The Step Back 2019 NBA Draft Big Board: December Update

Zion Williamson has separated himself as the top player in the 2019 NBA Draft, plus other thoughts after the first month of college basketball.

The 2019 NBA Draft picture is starting to take shape. Six weeks into the NBA season, we know who a few of the teams who will be picking at the top of the draft are. The Cleveland Cavaliers, Phoenix Suns, Atlanta Hawks, and Chicago Bulls will be among the landing spots for the class’s top tier, and teams like the Brooklyn Nets and New York Knicks seem a few games from joining them. Meanwhile, we’re a month into the college basketball season, which has helped us sort out who the players are that will be headed to those destinations.

The college season has been headlined by Duke, and their trio of top-five prospects. Plenty of questions surrounded the unifying of Zion Williamson, R.J. Barrett, and Cameron Reddish in the preseason — could the trio coexist? Would one of the three get marginalized? So far, the team has mostly been a steamroller, and they’ve gotten along quite well — Barrett initiates the offense, Williamson terrorizes on the break, and Cameron Reddish cleans up the scraps with spot-up 3s and playmaking in garbage time. All three still look like top five picks so far.

There’s still about three weeks until conference play starts, when a majority of the meaningful game tape we will see on the top prospects takes place. But so far, we’re getting a good picture of who will fill in the rest of the lottery. We have seen some players shoot up the board with promising starts to the campaign, such as Kevin Porter of USC and Luguentz Dort of Arizona State. Now we see if those players can keep it up, and turn what was supposed to be a bad draft class into a decent one.

To get a gauge on where the 2019 NBA Draft class stands, here are our top 60 prospects, split into five tiers – with tier one being the one player who has separated himself from the pack.

Tier 1

Williamson has taken over the consciousness of both the college basketball and NBA Draft communities. He might be the most athletic player we’ve seen in years, and he also shows a high level of skill to go with it. Questions about his positional fit in the NBA are largely overblown. He has the size to bully college fours one-on-one in face-up situations, and he’s quick enough to defend guards on the perimeter. He does have his warts — he really struggles with pressure from long teams like Auburn, and his defensive intensity isn’t consistent. But his dominance is too difficult to ignore, and there’s a pretty clear role for him as a Blake Griffin-style initiator at the four. So far he looks far and away to be the best shot a team has at a star in this class.

Tier 2

Barrett’s defense has been a legitimate problem — he doesn’t seem to understand how to close out on a shooter, and he has been largely hidden in Duke’s defensive system when he shares the floor with Reddish and Jack White because his awareness has been problematic. On offense, he has been a productive isolation scorer and shows good catch-and-shoot mechanics, but his finishing troubles have been worrying even if he has shown some craft around the basket. For those reasons he remains in this tier below Williamson, along with Reddish, who has been frankly astounding with his defensive engagement and comfort with off-ball shooting, and Little, whose flashes in a variety of skill areas can’t be ignored even if he isn’t producing at a good enough level of efficiency right now.

Tier 3

Yes, that’s two players who are out for the year with an injury in my top ten. ACLs and meniscus injuries always scare people, especially with college players, but the science of rehabilitation is improving every year, and we see less and less negative effects on a players’ long-term development from these types of injuries. Garland and Porter also represent two of the best offensive values in the class, with Porter’s shot creation potential and Garland’s pick-and-roll skill level looking very translatable to the NBA level. Both guys are also almost guaranteed now to slip below their actual value in terms of landing spot in the draft, meaning there’s a higher likelihood of them landing in good situations that will understand how to develop their talents into players who can contribute quickly to winning basketball.

Shittu vs. Bol is one of the more interesting questions of this update to me. On one hand, Bol has all of the physical tools that the undersized Shittu lacks, and can erase his own mistakes with ease on the defensive end due to his absurd length. On the other hand, Shittu looks like a carbon copy of Wendell Carter at times with his innate feel for pick-and-roll situations and reads on defense, while Bol seemingly forgets the goal of defense once every five possessions. I still have Bol ahead for now due to the upside, but the more I see of Shittu, the more convinced I am that if he was 7-feet tall, he would be in the same tier as Williamson.

Johnson and Hunter continue to be the safest bets to become two-way secondary playmakers at the wing, and that’s the most valuable NBA role for my draft board.

Tier 4

A few highlights from this massive group of mid-to-late first-round prospects, the majority of whom are wings:

Tre Jones continues to be the most fundamentally sound point guard in the class and he has significant upside if he can get a functional jumper worked out. He’s forgotten at Duk, but is very much a first-round prospect.

The Langford/Grimes decision is a tough one. Both are decent players with secondary playmaker potential, but both are also very weak in important areas for that role. I trust Langford’s shot to come around more than I trust Grimes’s defense at this point.

There are so many three/four combo types who look like future NBA small-ball lineup keystones off the bench in this class. I’d take any of Grant Williams, Dean Wade, Jaylen Hoard, and Brandon Clarke to be productive bench players for good teams eventually.

Players with the best shot to move up a tier in the next month: Kevin Porter, whose athleticism and transition play is very enticing; Ja Morant, if he can demonstrate more consistent decision-making and shot selection; and Langford, who probably will go in the lottery off the back of his high school shooting reputation and college production, but really needs to get a few to fall in a row soon.

Tier 5

This carries us to the end of the board, so a few thoughts and defenses of rankings are provided throughout.

It’s hard to tell what to make of Konate this year — his production hasn’t slipped, but he doesn’t look as comfortable on film, and his team has regressed significantly. He’s up here mainly because the big man class falls off a cliff after Gafford.

The narrative is that Hachimura is a likely lottery pick because of his offensive development and positional size. However, he’s also given development potential by some, but is 21-years old and is a complete project on defense at this point in terms of recognizing actions and necessary rotations. If I’m taking a four because of his thick, jacked frame and potential versatility, I’d much rather have Schofield even though he’s nearly three inches shorter.

I’m forced to keep Bazley on here until given reason otherwise.

Including Ponds, 54-56 is the “Would be a first-rounder if you were three inches taller” tier.

Let’s take a second to just marvel at the fact that Magee is taking 11 threes per game and hitting 38 percent of them.