NBA
Is the NBA Draft overrated?
In the last few years, something crazy has happened: The NBA Draft has ceased to matter.
Well, not really. But kinda.
Undrafted Gems
Fred VanVleet, a top three finalist for Sixth Man of the Year in the 2017/18 season was an undrafted free agent in 2016. This year, Allonzo Trier has been one of the best rookies in the NBA. He was also passed on by 30 teams in two rounds in 2018. Danuel House Jr, Luke Kornet, Bryn Forbes, Derrick Jones Jr, David Nwaba, and many more are quality rotation players in the NBA. All of them were undrafted, and this is only looking at the last three years. MANY more are coming.
But VanVleet may be somewhat of a pioneer. He may be the greatest undrafted player success story in the NBA’s recent history, but he may also be just the beginning.
It’s About Money, Honey
In a salary cap era, with the advent of the G-League and with increased scouting through social media access, there are more player options than ever before in basketball’s long history. Also, there is a greater economic incentive to identify those contract bargains.
The cost savings are significant.
The rookie contracts have set prices, and those prices are in the millions for all first-round draft picks. As for undrafted rookies, teams could sign them for as little as $77,250 on a two-way deal. And that’s if they make the NBA. G-League contracts are even less!
The Age of Abundance
We are entering the age of abundance. No longer does the world believe that two rounds of annual basketball talent are enough to fully supply the labor market in the NBA. While there remains a finite supply of NBA player jobs (there hasn’t been NBA expansion for 25 years), the number of competitors for those few jobs is immense. NBA jobs can be measured in DAYS, not years.
A 10-day contract is a pretty standard entry-level contract for a new player added mid-season, and the new two-way contracts stipulate that a player can spend 45 days MAX at the NBA level. By fragmenting these jobs, essentially turning full-time jobs into part-time contract jobs, the number of prospective employees is exponential.
The path to the NBA is also more circuitous than ever before. 2018 second round pick, of the New York Knicks, Mitchell Robinson didn’t even bother to go to college to prepare for his NBA job. Simply, he hired a personal trainer to work with him for a year, then declared for the NBA Draft — securing a job at pick #36. He’s currently averaging 2.4 blocks in 19 minutes at the NBA level, with an insane block percentage of 10.7 (while he doesn’t actually “qualify,” Robinson leads the NBA in this advanced metric. Myles Turner is credited as the league leader in block % at 8.5).
The Future
Where do we go from here?
The college system is already somewhat of a joke with most elite high school players opting to spend one year in college before “graduating” to the NBA. The G-League is offering prospective college players the option to forgo college and fast track their way to an NBA future for $125,000 under their new Selects program.
The NBA itself has just created a new, 12-team league in Africa to develop more international talent. Many more player options are coming, and yet, there remains a finite number of NBA jobs available. The bottom line here is that Fred VanVleet’s unconventional path to the NBA indicates more than a stroke of luck. It’s a fundamental alternative to the old way of doing business. And it’s only the beginning of a much larger wave coming.
Perhaps the future will view all prospective players more like a series of actors represented by agents instead of a lucky few hoping to win the NBA’s “lottery.” If that’s not a metaphor, I don’t know what is.
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@Raptors via Twitter
