Breaking Down The Second Half of the Draft

by user Wade Garrett

The top ten picks have been discussed at such length, and for so many months, that I'm sick of talking about them.  Let's look at the rest of the draft:

1) I have no idea what to make of the Trailblazers.  Not only would I have chosen Kevin Durant over Greg Oden, I also think that Portland could have received more in return for Zach Randolph.  He's a legitimate all-star, while Steve Francis, though a former all-star, has serious and possibly career-threatening tendonitis in his knees.  Channing Frye, the other player the Trailblazers received in the deal, can back up both Oden and Aldridge, but is more of a career backup than anything else.

2)  Having just said that about Portland, I really like what they did with their later picks.  I've already written about how much I like Sergio Rodriguez; I think he's their point guard of the future.  Now, they can team him with Rudy Fernandez, his teammate from the Spanish national team.  Fernandez played very well in the 2004 Olympics and the 2006 World Championships, and is a definite bargain with the 24th pick.  Whether he'll get on the floor with both Brandon Roy and Steve Francis playing ahead of him, I have no idea.  You have to expect that Rodriguez and Fernandez will see a considerable amount of playing time together, since they've already been teammates for so long.  With a backcourt of Brandon Roy, Jarrett Jack, Fernandez, Rodriguez, and what's left of Steve Francis, the Blazers could become legit in a hurry.

3)  Keeping with Portland, I like the Josh McRoberts pick.  I have serious reservations about McRoberts, because, though he is very talented, I think he is a bit of a soft player - he doesn't seem to want the ball near the end of close games.  Having said that, he was ranked roughly 20th in the draft based on his talent and multi-dimensional skills, and for Portland to grab him with the 38th pick is a potentially enormous bargain.  With so many better scoring options around him, McRoberts can concentrate on what he does best, namely run the floor, hit open threes, and pass well out of the high post.  On the Trailblazers, he can leave the clutch-time shots to Roy, Oden and Francis.  I think Portland just got itself a bargain.

4)  Alondo Tucker is going to be a great fit for the Suns.  He's best suited to play on a running team, where his relative lack of size won't hurt him as badly as it would on a more half-court oriented team like, say, Detroit.  A first-team all-american, enormous college numbers, undersized for the NBA game, drafted 29th overall . . . Alondo has all of the makings of the next Josh Howard.

5)  Aaron Affalo has a very similar game to Richard Hamilton, which makes him a natural selection to be Hamilton's back-up in Detroit.  Plus, he is a proven winner and a big-game player.  He's a good selection for a number of different reasons.

6)  The LA Lakers got a deal on Marc Gasol, another Spaniard.  He won't be a star in the NBA like his older brother Pau, but he's already good enough to be a solid rotation guy, and that's a good bargain for the 47th overall pick.

7)  Nick Fazekas might be best pick of the second round of the draft.  He, like Alondo Tucker, might have fallen victim to the "college senior syndrome," the rationale for which is:  If he's such a great player, why hasn't he turned professional already?  Well, he's averaged 21.1 points and 10.3 rebounds per game for the past THREE years.  How did he slip this far?  Didn't anybody learn from Paul Millsap last year?  He's the sort of player that San Antonio or Utah would normally be intelligent enough to select.  He's going to be a good pro, you heard it here first.

8)  The Spurs drafted Tiaggo Splitter, the 6'11" Brazillian.  I've seen Splitter play in international competition; at the NBA level I think he'll be similar to, say, a Kurt Thomas-type player.  Definitely a good value pick considering they took him 28th overall, but if I was the Spurs GM I would probably have chosen Fazekas instead.