The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - NBA Draft Reaction: Lakers STEAL Knecht, Grizzlies draft Zach Edey, Wolves big trade

Episode Date: June 28, 2024

Jason Timpf reacts to Round 1 of the NBA Draft featuring Zach Edey joining Ja Morant and the Memphis Grizzlies, Dalton Knecht falling to LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers, and Anthony Edwards' Minnesota Timberwolves trading up for Kentucky's Rob Dillingham. Jason also shares his thoughts on the Top 5 selections including Zaccharie Risacher going to the Atlanta Hawks with the No. 1 overall pick, Alex Sarr heading to the Wizards at No. 2, and Reed Sheppard joining a young Houston Rockets team. 6:00 - 1. Hawks: Zaccharie Risacher 8:00 - 2. Wizards: Alex Sarr 10:00 - 3. Rockets: Reed Sheppard 12:00 - 4. Spurs: Stephon Castle 13:30 - 5. Pistons: Ron Holland II 15:45 - Why Kel'el Ware fits with Heat 24:00  - Timberwolves trade for Rob Dillingham 29:00- Grizzlies draft Zach Edey 33:30 - Lakers steal Dalton Knecht (Timestamps may vary based on advertisements.) #Volume #HerdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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We had a couple of interesting trades. Obviously, we're going to get into the guys at the top of the draft. We're going to kind of bounce around the first draft. and hit a bunch of the top storylines. You guys know the drill before we can start. It's subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason LT so you guys don't miss show announcements. Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight.

And then keep dropping mailbag questions in the YouTube comments. So we can keep hitting them throughout the end of this week and into next week. All right, let's talk some basketball. So to give you guys an idea of the kind of outline today, I'm going to briefly hit on each of the top five picks. And then I'm going to hit some of the bigger stories in the first round. So Minnesota getting Rob Dillingham by trading up into that San Antonio Spurr spot. That was super interesting to me, kind of like an aggressive move from Minnesota to address a specific need. So we're going to get into that a little bit and how he fits.

The Grizzlies getting Zach Edy, which I thought was really interesting. We're going to talk about whether or not Zach Edy can play in the NBA. Well, I think kind of that debate is silly. And we're going to get into his specific fit with Memphis and why I actually think that's the perfect spot. for him to start. One of my favorite picks out in the Eastern Conference, Khalil Ware, going to Miami, a guy who brings kind of like a rim protection and a floor spacing element. We're talking about him. And then lastly, a guy who was projected by most to be a top 10 pick, Dalton Connect falls to the Los Angeles Lakers. We're going to talk

a little bit about him at the end of the show. All right. So we're going to start with the top five. So Zachary Roshascha takes, goes to Atlanta at number one. And this guy is just a quintessential offball role players. 6-9, he's rangy, off-ball defender, really good kind of like making reeds from that low-man position, whether it's jumping, passing lanes, whether it's bothering

role men in pick and roll, covering ground on the weak side to shooters and rotation. Remember, this is something that we've seen become immensely valuable over the course of the last few years in the NBA. This is that ground coverage concept that we've been talking about, right? So elite players require aggressive coverages, right?

When you throw aggressive coverages, you leave weak side two-on-ones typically, right? And so having guys that can, you know, if there's a pass to the wing who can close out to the passing lane in between the wing and corner shooter and effectively kind of be in multiple places at once, guys who can win contested rebound battles with their length, guys who can, you know, when you have to bring your rim protector up to the level of the screen and there's a lob threat rolling down the lane, a guy who can bother lob passes, that type of like, off ball ranginess and length is super valuable, right? And then he brings a little bit of the same kind of offensive capability on the other end of the floor, right? Like he was streaky, but this kid can shoot. And I actually think his game compliments Jalen Johnson pretty well. Like Jalen brings the more athletic kind of like downhill type of feel, right?

Whereas like Rishas, he's got the length, but he's more of like a finesse type of player, good at attacking closeouts, better shooter at this point. So, like, I kind of think that they represent an interesting three, four type of pairing for Atlanta to evaluate over the course the next few years. Now, everything for Atlanta comes down to what they're willing to do with Trey Young and what they're willing to do with DeJante Murray. Are they going to keep Clint Capella? How does DeAndre Hunter fit into this now that you have your three and four kind of lined up in terms of the future? So it's really hard to get a read for what Atlanta's going to look like next year. But at least at the three and four, Zachary Ressache and Jail and John.

and represent an interesting kind of future core to keep an eye on. Alex Sar to Washington, right? Alex Sar played in Perth last year, played alongside a Tucson guy named Bryce Cotton, who a guy that I played a lot with back when he used to live here, and brings a lot of intriguing skills, a lot of upside. But the exciting thing with Alex Sar is he's one of the higher floor guys in this draft because he's just already an excellent defender.

