I feel like this needs to make it to the NBA from the G League.



Anyone ITT attended a G League game this season?

You have to be a pretty big fool to think Mitchell>Booker going forward is not close. Either or is fine, but it not being close is dumb.

Define "going forward". I was looking at it in terms of who you would want just for the rest of the season, without looking at future seasons, if you were a playoff team. I can imagine Mitchell, Bradley, or Harris being the guy, depending on which team it is. I think Booker is probably never the #1 choice.

It’s not close.

Booker has the highest upside by a lot and Bradley sucks.

i'm prob getting wrapped up in semantics here b/c i think we agree, but given that there are distinct skills it makes sense to discuss positions. however, the traditional nomenclature certainly consists of misnomers. the best players becoming more versatile has obv exacerbated the problem.

people often suck at naming things


edit: bradley beal used to be pretty meh, but he has gotten a lot better in that last 2 years. his game has expanded considerably off the dribble. he is good now

Heres a post earlier from me when we were talking about best under 23 guys. I edited out a part about Jokic and some stuff about Fultz and the the sixers.

Anyways my point being my EXPERT opinion even has Mitchell and Booker close. Mitchell has more defensive upside while Booker has legit best scorer ITL upside. I'd also put Tatum right there with those guys as hes just a straight monster already.

Also reading here I'd throw G.Harris on there at 10. You guys have swayed me. I think hes the type of dude thats easy to underrate. Then I'd put Capela//Murray/Gordon/Fultz/Brown in that order as my next young pieces. Obv next season with this sick rookie class coming in its going to change a bit. I really should put Fultz at the bottom of those guys since I havent seen him in action but i still have hope that he turns out to be the man and he just has some freak injury slowing him down from playing.

edit-Forgot about Murray. Nearly every game ive watched him or just looked at his stats since that post hes been really good. Think i was biased against him when i made that post because he kept thrashing my DFS teams early in the season but yeah hes legit too.

lou williams having a perpetual green light is lol coaching

Mitchell is basically a junior coming out and has a fully developed body. Booker is three months younger and plays on a team with zero spacing nor any form of system and his numbers crush Mitchell's. How it can't be at least close is lol to me, especially when Mitch has been inefficient both years in college and SL, there is a good chance his last 1-1.5 months includes some run-good with respect to shooting.

There should be awards for old rookies vs. young ones because it seems like we go through this every year. OMG Kuzma/Bell/Faried/Hood/Brogdon are such awesome rookies, yeah but they are 2-3 years older than everyone else.

Mitchell was coached by Pitino. He had to have nba players that seen him play tell him he was good enough to go pro. His coach didnt even put it into his head that he was going to be nba ready. Working with nba coaching staffs has alot more value then working with college coaching staffs which offsets a age difference to some point. Obv some college coaches are much better then others so it can depend.

i don't agree that mitchell is head and shoulders above booker, but these arguments are thin. isn't mitchell is at least a year younger than most of these players were, except maybe hood? can make the age argument against mitchell relative to booker, but he is not old at all.

Just skimmed through this, someone would take Mitchell over booker for this season? Every meaningful offensive stat I just looked on bballref booker is better.

People itt must absolutely stop the circlejerk about the difference between a 19yo kid and a 21yo. Experience in NBA is a way bigger factor than age

Booker has 2 more years of experience than Mitchell and if you remove the first 15 NBA games of Don he kills Booker in every stats

Kuzma's problem for his future progression is not his age. He is similar to a player who was nicknamed Bad Porn

Some people think that defense matters a little.

Had to google about that last one.

Haven't watched Mitchell a lot, but since he's a young rookie I'm going to assume he's not great at defense.

He is a negative yet, but a lock to be a positive defender over his career

Anyway I think he's the starting PG next year when we get rid of Fraudy Rubio

Has there been studies of this? I always thought it was the other way around, but I have nothing to really base this off other than older players typically aren't considered as great of prospects, and almost all elite players come in as very young rookies.

[edit] Not that DMitch is old, just older than 1 and dones.

Anyway wrt Mitchell, I'm going to continue to bring up just how bad and overrated the Utah Jazz FO has been in handling what could have been a great roster. They were stocked to the gills with picks for a long time, and rather than do what I suggested two years ago (trade Hayward as soon as Rudy was inked), they desperately wasted assets to try and convince him to stay when they did the the exact opposite two years prior when everyone knew the cap would explode.

If they traded Gordon then they'd have been able to get some young pieces back, still draft Donovan Mitchell, and NOT had to give up Lyles in the process.. who by the way would be an excellent fit next to Gobert.

Instead they traded a lottery pick that because Taurean Prince for a 1 year rental of Hill, and another future first for a point guard who might be the worst fit next to Gobert like ever.

Mitchell/Prince/Lyles/Gobert with Exum/Hood, plus whatever future picks they could have gotten for Favors and maybe Ingles, plus the OKC pick they got for Kanter (and traded for Rubiolol). That's a pretty sweet young core that probably playoffs this year.

Instead they have one of the oldest rosters in the league wrt minutes being played, and other than their two stars have nothing of value to show for it. Once they made the mistake of not signing Hayward to the max extension or even a 4 year one they should have realized their error and worked around it, instead they doubled-down and hoped it'd work out.

The craziest part is they spent FIVE first round draft picks trying to find a PG, two lotteries no less, and ended up with Exum and Rubio.

If we are comparing him to Booker for this season, what matters is their relative level of defense, not Mitchell's absolute level of defense.

How do people rate Booker's defense and how much is he expected to improve?

So the Mitchell analysis has become a way to talk about Trey Lyles?

Listen, Mitchell is great. Booker is young but is approaching 6k minute in the L and is probably one of the most overrated players in the league. The horrible Suns aren't even really even worse when he's out. He's the rare near replacement level 'star' with limitations on both ends that seem kind of hard to overcome.

Obviously he could. He's 21, he's improved as a passer and 3pt shooter. He's still a worthless defender and not a great passer/non scoring offensive player as your primary creator.

Basically I'm saying that in 4-5 years, I'd be shocked if a team with Booker as its highest usage player isn't markedly worse than one with Mitchell as its best player. (Even though neither scenario could be an ideal one)

I mean on draft day the difference between a 19yo and a 21yo is big. I don't deny that

But comparing players stats using Booker is the same age as Mitchell while Booker played already 2 full season in the league is totzl bull****

The Knacks have arrived in Miami - Jarrett Jack checking in to the locker room

Yes we have 6k minutes, almost 2.5 seasons where he's improved every year and is still younger than Mitchell. If Donovan is similar to the guy we've seen the last month then yes he's the better prospect, but what are the odds that he like all players from time to time is just on heater? He was worse against worse competition in college, worse in SL, dog**** in October and November, and elite in December. It seems pretty normal to suggest he's shooting at a higher percentage now due to variance than suddenly figuring it out all the sudden.

A lot of the shine on DM is that we don't have much data on him other than what appears to be meteoric progression this year.

Is it bull**** though? I mean has there been any studies hypothesizing that 3rd year 21 year olds improve less/more over their next 4 or 5 seasons than a rookie 21 year old? I know I have read articles showing how risky it is to draft upperclassmen in the lottery, but that's the closest I've seen to any theories about the development of older rookies.

Welp GG sixers that didnt take long.