Aleksej Pokusevski - 2020 NBA Draft Prospect

[ace3g]

Eurohoops @Eurohoopsnet
5h
Aleksej Pokusevski leaving for the States to practice before the draft eurohoops.net/en/euroleague/…

[cd98]

Cause it needs to be done

[img] https://www.thestepien.com/wp-conten...7.18.36-AM.png [/img]

Aleksej Pokusevski

College: NA
Position: PF/c
Age: 18.48
Height: 7 foot
Weight: 201 pounds
Draft Range: 4 to 20

Why: If the Spurs want more rings, they need a ring-worthy centerpiece. Picking 11, that’s challenging (there is a serious chance, IMO, that he will be gone before 11). Poku has that ceiling : Poku’s a unicorn prospect – very young, physically under-developed, but very promising. The following comparison is IMO instructive : http://www.tankathon.com/players/com...taps-porzingis . Note who gets the most rebounds per 36, blocks, steals (and assists). He’s a 3 pt shooter (.505 attempt rate), and his FT% (again, the best of the 3) suggests he will shoot a good 3FG% in the long run…

Why Not: He's too skinny to deal with the NBA right now. The question is, do you think he will fill out? How soon? I will note that Gobert, Porzingis and Giannis all came over roughly as skinny as he is now, and managed just fine in the long run… Young men don’t tend to fill out until they stop growing vertically, and he’s only 18 and a half.

Spurs Fit: Welcome to Austin … for at least a year, and maybe 2. It really depends on his development after that, but even if he remains skinny, there have been twigs in the NBA before. His current skills are enough to be a decent perimeter 4, with some shooting, playmaking and acceptable perimeter and help (but not post) defense. Even limited physical improvement will make him Keith van Horn.

Comparison - Ceiling: Dirk (with D!)

Spurs Comparison - Floor: Ryan Richards

Statistics

Scouting Report

Love this comp. This guy could go anywhere from being one of the best players in the history of the game to a guy barely good enough to sit on the bench in summer league. There's a lot of in between on that.

[cd98]

If the Spurs draft this guy, they probably stash him, so the G-league thing would be another non-issue.

Spurs should not be stashing any first round draft picks. This team is in rebuild mode. They should play all their young players.

[rankingtear]

Spurs should not be stashing any first round draft picks. This team is in rebuild mode. They should play all their young players.

Have you seen this kid, if he played in the NBA next season he'll be out of the league before his first contract ends. He's skin and bones right now.

[cd021]

My guess is that by New Years, there will be a vaccine, so they’ll probably have an abbreviated season.

Yeah, but it seems that it wouldn't be widely available until summer of 2021 and it may not be 100% effective either. The G-league may end up having to do its own bubble, which probably isn't worth it financially.

[Dejounte]

Yeah, but it seems that it wouldn't be widely available until summer of 2021 and it may not be 100% effective either. The G-league may end up having to do its own bubble, which probably isn't worth it financially.

So why doesnt the gleague play in the same bubble as the NBA and just do night shift? Regular people do it.... I guess they wouldnt have fan attendance in that scenario...

[Ditty]

Luka is probably going to kick our ass for many years to come. We need all the high risk/high reward type of players because no play max worthy is going to sign here anytime soon. We need to strike gold again to contend anytime soon. Nevertheless Patrick Williams is still my preferred pick .

[DAF86]

This guy makes some awesome points about Pokusevski's game:



Those per 36 stats are eye opening: 17 ppg, 12 rpg, 5 apg, 3 bpg and 2 spg. The guy is a stat stuffing machine. He does a little bit of everything.

But the thing that most caught my attention were those 7,5 attempted 3s per game. He shot more than half of his attempts beyond the 3pt line. You wanted volume 3pt shooting? There You have it. Sure, he only makes 32% from 3, but the fact that he isn't afraid to keep putting them up, paired with the fact that he shot 78% from the free throw line makes up for a very encouriging shooting potential.

To all of that add the "it" factor he displays on these highlights. It reminds me a bit of Manu with that flair for risky but spectacular plays. This tells me the kid believes he's a star, and believing is half the battle. This is the third time I have flip flopped on my number one target but I think this time is for good. I want the Spurs to draft this guy at 11.

[cd021]

So why doesnt the gleague play in the same bubble as the NBA and just do night shift? Regular people do it.... I guess they wouldnt have fan attendance in that scenario...

This bubble think has worked far better than anyone could've expected. I think the thinking was that logistically, adding a couple hundred more players to the mix wouldn't be worth the trouble.

I wonder if after the playoffs, would the NBA keep the courts intact at Disney and in the off-season, try a extended summer league--but obviously in Fall/Winter.

