2022 NBA Draft

[jimsumner]

Are we allowed to give Trevor a subscription very quickly?

An improper benefit, methinks.

[scottdude8]

The other side of the coin is what if he comes back and doesn't improve his three-point shot and doesn't improve his body fat ratio? Most of his other measurables aren't going to get better. He could go from getting drafted in the 2nd round this year to being undrafted next year. You can't just assume he's going to drastically improve. Not everybody does.

Very true, although I don't think there's any possibility of him going undrafted. If he was a fringe first round pick this year, came back and performed almost identically, he'd be a second round pick at worst next year. It'd take a pretty big implosion for him to plummet that far. I can't think of a recent example of that happening, although I'm sure someone else can think of one...

[brlftz]

I think you are moving the goal posts, there. Staying the same is not overly damaging, given that he seems unlikely to be landing a decent contract this year, and he's young enough that a regression down to being off the board entirely seems really, really unlikely. Moreover, mild improvement for an 18-year-old is pretty much the norm.

So, yeah, an assumption that he "drastically" improves is unrealistic. But an assumption that he at least doesn't damage his prospects down to undrafted status does seems pretty reasonable, at least to me.

I don't think I agree, just because being the same player but a year older IS worse from the perspective of a team trying to project your growth, and therefore value. If he doesn't show improvement teams might extrapolate a flatter curve for his development, which I think would really hurt his draft prospects.

[scottdude8]

Are we allowed to give Trevor a subscription very quickly?

An improper benefit, methinks.

Couldn't we arrange an NIL deal with The Athletic, where the compensation includes a subscription? Players endorsing car dealerships are getting cars, after all

[johnb]

The other side of the coin is what if he comes back and doesn't improve his three-point shot and doesn't improve his body fat ratio? Most of his other measurables aren't going to get better. He could go from getting drafted in the 2nd round this year to being undrafted next year. You can't just assume he's going to drastically improve. Not everybody does.

I tend to agree with this, but I'd say that he has quite a lot of control over at least some of the variables. With a year of hard-core conditioning and effort, his weight, body fat, quickness, speed, and vertical should improve. All of these should also help that 3 point shot. Enough to make the difference between an NBA rotation and G League/Europe? I dunno, but his situation feels different than that of someone with character issues, tweener size, a lack of an NBA skill set, etc.

Where is he most likely to make this physical improvement?

I'd guess an upper echelon NBA first rounder would have the most time and resources, probably a bit more than that person would get at any college, though there is a limit to how much exercise one can do each day, and if he made an NBA team, he'd almost certainly be expected to travel with the team even if most of his time is spent on the bench. I'm not sure how that's going to get him in shape. And he'd be playing every day in the G League, but, if that's next year's outcome, it does seem likely he's going to get better/more attention from trainers, etc, at Duke.

My view on the economics is simple. He is going to get some serious cash next year either way. Traveling with an NBA team is likely an expensive proposition, so--with taxes and agent--he's liable to bank less even if his 1st yr NBA contract pays more than NIL. From a long-term wealth perspective (at least from playing bball), the key thing is being good enough to play in the NBA for 5 or 10 yrs and not being financially reckless. We'll see...

[Kedsy]

I think you are moving the goal posts, there. Staying the same is not overly damaging, given that he seems unlikely to be landing a decent contract this year, and he's young enough that a regression down to being off the board entirely seems really, really unlikely. Moreover, mild improvement for an 18-year-old is pretty much the norm.

So, yeah, an assumption that he "drastically" improves is unrealistic. But an assumption that he at least doesn't damage his prospects down to undrafted status does seems pretty reasonable, at least to me.

Moving what goal posts? Staying the same could very well be damaging. The thing is, his college stats don't justify the draft pick. The justification is in his "potential" to become a valuable 3-and-D player in the League who can also bull his way to the basket. If his measurables don't suggest strong D against the better athletes in the NBA, and his shot doesn't improve, his potential becomes questionable. Early second round to undrafted is only going from the #41 player available to the #61 player available. It's not a very big difference at all, much less "really, really unlikely."

Of course, if he comes back and becomes a 40% three-point shooter, while improving his body which could also improve his quickness, then his potential looks more like a first round pick. But staying the same (or probably even "mild improvement") would be bad for him and all I'm saying is returning could cut either way.

[Kedsy]

Very true, although I don't think there's any possibility of him going undrafted. If he was a fringe first round pick this year, came back and performed almost identically, he'd be a second round pick at worst next year. It'd take a pretty big implosion for him to plummet that far. I can't think of a recent example of that happening, although I'm sure someone else can think of one...

Is James Michael McAdoo recent enough? He improved some between his freshman and sophomore seasons and went from fringe lottery to likely undrafted, stayed a third year, improved a little more and still went undrafted.

