Thoughts from the NBA Draft

Rather than do the typical team grades for each team, I will offer up a few quick comments on things that stood out from last night's draft:

My first thought was, the chair Mark Jones was sitting in looked really big for him. I find Stuart Scott to be rather annoying and his left eye is getting tougher and tougher to look as each month passes by. I would have liked to have seen Hubie Brown on the coverage last night. Mark Jackson didn't appear comfortable. Perhaps another college coach on the set would have been a nice compliment to Jay Bilas too.

The New York city crowd was in it's usual rare form. Right on cue they booed the Knicks draft selection (apparently that's a yearly right of passage for Knicks fans). The biggest chant of the night was "Adam Silver! Adam Silver!" He is the nerdy, bald-headed NBA Deputy Commission left with the responsibility of announcing the 2nd round selections, while David Stern nestles up to the Madison Square Garden Bar for the rest of the night. I was a little disappointed to not see David Stern announce the first selection of the draft wearing a white glove on his hand to honor the passing of Michael Jackson.

How about Brandon Jennings?!? His agent Bill Duffy advised him not to show up to the Draft festivities because he couldn't guarantee him a 1st round selection. So Brandon watched the draft from his hotel room. Well, Brandon got selected 10th overall by the Milwaukee Bucks and, man would I have liked to been in the hotel room when that happened. You can just see Bill Duffy calling up there, "Brandon, put the room service burger down, put on that suit I bought you, and get your a*s in a cab immediately!" Next I envision Bill Duffy in the back room begging, pleading with David Stern to allow his "lottery client" a chance to walk the stage, shake Mr. Stern's hand and sit in the really big chair with Mark Jones. This kid looks like trouble already. He had a sh*t-eating grin on his face and when asked if he regretted playing overseas, just said, "I still went in the top10." Welcome to the NBA Mr. Jennings, now meet one of the toughest, hard-nosed coaches in the league - your coach - Scott Skiles.

Obviously the Minnesota Timberwolves are trying to make up for lost time at the point guard position. After taking Rubio and Flynn back-2-back, coaches around the league began looking through their playbooks: "Hmmm....a 2-point guard offense? I can't seem to find the pages for that one." Time will tell how that works out. Considering Rubio can't shoot, I would expect Flynn to play more 2-guard. This could be genius or a complete disaster with ego's clashing and one of them demanding a trade by Christmas.

Michael Jordan, once again had a questionable draft night - selecting Duke's Gerald Henderson. Although it wasn't hard to predict since rumor has it, Jordan only watched 2 players work out for the franchise, one was Henderson, the other was believed to be Adam Morrison's brother.

Ty Lawson learning under Chauncey Billups excites me. Terrance Williams replacing Vince Carter in New Jersey intrigues me. Three years from now we might say Toronto got a steal landing DeMar DeRozan at #9. Minnesota swung and missed with Rashad McCants...in the on deck circle: Wayne Ellington.

There are plenty of 2nd round picks that could be of some real value to a lot of teams. I like Sam Young with Memphis and DeJuan "keep me away from the burritos" Blair in San Antonio. Jodie Meeks should have stayed at Kentucky - as he went #41 to the Milwaukee Bucks. With Larry Bird going "white" in the first round, selecting Tyler Hansbrough, he had to address his PG situation in the 2nd round, and probably did as well as he could snagging AJ Price from UCONN. The last player selected in this year's draft is a hell of an athlete - Robert Dozier, going to Miami. D.Wade better point this kid right to the weight room.

Like most drafts, we can't grade this one until probably 3 years from now. Free Agency officially begins July 1st. Until then, it's baseball and the smell of college football right around the corner.