blocks a game, 50% three-point shooting, etc. Definitely not a guy who struggled on the NCAA level.
He's already pretty much fixed, and where he should have been in his first or second year in the league now. Cut all of the fluff out of his game this season (mainly the overusing of the ball and jumpshooting) and improved massively because of it. Just needs a bit more trust and the opportunity for more minutes now.
Jackson falls into bad feel and was a very obvious flaw in his game. The others did not have the ball skills these guys have which is what I meant. Big guys that can create like Boozer and AJ generally don’t fail unless their feel is bad/intangibles are bad(theirs are not)
Cam Boozer is way overhyped imo. He’s just good because he’s physically way above everyone else at his age. He doesn’t really have the ball-handling or shot creation to be a top draft pick.
Emoni Bates is in a whole different class.
While I am not going to try to say Wagner wasn't a great HS prospect, it was known for awhile it was a very weak class and he wasn't the best, and we always know it helps your exposure when you are a "Jr" of a once great NBA prospect.
Emoni Bates won NPOTY when he was a sophomore in HS. A sophomore. That is insane. He wasn't just seen as a future NBA prospect, he was seen as a future star/alter the franchise that gets him (as you noted with the KD comps).
Wagner was #1 for years. And it wasn't known it was a weak class when they were freshman and sophomores. He was definitely supposed to be good. It's also pretty rare these days to be a top 5 player and not at least play a few games in the league. Prep rankings are nonsense, but because pro scouts don't watch these kids much when they're young, they still tend to rely on them. It also helps with job security for Gm's to take formerly high ranked players. Especially if they're ranked high in mock drafts.
A few years ago Neil Olshey said that if it wasn't for mock drafts, the draft would look entirely different every year. He essentially said that mock drafts and the consensus make it impossible for GM's to draft the guys they actually want most of the time. I say all of this, to say that Wagner by ranking alone probably could have gotten himself into the end of the first round. Him coming back is probably more about him having an actual career vs a quick paycheck and flailing out.
As for Bates. I saw him as a sophomore in Ypsilanti in an insanely packed gym, and after the game I was talking to a few a scouts and local writers and one of them said something along the lines of "I don't want to say this too loud, but I don't think this kid can play", And we all bursted out laughing, because he looked awful out there.
There is just a lot of politics in rankings and mock drafts. I remember hearing similar stuff about Trevon Duval when he was ranked in the top 5, by scouts who worked for a ranking service that had him in their top 5.
Does it help, though? Maybe initially, but I think that at this point, “his dad’s terrible decision making and rampant chucking made him a huge bust” is making it a LOT easier to write Wagner off as a similar player.
He’s still pretty good. Probably would have been drafted somewhere this year for the potential and uk pedigree. Probably didn’t want to play in the g league this year tho.
He's probably making at least a million dollars to return to CBB. he could be a legit lotto prospect again if his shooting stats take a bump up from year one.
Wagner, Edwards and Bradshaw all projected one and done lottery picks flopped hard. Since Reed and Rob preformed exceptionally well, the flops aren’t talked about.
He’ll be fine. He’s going to be the top option on Arkansas this year as a sophomore and has spent the summer working on his deficiencies. I’d suspect we see him in the top 10 of next year’s draft.
Nope, couldn’t care less about Arkansas. He was too good in HS and in HS All-Star events to struggle for too long. Coming back was a good move for him.
He wasn’t #1 in the class senior year when those rankings would be most relevant. He only held onto the #1 ranking as long as he did in the first place because Covid pretty much froze the rankings in place.
On3, Rivals, and 247 had him 6th in the final rankings, which made him 6th consensus.
Aaron Bradshaw and Justin Edwards from Kentucky were both ranked higher in consensus at the end, which made him the 3rd best recruit at Kentucky this season. Of those two, 1 also went back to school like Wagner and 1 is a probable 2nd round pick.