[scottdude8]

For those who don't have access to The Athletic, they just tweeted out one hell of a pull-quote from Marks' article: https://twitter.com/TheAthleticCBB/s...QIhCYpSypkvsjA

One-hundred percent he should go back. He'll be a G League guy if he doesn't. - NBA evaluator on Trevor Keels, to The Athletic's Brendan Marks

[scottdude8]

Is James Michael McAdoo recent enough? He improved some between his freshman and sophomore seasons and went from fringe lottery to likely undrafted, stayed a third year, improved a little more and still went undrafted.

Definitely... that's a good one. As I said, I was sure there were examples I wasn't thinking of

The question for Trevor becomes one, again, of maximizing his expected income. How high of a probability do we put on the scenario where his stock drops in Year 2 versus scenarios in which his stock improves? Based on my previous analyses looking just at earnings over the next 3 years, the probability of him dropping in the draft would have to be reasonably high in order to make his expected earnings over the next few years lower than what it would be if he returns (assuming ~500k in NIL earnings). If Trevor thinks there's a non-trivial (say, >10%) chance of his stock dropping, that would change the calculus. If this is just a possibility, albeit a very unlikely one (say <5%), then I'd argue nothing much has changed.

Lots of potential stuff here... if anyone wants to pay me to make a career change from modeling the brain to modeling college basketball, I'm all ears

[CDu]

Moving what goal posts? Staying the same could very well be damaging. The thing is, his college stats don't justify the draft pick. The justification is in his "potential" to become a valuable 3-and-D player in the League who can also bull his way to the basket. If his measurables don't suggest strong D against the better athletes in the NBA, and his shot doesn't improve, his potential becomes questionable. Early second round to undrafted is only going from the #41 player available to the #61 player available. It's not a very big difference at all, much less "really, really unlikely."

Of course, if he comes back and becomes a 40% three-point shooter, while improving his body which could also improve his quickness, then his potential looks more like a first round pick. But staying the same (or probably even "mild improvement") would be bad for him and all I'm saying is returning could cut either way.

Exactly. He will need to show substantial improvement next year just to even stay on the 2nd round radar given that his measurables are mostly likely going to hurt him next year too.

He could certainly have a Kennard-esque sophomore year and wind up in the mid-first round. But if he comes back and plays only marginally better (sort of like Roach did this year, or Moore did last year)? Then he almost certainly wouldn't get drafted.

There is an opportunity in him returning, but there is also a very legitimate risk.

[CDu]

Is James Michael McAdoo recent enough? He improved some between his freshman and sophomore seasons and went from fringe lottery to likely undrafted, stayed a third year, improved a little more and still went undrafted.

There is also Josh McRoberts (less recent obviously) who improved A LOT as a soph and yet still dropped from likely 1st rounder to 2nd rounder. Which illustrates the point that “returning and being roughly the same player would just bump him to the 2nd round” is probably an incorrect assertion.

When your draft stock is almost entirely based on potential improvement, returning and not showing huge improvement can be devastating to your stock. Especially in the case of Keels, where he isn’t a good shooter and has poor measurables.

[Rich]

Of course, if he comes back and becomes a 40% three-point shooter, while improving his body which could also improve his quickness, then his potential looks more like a first round pick. But staying the same (or probably even "mild improvement") would be bad for him and all I'm saying is returning could cut either way.

Maybe I'll get flamed for this, but pretty much everyone can improve their body with some effort. It's not always easy, but it is totally do-able, especially for a young, elite athlete (or someone who aspires to be one) if they put their mind to it. That alone bumps him up in the next draft assuming his shooting % doesn't tank.

[sagegrouse]

Definitely... that's a good one. As I said, I was sure there were examples I wasn't thinking of

The question for Trevor becomes one, again, of maximizing his expected income. How high of a probability do we put on the scenario where his stock drops in Year 2 versus scenarios in which his stock improves? Based on my previous analyses looking just at earnings over the next 3 years, the probability of him dropping in the draft would have to be reasonably high in order to make his expected earnings over the next few years lower than what it would be if he returns (assuming ~500k in NIL earnings). If Trevor thinks there's a non-trivial (say, >10%) chance of his stock dropping, that would change the calculus. If this is just a possibility, albeit a very unlikely one (say <5%), then I'd argue nothing much has changed.

Lots of potential stuff here... if anyone wants to pay me to make a career change from modeling the brain to modeling college basketball, I'm all ears

This is just plain wrong as an objective: it would rate a 0.50 probability of $200 million and a 0.50 probability of $000 as an expected value of $100M, and better than a 0.50 probability of $100 million and a 0.50 probability of $50 million (exp. value of $75 million).

