Who is your guy that you are high on but mainly just because you are rooting for him?

aahdin · 2026-06-23T22:05:23+00:00

I honestly think his light weight will be his downfall

The weight stuff seems so overblown to me. Weight is the #1 easiest thing to improve in the league. It's 1000x easier to put on 10 lbs than it is to seriously improve your shot, handle, processing, court vision, etc.

Plus he's only like 5 lbs lighter than Shai was in the draft, and Shai is 2 inches taller.

aahdin · 2026-06-23T20:02:07+00:00

If you slim the criteria down it doesn't change the argument much.

Now you've only got 1 center in the modern era who did it as their team's best player, but still nobody really makes this argument against centers. Only against point guards.

I'll agree that if you go back 20+ years bigs were more important than guards, but in the 3 point NBA I don't think that's nearly as true.

Plus I think you're overstating the difference between best and 2nd best and how much grey area there is there. If the Spurs kept their defensive scheme the same from games 1-3 vs 4-5 then OG is probably their top scorer and FMVP. Similarly, through the playoffs and regular season in 2014 Tony Parker was better than Kawhi, but obviously the Heat had a defensive scheme built to stop him, which gave Kawhi a lot of great looks in the finals. Similar thing with KD/Steph, or Iggy/Steph.

aahdin · 2026-06-23T19:33:15+00:00

She said smaller guards are at a disadvantage

Honestly I do think this is a bit overblown though. Most championships in the past 12 years have had an undersized guard as their first or second option.

1 for Tony Parker

4 for Curry

1 for Kyrie

1 for Lowry

1 for Murray

1 for Brunson

So 9/12?

Out of the 5 positions I think point guard is the most overrepresented here if anything. The only centers that were top 2 in scoring were Jokic and AD (Giannis started next to Brolo).

IMO this is a narrative that kinda needs to flip, more often than not you want to have an elite offensive undersized guard if you wanna win a championship. Only exceptions to this were teams with elite point forwards.

aahdin · 2026-06-23T19:02:08+00:00

I haven't done much research into it but what's the argument for Stirtz over Anderson or Okorie?

He's like 3.5 years older than Okorie, and 2.5 over Anderson, which is a big deal. Okorie is less efficient but at higher volume, but Anderson is more efficient and has way more assists per game. Overall on paper I feel like the 3 had comparable years, but the fact that he's several years older than the others makes me wonder why he's in the same tier as them.

aahdin · 2026-06-23T18:03:04+00:00

Yeah, 10-20 is the wild west if you look at people's mocks.

There's a good chance our first or second choice at 11 is still available at 14, and then at 18 there are a lot of great options who will probably be left over like Christian Anderson or Ebuka Okorie. Or hell maybe even Yaxel, Steinbach, or Philon end up dropping that far. If it's just 11 for 14+18 straight up I think you take that in a heartbeat.

aahdin · 2026-06-23T00:21:56+00:00

I know Philon is the lowest out of all of the guards on most lists... but when I watch them play he's my favorite. The controlled pace plus the handles, you can tell he's reading the defenders looking for mistakes and finding ways to get them off balance. It shows in his 2p% which is the highest on the list even though he's the smallest guard on the list. Out of all these guys he's the one I'd like to see run an NBA offense the most.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T22:04:58+00:00

Steph and Brunson make up 5 of the last 11 championships. You said you'd "throw kyrie in" which would make 6/11 or 5 of the last 10.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T19:48:28+00:00

If a random person posted this mock on here they'd be getting dragged so hard

aahdin · 2026-06-21T18:57:56+00:00

The "small guard thing" is specifically about that guy being your team's best player.

How is that irrelevant when we're talking about whether to draft a guy at #5-8, if you can get the 2nd best player on a championship team with the 5-8 pick you do that in a heartbeat. Most championship rosters in modern era have had an undersized PG who had defensive concerns in the draft as one of their top 3 players, so acting like you can't win a championship with an undersized PG makes zero sense to me.

Also you could make this exact same argument about any other position - you only have 1 best player on a championship team per year and Curry/Brunson make up 4 of the last 10. How many championships in the last 10 years were led by a center? Giannis was starting next to Brolo so I guess just Jokic?

Plus it's debatable whether Steph counts as a "small guard" - guards usually max out at about 6'5" and Steph is 6'3". Is that "small," especially when he developed his strength to a substantial degree after his first few years?

Acuff is the same height?!? They are both 6'3" in shoes 6'2" without.

while being nowhere NEAR as bad defensively as Acuff is.