He's especially in pick and roll, he's just got a bunch of versatility in the way that he can guard. Like, throw him in a deep drop. He's got the length to bother stuff at the rim. He's very good. I'd argue it's like one of his strengths being aggressive in ball screen coverages with his length on the ball handler, although he can sometimes get burned on the backside as a result.

He's a guy that can switch and guard perimeter players in space. So like immediately he represents kind of like a foundational piece for a defense, right? Now, the offensive end is where his potential upside is. like did a lot of work in Perth's five-out system as like a dribble handoff kind of of folkroom, right? Like he's a guy who would kind of dribble at guys coming out of the corner and they'd either come off of him for handoff or cut back door. He just was good at kind of making those reads.

He has some improvement to make in terms of like actually setting solid screens, but that'll come in time, especially as he gets bigger. It got a lot of aggressive coverages towards Bryce Cotton. So he got some work in the short role where he made good reads to guys cutting along the baseline and kick out passes to show. shooters in the corner. I think that he just kind of has the potential to be that type of five out big that we talk so much about on this show where I think the future of NBA offense is heading anyway. So it's a high floor pick, a guy that has a lot of offensive upside that may or may not

be realized. It really just comes down to how well his jump shot develops over the years, right? But I like it. It's like a good ball screen fulcrum to pair with Jordan Poole and a defensive foundation. You can get a better look at how Jordan Poole fits into your team's future looking forward. I like the pick. Alex Sart to Washington. At three, Reed Shepard to the Rockets, just a ready-made role player. He's one of the best shooting prospects in this draft, if not the best. He's really good at operating with an advantage. This is when Reed was at his like the most fun to watch, right? Like whether it was kind of in the open floor when things are chaotic or whether he's attacking a closeout or kind of functioning in the offense when he has an advantage. He's just a really

good ball handler and has a really good feel for like reading what uh where defenders are leaning and hitting them with counter moves and then he's just got all the footwork literally looks like he's uh the kind of guy that you'd see in like a skill development video like he can take off left right he could take off right left he could take off off the hop like he can do all of these different footwork things to get different kind of releases from different angles as a shopmaker and so he'll immediately be a really good connective piece for Houston. He's like it just is going to be a guy that kind of makes things work better offensively, especially on a team like Houston that has a lot of raw talent. He's kind of more of a finished product that will help it like tie it all together.

It doesn't have the upside as some of these other guys in Houston, but he should be able to immediately come in and help and immediately come in and be that type of connective piece, especially for a team in Houston that as we know, especially from the Intel, wants to be good sooner than later. Like they want to be in the mix in the West. sooner than later. Good defender as well, always in the right place. Doesn't have great physical tools, a little short, a little, doesn't have a ton of length, but he does his job. He is always in the right place. Like I said, he competes on the ball, fights over screens. One of the things that stood out to me on film when I was watching him was he's really good at attacking the dribble pocket after chasing

over the top of the screen. Got a lot of steals this year where he would chase from behind and just swipe at the basketball and he generate transition opportunities that way. And so again, I like to, I like fit with Houston as basically a guy that can kind of just immediately slot in and help kind of grease the wheel, so to speak, offensively while also being a functional piece of their defense. And like we talked about earlier, there's lots of intel that the Rockets could potentially be gearing up for Star Trade at some point before the deadline, and he just represents another asset that you could potentially use in a situation like that. Number four, the Spurs drafts, Stefan Castle. Stefan Castle was one of my favorite guys to watch when we were doing

our draft prep. He's just a classic big guard, right? Kind of slow, methodical, doesn't have a super quick first step. Not a guy who's looking to shoot a ton from the perimeter. He's just trying to kind of get into that short to mid-range where he's got every counter move, every floater, every hook, every short jump shot in the book, and he's just super comfortable operating in that area. He's got a lot of like that kind of like Shegey Alders-Alexander kind of crafty stuff within that like 10 to 15 foot range, not as good as shooter as Shea, and that obviously is going to be the huge swing factor for Steph's career, right? Like if he's going to be anything more than what he's projected to be at this point, he's got to become a more functional shooter from the perimeter.