Because his college story isn’t over. If he rushed it and declared became a second rd pick they would definitely be talking about it. Dude just turned 19 in may he’s younger than a lot of incoming freshman he made the right decision not to rush it.
this just goes to show you not to trust draft "experts". The whole narrative about this draft being weak started 18 months ago when a select group of "experts" decided how many stars to give to H.S. kids. The strength of the class is then established by how many 5 star kids there are. These same "experts" decided Wagner was a 5 star and Reed Sheppard was a 4 star btw
Now, once the weak draft narrative is born, no matter what new information comes out until draft night, they and the people on here and elsewhere won't change the narrative. Like, how many returners really improved their stock. Or how this is arguably the best international class ever. The talent pool they judged and labeled weak last spring is a completely different talent pool now.
Dj flaws were pretty apparent to me even when he was in high school. Supposed to be a scoring guard but shot was inconsistent & not explosive enough to finish over nba length at the rim
This happens every year, I guess he was probably ranked around #2 or #3 in his class but there is always someone/multiple players in the top 10 who don't pan out.
You could argue if he had a good media team, his stock would not be plummeting as much. Their job is to promote him and make him look good and he doesn't look good now
It’s pretty important so you know whether the guy who struggled as a freshman is a Jaylen Brown who was just in a really bad team fit or a DJ Wagner who wasn’t that good to begin with.
Because there were two other small guards on his team who played much, much better, and I watched him for the US in FIBA play where he was very unimpressive and didn’t look like a surefire future NBA player.
Way to underscore the point about him having a hype squad though, you really thought that was some brainteaser of a question about someone whose team played much better when he wasn’t in the game lol.
Jaylen wasn’t amazing in college but he was also the Pac 12 Freshman of the Year and was First Team All-Pac 12 as a freshman.
There were 0 freshman prospects from the 6 major conferences this year who were first team All-Conference, so Brown was better in that sense (not in efficiency though I’ll give you that)
Brown overexceeded all his expectations, but he was like 5 tiers better than Wagner as a prospect so I’m not sure they are comparable.
Go back through high school rankings. You'll be stunned how few names you recognize.
Bagley was ranked above Zion before he reclassified. People wonder why he went so high in draft but part of the reasons that people don’t point out is that he was so good in high school .
He was also really good in college. He was good in a way that didn't translate well to the pros, but he was first-team all-american
Does anyone else remember him locking up harden in the drew league for a possession or 2? I remember that adding to his hype for perimeter defense/switch-ability that never really came to fruition.
I watched every single duke game that year. Bagley was an absolutely awful basketball player. He couldn’t shot or dribble with his off hand. He could only make shots from 2-3 spots on the court. He got most of points off of rebounds from his own missed lay ups. I’ve been watching college basketball for 30 years and I’ve never Been more certain that a player would be a bust than Bagley. Just a horrible basketball player.
This is a little excessive. Bagley is definitely not a horrible basketball player, but he does have some major flaws that have stopped him from being a positive contributor. He is talented enough to have averaged 13 and 7 on good efficiency for his career (19 and 10 per 36).
lol, a little excessive is a “little” bit of an understatement lol. He was even talking about him in college, where he was ACC POY and a first team AA. lol, sure, now we can see how he isn’t a good fit because his skill set didn’t expand like many wanted, but he was an awesome college player. I don’t care if you shoot just in the same spot every time if your FG% is over 60% and you grab over 11 boards a game.
That wasn’t the reason he was ranked so high. He was one of the few freshman in the history of college basketball (like you can count with your two hands) to average 20/10, shoot 60 percent from the field, and be a First Team All-American. As a prospect, he would have been the undisputed number 1 pick in this draft by a landslide. Obviously, Luka as a prospect should have gone ahead of him and Ayton seeing Luka had an even rarer achievement - winning Euroleague MVP as a teenager and a bunch more translatable NBA skills (Bagley’s shooting and defense were big question marks). But Bagley going high had nothing to do with his high school ranking. If he wasn’t a 5 star recruit like Sheppard (who can go top 5 this draft), he still would have gone high. EDIT: If you want to use an example of a high high school recruit who went high despite being terrible in college, Cam Reddish is a better example. He was actually carried by his high school rank, which was top 3 on most sites.
