With no surprise and being on the clock since winning the draft lottery, the New Orleans Hornets drafted Kentucky’s Anthony Davis. Davis was last years AP Player of the Year, leading his Kentucky Wildcats to a National Championship victory. Davis will look to help the Hornets regain some confidence after a rough 21-45 season. Although Davis is defensively NBA ready, he will need to develop his offensive game to help make a bigger impact on both ends of the court.

The second pick of the draft belonged to the Charlotte Bobcats. The Bobcats finished the 2011-2012 season with the worst winning percentage in league history. With their pick, the Bobcats drafted another Kentucky star, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. This was the first time ever that the top two picks of the NBA draft were from the same school.

Washington was able to land Florida guard Bradley Beal with the third pick in the draft. The freshman guard has been compared to current NBA star and future Hall of Famer, Ray Allen.

Cleveland, who had their eyes on Beal, settled with Syracuse sophomore guard, Dion Waiters. This was a shock to some, considering Waiters did not start a single game for Syracuse last year, but should have an immediate impact for the Cavaliers.

Sacramento fans should be thrilled after drafting Kansas forward, Thomas Robinson. Through all the off court tragedy Robinson dealt with, he still led the nation with 27 double-doubles averaging 17.9 points per game and 11.8 rebounds.

Guard Damian Lillard from Webber State was drafted 6th by the Portland Trail Blazers. Lillard averaged 24.5 points per game, 2nd in the country. Lillard faces a tremendous amount of scrutiny based on the college competition he encountered. However, the 6’3 guard will look to make a quick impact for the Blazers.

Harrison Barnes, North Carolina forward, was drafted 7th by the Golden State Warriors. Barnes led the Tar Heels in scoring last season, averaging 17.4 points per game.

The second surprise of the draft was the Toronto Raptors’ 8th pick, Washington sophomore guard Terrence Ross. Ross, an excellent shooter, was not expected to be drafted so early; however, he can definitely make an impact on the Raptors 28th ranked offense.

Detroit decided to go big with their pick, drafting Connecticut center Andre Drummond. There is concern about Drummond’s youth, being only 18. Also, it was a bit of a surprise considering Detroit already has a young center, Greg Monroe.

The Hornets were back on the clock with the 10th  pick of the draft, and added Duke guard Austin Rivers. Rivers led Duke in scoring an average of 15.5 points per game. Rivers will likely play an important role off the bench behind current Hornet, Eric Gordon.

The Hornets can easily claim to be this year’s draft winners. Combining Anthony Davis and Austin Rivers with Eric Gordon gives the Hornets hope for a very bright future.

July 1st marks the 2nd day of excitement for organizations to make a push from being a good team to becoming an elite team with free agency.

Check out the rest of Round 1 and Round 2

Image Courtesy of  Anthony Davis

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News flash: LeBron James is undoubtedly the most vilified athlete on the face of the Earth. Alright, that isn’t exactly breaking news, but it still holds 100% true, regardless. And now that he and his Miami Heat are back in the NBA Finals for a second consecutive year, his army of haters will be in full force.

But what makes the NBA’s greatest player the most despicable sports superstar out there? Well, many people who loathe him in this manner will point at “The Decision” of Summer 2010 as the moment they decided to scrutinize essentially every single move that he makes.

To those fans, here’s the message: Re-evaluate it and realize that you need to let it go.

When James left the Cleveland Cavaliers and his home state of Ohio, he did it in what was perceived as such an egotistical and selfish fashion that it was simply unforgivable. He did not inform even a single soul within the Cavs organization of his final decision to leave and take his “talents to South Beach,” where he would form a super alliance with fellow All Stars Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh on the Miami Heat.

He did not owe the city of Cleveland and its fans that had suffered for so long before his arrival in 2003 anything more than the classy farewell they deserved. An hour-long special aired live on ESPN certainly didn’t qualify as classy to them or anyone else watching.

However, other than that, he didn’t owe them a new contract, a championship, or to finish what he started straight out of St. Vincent-St. Mary High School.

He gave them everything he had in those seven years and exercised his free agent right to pursue a new opportunity elsewhere. How is it any different from a person who isn’t an entertainer, who decides to leave the job they’ve worked for years for an even better one?

Don’t kid yourself, you know it isn’t. Plus, when regular people announce leaving their jobs that usually doesn’t bring in a boatload of money in donations to the the local Boys and Girls Clubs.

So if you think about that twice, declaring your intentions to start a new job in front of your entire family at Thanksgiving dinner might seem a little more self-centered than what James did.

Of course there are people out there who don’t really care about any of that stuff. Instead, there are those who will claim, ‘I hate him because he went and joined two other great players. One is also a top five superstar player in this league (Wade), and the other has been one of the more underrated All Stars pretty much his entire career. Jordan wouldn’t have done that.’