But the big thing that I like about Stefan Castle is he just has a great feel for the game. He's really good at playing alongside other good basketball players. He's not a guy that's going to disrupt the flow of an offense. It's kind of like we were talking about with Reed Shepard. He greases the wheel, so to speak. And so we know this is a Spurs team that desperately needs more feel around Victor Wembenyama, right? Like guys who know how to play with other good basketball players, right? So this was a really good step in the right direction to pair him with Victor Wembenyama. Number five, our last pick in the top five, Ron Holland, going to the Detroit Pistons. Kind of another high motor athletic wing with a lot of upside that hasn't really come together

in terms of his skill development. So you're betting in the long run that you pair him with Thassar Thompson, and you basically just have these layers of wing athleticism to compliment Kade Cunningham on the margins, right? And this is just kind of the direction we're seeing the game going. We've seen multiple different types of teams win recently, right? Like Boston wins with all this wing talent and driving and kicking. Denver wins with this like interior frontline presence and over-the-top shot making with Jamal Murray and Golden State wins with five-out motion and the best pull-up shooting guard in the history of basketball, right? So like, they're all very different types of teams. But in general, if you were like asking,

what the single most effective form of modern basketball right now, it's rangy wing athleticism that can drive and kick. And specifically, if there's one offensive skill that Ron Holland's already pretty good at, it's driving closeouts. And so I think that's kind of the angle that they're looking at here is benefiting off of the attention that Cade Cunningham draws and his ability to generate those types of close-out opportunities. Again, a lot of the downside of the pessimism surrounding Ron Holland is he just struggled a lot

on the ball with G-League Ignite last year. but Gleague Ignite was a total shit show. And I'm going to say the same thing I said about McHale Bridges last night. Like, they're just reps. No one's drafting Ron Holland to be this dominant on-ball creator. It's not even something that Detroit needs in the long run, considering they're kind of built around this Cade Cunningham, Jaden Ivy, kind of shot creation foundation, right?

So like, what you really need is him to be a functional off-ball offensive player and those reps on the ball, they make it easier. Like, it's like one of those things where you're trying to learn how to make these reads when you're not very good at it against loaded up defense. And then what happens is you slide into a smaller role, you're constantly playing with an advantage. And then suddenly that just kind of becomes a little easier because you've practiced doing a much, much harder version of that. And specifically for teams like Detroit that are just so far away from contention, I like betting on wings with upside because they're the riskier ones, but they're the ones that have potential

to pan out to guys that can be profoundly impactful, especially in the later rounds of the NBA playoffs. One of the pick I wanted to shout out before we get into some of the bigger stories was Khalil Ware going to the Miami Heat. I really like this pick on a bunch of different levels. First of all, like this concept of like layering layers of athleticism on your front line, essentially like instead of viewing Bam necessarily as just a five, like what does it look like if you put him alongside another freaky athlete to kind of like layer that athleticism? This is the thing we saw a bunch around the league this year. This is a thing we saw with Minnesota that led to a lot of success against Denver.

Denver won last year with a massive center as well as this massive forward that has Bam at a biotype of size and Aaron Gordon at the four, right? And so like I like the idea of if you're struggling with ball handling and you can't find ball handling that meets that kind of meshes with what your ultimate goal is as a team. I like the idea of finding functional tools that can help immediately. And Kalil Ware can shoot, which is an interesting kind of pairing with Bam at a bio if he operates more as a dribble handoff fulcrum and operates more close to the rim. and then he brings just that height, athleticism, vertical spacing piece. And so I just thought that was a really interesting fit for Miami. And one of the things, too, is like the rub on Khalil where he can struggle with physicality, right? Like, he's just not a very tough type of big, right?

