Wow, a lot is going on in this thread. Here's my 2 cents:
Anyone who thinks that UK or any college team that finishes on top can beat the worst NBA team in a given year likely doesn't watched many NBA games. I'm always amazed at how well and how easy most NBA players are at knocking down open and moderately contested shots. In the college game there are few players you can count on knocking down those same shots at anywhere close to the same clip.
In fact, I sometimes find the NBA game boring when they're not in post-season mode where they actually defend for long stretches of the game, where each team goes down and hits shot after shot from all over the floor.
In the college game, you just hope your team can make shots on a few consecutive trips down the floor during a few stretches of a given game. All in all, the shooting and finishing skills at the NBA level is leaps and bounds higher than what you see in the college game. Now there are a handful of players on some of the rosters who aren't good shooters, but those are the ones who are either rebounding/defensive specialists or ones that excel at certain skills on the offensive end such as driving and/or dishing (Rondo) or dunking. Enough with this one.
As for where Lamb might get drafted, I think his stock took a hit this season and it might take an even bigger hit once he begins to work out for teams. Someone listed 7 players they thought that would get drafted over JL and wasn't sure if he'd find more if he kept on digging. Lamb's skill set and deficiencies IMO are really tough to gauge as far as how those will play out at the next level. Here's some bullets on this:
The Good:
Shot-making - There's little doubt that when given enough room, Lamb is one of the best shot-makers in college. He finishes around the basket and from mid-range at a high level. He has NBA range on his 3-ball. He has the best floater I've seen since the Ice Man, George Gervin.
Long Reach and Great Hands - Not talked about often, which is common for guards, few guards have better hands than Lamb. He's very good with receiving the ball and is a very good rebounder for guard due to his long reach and big hands. Rarely did you see him bobble a defensive rebound. It was like watching Spiderman snatch some really tough in-traffic rebounds this past season.
Ball Handling - For a long armed player, he handles the ball very well, especially in the open floor.
The Not So Good:
Lacks a quick first step and overall strength - This impacts his game, and not in a good way, especially at the next level. Lamb really struggled to drive by good to average defenders when given the ball at the top of the key w/out any momentum. Part of this was due to a lack of a first step burst and a lack of strength, but maybe also due to a lack of confidence in this part of his game. IMO, it's this part of his game that may have caused his stock to drop. Now maybe if he works hard on his foot work and in the weight room he can make up for this deficiency. Many NBA players who aren't super quick have learned to be able to get the corner on their defender using their strength and ball handling. Once such a player can get that half step on the defender the strong ones can ward off the defender and either draw the foul or get around them. I'm on the fence if JL can improve enough in this area or has enough other attributes to overcome it to become a Lottery worthy pick. Add 20 pounds of muscle, work hard on drills to improve that first step and gain better instincts how to go early with his drive or do something that gets his defender leaning the wrong way, and maybe he can overcome this issue so that he can dominate using his other skills listed above.
Not a good defender - This is directly related to the above. Stronger and Quicker NBA guards are going to get a step on him and blow right by him. He's not nearly quick or strong enough to defend the 1, 2 or 3...hum...any position to that matter at the next level. This has been a problem for Rip & Ben their entire careers. Neither are strong enough and for whatever reason both have horrible defensive instincts. Hooper and I have discussed this and scratched our heads for years about this one. It always amazes us how a player who seems plenty quick to create their own shot can be so bad at keeping their man in front of them. On the ball defending and staying with a player through screens is a factor of quickness, strength, reaction time and instincts. I'm convinced that a great deal of it is with the latter two since I've seen quick players who s*ck at D and not-so-quick ones surprisingly hold their own. If Lamb can learn to improve a little bit in those 3 areas plus use those long arms, he could develop into a solid enough defender and not be a liability. But that's a a lot of ifs. Few bad defenders coming into the NBA develop in this area, but some do. The ones that do, worked the asses off to get there. I'm just not sure if Lamb has that type of work ethic. Taking extra time to work on your shot is one thing. Taking extra time to work in the weight room and on your foot work and drills that lend themselves to the defensive end of the floor, is another thing.
Not a 4th quarter guy - I must admit, I was surprised that like Rudy, Lamb did a nice job on his late game disappearing act. Now a big part of this is likely due to teams making sure that he did not beat them late in games. As a #3 or 4 option early on in his NBA career, he might actually find more space to score than he did at UConn this past season. We all know what he can do when he has the space to get off his shot. But we are talking about a potential Lottery Pick where by his 3rd season you'd hope he will develop into a 1st or 2nd option on offense where he's going to find the opponents top defenders standing between him and the basket. Will he be the type of scorer that warrants a lottery pick or are there others in this draft that have a higher likelihood of being more productive long term players.
I wonder if JL is sort of a 2/3 tweener. We're use to seeing the 3/4 tweeners like Donyell, Sticks and Roscoe. Ones that aren't strong enough to play the 4 or quick enough to play the 3. In Lambs case, he's not big enough to play the 3 in the NBA and I'm not sure he's quick enough to play the 2. As I pointed out above, maybe he has enough in him to close the gap on his deficiencies so that he can excel in the areas where he's special.
The Conclusion:
So this brings me to my concluding remarks. The real question at hand is not necessarily how high he might get drafted but is will his stock be higher after one more season? Let's assume his draft position either dropped from what it would have been last season or at most improved slightly, if he has another season where he shows moderate to little improvement, NBA GMs are likely going to believe that he has a low upside and that some of these deficiencies are going to limit him at the next level. On the other hand, if he can work on his deficiencies and show that he can score off the dribble and defend better, his stock could soar high up the lottery ladder. I can never remember how many lottery picks there are, nor have I looked at any of the mock drafts lately, but I'm inclined to think based on the players he's competing with, he's going to get picked in that 12 to 16 range. Sometimes team needs and style of play will play a factor in this. I wish we had seen a lot more screen-catch-and-shoot from him this season, ala Rip Hamilton. He's much better when he gets the ball with a little space and while moving. There are teams that have offenses that lend itself to players with this skill set, but for whatever reason we saw little of this for JL.
I'm inclined to think that it would be best for him to enter the draft and be satisfied wherever he lands. I think he runs the risk of falling even further if he returns, plus the money he leaves at the table that he would be making this upcoming season. Unless he believes he can really improve his game, I think he'd be taking a huge chance by returning to UConn. I hope he does, but I doubt it. If he were able to improve in those areas he could have a monster year and be a lot of fun to watch. A 10 to 15 pound stronger Lamb at the college level would be fun to watch.