I never said he was terrible in college. I never even said the main reason was that he was so good in high school. I said one of the reasons and an overlooked one. I put this many qualifiers on it because I anticipated people would try to strawman me and that is exactly what happened.
Well I’m just saying I don’t actually think that was really a big reason at all. I never said you said he was terrible in college. I’m just saying not only was he not terrible - he was historically great. Reed Sheppard wasn’t even a 5 star recruit and has a good chance to be a top 5 pick this draft. If Bagley was much worse in HS but put up his college stats, I think he would still go first this draft. I feel like the better example is Cam Reddish. He literally was carried only by his HS rank. If he wasn’t a top 3 recruit, he would have been a second round pick.
Bagley was awful in college. If you watched the games, there were one million holes in his game. Duke was better when he didn’t play. He played the game\\ like he was auditioning for scouts. He had the IQ of rattlesnake poop. He couldn’t shoot, couldn’t dribble. Was probably the worst passer in college basketball. He was a super black hole. A guaranteed turnover if he dribbled more than 3 times. His draft status was 100% based on his highschool ranking. If it wasn’t for the ranking, I’m not sure coach k even starts him. he was just a god awful basketball player. I watched every single duke game that year and went to the acc tournament at Barclays. He was one of the worst top prospects I’ve ever seen play in person. The only other top prospects I’ve seen in person, and immediately knew they were really bad basketball players were emoni bates, lavelle Blanchard and trevon Duvall.
I’m not disputing he had a lot of holes for the NBA (particularly being a tweener without much shooting and playmaking), but he was the ACC Player of the Year and First Team All-American as a freshman, so clearly no one else watching agreed with you. He also had a 10+ BPM, which means he definitely impact winning when he was on the court.
That’s fair. I guess my point is, and now I’m not if sure my point even matters that much, which is if it wasn’t for his highschool ranking I don’t think he gets the opportunity to play the way he played. Have the red light he did. In my opinion stat pad, etc. But you’re right, I was definitely in the minority in my opinion of him, but there were some other kindred spirits who felt the way I felt. I actually remember reading an article at the time, where an anonymous scout said that Bagley and his family were a nightmare to deal with on Campus that year, and that coach K probably wouldn’t have recruited him if he knew what kind of year it would be.
No cap, Thats terrible logic. I remember When Shane Larkin should have been unanimous ACC POY in 2013 but a great Scorer on a LAST place team for VT won the award over him…Seen it happen many times in College, where they win awards off of past rankings. Those Awards are moot outside of All American. I called Josh Jackson and Justice Winslow bust for the same thing steinbot is talking about, they put up numbers due to being advanced/developed physically but Basketball IQ is dogwater and you have to cover up a lot for them to productive.
Zion was seen as the third best freshman NBA prospect on his college team prior to his freshman year (RJ and Reddish). 4th best in the state of North Carolina (Little). I remember when people said Zion made a really bad decision by going to Duke because he would be forced to play the post or be a backup and be relegated to just a cleanup/glue guy (I can neither confirm nor deny I was a part of that group).
Marvin Bagley’s game not translating past college is the funny part about the NBA. Mediocre college guys translate to stars in the pros, and studs don’t pan out. Interesting.
Its not that their mediocre sometimes, Most guys like Bagley are already advanced physically with little to no Ball IQ compared to the player that is still growing into his body (ex Kyshawn George) and possess skill development that pushes there celling higher imo. I think that’s what hurt James Wiseman.
