Why the Thunder's draft haul raised their championship ceiling more than any NBA team
Yahoo Sports senior NBA analyst Kevin O'Connor breaks down why Oklahoma City's three draft picks all project as immediate contributors who raise the team's championship ceiling. Check out the full conversation on "The Kevin O'Connor Show" and subscribe on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , YouTube or wherever you listen.
Video Transcript
Okc.
I think Oklahoma City did.
I think-- And the reason why I say that with San Antonio is because, like, Tariq Reid is, in my opinion, more of, like, a replacement level center.
I think he's gonna be a good rotation guy, but he's not, like, some world beater type.
Malik Brown is a, a rotation guy.
Gillespie is very undersized.
We'll see how much he plays.
And Quaintance, we'll see if he even plays at all.
Whereas with Oklahoma City, they drafted Adebayo with the 12th pick, the player everybody was talking about them trading up to go get, and they get him at number 12.
And then they trade up one spot for Bennett Sturtz, who's a f- five-year college player, a- an elite pick and roll creator, an elite shooter off the catch.
I cannot wait to see him playing in this OKC system.
And then in the second round, they take Ota- Otega Owet, who is a very, very interesting player.
At, at Kentucky this past year, he was a lot of an on-ball guy.
He had a huge 35 and eight and seven game against Santa Clara in the opening round again, in March Madness.
He had a buzzer beater to force overtime in that game.
So he can do a little bit on ball, but to me, he projects as more of a three and D plus guy in the NBA, and he made 38% of his catch and shoot threes over his four-year college career.
He's a very good, very strong, versatile defender.
He, like, to me, he feels like a potential Lou Dort replacement.
And so I think with OKC, all three of their picks, Mara can play right away, Sturtz can offer rotation depth right away, and Owet gives OKC a bit more flexibility with the moves they wanna make.
I think OKC raised their ceiling quite a bit with their three draft selections, whereas San Antonio, it's more like depth behind Wemby, which is important, but not necessarily big-time ceiling raisers.
