Lol we didnt miss on Mobley, Mobley on this team would look a lot like Jabari he can't score by himself. Jabari as bad as he looks right now is still a better prospect than Murray. Murray is 22 Jabari is 19. Why dont you wait 3 yrs first and then judge Jabari if your standard is Keegan Murray? Wtf.
Jabari is/was the BPA at 3 by a mile. 3 and 4 prospects were 22 yr old Keegan Murray and 21 yr old Jaden Ivey. Meanwhile Jabari is 19 yrs old, 6'10 atletic defensive minded player who was an elite shooter in college. Anybody doing their hw would pick Jabari hence he was CONSENSUS at 3. Jabari looks like ass now but there's no way of knowing the dude who was shootig 6 threes at 42% in college gonna be a bricker in the NBA. Plus even now in a redraft Jabari is still a better prospect than Ivey or Murray given his age and potential.
That’s not the point. Markelle Fultz, Lonzo Ball, De’Aaron Fox, and even Josh Jackson were all higher than Tatum on big boards that year. Celtics did their homework on Tatum, and had him #1 on their board over 4(!) consensus prospects. Same with Jaylen Brown in 2016. Celtics took him at 3, when he was at 8 on most people’s boards. Smart organizations don’t rely on consensus.
Most drafts had him in the top 4, Tatum, Celtics didn't have the #1 pick so it's impossible to know what they'd do with it. For all you know they could have liked Ball over Tatum. Also, Celtics fans were ready to trade Brown not that long ago lol.
Jabari was not the BPA by a mile. There were several people on here, @foggy94 being one of the people I recall, that had Ivey over Jabari. Jabari’s red flags were always on full display in his draft film: lack of self-creation, lack of creating space on jumpshots, lack of handles, lack of touch around the rim, dreadful 2P% for a 6’10 prospect. I mean, his film screamed Role Player, and people just simply ignored the red flags. Dude shot 3-16 his last game at Auburn against a physical Miami team. The evidence was there, but people fell in love with what he *could* be. Organizations have advanced data that average fans, and even draft evaluators, don’t have access to. Front office’s big boards are usually different than consensus. As I mentioned above, this was on display with Celtics taking Tatum and Brown at their respective slots. Toronto taking Barnes over Suggs. OKC taking Giddey over Kuminga. This is just what smart organizations do.
Except Celtics did have the #1 overall pick. They traded back to draft a guy mocked 4-5 on people’s boards. That’s an insane “consensus” gap, and a reflection of how impressive their scouting was.
The trade happened days before the draft though? All you can assume is that they did not want Fultz, which as you rightly pointed out they didn't like what they saw from him and traded out of the pick, we have no idea what they thought of Lonzo Ball but we do know there was close to 0 chance the was slipping past the Lakers with all the connections he had to the team but Tatum was mocked in the top 3 for plenty of publications. https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/...re-with-lonzo-to-lakers-and-tatum-to-celtics/ https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2716889-2017-nba-mock-draft-final-2-round-predictions https://nbadraftroom.com/p/2017-nba-mock-draft/ https://www.sbnation.com/nba/2017/5...-boston-celtics-lonzo-ball-los-angeles-lakers https://www.si.com/nba/2017/05/17/nba-mock-draft-lottery-results-celtics-lakers-76ers https://www.nbcsports.com/washington/washington-wizards/2017-nba-mock-draft-post-lottery-edition So I'm not buying that they did something unexpected. In fact you can see a lot of these drafts predicted they would draft Tatum. It's pretty similar to the Rockets and Green actually. Rockets had no chance at drafting Cade and could not select Mobley because it seemed to be made clear he didn't want to come here. If Green does turn out to reach his potential it doesn't make them geniuses. What makes the Celtics geniuses is that they have a well run organization and surrounded Tatum and Brown with good coaches and veterans so that they could actually play and improve in a stable environment versus throwing out a team full of 19-21 year olds with a first time player-friendly coach.
