The NBA draft has become a baseball draft.
Because of the relative youth of recent drafts, very few players per year can step into an NBA lineup and contribute immediately. Similar to MLB, more and more selections are based on long-term (three-to-five year) projections.
Which brings me to Kentucky's Karl-Anthony Towns. The 7-foot, 250-pound freshman with a 7-foot-3 wingspan will be one of the top three players selected on June 25. And although the 19-year-old is not as advanced as fellow Wildcat Anthony Davis was at the same stage, he is the basketball equivalent of a five-tool guy, with a nice combination of skill, size, athleticism, youth and a "give a damn" meter than runs high.
However, unlike Duke's Jahlil Okafor, he is not the focal point of Kentucky's team even if he is its best NBA prospect. To compare, Okafor has had 15 games of eight attempts or more for the Blue Devils while Towns had not had even one game with more than eight field goal attempts.
The first subtle attribute that jumps out to me about Towns is that he is an alert player on both ends of the floor. Watch him closely for 10 minutes of any game and you'll notice that he has a good feel. Something I see as a coach is that rebounds he can't grab initially, he'll tip to himself.
On the defensive end, he is proving to be -- because of his considerable length, timing and instincts -- a prolific shot-blocker. In fact, his block rate, according to kenpom.com, is a robust 14 percent, fifth-best in the country. In Tuesday's win against Vanderbilt, he blocked seven shots in just 18 minutes.
In this recent win over Missouri at home, look at Towns' extension on these blocked shots. He is at the TOP of the square on the board when he rejects the second shot. This takes outstanding timing, a product of his athletic ability. This is what I would describe as "rim protection."
He also possesses good lateral quickness for a player his size which, combined with his basketball I.Q., allows him to effectively defend screen-and-roll and isolation plays. With so much of the college game starting to be influenced by the NBA's screen-and-roll and one-on-one concepts, finding a young big man who can defend away from the basket is critical.
See how Towns jumps out to hedge on the screen-and-roll, switches onto the ball and keeps an Eastern Kentucky guard in front of him. He "walls off the basket," staying between the ball and the basket until the offensive player has to pass the ball back out.
The first time I studied Towns closely was when he was a 16-year-old high school player from New Jersey, who because of his mother's Dominican roots, was playing for John Calipari and the Dominican Republic national team in 2012. Just failing to qualify for the London Olympics, the team was taking on Team USA in an exhibition game in Las Vegas.
Despite Towns' massive size even then, he had all the mannerisms of a normal 16-year-old. And at that time, he was spending an inordinate amount of time playing on the perimeter and eschewing physical play around the basket. When I asked him about that, he told me he worked on his outside game as an antidote to being double- and triple-teamed and picking up cheap fouls in his high school games. It made perfect sense.
And Towns still has a unique ability to stretch a defense with his outside shooting although he's attempted only seven 3-point shots this season. It hasn't needed to be part of his offensive arsenal, but it is a capable weapon he is likely to show off during his NBA career. One NBA scout told me he watched Towns make 13 straight college 3-point shots before a recent Kentucky game.
Towns has shown terrific offensive agility in the open floor. In the Wildcats' win at Louisville, he had an open-court move and finish that was ridiculous. Look at him handle the ball at mid-court and finish with a swooping move to the basket.
Most importantly to Towns' future development is that he has begun to embrace physical contact in the paint. He works hard for position and has all the attributes that will make him an outstanding low-post scorer, including a soft shooting touch that, along with his size, translates well to the painted area.
Right now, for obvious reasons -- he is a righty -- he turns to his left to shoot a right-handed jump hook almost exclusively. Check out his release point on both of these jump hook shots against Louisville.
And while his right-hand jump hook over his left shoulder is his go-to move, he possesses an increasingly deft shooting touch with his left hand, as well. He utilizes it here in this game versus Ole Miss.
I used the baseball analogy earlier, in part, because I believe college basketball at its highest levels is the equivalent of Double-A baseball right now. More and more top players are leaving for the NBA early and the talent level, in my opinion, has been diluted. So starring at this level is no guarantee of future stardom in the NBA. (Look at how many first-round picks last June are not yet contributing for their teams.)
I've tried to watch Towns closely and I have talked with him and to people close to him. The sense is he loves the game, is very coachable and is willing to work hard to improve. It's the same sense I get about him from NBA people who are following him carefully.
Towns is a young player with the long-term potential to be a professional star, but he will arrive in the NBA as still relatively raw and physically immature (however with immense talent). He may not yet have the polish that Okafor possesses, but automatically thinking the Duke big man will be better five to 10 years from now is premature.