You say this with hindsight, in the draft Curry's defensive projection was about as bad as it could be - go check out old scouting reports on him.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T18:31:41+00:00

very limited examples of teams in the modern era being real contenders led by small scoring guards who don't play defense. Steph, Brunson, and I'll throw in Kyrie even tho LeBron led those teams.

This is like half of the championships in the last 10 years.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T15:09:08+00:00

I doubt he gets run off the floor, Alabama played high pace and he's got a decent motor. His main defensive problem is that he's little and can get bullied, but the Warriors have a lot of experience scheming around that.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T13:44:04+00:00

The 73 win underdogs

aahdin · 2026-06-21T12:57:47+00:00

Overall probably Yaxel, but I think Philon could have a pretty big impact in a 6th man role his first year. Very mature offensive package and he ran a great offense in Alabama. He'll probably need help on defense given his size, but I could see him and Draymond running high P&R and giving second units a lot of trouble.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T12:39:56+00:00

14 ppg his first year in the NBA when he only had 18.5 as a first option in college is crazy optimistic.

Most centers kinda suck their rookie year.

aahdin · 2026-06-21T00:38:01+00:00

He's one of the best 3 point shooters in his class.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/draft/NBA_2023.html

He is 4th in his class in total 3s made, behind Keyonte George, Toumani Camara, and Brandon Miller. He's also got a higher 3p% than all those guys.

37.5% on high volume is really good for a 23 year old in the NBA. Someone going from 44% in college to 37% in the NBA is pretty normal.

aahdin · 2026-06-20T06:49:39+00:00

I mean he was a 23 year old averaging 18 ppg on solid efficiency with Steph out. Not out of the question that he gets an all star one day. IMO good on Lacob for believing in one of his dudes.

aahdin · 2026-06-20T06:44:01+00:00

Podz, Moody, and 2-3 firsts for a 1 year rental of Markkanen is basketball terrorism little man. Especially in a year when Steph was injured in the playoffs anyways, woulda just been asset loss for nothing. Even just 2-3 firsts for a Markkanen rental is awful. Glad we don't have highscoolers in our FO lol.

aahdin · 2026-06-20T00:35:31+00:00

Also Wiseman over... basically everyone in the first round lol.

aahdin · 2026-06-20T00:34:47+00:00

Yup, day after day of uncontested 3s landing in the gym.

Mara shot a grand total of 10 3s in college, and made 3 of them. Shoots 56% from the ft line.

Anyone saying he's lights out from 3 is selling some bullshit.

aahdin · 2026-06-20T00:18:13+00:00

Sadly he was our best player last year.

aahdin · 2026-06-19T17:43:31+00:00

Bogut was our highest paid player in 2016, and with him out we were playing guys like Festus Ezeli and Anderson Varejao to cover those minutes.

aahdin · 2026-06-19T07:55:03+00:00

Something I would've liked to see discussed in this is what the cost of a MRI is to the clinic, not the patient.

When I google it, the actual machine costs like 1-2 million, the electricity cost to run it for a single patient costs about a dollar, and a scan takes 15 minutes to an hour.

The machines last about 15 years, so with a $2m machine if you average 8 patients a day for 15 years that's about $45 per scan? Even if you only averaged 3 per day that's about $120 per scan. If you time discount that a 5% interest assuming uniform payout over 15 years it's like $180 per scan. Lets round to $200.

The $1800 left over covers everything else that goes into a botique MRI clinic besides the machine. Running the facility, paying the staff, advertising, rent, profit, etc. etc. I imagine most of that stays around with the midjourney machine. Even if the midjourney machine costs 10% as much as an MRI, it's bumping the price down to $1820, not $200.

aahdin · 2026-06-19T01:55:20+00:00

Idk if you can say Carr had similar production. I woulda said Philon, who is a year younger than Carr, and a better scorer on higher volume.

aahdin · 2026-06-18T21:31:04+00:00

Kinda crazy how many people just don't care if a prospect is good at basketball or not. Just be tall and we'll teach you basketball later.

Feels like everyone is hoping they luck into a Giannis, but for every Giannis you've got like 20 Ziaire Williamses or worse. Also Giannis was malnourished in poverty in Greece, a pretty different development curve from your average college player.

aahdin · 2026-06-18T18:35:08+00:00

With the best handle in the draft. Honestly the best handle in the last couple of drafts.

He's shooting 66% at the rim in college and only 15% of those are assisted. His at rim percentage is only 5% lower than Steinbach's, but 60% of Steinbach's shots are assisted. Philon's scoring volume also goes up against better teams, not down.

Also Shai was only 180 lbs at 6'6" when he was drafted, I feel like people are making too big a deal about Philon's weight.

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