And like, give me that in Miami's system over anywhere else in terms of a system that breeds toughness that's going to get him in the weight room, that's going to have him in the peak version of himself physically, that's going to hold him a that's going to be that's going to give them tough love i think like that's the kind of thing like a lot of times you have to you have to find a way to drive that toughness out of them and in in kind of like get them to fight where they can struggle to fight sometimes and so i kind of like the culture of miami as a foundation to help cali aware uh get going and once again like that's just kind of if you're it's an upside pick in the sense that if you're dreaming about what the modern mba center looks like it's the ability to stretch the floor shot over 40% from three last year i'll be it on

really low volume. It's the ability to stretch the floor and the ability to protect the rim with real vertical presence on the other end of the floor. But it also brings that vertical spacing on the offensive ends. I like that pick for Miami. So the three biggest, like, stories that I thought were interesting in terms of like interesting, aggressive moves, it had to do with all three of them kind of had to do with bizarre circumstances, right? So the Timberwolves get Rob Dillingham. We're going to talk about that. Just had to do with the trading up, right? This is a team that was in the conference finals last year that managed to get a top 10 pick via giving future draft compensation. Then we have Zach Edy going to Memphis. This is a pick

that was available to Memphis because of the fact that they had this really bad season, because John Morant was out, because Marcus Smart was hurt so much. So we have a really good team that drafted towards the top, a really good team that traded towards the top. And then Dalton connect a top 10 prospect by most by most of the people that I trust covering the draft. Alton Connect was one of the top 10 prospects, falls all the way to 17 to the Los Angeles Lakers. So those are the three kind of bigger picture storylines that we're going to hit here in the next couple of minutes.

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on my new podcast, learn the hard way. Open your free, our heart radio app, Search learn the hard way and listen now. Hey, this is Robert from the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast. Joe and I are both lifelong Star Wars fan, so we're celebrating May the 4th with a brand new week of fun, thought-provoking Star Wars-related episodes. Join us as we tackle science and culture topics

from a galaxy far, far away, such as the biology of tauntons and wampas on the ice planet hot, or the practicality and corporate business sense of the Sith Rule of Two. Listen to Stuff to Blow Your Mind on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. Let's start with the Timberwolves getting Rob dealing in. So I look at Rob is kind of like a smaller version of Malik Monk. He was an overtime elite guy and he transferred to Kentucky.

It was immediately one of the best shot creators in the country. He was 87 percentile among pick and roll players at high volume. He's already a really good pull-up shooter. He's got a deadly floater. He shot 53% on them this year at Kentucky. He made some strives as a playmaker. That was his biggest weakness when he was with overtime elite. he basically just dribbling up the floor

and shooting every single time. And, you know, we talked to Damien Wilkins on Monday, and he made some good points about the fact that, like, that's what he does. And you want to lean into that. But the growth as a playmaker is important because if you want to be a sixth man who just comes off the bench and shoots every time, sure. But if you want to be a functional part who plays significant rotation minutes

on a great team, you're going to have to be able to play alongside other good basketball players. And he did make some strides in that area of the game at Kentucky. Super explosive off the balance. He has good start-stop quickness, a deadly, like, left-handed high-hesitation dribble where he'll, like, come to a complete stop and then shoot out of a cannon can really beat people off the dribble. But the big thing that's exciting to me, as far as the fit with Minnesota, he is a straight-up deadly off-ball shooter. He shot 50% field-goal percentage on unguarded jump shots this year. That came out to 1.48 points per shot.

48% overall field-go percentage on catch-and- shoot jump shots, regardless of whether or not they were guarded. he was a 97th percentile, spot-up player. He got 1.3 points per possession. Those are like Michael Porter Jr. type of numbers, right? So the biggest weakness with Rob is that he's small, right? And that can obviously cause some issues for him defensively, but he does play hard and he does compete. He's got a good motor.

So like Minnesota makes a ton of sense for me in terms of a fit for Rob, because if you had to construct a team that would allow him to have an achievable defensive role, it would be on a team like this that has multiple elite perimeter defenders and an elite rim protector. Because what that means is Rob is most likely going to be on a movement shooter. Like any sort of on ball dribble creator, you're going to put Ant on. You're going to put Jada McDaniels on, right? You're going to ask Rob Dealingham to guard a shooter who's either operating on the weak side or maybe occasionally coming off of some screening actions.

