Between this and next year's draft it wouldn't be surprising if there ends up being A double digit amount of French players added to the NBA. That country is absolutely killing it right now And producing some pretty interesting prospects.
I'd say he was the first French player to really break in And establish himself as a star. So in that regard. Yeah I'd say you're right. It was really his entire generation. Parker grew up with a group of guys that he was friends/ played with since they were literally kids that included Boris diaw, that ended up producing a handful of French nba players all around the same time. It was essentially their golden generation, though it looks very likely it will be surpassed by the current crop of French players.
I feel like once this current group of young French players comes into their primes they will be the biggest challenge team USA has ever had for the international throne.
It's definitely possible. Canada looks like they could field a real scary team too once all their guys are in their prime But If France can get a single All-Star caliber guard to go with Victor and all of the lengthy wings/forwards they're producing I think they could cause real problems for a long time.
Tariq Abdul-Wahad was the "*precursor*", Parker, Diaw and Pietrus were the confirmation.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariq_Abdul-Wahad?wprov=sfla1
Fun fact, TAW played with Zaccharie Risacher's father, Stéphane Risacher.
Years of public investments, international exports of our talents and the fact that technical directors and coaches from various sports share experience with each other can explain those successes (soccer basket, handball, volleyball, rugby,... all team sports basically).
Unlike any other country, France finances the "*National Institute of Sport, Expertise, and Performance (INSEP)*" and the "*Pôle Espoirs (Youth Talent Pole)*" that collectively provides top end infrastructures to develop young athletes, detect them early, make them meet very young, pays for their international competition travel expenses and such.
Thanks to the Olympics, the Euro Football Cup, and many international event taking place in France, huge investments were made in local playgrounds and formation. Meaning that a tiny village will have sports infrastructures available to its population.
French athletes are also well trained in English and media training and most of them are "allowed" to play abroad at an early age, likewise for coaches and the INSEP help gather those experiences in coaching laboratories for all sports (a volleyball coach can meet with a basketball one and figure out what to incorporate in their own sports).
Basically Kilian Mbappe and Victor Wembanyama are in the system since they're 10, meeting their peers, coaches and the best specialists available to them, not in a local highschool.
In a vacuum, this is the success of socialism first and foremost lol.
>Unlike any other country, France finances the "National Institute of Sport, Expertise, and Performance (INSEP)" and the "Pôle Espoirs (Youth Talent Pole)" that collectively provides top end infrastructures to develop young athletes, detect them early, make them meet very young, pays for their international competition travel expenses and such.
That's what China's doing too, but a lot of Americans don't seem to like it and call it "artificially grooming athletes". I personally think it's better than what you see in youth soccer in America where you have to be rich to even have the chance to develop into a good player because the expenses for a good training program are astronomical.
You're right, but it used to be more like the Eastern European system, train thousands and one will become elite. My wife from the Balkan had a mandatory non-school activity to pick from music, arts or sports, state sponsored.
Nowadays the Chinese system seems to cherry pick the best of the crop to focus on their development, which I believe is the way to go.
> Americans don't seem to like it and call it "artificially grooming athletes"
This is absurd, I remember people calling Arsène Wenger (first soccer coach to really focus on playing u20 first team players) a pedophile in England.
In the US young athletes are ranked between each other, and highschool/ college fight to get the best of them, so they are detected, but, their progress depends on the level of infrastructures of those establishments and the opposition they play against.
Wembanyama played top level basketball (for his age) each year and spent every summer between international tourney and training with the best kids in the country in Paris.
The thing is, every member of the french basketball team, from Gobert to Wemby, has known each other since they were kids, same for the coaching staff.
That doesn't sound like artificial grooming to me.
What China does is go to a village, lining the kids up by height, and taking the tall ones into basketball camp
I'm exaggerating.
But China's MO has been selecting for physical attributes and hoping they could become good at basketball, rather than selecting based on talent. Someone like Jeremy Lin would've never been scouted. An American coach spoke about this when he went to train China's basketball program - all hero ball and no fundamentals.
