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There seems to be an unusually high amount of fallout from the NBA Draft Lottery the other night. I’m assuming part of it is because of Durant/Oden and another part of it is Spurs/Jazz/Cavs/Pistons (although last night’s horrible officiating should help detract the talking heads from the lottery for a second). The majority of the reactions fell into two categories. The first: Hooray, we beat the lottery, our franchise is saved! The other: The lottery screwed us, the lottery sucks, our franchise is doomed for the next 30 years. There was really nothing in between.

NBA Draft: Wilson Chandler

Spokane, WA - Eastern Washington University’s loss is the National Basketball Association’s gain.

Although he kept open the option to possibly return for his junior season, Rodney Stuckey has eliminated that option by recently hiring Goodwin Sports Management based in Seattle, Wash., to represent him.
On April 25, the sensational Eagle basketball player declared for the NBA draft that takes place on June 28. If he hadn’t hired an agent, he could have withdrawn his name by June 18 and returned to EWU next fall.

The Portland Trailblazers are the big winners of the 2007 NBA Draft Lottery. The Blazers already have a core of forwards in Zach Randolph and Brandon Roy, so its a virtual lock they would want Greg Oden. Seattle also moves 3 spots to #5, and will be in line to pick Kevin Durant.  The Atlanta Hawks get lucky and move up to #3 as well. The league's worst two teams, the Grizzlies and the Celtics bucked all odds by dropping out of the Top 3.

 

This is a straight forward list. Every draft prospect is listed with their consensus draft projection, along with whether the player is overrated, underrated or rated properly. In limited situations, where noted, the player's projected draft position varies so widely that its hard to pinpoint whether a player gets too much or too little respect.

Mohamed Abukar - C - Undrafted - Rated
Arron Afflalo - SG - Early Second Round - Underrated
Morris Almond - SG - Late First, Early Second - Rated
Stanko Barac - C - Mid Second round - Rated
Marco Belinelli - SG - Late first Round - Underrated

This is a follow up to yesterday's analysis of the point guard prospects. Tomorrow will be the small forwards. Shooting guard has some uncertainty as guys like Cook or Afflalo could (and I'd say should) return to school.

NBA Draft: Ali Traore

(no stars)