The Prospects Who Changed My Mind at NBA Summer League
The first week of Summer League provided new answers, new questions, and enough evidence to change my opinion on several prospects.
One of the hardest parts about evaluating NBA Summer League is resisting the urge to overreact.
Every year, a rookie has a huge scoring night and people rush to crown him a future star. Another struggles through his first few games, and suddenly questions begin to surface about whether he was worthy of his draft position.
That’s one of the reasons I haven’t rushed to publish my Summer League thoughts.
I wanted to give myself the opportunity to watch players over multiple games before drawing any conclusions. Even then, we’re still talking about a very small sample size, so it’s important to keep everything in perspective.
At the same time, Summer League also reminds you of another important lesson as a scout:
You have to be willing to change your mind.
Like every evaluator, I entered Summer League with players I believed in and others I wasn’t completely sold on. While one week in Las Vegas shouldn’t completely rewrite those evaluations, it can provide valuable new information.
Sometimes a player looks more comfortable in an NBA role than he did in college. Other times, a prospect is asked to play a completely different role, whether that’s taking on more offensive responsibility or learning to thrive with fewer touches. And sometimes you simply see a player address a weakness that concerned you throughout the pre draft process.
Over the last week, several players have forced me to revisit parts of my evaluation. Some raised what I believe is their long term ceiling. Others reinforced the opinions I already held. And a few reminded me that player development is rarely linear.
With most of the lottery picks and headline rookies now finished playing in Las Vegas, here are the prospects who changed my mind the most during the first week of Summer League.
I Was Too Low on Maleek Thomas
The easiest choice for me was Cleveland’s Maleek Thomas.
I’ll admit it. I was too low on him.
Coming into the draft, I knew Thomas could score. After all, he averaged 15.6 points, 3.8 rebounds, and 2.5 assists per game as a freshman at Arkansas. He also knocked down 41 percent of his three point attempts on a healthy five attempts per game. The shooting ability was never in question.
