To help readers get to know top NBA draft prospects, Insider offers a 360-degree look at many of them in a concise and thorough scouting report featuring three expert perspectives: Kevin Pelton (analytics), Fran Fraschilla (scouting) and Chad Ford (NBA front offices). Here's a look at Justin Anderson.
WARP Projection: 0.9 (43rd among players in top 100)
Comparables: Antoine Wright (95.8), Josh Childress (95.4), Gerald Henderson Jr. (94.4), Brandon Roy (94.0)
Strengths: Assist%, Block%, TO%, PF%
Weaknesses: 2P%, Rebound%
The analytics perspective
The way my system is designed, Anderson's improvement from 30 percent 3-point shooting his first three seasons to 45.2 percent on 104 attempts as a junior (but 32.8 percent after the start of conference play) doesn't have much impact on his NBA projection. He's projected for just 30.9 percent 3-point shooting as a rookie, though his solid free throw shooting and high 3 attempt rates suggest the potential for improvement.
Even without knockdown 3-point shooting, there are reasons to like Anderson. He's shown the ability to make plays from the wing, and his block rates as a young player were excellent for a wing. He's the second-shortest player in my database (behind freak athlete D.J. Stephens) with a projected block rate of better than 2.0 percent in the NBA, and the group of wings with high block rates has generally performed well defensively. If Anderson's steal rate increases outside of Tony Bennett's conservative pack-line defense, he could be an impact defender.
On the downside, Anderson has consistently made around 48 percent of his 2-point attempts, a poor mark for an NBA-bound wing. To contribute in the half court offensively, Anderson will probably have to develop a consistent 3-point shot, in which case he could qualify for the 3-and-D role NBA teams are always looking to fill.
-- Kevin Pelton
The scouting perspective
I like Anderson. I watched him play a lot in high school and enjoyed seeing him improve in three years at Virginia. But if he stays in this draft, he is taking a huge gamble. In his workouts with individual teams and at the NBA combine, he will have to show that he has the necessary athleticism and skill level to play shooting guard in the NBA.
At 6-foot-6 and 226 pounds, he has played the small forward position in college. And, he has been hidden in the cocoon of Virginia's great man-to-man defense. While his effort defensively has been good, his lateral quickness for the NBA is average and he was a "screen magnet" in screen-and-roll situations, often giving up when he hit a screen.
Offensively, he played in a system at Virginia that, while extremely effective, didn't show whether he could play in isolation situations very often. So, it will be up to NBA teams to determine how well he can create offense off the dribble.
One major positive this past season is how much he improved his 3-point shooting, especially with his feet set. At one point in the middle of the season, he was making over 50 percent of his 3-point shots. It was a major improvement over the 30 percent of 3s he made in his first two seasons.
He'll need to prove to NBA teams that his improvement wasn't just an outlier. Interestingly, when he returned after missing eight games due to a hand injury and an appendectomy, he made only 1 of 9 shots from beyond the arc. But, digging deeper, Anderson made only 7 of his previous 25 3-point attempts before the injury.
Keep in mind, also, that he made only 25 percent of his 2-point jumpers, which came mainly on the move.
At the moment, for Anderson to reach his dream, he'll need to work to become what NBA teams call a "3-and-D" guy. If he can continue to show that he can make NBA 3s and defend the wing position, he has a chance to end up in the first round. Whether he can become that is a mystery teams will begin trying to solve soon.
-- Fran Fraschilla
The front-office perspective
Anderson was a marginal NBA prospect heading into his junior season. He had the athleticism and body of a NBA player, and his defense could be great, but his offensive game was considered too raw for him to be a first-round prospect. This season, however, his major uptick in 3-point shooting has forced NBA GMs and scouts to give him a serious look.
After shooting 30 percent from 3 as a freshman and 29 percent from 3 as a sophomore, he shot a red-hot 47 percent this season. Combine that hot shooting with his physical tools and suddenly he looked like a lock for the first round.
A hand injury slowed him down at the end of the season, and even though he returned in time for the NCAA tournament, he clearly wasn't himself. Anderson shot just 1-for-9 from 3 after the injury. The question scouts have is -- how much should Anderson's late-season shooting slump be attributed to his wrist and how much should it be attributed to a regression to the mean?
Workouts will likely answer scouts' questions. If he shoots well, I could see him going in the late teens to early 20s. If he struggles, he may be more in the late first to early second-round range.
-- Chad Ford