Those were mock drafts. Mock drafts are predictions from draft experts based off intel and sources. Sure — after the Celtics traded back to 3, draft experts accurately *predicted* Celtics would take Tatum. I was referring to big boards, which is what draft experts use to show their own rankings of the prospects. All these big boards had Tatum around 4-6: https://syndication.bleacherreport.com/amp/2716558-brs-final-2017-nba-draft-big-board.amp.html https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/...gs-of-the-top-100-best-players-available/amp/ https://nbadraft.theringer.com/2017/ https://nba.nbcsports.com/2017/06/22/tiered-2017-nba-draft-board/amp/ Celtics clearly had Tatum #1 on their board, despite wherever draft experts ranked him. (If they wanted Lonzo, they would’ve just took him #1 rather than losing him to the Lakers) We can go back and forth all day on Tatum. But he’s not the only instance. As I mentioned before, Danny Ainge did it again the year before with Jaylen Brown. Masai did it with Scottie Barnes over Suggs. Presti with Giddey over Kuminga.
Almost everyone was expecting Banchero falling to 3rd...... lol People who overrated Smith Jr. didn't succeed.
They couldn't take Lonzo because he told everyone he was going to the Lakers, his dad made sure he was going to the Lakers, and he wouldn't even work out with other teams. The mock drafts show that it wasn't a big surprise that Tatum went third and the big boards you're referencing are just guesses, no one knows how the GMs actually see these players. We have no idea how many teams had Tatum just as high on their board but didn't have the chance to draft him. So this is what I'm getting at. It seems, based on what we know, the Rockets would have LOVED to draft Paolo but didn't have the chance to do so. It seems OKC had Jabari 2nd on their board and likely just didn't want Paolo because of his fit and Presti does put a high value in defense and the knock on Paolo was exactly that. What I don't like is all this back peddling from this board. 91% of yall wanted Jabari right here at this spot. Therefore there can't be many of yall complaining about the pick, to the 9% that didn't like it, these people get to brag (for the moment) but the rest of yall should not be criticizing the pick when most of everyone was celebrating the pick. This is all a bit a rush to judgement any way, drafts are rated 5 years later, it's far too soon to be criticizing any GM. For all we know Jabari's shot will start falling and his potential while Paolo will be a Melo-like player, flashy, puts up numbers, fun player to watch...or hell, for all we know Mathurin will be the best player in this draft and make people wonder why 5 teams passed on him. So it's a bit silly to me to go judging these drafts now. We can do this with the 2017 draft, enough time has passed to accurately judged who picked well and who did not...but we can't do this with the 2023 draft, not yet.
I think Jabari is going to hit 37-38% of like 8 3pt attempts next season and the rest of his improved game (driving, finishing inside, attacking closeouts, passing, cutting, defense) will compliment his shooting so well. His defensive potential is indispensable to our future, I can see the makings of a future DPOY. Other than shooting, he has improved at practically everything this season. Bulking up and working on that 3pt shot is going to make a world of difference for him. His game is tailored to work AROUND a deadly 3pt shot. Everything he is doing now is going to become Plan B or Plan C once his 3pt shot starts falling. Would you bet against him shooting well next season?
That's right, I had Ivey over Jabari and it wasn't even close. As a prospect Jabari had no handle, no passing chops, a sneaky poor rim protector for his size, and had absolutely no juice whatsover trying to beat a guy 1v1 or get to the basket. That being said, I still had him 4th, because I expected him to be a great perimeter defender and a 40% 3pt shooter with perhaps some post/pullup game. He's finding ways to be productive (at least a little bit) without the shot which will hopefully help him long term. But man, he just needs to get back to the shooter he was or else his future on this team is a bench player. He shot around 40-41% over three seasons in HS and College, he's still a very good FT shooter, so I'm confident the shot will figure itself out.
Have you considered that so many, myself included, don't like Jabari because he sucks? I would LOVE if he started averaging 18 on 45/40 shooting splits.
i wanted ivey over jabari but there’s no point b!tching about him now while he’s still 19 and dynomite skinny like jj gotta wait couple seasons to see how he turns out
I mean that's fair but what I meant was that there was literally no way for him to win over everybody in this Rising Stars game. And it's true that if he was averaging 18/8 on great shooting splits, we wouldn't give a damn what he does during all-star weekend.