Basketball players, just like the rest of us, need to be risk averse -- and overweight (i.e., avoid) the bad outcomes.

[dukejim1]

Maybe I'll get flamed for this, but pretty much everyone can improve their body with some effort. It's not always easy, but it is totally do-able, especially for a young, elite athlete (or someone who aspires to be one) if they put their mind to it. That alone bumps him up in the next draft assuming his shooting % doesn't tank.

Absolutely worked for Wendell. They were able to change his gait,which is not easy, which improves his testing levels.

[scottdude8]

This is just plain wrong as an objective: it would rate a 0.50 probability of $200 million and a 0.50 probability of $000 as an expected value of $100M, and better than a 0.50 probability of $100 million and a 0.50 probability of $50 million (exp. value of $75 million).

Basketball players, just like the rest of us, need to be risk averse -- and overweight the bad outcomes.

Yup, I 100% agree with you that this "model" (if you can call my back-of-the-envelope calculations based on simple pot-odds theory from poker a "model"... again, I'm more than happy to apply my modeling skillset to basketball full time if someone wants to pay me, hahaha) should not be reasonably applied when there are huge outlier possibilities like what you described. That's why I'm not applying this to any of us going to the NBA, but instead to a pro-caliber talent where the outcomes and probabilities are more within a reasonable range.

I also agree with you philosophically, at least in regards to my own life, that we benefit from being risk averse. But I think it's a reasonable question to ask whether being so risk-averse benefits someone in Trevor's specific situation. Based on the NBA rookie scale contracts, there's potentially 10s of millions of guaranteed dollars at stake if Trevor jumps into the lottery from the early second round. Yes, there's a risk that he could fall out of the draft, but that risk is mitigated in part by the NIL money he will make this year and insurance policies he would likely take out if he returned. And the worst case scenario is not that Trevor makes 0 dollars, but rather likely that he still makes 6 figures playing overseas, which is also something to consider.

There's a famous aphorism in my line of research that "All models are wrong, but some are useful." The models of the expected income I'm using here are certainly wrong, and don't encapsulate all the possibilities involved... and are arguably inherently flawed by the fact that I haven't taken catastrophic outcomes into account (again, back-of-the-envelope calculations here!). But I'd argue that the model is useful in showing that the risk/reward calculation may, against our intuition, be in favor of Trevor returning from a reasonable set of assumptions.

As an aside: I know the poker analogy is forced here, but think about what would happen if you played poker with your "risk-averse" strategy. For example, you'd probably never call any bet with a flush draw, even if probability told you that, if you played this exact scenario 100 times, you'd end up making money over that period. That would cost you money in the long run, and you wouldn't be very successful at the tables.

That example is just to go to the point that some risk is probably necessary for success in most ventures. How much risk one can tolerate is a personal choice, of course. If Trevor is risk-averse, you're probably right that he'll go pro. If he can tolerate a reasonable amount of risk, there's a strong argument that says coming back for another year would be in his best interest.

[scottdude8]

So back to the topic at hand after my missive about the pros and cons of modeling above

Who knows how much he's in the know (there have been clear examples of when he's had insider knowledge, like with our COVID outbreak, but also some swings and misses), but Zion Olojede is saying that there are people with Trevor's ear who are relaying info along the lines of what was reported in The Athletic article to him: https://twitter.com/DukeNBA/status/1...ms8JXzjuGlcaXQ

Gonna be an interesting week as we await real intel...

[dukelifer]

Exactly. He will need to show substantial improvement next year just to even stay on the 2nd round radar given that his measurables are mostly likely going to hurt him next year too.

He could certainly have a Kennard-esque sophomore year and wind up in the mid-first round. But if he comes back and plays only marginally better (sort of like Roach did this year, or Moore did last year)? Then he almost certainly wouldn't get drafted.

There is an opportunity in him returning, but there is also a very legitimate risk.

This is all true but he has given the scouts very little to be excited about regarding potential and is very likely only a second round pick or perhaps undrafted and simply given an opportunity to compete for a spot in summer league play. While he may be in a hurry to get to the NBA- he could find staying 3 more years will help his stock. He is likely to a very good college player- potential All American as a senior and that may be enough to sneak into the first round. The NBA seems to like some seasoned seniors.

[Truth&Justise]

All these reports giving reason for Trevor to come back--I'm just ready to have my heart broken again.

[cbarry]

All these reports giving reason for Trevor to come back--I'm just ready to have my heart broken again.

He ain’t coming back.

[Steven43]

Maybe I'll get flamed for this, but pretty much everyone can improve their body with some effort. It's not always easy, but it is totally do-able….

Are you considering posting some before and after photos of the new and improved Rich?