That's an achievable role for him, right? And then like, yeah, he's going to be attacked in some ball screen situations where they bring his man up into the screen, but he's quick enough to throw a hedge and recover. Again, like, that was the thing. What caused issues for Luca in the finals was he's not fast enough to hedge and recover, so he basically has no choice but to guard, and he can't guard. And so it became an issue as Boston continued to get dribble penetration on him. Like, when it comes to weak defenders, you just have to have the ability to do something in terms of the game plan. And as long as he can chase shooters around and as long as he can functionally hedge and recover to protect himself from getting attacked

and switches, I think it can work. Not to mention, in terms of in his lock and trail situations, he's going to be in a pretty good spot from the standpoint of having Rudy Gobert behind him and just the overall amount of length and athleticism behind him to kind of anchor him on that end of the floor. And again, he competes. And he competes and he's got the quickness. Those are things that I think make it doable. Things I like.

He's just an absolute flamethrower off ball score. And after what we saw happened to Minnesota and the Dallas series where Dallas just loads up the strong side and just any of those swing passes to Nikiel Alexander Walker, Jaden McDaniels, or Kyle Anderson, whoever, there just wasn't enough off ball scoring pop to make Dallas pay for loading up the strong side, right? Especially with Rudy Gobert, who can really cause problems for the offense with his inability to catch and finish in traffic around the basket, right? So like Minnesota is uniquely set up to benefit from Rob Dillingham's strengths while also covering for Rob Dillingham's weaknesses. And then in addition to that, he fits a positional need. Mike Conley's 36 years old. He's going to start this year.

He's going to be their primary guy in that position, but he can help Rob as a mentor. If Conley has to sit out games, he can slide into that role. And over time, if he shows the ability to compete defensively and shows that his scoring, his flamethrower scoring can help in that back. court, that could be his spot to take. My one concern, he's not a natural playmaker. He's getting better at it, but it's not a natural thing for him. And I don't love the idea of having your back court be two ball handlers that both aren't great passers, right? Like, it's getting better,

but that's not his natural strength either. And I would argue that overall ball movement in that five-man grouping for Minnesota is one of their biggest weaknesses offensively, right? That's how you beat teams that load up the strong side. We talked about this a lot yesterday when we were kind of breaking down some of the five-out stuff. Like, you need to get the ball side-to-side. Imagine it like this. If you have the three-point line and everyone's loaded up on the strong side, you need to get the ball to the other side so that defense has to shift. And with multiple side-to-side shifts, that's where you can find cracks in the defense

that you can take advantage of. And you're just not going to get those opportunities unless you have a certain amount of playmaking on the floor. So that's my one concern. But that's another thing that, like, if Rob can get better at it in the long run, especially under Mike Connolly's tutelage, it makes a lot of sense. And I do like the off-ball scoring piece, and Ants development as a playmaker will help a lot in that regard as well. Okay, the Grizzlies and Zach Edy. I want to look at this from two angles first.

I want to talk about Zach Edy kind of in a vacuum as an NBA player, and then we'll talk about his fit in Memphis. Can Zach Edy play in the NBA? That's the big debate that everyone's been talking about over the last few weeks. And it's a lot of, like, radical, like, he's going to be awesome or he's not going to be able to play at all? and to me the answer is really simple. He'll certainly be able to play in some matchups.

When he can run drop coverage on defense, meaning against teams that can't really force him to guard in space and teams that can't run him off the floor in transition, when he's in those situations, he won't just be playable, he'll be good. Because he's huge, and he's a smart basketball player who knows how to use his size. On offense, he'll set great screens

and he'll roll into the lane for deep seals and buckets around the rim, and on defense, he's going to protect. protect the paint and clean up the defensive glass. He is a functional big man when he's able to be close to the rim and when he can't be capitalized on in space, right? But he's definitely going to struggle against the pace

and space type of teams that can run him up and down the floor and force him to guard on the perimeter. But this is something that Memphis is set up to deal with. Memphis can function as a team with Jaron Jackson at the 5 and with Jaron Jackson at the 4, right? Especially with the rise of G.G. Jackson, who I really

like as a forward that can shoot the ball, that you put next to Jaron Jackson in their smaller looks, you can actually see it all work together, right? Like, here's Memphis in a matchup against Minnesota, a team that you can load up the strong side against, and you're not as worried about Rudy Gobert, forcing EDI to guard in space, or Minnesota, like, just kind of running up and down the floor in transition, right?