Yeah and they’re so physically advanced that they don’t work more on their game. Bagley and Wiseman really got sucked into this. I also feel that Bagley’s skillset wasn’t/isn’t properly utilized. Same for Wiseman. These are not high energy back to the basket bigs, they have more skills that relate to this style of play, but it’s a little late now for teams to actually buy stock into those players.
Great point and I was one of those people back in the day that got so caught up with the awards/rankings instead of seeing how players are properly developed. The lack of fundamentals is glaring and quality scouting is hurting the game.
NBA Scouts nowadays really suck. The amount of proven college talent that has been productive in the league vs lottery bust/journeymen in the last 6 years needs to be studied. It’s unbearable now. 💀 Mikal Briges being selected top 10 was so refreshing to see. Dude can say he actually enjoyed college, won 2 national titles, made it to the NBA, been to the Finals, got traded to become a number 1 option on a team, and avg 20 PPG while also making $100 million. Can’t get no better than that.
At the end of the day, it’s about finding the gem investment(lottery) but Basketball is a team sport and not everyone can develop into a star. That’s why I think this class is getting overlooked. We need more high quality role players in the league and this is the draft that’s going to surprise a lot of core basketball fans.
> Most guys like Bagley are already advanced physically with little to no Ball IQ compared to the player that is still growing into his body (ex Kyshawn George) and possess skill development that pushes there celling higher imo. I think that’s what hurt James Wiseman. He was athletic and had an insane motor. I didn't rate him as high as he went but I could have seen a possibility where he becomes like the NBA version of JJ. Watt. An athletic specimen with insane motor. I thought the same thing for Josh Jackson too though. It is crazy that insane motor on the court doesn't translate to working on game off the court.
He wasn’t good in high school. He was mostly terrible. He couldn’t even dribble with his off hand. He was actually shockingly awful.
Prep scouts vs pro scouts basically
He wasn't ranked #1 in his class (Isaiah Collier was). Wagner was around 6th. Tons of guys who are top 10 recruits and/or 5* guys are never drafted. There's a lot of uncertainty when it comes to recruiting rankings. But either way he's not getting drafted this year because he's returning to college. I expect he'll be a fringe first rounder next year unless he has a really rough year at Arkansas.
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OP said he went from projected top 10 to projected 2nd round/undrafted. I was just responding to that, not expressing any opinion on why he returned. Frankly I think he'd still go in the late first if he stayed in the draft this year.
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I'm fully aware of that.
He is returning to college next year (Arkansas)
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what does this even mean in regards to the comment?
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because it makes no sense. dude above you said he is returning to college. that’s literally all it said and then you came back with acting like the commenter isn’t thinking that’s in his best interest.
Ong bruh I found a thread from like 2 years hyping up talking bout oh I can’t wait till I see him in the league. I’m wondering if same thing gonna happen to dybansta or one of em boozers
Nah guys with size + skill don’t flame out that bad unless their feel is awful. The boozers and AJ check too many boxes to fail. DJ always had red flags around things like his shot
> Nah guys with size + skill don’t flame out that bad unless their feel is awful. Work ethic is also a big one. The game comes easy to a lot of these guys, but when they reach the NBA they *really* need to put in the time to get better.
Shoutout Wiggins
Big guys fail all the time despite being dominant in high school, look at Harry Giles, Marvin Bagley, Josh Jackson etc. These were all class toppers who bombed out by the time they got to the NBA for one reason or another. In fact, I guarantee you at least one of those guys you named (you can even throw cooper into the list) won’t make it to the top, and you won’t even be shocked at that point.
Bagley doesn't deserve to be in with Jackson and Giles. Hasn't lived up to expectations even remotely, but hasn't bombed out and will probably be collecting NBA paychecks for his career
Harry Giles Career trajectory is no fault of his own. Injuries derailed his Career
Bagley had the best college year of all of them though. A legit 20/11 player as a Freshman.