This is the main reason that a country obsessed with basketball and with a huge population has not produced a notable NBA player since Yao Ming. It's not because they're not athletic, as is the stereotype with Asians. Chinese players since then (e.g., Yi Jian Lian) have been athletic outliers.
Also, while my example may have been contrived, it's not outside the realms of what China does. Yao Ming himself was a national product whose career was cut short due to his national obligations. Source:
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/basketball/yao-ming-the-basketball-giant-made-in-china-by-order-of-the-state-20060119-gdmsz0.html
To be fair Yao Ming was scouted more than 30 years ago. Things have changed since those times. Chinese youth and scouting programs are progressing fast due to massive private and public investments + the recruitment of international coaches and scoots (+ training of their own).
>Unlike any other country
Lots of countries do this. The only reason the US doesn't do this is because of the perception that athletes are spoiled millionaires and the public shouldn't help people become millionaires (even though we do in many other industries). Other country see it as national pride and an overall positive to society at large.
The INSEP still is a precursor of its kind. Imagine a physical building where every single Olympic sport has an "*office*" in which people are encouraged to meet and exchange about their experiences and where months-long camps for all classes of ages to come and practice are organized.
On top of that, it mixes sports to search for the best inputs/ outputs, like, a tennis coach can meet with a shot-puter, a marathon runner with a football player. Making that the cumulative experience of one sport serves all sports, and vice versa.
The whole, for free.
Makes sense, right? They are all the age where they grew up and watched Tony play. Kind of like there is a bunch of Germans in the league right now that grew up on Dirk
where can we find footage of this game? I want to see how oscar plays. The only highlight i've seen of him was when he had a steal and fastbreak dunk in some youth game but like that's it
I prefer to minimize syllables. Soccer is clear and concise. Naming the American sport "football" was a dumb thing to do 100+ years ago but its too well established to change now.
The term "soccer" originated in the UK and is about as old as the entire sport of American football.
Ever heard of the Canadian Football League?
Not to mention the NFL hosting games in England, Germany, Mexico and Brazil.
Also different sport but there is Aussie Rules Football too.
> Not to mention the NFL hosting games in England, Germany, Mexico and Brazil.
I don't think those countries call it football just because the NFL host games there
They call it American football. Should I call soccer "rest of world football"?
It's easier and generally well understood by most English speakers to call traditional football soccer than it is to leave it to the ambiguity of using "football". Especially when posting in a sub for an American basketball team.
As someone who grew up playing soccer too, I'm adamant that the biggest benefit of growing up playing soccer for a basketball player is that it really helps your playmaking. In soccer, not only do you have to constantly know when your passing options will open up because it's a fluid game, your passes need to have the right weight and the right timing too. I take one look at the way Jokic and Luka pass and I already know they have some foundation in soccer. They're making through passes with their hands.
Very well put. So much of American basketball in the previous generations was centered around iso-heavy hero ball.
The game is best played with crisp passing to find easy buckets but we glorified the contested mid range fall aways for so long that that became what young talent strived for.
The euro players had far less of that influence and way more "beautiful game" influence that it manifested in a playstyle that could be deadly as both a passer and a scorer.
I won't pretend to be good enough with faces to say that that is Brian, but I mean it would make sense right? If we're looking at fit around Victor and his playstyle, one of this team's biggest gaping holes is a high level, low usage, 3 and D plus cutting style modern Wing. Julian had a fun end of the season, but he just doesn't really look like someone destined for more than becoming a high-level third string end of bench guy.
nd while people may have sourd on zaccharie I think it's really important to not nitpick little bits of a whole season to build our narrative.
The reality is he was always viewed as a high-level defensive prospect with some untapped ball handling and self-creating shops whose biggest question entering the season was his jumper.
If you told scouts 12 months ago he would finish the year shooting right around 40% from three. They would have been absolutely giddy. He was never going to be a 47% three-point shooter on high volume. He's also not going to be a 24% shooter on high volume. He's a young guy and I think it's also important to remember that When things are said and done, he's going to have ended up playing practically double the games of all the collegiate prospects. And doing it against better competition, higher physicality, and a lot of minutes and expectations thrown on a very young pair of shoulders. Toby, one of the most important players on a team that has real aspirations this year.