[BatManu20]

Hard pass tbh. This guy is fool’s gold. One the worst defenders of any 1st Round prospect in this draft and his frame isn’t conducive to putting on a lot of muscle. Skinny shoulders. He played against weak compe ion in a weak league last year and his numbers were still pedestrian. Please don’t waste a pick on this dude. I’m confident Spurs are smart enough not to.

[BatManu20]

Honestly I hope he shoots up draft boards and goes in the top-10 so the Spurs aren’t even tempted tbh.

[objective]

Here's some additional context for Pokusevski that only occurred to me while watching that Locked on Fantasy video when I finally registered that he played for Olympiakos and what that really meant. I knew he played in the Greek B-division but never paid much mind to whether it was for Olympiakos or Panathanaikos or AEK or Aris.

BUT

Here's what some people are missing contextually, and if everyone has been posting about this or knew it I apologize.

Some knock him for not playing more with the Olympiakos main team. Because surely, if he was any good, wouldn't he be playing with the big club?

Not so fast.

Olympiakos didn't play in the 1st division Greek Domestic League, the HEBA A-1. That's good for anywhere from 25-40 games a year.

The reason was a typical Greek dispute like the street fights that happen in their arenas. If I remember right Olympiakos' owner got so pissed off at the officiating last season that he was demanding independent refs or some other typical nonsense, and the Greek league refused. So then either Olympiakos withdrew for the season in pouting protest or they were banned. It doesn't really matter.

But the impact is that younger players in Europe typically get more time with the main club during the domestic play. Take a look at Advija, who barely played in Euroleague but had a ton of minutes and eventual MVP (such as it was) in domestic Israeli league. Avdija played 371 minutes in Euroleague (26 games - 5starts), but would go on to play 910 minutes in the Israeli league (31 games - 21 starts).

Even on Olympiakos, you can look at the career stats of someone like Vasilis Toliopoulos (undrafted 2018), who would barely register in the Euroleague but did play some A-1 games, often playing between 5-30x as many total minutes each season in A-1 compared to Euroleague.

So while it may be discouraging from a development perspective as far as court time, I don't think people should read too much in him 'only' playing B-division ball. Because nobody on Olympiakos was allowed to play A-1.

[leo07251413]

https://youtu.be/PZRgRZoiQaU

I love his confidence on the first comment!

[cd021]

Honestly I hope he shoots up draft boards and goes in the top-10 so the Spurs aren’t even tempted tbh.

Other non top-10 players moving up the draft board means others move down. Hopefully that helps the Spurs. I remember when Hampton seemed like a lock for a top 10 pick but I've seen him in the 20s because players like Okoro, Williams, and Vassell have shot up the board.

[DAF86]

Hard pass tbh. This guy is fool’s gold. One the worst defenders of any 1st Round prospect in this draft

He is one of the best rim protectors of the entire draft and he gets steals at a high rate. That alone makes him far from one of the worst defenders of any first round prospect. Toppin, for example, is much worse than him, imho. This kid can at least move laterally.

and his frame isn’t conducive to putting on a lot of muscle. Skinny shoulders.

Like I already said, this is a non-issue for me. He's a 7 foot teenager, he's suppossed to be a skinny . Giannis was 190 lbs when he got drafted, that's less than what Pokusevski weights. Sure, Pokusevski doesn't have Giannis frame to bulk up like he did, but he should be fine anyways. Worst case scenario, the NBA's elite diet (and PEDs) only allow for Pokusevski to built up like a Davis Bertans. A taller, longer, more talented Davis Bertans is fine with me, tbh.

He played against weak compe ion in a weak league last year and his numbers were still pedestrian. Please don’t waste a pick on this dude. I’m confident Spurs are smart enough not to.

His numbers are actually better than Giannis' while playing on exactly the same league.

[Kurgan]

Outside of playing in the same league, I don't get the Giannis comparisons. He was much more athletic than Poku currently is. This guy is highly skilled for his age but he also has the body type that's probably going to result in an injury prone career, not too dissimilar to Kirilenko or Porzingis.

[DAF86]

Outside of playing in the same league, I don't get the Giannis comparisons. He was much more athletic than Poku currently is. This guy is highly skilled for his age but he also has the body type that's probably going to result in an injury prone career, not too dissimilar to Kirilenko or Porzingis.

Did you see the coordination and quickness with which this 7 foot guy moves on tight spaces? He's literally a guard on a 7 foot body. That behind the back, between the legs dribble he pulls between two defenders and the out of bounds line is some filthy stuff I have never seen before from a guy his size (at the 4:50 minutes mark of the video I posted). He's also pretty bouncy.

I really don't know how much more athletic Giannis is to this guy, tbh. Giannis probably jumps higer and runs faster (and yes, I'm being totally racist here ), but Pokusevski doesn't seem to be any kind of bum on either of these areas. Pair that with the unbelieavable coordination he displays (to me, even better than Giannis') on this footage, and I don't think the athletic disparity is very significant at all.

