"Height / length?" It wasn't Sullinger's height that had NBA GM's concerned, Carl. It was the fact that while he was one of the more polished bigs in the 2012 draft class, Sullinger also had a very gimpy back. His draft value plummeted from the 1-5 / 1-10 range to late round as guarantees that he would ever have the health needed for a successful NBA career dried up. Nothing will get you "passed" in the draft faster than getting seriously hurt and then gimping around during workouts at reduced ability like a wounded animal.
The one that hurts is Kenneth Faried. We picked Marcus Morris and Donatas Motiejunas over the Manimal. We could have had Chandler Parsons at 38, Kenneth Faried at 20 and Kawhi Leonard or Nikola Vucevic at 14... I think Donatas COULD be the perfect PF for this team though, If he develops properly.
All I gotta say is, if we had picked Sullinger instead of Lamb, White or Jones during the time of the draft, so many Clutchfans members here would've complained. And if we had CF during 1992, most of you guys would be complaining we drafted Horry over Harold Miner. Hindsight is 20/20 folks!
We don't need what he brings to the table. We could just have hung onto Scola if we're worried about production. We needed to take risks, find players with high ceilings. Of course Sullinger is contributing, that's why a contending team took him. He is what he is. What are the Rockets going to do with another marginal, low-ceiling player? Win 2 more games this year? C'mon.
Agreed. Sure, Sullinger is proving that he is more NBA ready than our other first round picks this year, but I thought that was pretty much the consensus opinion of him going into the draft (notwithstanding injury concerns coming to fruition). Good pick up for the Celtics and where they're at right now. We're not contending this year anyway. Still would rather tack a chance on currently very raw Jones, and of course still hoping White can buy in, be healthy, and tear up the league. Isn't the Development League designed for guys who are developing? Seems apt that's where our rookies would be.
Oh ok...i damn near fell out my chair and couldnt figure out why no one saw this but me. Thanks for the heads up
Sullinger has looked good for the past 2 weeks? Before that there were still questions about how he would work out since his defense was atrocious (still sort of is) and seemingly got 2/3rds of all his shots blocked at the rim. Let's wait a bit before we anoint him a prospect we missed.
I watched him live at the Knicks Celts game on Monday - he's about as unathletic as I've ever seen an NBA player look in person, all gut & butt, and has the vertical lift of Yao Ming...today. I don't know if he'd be a good fit in the high-octane HardenLin attack. If you need a guy to box out for boards his ass is the ass you want out there though. It's got Mark Aguirre style strength.
There was much debate on this board about him pre-draft. I was one who liked him given where he had slid too. It was clear he was no longer a top 5 type pick, but in the late teens, it seemed to make sense to me. But as others have said, nothing to really fret about.
The thing with Jared is that he is one of the most NBA-ready players in the draft so I'm not surprised how well he's doing. Plus, he's playing alongside Kevin Garnett, who's been a big mentor for Jared. I won't say the Rockets passed on him 3 times because Jeremy Lamb, was used to trade for James Harden so Lamb wasn't a waste of a pick. Whatever he's doing in OKC is their business, not ours. We can't say anything about Jones yet because he's still a young player who's slowly working his way into the rotation. Jared may be playing well for Celtics but we can't automatically label him as a better player than Jones yet. Its still their rookie season and most players will take a few years to blossom. But with Royce White, yeah he's a wasted pick. But there was a reason why Jared fell all the way to the early 20s. But it doesn't matter now. Its not only the Rockets that passed on him. A lot of other teams have passed on him as well, and the Celtics were lucky he fell into their laps. Just like Chandler Parsons last year, when a lot of teams passed on him as well...
OMG I always think about that. I can't blame Houston for drafting D-Mo. But I wished the Rockets would have drafted Kenneth with the 14th pick instead of Marcus Morris... Kenneth would be a great fit right with this current group.