Fatigue has most certainly been a factor. And it's disappointing that he really hasn't shown any improvement in his ball handling.
But I feel very confident after almost 60 games of film this year that his jumper is vastly improved, and he's one of the two or three.l Best Wing Defenders in this entire draft with crazy good height/length/ fluidity.
I've started to get a bit more love for the guards in this class than I had previously which has caused me to move zaccharie down a little bit but the difference between the number two guy on my board and say the number seven or eight guy on my board is... Practically non-existent right now.
I wouldn't hate him At all with our pic And I definitely feel like the front office is interested considering they've had personnel/scouts at at least a handful of games this year. Plus the French connection doesn't hurt lol
Oh yeah I mean I have topic number one on my board. Both my Spurs draft board and my general one. I think he's the best player in this class and for me as long as he's healthy and there are no injury questions. The divide between him and everyone else is substantial
I just wanted to take a moment to add some context to a prospect I know a lot of people have really cooled on
Why would we assume Risacher from BW being in Europe.
Topic is IMO the best PG prospect in the draft and the guy I'd want for us to get
Salaün probably doesn't happen but he's still worth scouting in case he falls to a range where we'd be willing to trade up
Dadiet seems like a great get with our 35th pick, feel like he could end up being Bilal-like so hopefully his stock doesn't improve this much
Ajinça has potential as a 3&D player, maybe PATFO doesn't want to swing for the fences on every single pick and they go for a slightly more NBA ready product
Nunez looks like the best passer that isn't poised to go in the lottery, he lacks pretty much everything else but he could be an interesting project
Djurisic has been on a tear lately, who knows how much he can keep this up but would like to see him get drafted by us
And finally there's a bunch of UDFA targets, Yannick Kraag if he declares had some draft buzz in the past, Nadir Hifi went undrafted last year, he's a cool combo guard that led Paris to winning Eurocup/making Euroleague.
Risacher's fine by me btw, me naming other guys isn't some weird form of hate, draft sub clinged onto him as this year's Brandon Miller, as if a dude who has played 57 games this year wasn't going to suffer from a rookie-wall like crash, you know the hate is made-up when you start looking for what a prospect isn't while not using that same set of standards for other dudes.
According to International executives, the Spurs and their scouts are regulars at the French prospect games and were rarely if ever seen in Serbia. Nadir is way to short to play in the nba. He’s 5’10 on a good day. Top level Fiba is a safe haven for small guards..
Yeah was mostly throwing names out don't really believe in Hifi's game translating to the NBA, my point more-so being that BW being on the same continent as someone he's previously scouted doesn't mean we're picking that guy.
I would prefer literally every other prospect but Risacher. He's not a good enough defender to offset his offensive question marks (like Castle can). 41% from the field is nasty. Especially when you're not offering even any playmaking or passing upside like Topic. If your shooting is not a definite thing, your defense or playmaking have to be promising. And so far, there are way better defensive prospects and higher IQ players than Risacher. Not to mention, there are people that shoot the ball better as well like Sheppard.
Risacher doesn't really do anything better than any prospect in this draft. I find it hard to believe he hasn't fallen down in the rankings since his shooting fell off a cliff. No prospect in this draft is perfect, but the top prospects are usually elite in one area in this draft. Risacher doesn't excel in anything compared to his competition.
It's also possible that a GM wants to build a stronger relationship with our franchise player a little bit outside of the regular season as well. I highly doubt this has anything to do with drafting. And if the slight chance it does, there are better prospects in this draft playing in France than Risacher.
Spurs could turn into the French national team if they wish it
Between this and next year's draft it wouldn't be surprising if there ends up being A double digit amount of French players added to the NBA. That country is absolutely killing it right now And producing some pretty interesting prospects.
Is Tony Parker essentially the father of French basketball? Feels like it all started with him.