Alright, all of that is true. Jordan wouldn’t have left the Bulls to assemble some crazy squad alongside guys with the caliber of a Wade and Bosh. But that was then and this is now. If you live in the past and fail noticed that the league has been heading in this direction since the “Big Three” of Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett joined forces in 2007, you probably should pay a little more attention to players and teams other than your own and James.

James needed the help and the Cavs were incapable of surrounding him with enough of it because they play in Cleveland! The majority of people, especially young professional basketball players, don’t want to live in Cleveland during a long season! Jordan had Scottie Pippen, Steve Kerr and the rest of the crew to help him finish off the job; James just knew he had to make a drastic move in order to get his help, because Cleveland itself was repelling free agents like a great college in the middle of nowhere.

And for those who argue that he could’ve gone to a place like New York or New Jersey – where he could have been ‘the man’ and eventually gotten the aid he needed because that’s what Jordan would have done – you need to come to terms with the fact that there’s only one player remaining that still has that kind of old school mentality, and his name is Kobe Bryant.

Bryant’s admitted that he always wanted to be Jordan. That is why he has only one less ring than him. James just wants to be himself. That’s something that should be admired, not detested.

In the end, if this isn’t enough, the fact that it’s been two years should be. Unless you are that immature, you really don’t have an excuse to hold a grudge for this long.

LeBron James has moved on with his life, it would be best if the haters followed suit.

Image Courtesy of  Keith Allison

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Within a few hours of a blockbuster deal was approved to send all-star guard Chris Paul to the Los Angeles Lakers, David Stern and NBA league office blocked the trade.

The purposed deal was a three team trade between the New Orleans Hornets, Los Angeles Lakers, and Houston Rockets. The deal would have landed Paul with the Lakers, sent Pau Gasol to the Rockets, and given the Hornets Kevin Martin, Luis Scola, Lamar Odom, Goran Dragic, and a 2012 first-round pick from Houston.

NBA analysts across the nation are confused by the trade being blocked by the league office, as this seemed like the best way to solve Paul’s contract situation. The popular thinking is that if the deal was approved, the Hornets would at least be able to replace Paul with quality pieces instead of getting nothing in return.

Paul can opt out of his contract at the end of the season becoming a free agent, which allows him to sign to any team that is willing to make him an offer. Paul is on record stating that he would not sign a contract extension with the Hornets, and would like to test the free agent waters which have shown to be very lucrative; Amare Stoudemire received 100 million over 5 years during last year’s free agent frenzy.

With so many lingering questions as to why the trade was blocked, the league has yet to make a detailed statement on the issue. This hesitation has brought about speculation that the deal was killed due to overwhelming pressure from small market owners.  That theory is gaining traction as Yahoo.com acquired an e-mail sent from Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert to David Stern.

In the e-mail Gilbert states,”It would be a travesty to allow the Lakers to acquire Chris Paul in the apparent trade being discussed. This trade should go to a vote of the 29 owners of the Hornets.”

This issue is further muddied by the fact that the NBA owns the New Orleans Hornets. It is believe that the NBA league abused its power as an owner to negate this deal. The league’s stance on owning the Hornets has been that all basketball operations would be handled by the Hornet’s managerial staff without intrusion.

Paul is hoping that the seemingly obvious intrusion can be deemed illegal as he is looking to pursue legal action, with the help of NBPA director Billy Hunter, against the NBA. The NBA has just gotten over one of the worst PR nightmares in the form of the 2011 lockout just to jump in the middle of another one. To make matters worse, there are reports that both Paul and Odom will not attend training camp which is scheduled to open on December 9^th.

Image Courtesy of   http://www.flickr.com/photos/keithallison/

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Michael Szego: As of late, the top college basketball stars that have declared to enter the NBA draft have had to deal with constant ridicule and proposition that this may be one of the worst draft classes talent-wise that we have seen in a very long time. Whether it be because of unfamiliarity, biased opinion, or just good old dislike for some of the players, it seems as though that have obtained an unfair reputation before they have even gotten a chance to showcase their skills in a professional game.

Many of the players showed tremendous skill and personality at the recent NBA Draft Combine, and yet even before then, countless analysts were writing this class off. All of this talk is a bit early and unwarranted, and I truly believe that this class is going to surprise people in a big way.

Some players we have never heard of, or overlooked because they “couldn’t handle the transition to the pro game” (a phrase that is so horribly overused) will prove to have very productive careers in this league, and the 2011 draft class could instead go down as one of the most surprising classes of all time, rather than the worst.

Clodel Remy: As of right this moment, this draft is and should be considered one of the worst in recent history. We all know every incoming draft class will be scrutinized and compared to that of the 2003 class in which there are 2 future Hall of Famers for sure and several all star players… But this draft does nothing to stand up to that scrutiny and no player is really a game changer.

You’re absolutely right some of these players will have productive careers and some will have all star appearances on their resumes, but a draft without names is not a good draft; not memorable. There are many factors that plague this class which we will go into but that is not our fault as sports fans.

