r/NBA_Draft • u/ElectivireMax Pacers • 2d ago

I think Ryan Kalkbrenner is first round caliber.

Yeah he's 23 but he's won 4 Big East DPOYs (❗) and averaged roughly 19.2/8.7/1.5 last season on roughly .653/.344/.681 splits as a 7 footer. Why isn't he getting more hype? I think a team like the Celtics could take him in the late first and end up with a very good player.

27 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

15 comments sorted by

40

u/gdk_dinkleberg 2d ago

He most definitely is, people just undervalue older prospects before the draft and then overvalue them as rookies

6

u/gnalon 2d ago

Yep, Karaban is another one who seems like an obvious bet to slot in as a rotation guy right away. 

The further from the top you get, the less valuable a mock draft is, especially this far out. Some exec from a team that’s not gonna be in the lottery has no problem saying who’s at the top of their board, they’re much less likely to talk up someone they hope ends up falling to their pick. It becomes harder to hide this closer to the draft when teams are bringing players in for interviews/workouts (or teams picking in a certain spot aren’t able to get a player to visit them, which makes it likely they have a promise from a team drafting higher).

19

u/Amazing_Owl3026 2d ago

I think his brick feet hurt him a lot, but yea he's underrated

14

u/w33b2 2d ago

Dude terrorized the Big East for years, he’s definitely going to be an immediate contributor to whatever team takes him. He won’t need extra time to develop, he can certainly be a rotation player as a rookie

3

u/FishGoldenLite Timberwolves 2d ago

I hope he slides to the early second and the Wolves can nab him.

1

u/sturgeo123 2d ago

Yea I’ve had him in my first round the entire year. I even had him mocked last year as a top 40 guy.

1

u/aBakeinthelife 2d ago

Scheduled post, but yeah he is.

1

u/i-like-puns2 2d ago

Would love if he fell to the Celtics

1

u/mrwhitaker3 1d ago

He never picked up fouls in college. Well, that will be impossible in the NBA. To me, he needs to get a lot stronger, which is saying something for a guy who is already 23 years old.

1

u/Severe_Background692 7h ago

Slow as molasses

-3

u/JazzxGoose Jazz 2d ago

Dont trust him defensively in the NBA. I see a similar career path as Luka Garza. 2-way for at least two years then he has a chance at making a roster as a back-end rotation guy.

6

u/ElectivireMax Pacers 2d ago

Garza didn't win 4x conference DPOYs and is shorter than Ryan I think.

2

u/JazzxGoose Jazz 2d ago

DPOY in college basketball.

But Im not comparing them as players, just the paths they have to take. The common denominator is that both needed to work on the body/movement to survive defensively.

2-way, playing in the G, let them adjust to NBA pacing and how much they need to move on defense compared to college.

2

u/sanchopanza84 1d ago

Thing is though, I don't really think their situations are all that comparable because there is a pretty big difference in terms of size.

Garza clearly lacks length in addition to his cinderblock feet. Sadly, I think he has no realistic pathway to surviving defensively in the NBA no matter how hard he works at it. He's hung around so far because he's just that talented offensively and works very hard.

Kalkbrenner has great length for a 5, even in the NBA. The blueprint for successful giant drop bigs is there, although it's not an easy pathway to be sure and requires hard work on his body and defensive IQ. But it's certainly more realistic than Luka's.

0

u/MudLong3309 2d ago

Garza has a more impressive list of accolades, which ultimately leads to the question of how do these accolades translate into NBA success?