Like, in those situations, you go big, it's Edy at the 5, it's Jared Jackson at the 4, operating as the low man, You can allow EDI to be aggressive on the ball handler and use his length to kind of swarm there. Jaron Jackson's running that backline. You have G.G. Jackson is another layer of athleticism on the wing, or maybe you can go smaller with that group and have Smart Bain and John Morant out there. But if you're playing against the Golden State Warriors or the Indiana Pacers, a team that's really going to force E.D. to cover a ton of ground and really kind of expose some of his

quickness issues, that's where it might make more sense to take him out of the lineup, go with Jared Jackson at the five, Gigi Jackson at the four with Smart Bain and John Morant. The idea here is, is like, EDI is only going to be functional in the NBA in certain types of situations, but those specific types of situations are the only situations that Memphis is really looking at to use Ety anyway. And so the fit makes a ton of sense. When Memphis can load up the strong side and keep Ety by the rim, he's their big look. when they can't, they have Jaron Jackson, his ability to play at the five, and they can put a lineup out there with Jaron Jackson, Gigi Jackson, Bain, Smart,

and John Morant, where they just have a ton of perimeter speed, the ability to contain on the ball, plenty of offensive skill and spacing, right? So, like, it makes a ton of sense. And, like, I actually think Memphis is going to be a dominant regular season team next year. Like, I think they're going to be right back in that. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Memphis got a top four seed next year. So, like, Eadie's going to have a small and achievable

role alongside good role players. I love the fit. I'm excited to watch Edy play in Memphis. And then lastly, before we get out of here, the Lakers getting Dalton Connect. So Dalton was, by most of the people that I trust, ranked as a top 10 prospect in this class. He does not represent something that the Lakers specifically need, right? Like, if I was listing the things that the Lakers need, I would put it down to three specific types of players. I think that they, I think Austin at the one is perfect or Austin at the two is perfect, however you want to call it. One, two doesn't really matter to me on this particular team because they run five out and everyone operates with the ball. So it's more like back court, right? I like Austin is one of the back court

guys. I like LeBron at the four and AD at the five. I think those are all guys that are good enough to win a championship in those roles. The problem is they were running DeLo and DeAngelo Russell and Rui Hachamura at the two and the three. DeLo was redundant with Austin and that forced Austin to be your primary point of attack defender, and Rui was redundant with LeBron, which forced Rui to chase Michael Porter Jr. around screens, which literally was one of the things that got them beat against Denver, as Rui just kept losing him, right,

especially when they shifted back to Anthony Davis on Nicole Yokic. So, like, as far as the Lakers go, there are three players that I think they need. They need a guard to put next to Austin, who is an athlete, a guard who can beat people off the dribble and guard on the perimeter. It needs to be a starting caliber two-way athletic guard, right? At the three, they need a guy who is the opposite of LeBron. Instead of a big bruising forward that functions more as a low man,

they need a slender, more athletic forward that is quick and can work on the perimeter that can guard people over the top of screens, guard rangy, athletic scoring wings. They need athletes at the two and three that actually function in those positions. And then lastly, they need a five. that it will allow them to function defensively when Anthony Davis is off the floor. They got very lucky this season with Anthony Davis staying healthy, but chances are he's going to miss 15 to 20 games this year,

and if you're going to contend in those situations, you've got to have a better center. So they need three players. They need an athlete two that can play both ends, and athlete three that can play both ends to starting caliber players, and then they need a bench big that can actually function as the foundation of a defense when Anthony Davis is off the floor. Those are the three biggest needs.

Dalton Connect does not fit into that. That said, at 17, he was the best player available. And he will immediately be able to help the Lakers as a weapon for them off the bench. To quote, I'm going to start with, before we get into Dalton, Dalton's evaluation, I'm going to share just a quote from San Vassini's draft guide. He straight up said, Dalton's the best off ball score in this class. That is immediately functional within the Lakers offense, especially when you don't need him to be on the ball.

The rub with Dalton Connect was against super elite defenses that had tons of length and athleticism, he struggled to create on the ball. So the question is, will he be able to create on the ball in the NBA? And who knows? We'll find out in the next few years. But the Lakers don't need him to right away. What the Lakers need him to do is come into the game off the bench

and be an effective part of their five-out offense, and Dalton is going to be excellent at that right away. First of all, he has an extended track record of being a great shooter, consistently throughout his career in the big sky, at Tennessee, in Juko. This dude can just knock down three point shots. Last year at Tennessee, he shot 42% on catch-and-shoot jump shots, 1.24 points per shot. Ungarded, he shot 47% field goal percentage, 1.38 points per shot. Just a deadly shooter. He can knock him down on the move.