It is not my job to market these players and as far as the combine goes, it means absolutely nothing because what did it tell us that we don’t already know. It is hard to name 2 dynamic players in this draft that I would want to build a team around… this is a very bad year to have this number 1 pick and Cleveland will be right back in the lottery next year.

Michael: A big part of the problem stems exactly from what you just said. “A draft without names is not a good draft.” I can’t sit here and say that’s a false statement, but I can say that it stems from an altogether bigger cultural problem.

If a fan see’s a mock draft, and begins to decide which players would make the best fit on their favorite teams, majority of them immediately have more faith in an American player that went to a prominent university in the United States, than one from another country. Regardless of whether they have ever seen the international player play, or know where they are from, they often get discounted right off the bat. This season more than most, offers seven or eight foreign-born players that could be picked in round one.

Enes Kanter, a center from Turkey who was disqualified from playing at the University of Kentucky because of broken eligibility rules could be a top-five pick. Kanter stunned scouts at the combine showing that maybe some of these unfamiliar names are more valuable than we had previously thought. This unwarranted ignoring is part of what I like to call “The Darko Effect.”

Darko Milicic of course was the second overall pick in the incredibly 2003 draft you mentioned before, and is often referred to as the biggest draft bust in NBA history because of the eventual stars that were picked behind him. People now expect this to happen with international players, and refuse to believe that they could be just as productive as their American counterparts.

Look for players like Jan Vesely, Donatas Motiejunas, Bismark Biyembo, and Jonas Valanciunas to all be picked early, and have immediate impacts on their teams in their transition to the United States style of play.

Clodel: You see that’s exactly the problem with this year’s draft, not only the lack of names but also the amount of foreign players. I have nothing against players who were not schooled in the United States but how many of these players realistically you see making an impact year in and year out.

Dirk is the best European player in the league right now but we all knew what he would be capable of at an early age, so there was little left to discover. Excitement and expectation plays a large role in the overall perceived level of success a draft class has. The transition to the league is difficult and you can’t honestly expect these players to make that transition and actually contribute; not likely.

Aside from that, let’s not focus on what these players will do once in the league… let’s talk about what we know from watching college basketball this past season and what history has taught us. First off we know nothing about these players because they didn’t play in the U.S so the expectations are at ground level. History has shown us that big men take a while to develop in the league and all the guys you mentioned are big men so I see bust written all over them until they prove me wrong.

Michael: We could dispute talent levels all day long, but when it comes down to it, NBA teams want one thing and one thing only: championships. Owners and scouts look to draft proven winners that can show initiative and leadership as soon as they step on the hardwood with their new club.

I have four specific players in mind in this class that possess these valuable qualities, and yet for some reason are still being overlooked.

First we have Kemba Walker. I can’t say enough about this guy. Leading UConn to a Big East Championship and an NCAA Championship, rattling off countless pro-level performances in a row and bringing new meaning to the phrase “heart of a champion.” People are concerned about his size, but Allen Iverson seemed to do pretty well for himself at around the same height. Look for him to have a chip on his shoulder for not being drafted higher.

Next I look at two players from the 2010 National Champion Duke Blue Devils. Kyle Singler and Nolan Smith have proved over their years in Durham that they are born leaders and can flat out ball. Teams will surely get value out of them late in the first-round.

Lastly, don’t overlook Naismith Player of the Year Jimmer Fredette. He undoubtedly has the range to shoot the basketball from anywhere, and thus could be a impact scorer off the bench in his rookie season.

I am very excited for this years draft, and will be attending in Newark, NJ at The Prudential Center to watch these future NBA stars prove everybody wrong on June 23^rd..

Clodel: This draft is not worth the price of attendance and these players don’t bring out a high level of excitement as I stated before. The biggest name all year in college basketball was Jimmer Fredette and watching him get exposed as nothing more than an undersized gun slinging guard who doesn’t know what the word defense means changed my opinion of him.

Fredette was the great white hope and a poor man’s version of Stephen Curry. I like Brandon Knight and I think he has the potential to be a really good all star player in this league because of his shooting and his quickness but not a player to start my team around.

Now everyone has Duke freshmen point guard Kyrie Irving as the number one pick…I wouldn’t disagree with that rating but it is only by default. To be a number one pick, I would have liked to see more from Irving; he may be capable of being great but at the end of the day that dynamic playmaking is not present as of yet.

Players like Nolan Smith prove my point about this draft… He has been at Duke for a couple years and is very polished and I would love to have him on my team but only in the latter part of the draft. He like all these players will not be a star in this league. Kemba Walker has reached his ceiling and what he is now is what he will always be. He is a good player and at 6″1′, he is as tough as it gets as he proved during the tournament. But if he is the best the draft has to offer in terms of star power than I rest my case. He is no Iverson.

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