Handlogten's Heros
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He got a promotion and has been really busy at work.
Following Potential 2025 Draftees
- Thread starter Elizah Huge
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What I like about VJ is that I love pretty much every player in that archetype. I'd like it if he was Oldaipo, but I also like Derrick White, Suggs, Nembhard, Melton etc. Obviously you want an all star with a top 5 pick, but it doesn't hurt he's very likely to be one of those role players that you can't take off the court in the playoffs.
Gun to my head, I think Tre is slightly more likely to be an all star....but it's not to a significant to degree. I also think there's a scenario where Tre is an all star, VJ is not, but VJ is that guy you really want on your playoff team. Kind of like Derrick White vs Tyler Herro. If Herro is better for your team, your team probably isn't competing for a title anyways. VJ is a guy where I don't think you will ever question if his value is winning value if that makes sense.
Whichever guy you draft, you're probably hoping he plays more like the other one.
Talkathon has a projected NBA 3pt% that is based off of some calculation related to 3pt%, FT%, and 3PA. I decided to see how predictive their tool is, and so I compared the projected NBA 3pt% with the actual NBA 3pt% of players from the last 5 drafts. I compared their first year 3pt%, 2nd year 3pt% and career 3pt% vs the projections. In total I looked at about 50 players.
- The average difference for both the first year 3pt% and second year 3pt% was about 3.5% off. So if a player was projected to have a 3pt% of 35%, their actual 3pt% would be on average between 31.5% to 38.5%.
- The average difference for career 3pt% was only 2% off, or in other words as more NBA 3pt data was available, players shot closer to their projections.
Anecdotally, I would say their tool is actually a very good predictor of 3pt%, but that the variance for most players is due to shooting more catch and shoot vs pull up 3pt shots in the NBA. It seemed like the prediction would be higher than actual NBA 3pt% for players that take a lot of pull up 3's in the NBA, and the prediction is lower than actual NBA 3pt% for players that take mostly catch and shoot 3's.
- The average difference for both the first year 3pt% and second year 3pt% was about 3.5% off. So if a player was projected to have a 3pt% of 35%, their actual 3pt% would be on average between 31.5% to 38.5%.
- The average difference for career 3pt% was only 2% off, or in other words as more NBA 3pt data was available, players shot closer to their projections.
Anecdotally, I would say their tool is actually a very good predictor of 3pt%, but that the variance for most players is due to shooting more catch and shoot vs pull up 3pt shots in the NBA. It seemed like the prediction would be higher than actual NBA 3pt% for players that take a lot of pull up 3's in the NBA, and the prediction is lower than actual NBA 3pt% for players that take mostly catch and shoot 3's.
Here are the Tankathon Projected 3pt% for the top 10 players on their big board:
Cooper Flagg - 36.7%
Dylan Harper - 35.7%
Ace Bailey - 34.6%
VJ Edgecombe - 35.9%
Kon Kneuppel - 39.2%
Khaman Maluach - 32.5%
Tre Johnson - 39.0%
Kasparas Jakucionis - 36.9%
Derik Queen - 32.4%
Jeremiah Fears - 36.0%
Must weigh FT% incredibly heavily if Fears is at 36% after shooting below 30% in college
View: https://www.reddit.com/r/NBA_Draft/comments/1kimry0/khaman_maluach/
I know this board is generally selling on Malauch, but he could be the best pure lob threat of all time.
I believe 3PA are very heavily factored in as well. For example Cooper was 38.5% on 3's in college and shot 84% from the line, but is only projected as a 36.7% 3pt shooter because he only took 3.6 attempts.
I like it for what it is. 3FG% on it's own leaves out a lot of context, so I don't get too caught up in the number itself. I use it more to rank how they shot in college. It's definitely a better starting point than just looking at their raw 3FG%. Once upon a time I was fooled into thinking Vonleh was a greater shooting prospect. I think we were fooled by Cody in a similar fashion.
Cody had a tankathon projected NBA 3pt% of 33.9% compared to his actual college 3pt% of 41.5%.
Basically, Joe Ingles and Chris Mullin are guys who have barely been able to dunk but almost never do unless they're completely alone. Maybe late-career guys like David West or Boris Diaw would pass up dunks.
FT% generally seems to be the biggest indicator for shooting ability. The 3FG% can overlook a lot of context, like open vs. guarded, off-the-bounce vs. off-the-catch, etc.
With Cody specifically, the data samples were small, leading to higher potential for variance in outcome. I don't think the book on Cody is completely written yet.
Love Kon, but this is a real concern. He's kind of pushing the bounds for just how unathletic can be, especially if we're talking top 8 level prospects. You pretty much never see a wing this unathletic get drafted this.....and he's not just lacking in dunks. He's not a spectacular rebounds or stocks guy.
That gets repeated a lot, but FT% isn't a great predictor either. The best predictor is a combination of 3pt%, FT%, and 3PA. Tankathon is basing their calculation on quite a bit of data I'm sure.
Chargers Jazz Angels
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Was going to ask
Yeah I'd definitely say that 33.9% number is a better place to start. Ideally, there would be another layer on top that adjusted for the degree of difficulty of 3's. Like you said earlier, not all 3's are created equal. The off the dribble/catch and shoot split can be different for everyone. It's one of the reasons I'm so bullish on Kas. He "only" has a 36.7% projection, but his set of 3 point shots were the most difficult in the class IMO. His proportion made 3's that were assisted is by far the lowest. If there was an added element of degree of difficulty to this projection, I think Kas's projection would shoot up.
Donte is a knockdown shooter tho.. thats still projecting something to VJ which isnt there yet.
If I knew VJ was gonna shoot well then the comps are all legit valuable guys.
He's come a long, long way from Hoop Summit a year ago where Ulrich Chomche looked like a more viable prospect. If he's big, physical and dunks a lot that's fine. It's really just his defensive reactions and engagement that need to improve.
The dunks thing isn't just about dunking though. It's a proxy for general athleticism which is concern for Kon. I'm not actually that worried about his ability to finish at the hoop, but that athleticism deficit will show up other places as well.
Some of that gets baked in to the 3PA number. There aren't a lot of guys getting off huge volumes of 3's unless they are taking some difficult ones.
I hear you. My problem is that self-creation and scoring are essential requirements for "the guy". Other things just need to be sufficient.
So in that sense Tre is closer to being "him".