![]() The back half of the second round was an appropriate time to take a swing on Bates, who was unable to translate prep hype into efficiency in two years of college ball at Memphis and Eastern Michigan. Sadly, the biggest news of the night was Bulls vice president Arturas Karnisovas telling reporters Chicago doesn't expect Ball to play in 2023-24 after undergoing a cartilage transplant. 11 to Orlando) and the tampering penalty related to the Lonzo Ball sign-and-trade, the Bulls traded in to take Phillips in a reasonable spot for a talented player who wasn't particularly productive at Tennessee. Having started the night with no picks due to the final piece of the Nikola Vucevic trade (No. I'm good with considering Miller the better prospect independent of fit with LaMelo Ball, which shouldn't be the primary consideration so early in the draft. Ultimately, our opinions of Charlotte's draft will rest on the decision to take Miller over Scoot Henderson at No. Charlotte was also appropriately aggressive in moving up to draft Nnaji after he fell to the second round. As underwhelming as Smith's season at Arkansas was, that seems like an overcorrection. In October, Smith was in the top five of the preseason mock draft by ESPN's Jonathan Givony. The Hornets getting Smith with the 27th pick was one of my favorite selections. ![]() Clowney is a good fit for a team lacking size up front, while Wilson has the skills to stick as a role player on the wing. (Whitehead, who turns 19 in August, was the youngest drafted in the first round Clowney was third.) Whitehead went a little earlier than expected but still well after my projections would have had him (11th) on the strength of his age and EYBL play. With back-to-back picks late in the first round, the Nets took two of the draft's youngest players. Those picks could help the Celtics as sweeteners in future trades, while I like the value for Walsh, who ranked 22nd in my stats-based projections. ![]() Lundy is a shooter with size, an archetype teams can never have enough of, while the Hawks added another second-round pick via trade to take Gueye.Ī flow chart is necessary to trace the Celtics' series of four trades down from the 25th pick, acquired from the Grizzlies in Wednesday's three-team trade that landed Kristaps Porzingis in Boston, to ultimately taking Walsh 38th and adding future second-rounders from three different teams (Atlanta, Detroit and Sacramento). How he fits in a backcourt with Dejounte Murray and Trae Young is unclear, but by the time Bufkin is ready to step into a larger role, Atlanta's guard rotation might look totally different. Bufkin, expected to go a few picks higher, fit the bill. The Hawks' deep rotation gave them the luxury of taking the best player available with the first pick outside the lottery. ![]() I'm also grading on a curve with an average distribution of a "B," making an "A" grade something a team truly has to earn. Generally speaking, my grades for teams are based on how well they maximized the picks they entered the draft with rather than simply how much talent they accumulated, given that's more a product of last season's record (or past trades) than decision-making in the draft. With that in mind, let's grade how all 30 teams did in Thursday's draft, which was marked by a lack of major trades in the first round before a flurry of them in the second round. That said, teams don't get to draft with a crystal ball, which makes grading their process of selecting players a fairer measure in many ways than after-the-fact history that's subject to hindsight. Which teams won and lost the 2023 NBA draft? We won't really know that answer, of course, until years down the road when we see how players develop and which ones live up to expectations, fall short or exceed them. NBA draft 2023: Grading the Spurs, Hornets, Blazers and every team's night
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