NBA Draft Projections & Mock Drafts 2019

This I can certainly agree with (Boeheim being more lax with the rules). A little background - I live right outside of Syracuse and have several well connected friends. I’ve heard stories. I do know that the program has attempted to clean up some of these “fringe” type of benefits (or at least their connections to anything of the sort). I would bet that Boeheim would not be giving money from his pocket nowadays (different times back in the 80s and early 90s).

AAU is a completely unregulated and broken system. Do I believe that many AAU coaches are paid, pay players/families, and are basically completely dirty? Absolutely. I know this for a fact.

And Dylan, maybe you know something related to Battles recruitment and getting paid, but I have not seen or heard anything that would indicate that.

Lastly, despite living in an Orange crazed area, I’ve found it impossible to root for the team while Battle was on it. I think that whole situation - commit/decommit to UM and commit to SU - was shady and bizarre, just not in a $$$ way.

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I think his Dad was incentivized to sway Tyus to Syracuse. Skin in the game as they say.

I was actually a big Syracuse fan when I started watching basketball in the 1980s. I played point guard when I was young, and I really liked Pearl Washington - so much so that I special ordered a pair of the orange and white low top Nike Dunks that he wore back in the 1980s. I also really liked the Douglas/Coleman/Thompson/Owens teams.

I was still a pretty big fan when they made the finals against Kentucky in 1996, and when they won it all with Melo in 2003. I still like them, but I’m not a huge fan of watching their zone (frankly, because it’s so good - it just makes games slower with less scoring), and their offense has been kinda brutal to watch lately too - seems like five guys trying to go one on one every time down the court.

Battle’s recruitment was very similar to Al Horford’s recruitment. Both committed to UM for a very short time, 1-3 weeks and both had the recruitment turned around by their fathers.

There was personal financial incentives around both of those changes whether by the school, shoe companies, AAU team, AAU team support, I don’t know the specifics. What I can do is smell a rat. :japanese_goblin:

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Agree with this. That team was something amazing. I was always a DC fan and that team was fun to watch.

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Enjoy the G-League/Europe

This is a common “taunt” by fans who don’t think a player will be an NBA star, as if that is the baseline for assessing a basketball career. Let’s start with the G-League. A player who signs an NBA contract but spends time in the G-League – as many young players do – still gets NBA money. Those who go undrafted and sign G-League contracts make $35,000 for a five-month season. Nice work if you can get it, and $35,000 more than a player makes in college.

In decent leagues overseas, players are getting at least twice that per season. The top players in the top leagues are making well into six figures. Shane Larkin left Miami after his sophomore year in 2013, bounced around the NBA for a few years, and reportedly signed a one-year, $1.8-million contract with a Turkish team last summer.

This is the point that I think makes the opposite argument that doesn’t make it a clear decision to leave to just go play pro no matter what.

If JP, doesn’t get a two-way G League contract, he is gonna go make normal person money playing in Europe at 50-80k per year. or 35k in the G League. Not bad for a normal college grad, but very bad when you consider that your career path will almost assuredly be over by age 35 at the latest… You can still work your way into big money in Europe or into the NBA, but it’s significantly easier to do it out of college than it is in Europe, and that 50-80k you lose for playing in college is not game-changing in the scope of your life (considering a lot of that money is not going to get saved and will be going to taxes/expenses).

There seems to be a theme that I see with players who see too late that playing overseas is often a dead-end and that you’ll need a backup plan and a second career path in order to keep living afterwards. IMO, it’s generally worth taking the risk to get into a secure position in the draft and get that life-changing money before you take the jump.

Of course, none of this applies if you are getting any sort of real NBA contract out of college (doesn’t have to be 1st round).

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https://twitter.com/AdamZagoria/status/1121431020123897857

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Europe is an interesting place as far as pay goes. They want their American players (some leagues have limits on amount of Americans) to be big time producers and they are paid that way. Generally, the first few years aren’t as lucrative but after you’ve proven yourself you are making big time money, and it’s tax free because the club pays your taxes.

The top teams in Russia (CSKA Moscow), Israel (Maccabi Tel Aviv and several others), and Greece (Panathiokos and Olympicaos) pay NBA type money. There have been several players that have decided to stay in Europe because they technically make more money and they are playing significant minutes.

There are some issues with teams in Europe. Sometimes the pay is late and sometimes you don’t get it at all (many go to court to retrieve their money).

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Nice work if you can get it, and $35,000 more than a player makes in college.

With infinitely more expenses than someone on a full athletic scholarship.

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Yes, their food, housing, stipends, etc are peanuts when compared to an NBA salary, significant when compared to $35,000.

Also, the value of the academic part of the scholarship is more relevant for players who are scrapping to earn more than those lower end pro salaries.

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Those games were battles back in the day! Banging and balling, throw a few elbows and the stare down! The Big East was a destination!

Absolutely. That conference always seemed to have the best big men and power forwards - Ewing, Mutombo, Mourning, Seikaly, Coleman, Billy Owens, Charles Smith, Bill Wennington, Ed Pinckney, Jerome Lane, Walter Berry (maybe a small forward, but he did almost all of his scoring in the post), the list goes on. Ewing played in three championship games in his four years. Pretty remarkable.

My cousin was a solid D1 player in a major conference for a top 20 team - I think he got 2nd or 3rd team all-conference as a senior. He never had NBA prospects. He ended up playing professionally in China for about 6 or 7 years.

In addition to this salary (I think he made about $60k or $70k for a season), he did not spend a cent of his own money during his tiem there - the team paid for his apartment, his transportation, his food…everything. A HUGE percentage of his salary was saved as a result.

After 7 years he had enough money to come back, and straight up buy a business that he doesn’t personally manage (a fairly successful restaurant), and simply live off the profits.

You don’t need millions to make enough money to significantly alter your life.

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But, your cousin has managed his finances very smartly. For every guy who does that, there are 10 who don’t.

Moreover, it sounds like your cousin is not a guy who felt like the NBA was in his future. Thus, he saved his money because the NBA was not part of his plan in life, but doing other things which required money was.

It would be really easy to see some of these kids blow through all their money thinking that the D-League or playing overseas is just a temporary “pit stop” before the NBA comes calling.

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Well sports are littered with examples of people who have blown their finances no matter how much they make.

I was more trying to illustrate:

  1. The compensation is far greater than salary, given that you don’t have any expenses while you play.

  2. Given that, while it’s not so simple as just having a ton of money, you can walk out of a few years as an ex-pat pro with a pretty good nut to start the rest of your life with.

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This whole “team pays for everything” seems to only be a thing if he gets in specific situations overseas. It’s certainly not how it works in the G-League, which is the most likely route if he doesn’t end up in the NBA but wants the best shot to keep trying.

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Well no, the G-League pays peanuts compared to overseas. Granted.

I agree that overseas would be a good place to make a solid living with his ability level, but I (just from interviews and stuff) think that his ambitions lie elsewhere and that it’s the least likely landing spot for him of the three “options.”

A 2-way paid about $78k this year, and maintained proximity/contact with NBA franchises.

That’s not a bad deal.

EDIT: Their G-League salary is $78k. Then they get paid NBA rookie minimum for their NBA time - so a guy that uses all his NBA service time gets paid $210k.