Official Wolves 2022 Pre-Draft Thread

[WildWolf2813]

https://twitter.com/DraftExpress/status/1528170237778087936?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1528170237778087936%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=


Why not?

[KG4Ever]

I have been waiting for the wingspan info and here are the players with longest wingspan:
Top wingspan measurements at 2022 NBA Draft Combine

Player Wingspan
Mark Williams 7-6.5
Christian Koloko 7-5.25
Kofi Cockburn 7-4.25
Walker Kessler 7-4.25
Orlando Robinson 7-4
Dominick Barlow 7-3
Trevion Williams 7-2.75
Moussa Diabate 7-2.5
Justin Lewis 7-2.5
John Butler Jr. 7-2.25
Jalen Williams 7-2.25
Tari Eason 7-2
Leonard Miller 7-2
Drew Timme 7-2
Patrick Baldwin Jr. 7-1.75

[KG4Ever]

I wasn't familiar with Dominick Barlow, but noticed he had a 7"3 wingspan and he went straight from High School to G League. I love his length and he seems pretty fluid, dunks easily, has some shot creating ability and some range. He's projected to go in second round and might be someone to consider at #48 or #50. Here is writeup at NBADraftRoom:

Dom Barlow is one of the lesser known 2022 NBA Draft prospects but NBA scouts have taken notice. Playing with the new Overtime Elite league, he's shown rapid improvement and is looking the part of a second round pick, with first round potential.
Dom is a versatile player on both ends of the floor. On offense he scores inside and out, can create his own offense and has a lethal mid range game. He can hit the 3 pointer, take his man off the dribble and has the size and strength to bang down low. He's got excellent shooting form and a very project-able shot. On defense he can guard all over the court, showing of his nice mobility, fluid hips and good anticipation. He's a hard worker who puts in the effort needed to be a good defender. Look for his name to start showing up on more mocks and for some buzz to start to generate around his name.

[KG4Ever]

A point guard who might be available at #48 and #50 is Andrew Nembhard from Gonzaga. He is a very good passer, has some height (6"4 or 6"5 depending on source) and his senior year, he shot 3s at a 35% clip while his FT% was 87% both career bests. He's more a facilitator than a scorer, is a solid defender. He also was a standout during the NBA Combine games. Could be a Monte Morris type-similar height, both played four years, both were facilitators rather than scorers, have similar assist numbers, solid defenders. If the Wolves don't draft a guy like Dyson Daniels, TyTy Washington or Kennedy Chandler earlier on, I think he might be worthy of one of our latter two second rounders.

[Lipoli390]

I have been waiting for the wingspan info and here are the players with longest wingspan:
Top wingspan measurements at 2022 NBA Draft Combine

Player Wingspan
Mark Williams 7-6.5
Christian Koloko 7-5.25
Kofi Cockburn 7-4.25
Walker Kessler 7-4.25
Orlando Robinson 7-4
Dominick Barlow 7-3
Trevion Williams 7-2.75
Moussa Diabate 7-2.5
Justin Lewis 7-2.5
John Butler Jr. 7-2.25
Jalen Williams 7-2.25
Tari Eason 7-2
Leonard Miller 7-2
Drew Timme 7-2
Patrick Baldwin Jr. 7-1.75

When I'm looking at centers and power forwards, I'm more interested in their standing reach. While Mark Williams has a really impressive wingspan, he's standing reach is an outrageous 9'9. To put that in perspective, Rudy Gobert and Boban Marjanovic both have a standing reach of 9'7. When Williams gets to the NBA, only Tacko Fall will have a standing reach equal to or greater than Mark's. But unlike Tacko and Boban, Williams is a terrific athlete with quick feet, nice bounce off the floor and good hands. He's a terrible passer, commits too many fouls and hasn't yet developed a perimeter shot. But he's worth a long look by any team in the latter half of the lottery and he'd be hard for the Wolves to pass up at #19.

