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Following potential 2015 draftees

Enes CanTear You Apart said:
I was at the game. Poythress had 5 rbs but he was indeed very good.

And I just snatched a copy of the boxscore paper from one of my friends at the scorers table.

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You gotta prob, Enes?
 
PKM said:
Behind Anthony Davis and before that Josh Harrellson decided to become a badass.

Maybe you don't know.. but UK is the best cbb team, ever.
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I was just joking with that question. He was pressing big time like he wanted to show Kentucky's coaches what they were missing or something by making him ride the pine. And every time he tried to do too much, one of your young bigs put him in place. Though he looked occasionally athletic, had a couple of nice recovery blocks, and showed some decent skills from time-to-time.....so I wouldn't doubt that he could've done some damage in college if he would've played somewhere that's a tier below Kentucky.
 
An amazing stat about these exhibition games.. everyone averaged 20 minutes per game.. with UK having team A and team B play 4, 5 minute stretches each.

Team A
AnHarrison
AaHarrison
Booker
Poythress
Johnson

TeamB
Ulis
Hawkins
Willis
Lee
Towns

Team A only averaged 4 more points per game.
the two teams tied in rebounding, blocks, and assists.

Scary thing (for opponents) is team b consists of two end of the bench guys (Willis and Hawkins) that are going to be replaced by two studs in WCS and Lyles.

Calipari may stick with the platooning this year and just wear teams out... I don't see any separation (or much at all) between 1 thru 10.

I could see the teams going forward as;
AnHarrison
AaHarrison
Poythress
Towns
WCS

and

Ulis (no drop off from Andrew)
Booker (little drop off from Aaron)
Lee (totally different from Poythress)
Lyles (similar to Towns.. actually ranked higher coming out of HS)
Johnson (no drop off from WCS)
 
How come ESPN.com and the like pretend these games don't exist? You have to dig up weird box scores and stuff that somebody took a picture of. Apparently there are like 15 teams besides Kentucky that have been playing in the Bahamas and....who knew? North Carolina lost to some bum *** Dominican Republic pro team......I didn't know until 5 days later. I think these games are interesting enough.
 
Duck Rodgers said:
How come ESPN.com and the like pretend these games don't exist? You have to dig up weird box scores and stuff that somebody took a picture of. Apparently there are like 15 teams besides Kentucky that have been playing in the Bahamas and....who knew? North Carolina lost to some bum *** Dominican Republic pro team......I didn't know until 5 days later. I think these games are interesting enough.
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Dumb NCAA rules. You can play them but can't 'share' the stats.
yeah, UNC got beat by a team that Ohio State beat by 51. Weird. UNC will be good this year.
 
Well, since Utah has so many second round draft picks let me introduce a player of my country, who is projected in some mock drafts to be in the second round of next year's draft.

That's Aleksandar Vezenkov. He's a 19 year old, 6'9'' small/power forward whose best attribute is his shooting... and he's a leftie. He's the son of one of the prominent Bulgarian basketball directors Sasho Vezenkov. He grew up in Cyprus and has never played in Bulgaria, he started his career in the Greek Aris a couple of years ago. Last year he declared for Xavier University, but later decided to stay in Europe and turn pro. He's been dominating the FIBA U16, U18 and U20 European championships for the past 5 years or so. In 2011's U16 FIBA Euro Championship he averaged 27 and 10. In 2013 he lead the U18 FIBA Euro Championship in both points and rebounds with 22.4 and 10.2 respectively, and just a month or so ago he repeated the same feat this time at the U20 Championship with 19.3pts and 11.2 rebs per game. He's been playing for a weak Bulgaria national team but still his high usage comes with pretty high efficiency. He also made the first team of the tournament. In all his international play he averages about 50%FG, 40% 3p FG and about 80% FT.

Last year he played for the Greek Aris in the first Greek basketball division and got a lot of playing minutes averaging 11.1pt, 6rb, 2.1 ast, 0.9 steals in 26 minutes of play as an 18 year old. His shooting %s were 49/39/76.

For the past month or so he's been with Bulgaria's Men national team, playing qualies for Euro Championship. He's been the leader of the team there as well, which was really surprising to me. I didn't believe his transition would be so seamless. He's averaging 17pts, 6rb, 2 assists in about 33 minutes of play(%s are 51/38/83). Last week he dropped 18 on Omri Casspi and today he had a 26 pt game vs the Netherlands. He's been getting better with every game, too.