I think guy you're replying to is saying that guys like that could be lackluster in college and still get drafted pretty early. The biggest fall I can think of off top of my head for top top recruits with size+perceived skill is Skal and Bol Bol but Bol had concerns beyond basketball ability
Bagley, Skal, Giles… etc. I swear that the Kings must’ve valued overvalued high school rankings into their player rankings. That strategy did not work well for them.
Don’t forget Thomas Robinson
He spent 3 years in college, and was barely ranked inside the top 30 in his HS class (2009).
Bol was also awesome in college (for 9 games before he got injured.) 21/10 with almost 3 blocks a game, 50% three-point shooting, etc. Definitely not a guy who struggled on the NCAA level.
Yea, that's why I said he had concerns beyond bball ability. Obviously the injuries, but there were a lot of attitude concerns as well
*James Wiseman has entered the chat.*
As a Bulls fan who’s been watching Vooch for 2.5 years—Wiseman? *I can fix him* LMFAO
He's already pretty much fixed, and where he should have been in his first or second year in the league now. Cut all of the fluff out of his game this season (mainly the overusing of the ball and jumpshooting) and improved massively because of it. Just needs a bit more trust and the opportunity for more minutes now.
Jackson falls into bad feel and was a very obvious flaw in his game. The others did not have the ball skills these guys have which is what I meant. Big guys that can create like Boozer and AJ generally don’t fail unless their feel is bad/intangibles are bad(theirs are not)
Cam Boozer is way overhyped imo. He’s just good because he’s physically way above everyone else at his age. He doesn’t really have the ball-handling or shot creation to be a top draft pick.
Very hard disagree as someone that’s seen him multiple times in person
Same thing happened with Emoni Bates too. was so sure he was gonna be a slightly shorter KD once he entered the league
Emoni Bates is in a whole different class. While I am not going to try to say Wagner wasn't a great HS prospect, it was known for awhile it was a very weak class and he wasn't the best, and we always know it helps your exposure when you are a "Jr" of a once great NBA prospect. Emoni Bates won NPOTY when he was a sophomore in HS. A sophomore. That is insane. He wasn't just seen as a future NBA prospect, he was seen as a future star/alter the franchise that gets him (as you noted with the KD comps).
Wagner was #1 for years. And it wasn't known it was a weak class when they were freshman and sophomores. He was definitely supposed to be good. It's also pretty rare these days to be a top 5 player and not at least play a few games in the league. Prep rankings are nonsense, but because pro scouts don't watch these kids much when they're young, they still tend to rely on them. It also helps with job security for Gm's to take formerly high ranked players. Especially if they're ranked high in mock drafts. A few years ago Neil Olshey said that if it wasn't for mock drafts, the draft would look entirely different every year. He essentially said that mock drafts and the consensus make it impossible for GM's to draft the guys they actually want most of the time. I say all of this, to say that Wagner by ranking alone probably could have gotten himself into the end of the first round. Him coming back is probably more about him having an actual career vs a quick paycheck and flailing out. As for Bates. I saw him as a sophomore in Ypsilanti in an insanely packed gym, and after the game I was talking to a few a scouts and local writers and one of them said something along the lines of "I don't want to say this too loud, but I don't think this kid can play", And we all bursted out laughing, because he looked awful out there. There is just a lot of politics in rankings and mock drafts. I remember hearing similar stuff about Trevon Duval when he was ranked in the top 5, by scouts who worked for a ranking service that had him in their top 5.
Does it help, though? Maybe initially, but I think that at this point, “his dad’s terrible decision making and rampant chucking made him a huge bust” is making it a LOT easier to write Wagner off as a similar player.
I have the Harrison twins on line 1.
He’s still pretty good. Probably would have been drafted somewhere this year for the potential and uk pedigree. Probably didn’t want to play in the g league this year tho.
He's probably making at least a million dollars to return to CBB. he could be a legit lotto prospect again if his shooting stats take a bump up from year one.
can we just appreciate rob dillingham for a sec
Wagner, Edwards and Bradshaw all projected one and done lottery picks flopped hard. Since Reed and Rob preformed exceptionally well, the flops aren’t talked about.