[KG4Ever]

I have been waiting for the wingspan info and here are the players with longest wingspan:
Top wingspan measurements at 2022 NBA Draft Combine

Player Wingspan
Mark Williams 7-6.5
Christian Koloko 7-5.25
Kofi Cockburn 7-4.25
Walker Kessler 7-4.25
Orlando Robinson 7-4
Dominick Barlow 7-3
Trevion Williams 7-2.75
Moussa Diabate 7-2.5
Justin Lewis 7-2.5
John Butler Jr. 7-2.25
Jalen Williams 7-2.25
Tari Eason 7-2
Leonard Miller 7-2
Drew Timme 7-2
Patrick Baldwin Jr. 7-1.75

When I'm looking at centers and power forwards, I'm more interested in their standing reach. While Mark Williams has a really impressive wingspan, he's standing reach is an outrageous 9'9. To put that in perspective, Rudy Gobert and Boban Marjanovic both have a standing reach of 9'7. When Williams gets to the NBA, only Tacko Fall will have a standing reach equal to or greater than Mark's. But unlike Tacko and Boban, Williams is a terrific athlete with quick feet, nice bounce off the floor and good hands. He's a terrible passer, commits too many fouls and hasn't yet developed a perimeter shot. But he's worth a long look by any team in the latter half of the lottery and he'd be hard for the Wolves to pass up at #19.

Mark Williams is certainly intriguing with that length, his shooting efficiency and shot blocking, but I have mixed feelings about him. He didn't play a lot of minutes so there are concerns with his stamina and he wasn't even the team's highest rebounder (though on a per minute basis he was). He doesn't have range, though his free throw shooting makes me think its possible in time. He's also not much of a passer, though given his efficiency that is understandable. I would be ok drafting him at 19 and if he graded out to be another Gobert, Adebayo or even a Robert Willams, he'd be a slam dunk. However, if not and there are projected higher usage two way players available, I'd lean towards the latter. Given that several highly touted Duke big men have been disappointments including Jahlil Okafor, Jabari Parker, Bagley and Zion (though mostly due to injuries), gives me pause. Also, there are likely a lot of bigs available in free agency (Hartenstein, Nurkic, Drummond, Smith etc), available via trade (Bamba, Holmes, Turner) or that might fall to 40, that I like too, so I'd rather draft another projected impact player if one falls there. In the unlikely chance Williams is available at 19, I trust Connelly will make the right call.

[KG4Ever]

I have been waiting for the wingspan info and here are the players with longest wingspan:
Top wingspan measurements at 2022 NBA Draft Combine

Player Wingspan
Mark Williams 7-6.5
Christian Koloko 7-5.25
Kofi Cockburn 7-4.25
Walker Kessler 7-4.25
Orlando Robinson 7-4
Dominick Barlow 7-3
Trevion Williams 7-2.75
Moussa Diabate 7-2.5
Justin Lewis 7-2.5
John Butler Jr. 7-2.25
Jalen Williams 7-2.25
Tari Eason 7-2
Leonard Miller 7-2
Drew Timme 7-2
Patrick Baldwin Jr. 7-1.75

When I'm looking at centers and power forwards, I'm more interested in their standing reach. While Mark Williams has a really impressive wingspan, he's standing reach is an outrageous 9'9. To put that in perspective, Rudy Gobert and Boban Marjanovic both have a standing reach of 9'7. When Williams gets to the NBA, only Tacko Fall will have a standing reach equal to or greater than Mark's. But unlike Tacko and Boban, Williams is a terrific athlete with quick feet, nice bounce off the floor and good hands. He's a terrible passer, commits too many fouls and hasn't yet developed a perimeter shot. But he's worth a long look by any team in the latter half of the lottery and he'd be hard for the Wolves to pass up at #19.

I agree that Williams has a freakish standing reach. There is definitely a very high degree of correlation between the two measurements as players who have large wingspans are also likely to have large standing reaches. I personally prefer to use wingspan as it is more accessible stat and I am more familiar with it. I just backtested NBA Combine data that goes back to 2000 to test both measurements to see which one hit on more stars and there is almost no difference. Looking at the top 20 in each draft class for both wingspan and standing reach, netted mostly the same stars but there were a few more stars based on wingspan. For instance bigs Paul Millsap, Joakim Noah, forward Otto Porter, plus guards James Harden and Tyreke Evans have a top 20 wingspan but not a top 20 standing reach. So I think you can use whichever measure you are more comfortable with.