His strengths are his shooting and rebounding, he seems to have very good basketball IQ as well, he's willing and able passer as well. Main weaknesses are his athleticism, quickness and on-man defense. Here's a scouting report that was published on him yesterday:
https://upsidemotor.com/2014/08/19/aleksandar-vezenkov-scouting-2014/
Aleksandar Vezenkov Scouting Report: August 2014
Posted on August 19, 2014 by Rafael Uehara

Aleksandar Vezenkov did what was expected of him in the European Championships U20 last month. He logged 704 minutes against grown men in 25 appearances for Aris in the Greek league last season, so he should have dominated his age group once he stepped down a level. But it was mighty impressive nonetheless. Vezenkov scored 174 points in 323 minutes, meaning he actually dropped a point every other minute. And that’s with him missing three quarters of his 53 three-point attempts, which is actually his best skill.

The six-foot-eight combo forward is a gunner who does most of his damage from beyond the arc. Over half of his shots were from three-point range in the Greek league and he hit them at a 38.4% clip while averaging over two makes per 36 minutes. Vezenkov has very good mechanics and a quick trigger off the catch. Like most left-handed shooters, he doesn’t angle his body straight towards the basket but rather on a 45-degree angle. Good elevation leads to a high release point that makes it hard for opponents to contest his shot effectively.

Vezenkov was played as a stretch four at Aris. He got a chance to run a pick-and-roll here and there but mostly screened for the pick-and-pop (poorly; doesn’t look to draw contact but rather focuses on slipping towards a shooting spot too quickly) and spaced the defense as a spot up threat. He is able to put the ball on the floor and attack closeouts, but possesses an average first step, isn’t quick even on straight line drives and still isn’t consistent dribbling the ball lower than hip level, which makes him susceptible to getting stripped in traffic; his 15.8% turnover rate is rather high in the context of his 18.1% usage rate.

Vezenkov was still a very effective player off the bounce, though, due to his pull-up shooting and finishing touch at rim level the times he was able to get to the basket, where he proved himself able to finish around length. Only two of his 204 attempts were blocked and he finished 63% of his two-point attempts. Most of them were of the jump-shot variety, which led to a low free throw rate (he averaged just 1.8 foul shots per 28 minutes) but Vezenkov was so prolific at them that he ranked in the top 20 among all players in offensive rating, according to RealGM.com.

He has proven himself a very willing passer, both making the extra pass out of dribble penetration and entering the ball to the post facing the defense from the perimeter. His 16.8% led the Greek league in assist rate among power forwards. Vezenkov did well from the post in the European Championships U20 but smaller opponents were able to front and successfully deny him the ball at the pro level. When he got the ball, Vezenkov flashed a turnaround, fadeaway that could become a money maker. Spending the vast majority of his time away from the lane at Aris, he was a non-factor on the offensive glass.

He’s a poor individual defender due to limited foot speed. Vezenkov can bend his knees and get on his stance but lacks lateral mobility to defend in isolation and offers very little resistance in space. He was a tougher defender on the post than on the perimeter, where he was unable to contain dribble penetration through contact despite his frame. Vezenkov was not an asset in rim protection (blocking just three shots in the Greek league and zero in the European Championships U20) or playing the passing lane to manufacture turnovers and struggled to closeout on shooters. He was, however, very active on the glass, controlling almost 20% of opponents’ misses when he was on the floor.

Ultimately, Vezenkov is probably more of a potential European star than an NBA player right now. Down the road, Vezenkov may be able to make the NBA as a spot-up shooting threat from the combo forward position in the way that Kostas Papanikolaou will hope to help the Rockets this season. Given that, right now Vezenkov profiles as a good second round prospect for someone to take a chance on.
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A lot of people say he's playing style is more suited to the Euroleague than to the NBA, but he's said on numerous of occasions that his goal is NBA and he believes in due time it will happen. In the DraftExpress mock draft he's listed in the second round in 2015.
Here are a few vids of him.

Highlights of his U18 tournament:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dp6fiJ_Ngkk
 
Highlights of his game(19pts) against Euroleague champion Olympiakos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4pyou7OD3M
 
^^^^^ Oh man, those Olympiakos uniforms are hard on the eyes.

As for Venzenkov, he definitely looks like his ceiling would be that Bonner/Novak range. Are there any foreigners that play that kind of spot role in the NBA currently? It seems like if they aren't above average, they usually go home pretty quickly rather than stick around to score 6 pts/game or whatever.
 
His attitude and intangibles seem pretty strong. He usually plays great against the better teams. He had great games both against Olympiakos and Panathinaikos last season and to me it seems like his ambition is to be more than a Bonner type of player. I doubt he would stick in the NBA for such a role. Unfortunately, his athleticism is a bit underwhelming, otherwise he's a smart player who can shoot. If he can develop a bit of quickness and improves his defense, I think his ceiling is something like... Mike Miller, they are pretty similar actually - they aren't good defenders, their blocks numbers are underwhelming, no offensive rebounding, but good at the defensive glass. They are good shooters with high and quick release. I am not sure his athleticism is quite there, but yah... that I think is a good ceiling for him.
 
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