Zeb Jackson down 26 spots to 95th (now 78th composite)
Terrance Williams up 5 spots to 100th (now 89th composite)
Hunter Dickinson down 9 spots to 47th (now 39th composite)
Also of some note, Todd down 13 spots to 27th (now 18th composite)
Feels like all of that movement is pretty much in line with what I’d expect.
Why would you expect Dickinson to fall, just out of curiosity? Already such a known commodity that the newly scouted players could reap some recency/shiny new toy bias from scouts?
Also, I completely agree with this logic on Hunter:
Probably the guy we had the most discussion about was Hunter Dickinson . At around 7-feet and 260 pounds, Dickinson is unique. Had he been born 10-20 years earlier; Dickinson would be in contention to be not just a top 20 prospect, but even potentially the No. 1 player in the class. He has legit size, soft hands, an ability to score down low, and is a good post defender.
However, now the game has changed, and post defenders also have to be perimeter defenders. Beyond that, scoring on the block is considered an inefficient way to play basketball, so without the ability to stretch the floor, it complicates the argument.
Basically, the NBA is simply ignoring guys like Dickinson now, except for very end of the bench roles. Even a guy as talented as Jahlil Okafor , who at one time was the No. 1 prospect in high school basketball, has been relegated to being a backup in the league.
And understand dropping his ranking because of it, but it doesn’t really change how he projects at Michigan. It is almost some underappreciated value as far as roster building.
Several Big Ten players in this mold who end up multi-year contributors (Garza, Ward, Haas, Hammons, Happ, just to name a few) who have old-school games and no NBA intrigue but are product.
Yeah, these all make sense to me. Although I’m always generally confused by 247’s logic as far as NBA potential. If you’re talking exclusively NBA potential, Hunter isn’t in the top 60, but if you’re talking college production, he’s maybe a 5 star (or close atleast). Not sure I understand the middle ground of partially weighting NBA potential in your rankings but not completely. Feels like I’d just rank them as far as “How good is this player now” and then maybe point out specific prospects with outsized NBA upside.
I think they just want to avoid “You guys had him as a five-star and he was never drafted.”
Yup. While at the same time trying to avoid the “you barely had him in the top 100 even though he averaged 17 and 10 in college.” Keeping Dickinson top 50, even though there may be more than 50 with higher NBA upside tends to try to play to both ends of the spectrum.
Yeah. I dislike 247’s logic considering what I care about is his Michigan potential and not NBA potential.
Which to be fair, makes logical sense to me? I do think that the bottom half of the top 100 should be more catered to college production than the top 30-40.
There are plenty of guys ranked on potential in that format as well. You have to balance a guy with a ton of potential (Bajema last year) vs. a guy who is maybe a producer (Williams this year).
That is what you use the rankings for, but that is not what they are ranking based on. How many NFL Draft graphics did you see from 247 Sports about how accurate their rankings are? That is a big part of the product.
I know.
I’m simply stating as a Michigan fan I care about how he translates to the college game and not the NBA and I wish their rankings would reflect that.
Tons of sites have NBA draft rankings for purely NBA potential.
I wish the H/S rankings would reflect college potential and not so high on NBA potential.
Yeah, I guess that is fair. I appreciate the nuance and the way that it was explained though. Far more valuable than a numerical ranking IMO.
People that read the nuanced explanation and then are still mad about the numerical ranking… Well, I’m not sure where to start. 
I guess some people just look at the numerical rankings as a win/loss type of situation like a game.
Haha.
I do appreciate the explanation they give.
I just wish Sam Vecennie would stick to NBA potential and recruiting sites would stick to college potential.
In the big picture I don’t care. Just a personal pet peeve lol.
I think that’s fair and logical. Would be very interesting to see places like 247 and rivals do two rankings. One based more on NBA potential, and another is based on expected college potential. I think the top would look largely the same because most those guys posses the highest upside and production potential. But after the top 20-30 I think things could get very interesting and look drastically different. Terrence Williams would be quite a bit higher up the board if based on college production and potential. If we went back to Cassius Winston’s class he’d be a top 5-10 player probably.
Well, is the goal to rank these players in terms of their future NBA potential and role, or how good they will be in college? Because if it’s the latter, there are not many 6-10 and taller dudes raining in threes in college, and the post game is very much alive and well, especially in the Big Ten. Just this year in the Big Ten, all of these guys were big post threats: Garza, Williams, Oturo, Tillman, Cockburn, Jalen Smith, Wesson, Potter, and even Teske on occasion. A few of them could occasionally step out for a jumper, but none of them were Karl Anthony Towns.
I should have read all the comments first. You guys covered it.
I always enjoy the discussion around trends/style of play and the transformation of the game. I think schools have to be mindful of how the game is played in the NBA. I for one hated the ISO and post-up game of the past but really enjoy the ball movement trend. You don’t want to get caught to far behind the curve and miss out competing with the Blue Bloods in terms of recruiting. Young men want to show case their talent and you can’t get caught in the past. The game is played behind the arc now and you’ll need athletes that can play in that space. I’m still amazed that MOE went in the first round, the skill set he has resonates to the big man of todays game. The GM’s love the analytics around the 3 ball and it won’t stop in the future. I won’t be surprised if Liver’s ends up at Golden State in a 2 way $350k per, they have two open spots and he can stretch the floor. I wonder how his 3 point average compares to the recruits in the draft. Cheers!