[Q-is-here]

Connelly has had ONE year where he kind of laid an egg in the draft (2020). Otherwise, the guy finds NBA rotation players in every single damn draft. In fact, he's been so successful that he's had to trade guys away because they were getting so backlogged with talented players in redundant positions (Nurkic, Vanderbilt, and Beasley are three great examples).

In other words, I'm excited to see who he picks at #19 and don't have much reason to doubt the guy. Rev up the engines for summer league boys!

[Monster]

Connelly has had ONE year where he kind of laid an egg in the draft (2020). Otherwise, the guy finds NBA rotation players in every single damn draft. In fact, he's been so successful that he's had to trade guys away because they were getting so backlogged with talented players in redundant positions (Nurkic, Vanderbilt, and Beasley are three great examples).

In other words, I'm excited to see who he picks at #19 and don't have much reason to doubt the guy. Rev up the engines for summer league boys!

Heck I'm excited to see who he selects with at least one of the 2nd round picks.

Edit: Actually Connelly had another year he drafted poorly. 2013 was his first draft where he was hired literally days before the draft. He traded the pick Utah used to selected Gobert for a 2nd rounder used to select Erik Green and cash. Of course the next draft maybe he learned something as he drafted Nurkic and Jokic despite having a roster with a lot of size. Let's go back to the 2013 draft. In the 2nd round he also picked Joffrey Lauvergne who at one point looked like a nice player for a late 2nd round pick. He traded him to OKC (partly because he ended up with a lot of depth on the roster) for two 2nd round picks from OKC. One of those 2nd round picks in 2017 he selected Monte Morris. So in a way even a draft where he initially didn't do well (it would be easy to give him a bit of a pass on that first draft all things considered) he still ended up with a really valuable player down the road.

[Lipoli390]

I have been waiting for the wingspan info and here are the players with longest wingspan:
Top wingspan measurements at 2022 NBA Draft Combine

Player Wingspan
Mark Williams 7-6.5
Christian Koloko 7-5.25
Kofi Cockburn 7-4.25
Walker Kessler 7-4.25
Orlando Robinson 7-4
Dominick Barlow 7-3
Trevion Williams 7-2.75
Moussa Diabate 7-2.5
Justin Lewis 7-2.5
John Butler Jr. 7-2.25
Jalen Williams 7-2.25
Tari Eason 7-2
Leonard Miller 7-2
Drew Timme 7-2
Patrick Baldwin Jr. 7-1.75

When I'm looking at centers and power forwards, I'm more interested in their standing reach. While Mark Williams has a really impressive wingspan, he's standing reach is an outrageous 9'9. To put that in perspective, Rudy Gobert and Boban Marjanovic both have a standing reach of 9'7. When Williams gets to the NBA, only Tacko Fall will have a standing reach equal to or greater than Mark's. But unlike Tacko and Boban, Williams is a terrific athlete with quick feet, nice bounce off the floor and good hands. He's a terrible passer, commits too many fouls and hasn't yet developed a perimeter shot. But he's worth a long look by any team in the latter half of the lottery and he'd be hard for the Wolves to pass up at #19.

Mark Williams is certainly intriguing with that length, his shooting efficiency and shot blocking, but I have mixed feelings about him. He didn't play a lot of minutes so there are concerns with his stamina and he wasn't even the team's highest rebounder (though on a per minute basis he was). He doesn't have range, though his free throw shooting makes me think its possible in time. He's also not much of a passer, though given his efficiency that is understandable. I would be ok drafting him at 19 and if he graded out to be another Gobert, Adebayo or even a Robert Willams, he'd be a slam dunk. However, if not and there are projected higher usage two way players available, I'd lean towards the latter. Given that several highly touted Duke big men have been disappointments including Jahlil Okafor, Jabari Parker, Bagley and Zion (though mostly due to injuries), gives me pause. Also, there are likely a lot of bigs available in free agency (Hartenstein, Nurkic, Drummond, Smith etc), available via trade (Bamba, Holmes, Turner) or that might fall to 40, that I like too, so I'd rather draft another projected impact player if one falls there. In the unlikely chance Williams is available at 19, I trust Connelly will make the right call.

KG - I end up in the same place as you. While taking Williams at #19 would be tempting, I think there will be other players with equal or more talent than Williams. And as you pointed out, we'll have lots of good free agent or trade options to upgrade our starting big position next to KAT.