I will try to find some full games from this guy to have a better picture.

[DAF86]

For anyone interested, here I found one.

[DAF86]

For anyone interested, here I found one.

Outside all the obvious great plays he makes on this game, look at how he directs traffic on defense at the 1:10:00 mark to tell his teammate to switch so he could stay closer to the basket and ends up making the defensive stop as a result. High basketball IQ, tbh.

[DAF86]

For anyone interested, here I found one.

That was a very good game from Pokusevski. The best thing is he didn't even need to have a good shooting night to be, by far, the best player on the court on both sides of the floor. By looking at his stats this seemed to be a pretty standard game from him. Not the best raw efficiency (although good in terms of effective FG) nor the most eye popping scoring display, but an all around dominant performance. Passing, playmaking, rebounding, rim protecting, stealing, he had everything. The cherry on top were that game icing rebound and clutch free throws.

The thing I'm most impressed with is his ability to be a game wrecker on defense despite not being a great one on one defender. The dude just has a knack for the ball. Whether it is on lose balls, rebounds, blocking or anticipating passing lanes, the ball always seems to find his hands. I'm gonna watch more games of him, but if they are like this one (which I believe they will), I'm more than sold on him being my guy.

The only thing I didn't like as much is how much he freelanced on defense. Some times he gambled too much or lost his man trying to come up with a big play. But then again, like I said on the previous paragraph, on this game at least it payed off more often than not.

[Dejounte]

Preliminary observations:

-doesnt play like his size at all. not sure if it was the angle the camera is filming or that his back looks permanently arched like Shawn Marion or Timmy D giving an illusion that hes shorter
-his 1 on 1 defense appears non existent, and its not because hes weak or physically related. Not confident that even if he bulks up that there will be a sudden improvement on that end. He has no instincts there at all.
-he plays with a certain rhythm on offense. Not sure how to explain it, but seems like he has practiced the art of timing on passes
-theres a player he reminds me of but cant think of him right now
-youre drafting this guy for offense. You dont hope he will develop into a shutdown defender. Right now, his ceiling to me is a quality 6th man to throw off defenses. Maybe like a Boris Diaw without the defense (there we go! I remember now)
-development wise, i see the same struggles Luka had this season. So you better be patient as and close your eyes to avoid being frustrated how easily he gets bullied by stronger players

[Dejounte]

P.s. you would think there would be reports of RC Buford being in attendance for any of Poku's games if the Spurs were interested, but there werent any... RC was at Deni's this year, and Luka's last year

[exstatic]

Preliminary observations:

-doesnt play like his size at all. not sure if it was the angle the camera is filming or that his back looks permanently arched like Shawn Marion or Timmy D giving an illusion that hes shorter
-his 1 on 1 defense appears non existent, and its not because hes weak or physically related. Not confident that even if he bulks up that there will be a sudden improvement on that end. He has no instincts there at all.
-he plays with a certain rhythm on offense. Not sure how to explain it, but seems like he has practiced the art of timing on passes
-theres a player he reminds me of but cant think of him right now
-youre drafting this guy for offense. You dont hope he will develop into a shutdown defender. Right now, his ceiling to me is a quality 6th man to throw off defenses. Maybe like a Boris Diaw without the defense (there we go! I remember now)
-development wise, i see the same struggles Luka had this season. So you better be patient as and close your eyes to avoid being frustrated how easily he gets bullied by stronger players

As pointed out here several times, he has high rates for both blocks and steals, and in the composite video, can be seen quarterbacking their defense, moving players, calling switches. His defense is anything BUT non existent. He moves well laterally, too.

[exstatic]

P.s. you would think there would be reports of RC Buford being in attendance for any of Poku's games if the Spurs were interested, but there werent any... RC was at Deni's this year, and Luka's last year

The Spurs completely ignored Kawhi during his draft process. They didn’t even work out or interview him. There have been too many times that teams trade in front of us and grab players (Batum, Gobert) that the Spurs show interest in.

[Dejounte]

As pointed out here several times, he has high rates for both blocks and steals, and in the composite video, can be seen quarterbacking their defense, moving players, calling switches. His defense is anything BUT non existent. He moves well laterally, too.

Chill. Maybe I should emphasize "preliminary" more? Anyway, I don't think high rates for blocks and steals are indicative of anything unless its at the NBA level. And i believe I specifically said 1 on 1 defense, meaning laterally staying in front of your man, standing your ground, how your hands are when youre in that position, etc. He floats around on defense a lot, gives a lot of space for his man. Wooty doo for being vocal on defense... Im trying to watch for more than that. By the way, let me say preliminary again.... Ill probably be posting more as i watch more