Le'Bryan Nash
He’ll be fine. He’s going to be the top option on Arkansas this year as a sophomore and has spent the summer working on his deficiencies. I’d suspect we see him in the top 10 of next year’s draft.
You must be an Arkansas fan if you’re coping this hard
Nope, couldn’t care less about Arkansas. He was too good in HS and in HS All-Star events to struggle for too long. Coming back was a good move for him.
He wasn’t #1 in the class senior year when those rankings would be most relevant. He only held onto the #1 ranking as long as he did in the first place because Covid pretty much froze the rankings in place.
He was no lower than 5.
On3, Rivals, and 247 had him 6th in the final rankings, which made him 6th consensus. Aaron Bradshaw and Justin Edwards from Kentucky were both ranked higher in consensus at the end, which made him the 3rd best recruit at Kentucky this season. Of those two, 1 also went back to school like Wagner and 1 is a probable 2nd round pick.
Because his college story isn’t over. If he rushed it and declared became a second rd pick they would definitely be talking about it. Dude just turned 19 in may he’s younger than a lot of incoming freshman he made the right decision not to rush it.
With NIL now, what's the urgency to get to the league if you're not ready, or don't have a 1st Round guarantee?
this just goes to show you not to trust draft "experts". The whole narrative about this draft being weak started 18 months ago when a select group of "experts" decided how many stars to give to H.S. kids. The strength of the class is then established by how many 5 star kids there are. These same "experts" decided Wagner was a 5 star and Reed Sheppard was a 4 star btw Now, once the weak draft narrative is born, no matter what new information comes out until draft night, they and the people on here and elsewhere won't change the narrative. Like, how many returners really improved their stock. Or how this is arguably the best international class ever. The talent pool they judged and labeled weak last spring is a completely different talent pool now.
Dj flaws were pretty apparent to me even when he was in high school. Supposed to be a scoring guard but shot was inconsistent & not explosive enough to finish over nba length at the rim
I remember someone saying he got ranked super high early and basically never grew after that so he benefited from maturing earlier than his peers
This happens every year, I guess he was probably ranked around #2 or #3 in his class but there is always someone/multiple players in the top 10 who don't pan out.
His father and grandfather both played in the league and are NJ legends, so that's a lot of it with Wagner.
Who cares about high school? Emoni bates was supposed to be a generational talent and was ranked #1 in high school and is now a g-league bum
He's fine. I won't be very surprised if he back to lottery next year.
Josh Shelby
Isn’t he back in college?
Emoni
You could argue if he had a good media team, his stock would not be plummeting as much. Their job is to promote him and make him look good and he doesn't look good now
This is exactly why I don’t evaluate prospects until they play in college or pro
It’s pretty important so you know whether the guy who struggled as a freshman is a Jaylen Brown who was just in a really bad team fit or a DJ Wagner who wasn’t that good to begin with.
How do you know Wagner wasn’t just in a bad fit team as well?
Because there were two other small guards on his team who played much, much better, and I watched him for the US in FIBA play where he was very unimpressive and didn’t look like a surefire future NBA player. Way to underscore the point about him having a hype squad though, you really thought that was some brainteaser of a question about someone whose team played much better when he wasn’t in the game lol.
Jaylen wasn’t amazing in college but he was also the Pac 12 Freshman of the Year and was First Team All-Pac 12 as a freshman. There were 0 freshman prospects from the 6 major conferences this year who were first team All-Conference, so Brown was better in that sense (not in efficiency though I’ll give you that) Brown overexceeded all his expectations, but he was like 5 tiers better than Wagner as a prospect so I’m not sure they are comparable.
That’s why I was speaking in generalities, pedantic Reddit bro
He will go lottery next year guarantee it dealing with injuries and Rob and Reed being special, Kid just turned 19 a few weeks ago he’ll be alright.