He can knock him down off the dribble. He can knock him down in spot-up situations. He was a deadly close-out attacker as well. He converted spot-up possessions at 1.22 points per possession. That's in the 94th percentile. So just a deadly off-ball score. But the big thing that I'm excited about is he brings a transition athleticism piece, which is going to function really well with a Lakers team that loves to push,

especially like LeBron loves to throw those kick-ahead passes. LeBron loves it when athletes run on the wing. He's going to throw those kick-aheads, and Dalton's going to get those opportunities to kind of snake two-on-ones or attack one-on-one in transition and uses athleticism towards the rim. The other thing that really excited me as I watched Dalton film over the last week, he's a really good cutter. Tennessee would run a lot of like weak side action where there'd be like two or three guys weaving around screens, and then he would just slip and cut to the basket, hit him with a bounce pass. He can quickly pop off of two feet and dunk in traffic. had a lot of bodies this year on cuts towards the rim. And so when I think about a five-out offense,

and I think about, you know, JJ Reddick implementing three-man action or while Austin LeBron are running ball screens, you're going to have weak side action with Dalton Connect and Anthony Davis and whoever it is that's out there on the weak side. He's going to get lots of opportunities to cut along the baseline and to cut from the, from the slot. That's a team that's going to be able to capitalize on that. Austin and LeBron are going to hit him on a touchdown.

ton of those cuts. He's going to do a lot of finishing around the rim. So, like, the offensive fit with the Lakers is absolute shoe-in perfect. He is a proven shooter right away who can shoot it from deep and can shoot it in every single possible way. That is going to fit immediately and he can make good reads as a cutter off the ball in the five-out system. The concern was his on-ball decision making. Is he too much of a score? Can he read defenses? That don't matter. He can figure that out in the long run if he needs to, but within this Lakers team, similar to what I said about Minnesota with Rob Dillingham, they are set up to accentuate his strengths and to hide his weaknesses at this point. Now, the defense event, that's the major concern with Dalton Connect. A couple of different

things. First of all, he does have the athletic tools. He's about six, five and a half without shoes on, got a six, ten wing span, excellent frame, excellent athlete, right? So like, now there's some questions about his lateral quickness, but he actually tested okay on that at the combine. So, like, he's got the tools to be a functional defender. He just wasn't good at it. He struggles to contain on the ball, was inattentive off the ball. Those were issues for Dalton, right? Those are the things he's going to have to figure out if he wants to be more than just a bench role player for the Lakers, right? But again, in this situation, especially when he's going to have opportunities alongside Anthony Davis who can clean up a lot of mistakes. He's going to have time to

try to figure it out. And again, I don't view Dalton as the shoe in two. I don't think, like, who knows, maybe Dalton does earn the starting spot. I doubt it, though. Like, I don't view Dalton as a starting two or three for this Laker team. I view him as a immediate ready made role player off the bench on the wing. And so to me, like, I get way more concerned about like the defensive upside and what he's capable of for those two and three that I talked about in terms of who's going to close games for the Lakers in big moments. And yeah, if Dalton's going to be that, he's going to have to make massive improvements defensively.

But I'm not as worried about it in terms of the fit for the Lakers because I view him as more of a bench weapon, right? And that'll be the thing. Dalton competes. Dalton has the tool. So Dalton is capable of being equality NBA defender, at least a functional NBA defender. He's just going to have to put in the work.

And that's the big question mark. Every player in this draft has question marks. That's Dalton's question mark. to figure out how to compete on the defensive end at the NBA level. All right. So that's just like an instant reaction to the first round of the draft. We're going to have a bunch of draft content coming out over the next week. I want to do some film stuff on some specific players.

Like I'll put some film together on Rob Dillingham and I'll put some film together on Dalton Connect and we'll do some videos like that. We're also going to be doing a mailbag tomorrow. So make sure you guys drop. I think that's most likely going to be tomorrow's show is just some, We're going to do some film sessions on a couple of guys, and then we're going to do a mailbag at the end. So drop your mailbag questions into YouTube comments.

We'll get to them tomorrow. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me in the show. We'll see you guys then. The volume. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smigel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier.

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