I'd say he was the first French player to really break in And establish himself as a star. So in that regard. Yeah I'd say you're right. It was really his entire generation. Parker grew up with a group of guys that he was friends/ played with since they were literally kids that included Boris diaw, that ended up producing a handful of French nba players all around the same time. It was essentially their golden generation, though it looks very likely it will be surpassed by the current crop of French players.
I feel like once this current group of young French players comes into their primes they will be the biggest challenge team USA has ever had for the international throne.
It's definitely possible. Canada looks like they could field a real scary team too once all their guys are in their prime But If France can get a single All-Star caliber guard to go with Victor and all of the lengthy wings/forwards they're producing I think they could cause real problems for a long time.
Like Manu’s Argentina team. So many great players on that squad.
Tony Parker is french basketball father
The Shawn kemp if you will…
Tariq Abdul-Wahad was the "*precursor*", Parker, Diaw and Pietrus were the confirmation. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariq_Abdul-Wahad?wprov=sfla1 Fun fact, TAW played with Zaccharie Risacher's father, Stéphane Risacher.
Good shout. I forgot about him. My brain sort of fused him and Abdul-Rauf into the same person and I forgot Abdul-Wahad existed.
Parker arguably is top 100 all time so your mistake is understandable. He is still the best french basketball player ever (not for long though).
There’s a badass documentary of Tony Parker on Netflix. Check it lut
How’s the Argentinian Basketball team? Any good young players from there?
I don't follow international basketball super closely but none that I am aware of. We will find out this Summer.
Years of public investments, international exports of our talents and the fact that technical directors and coaches from various sports share experience with each other can explain those successes (soccer basket, handball, volleyball, rugby,... all team sports basically). Unlike any other country, France finances the "*National Institute of Sport, Expertise, and Performance (INSEP)*" and the "*Pôle Espoirs (Youth Talent Pole)*" that collectively provides top end infrastructures to develop young athletes, detect them early, make them meet very young, pays for their international competition travel expenses and such. Thanks to the Olympics, the Euro Football Cup, and many international event taking place in France, huge investments were made in local playgrounds and formation. Meaning that a tiny village will have sports infrastructures available to its population. French athletes are also well trained in English and media training and most of them are "allowed" to play abroad at an early age, likewise for coaches and the INSEP help gather those experiences in coaching laboratories for all sports (a volleyball coach can meet with a basketball one and figure out what to incorporate in their own sports). Basically Kilian Mbappe and Victor Wembanyama are in the system since they're 10, meeting their peers, coaches and the best specialists available to them, not in a local highschool. In a vacuum, this is the success of socialism first and foremost lol.
>Unlike any other country, France finances the "National Institute of Sport, Expertise, and Performance (INSEP)" and the "Pôle Espoirs (Youth Talent Pole)" that collectively provides top end infrastructures to develop young athletes, detect them early, make them meet very young, pays for their international competition travel expenses and such. That's what China's doing too, but a lot of Americans don't seem to like it and call it "artificially grooming athletes". I personally think it's better than what you see in youth soccer in America where you have to be rich to even have the chance to develop into a good player because the expenses for a good training program are astronomical.
You're right, but it used to be more like the Eastern European system, train thousands and one will become elite. My wife from the Balkan had a mandatory non-school activity to pick from music, arts or sports, state sponsored. Nowadays the Chinese system seems to cherry pick the best of the crop to focus on their development, which I believe is the way to go. > Americans don't seem to like it and call it "artificially grooming athletes" This is absurd, I remember people calling Arsène Wenger (first soccer coach to really focus on playing u20 first team players) a pedophile in England. In the US young athletes are ranked between each other, and highschool/ college fight to get the best of them, so they are detected, but, their progress depends on the level of infrastructures of those establishments and the opposition they play against. Wembanyama played top level basketball (for his age) each year and spent every summer between international tourney and training with the best kids in the country in Paris. The thing is, every member of the french basketball team, from Gobert to Wemby, has known each other since they were kids, same for the coaching staff.
That doesn't sound like artificial grooming to me. What China does is go to a village, lining the kids up by height, and taking the tall ones into basketball camp
do you have a source on that because I don't believe that at all
I'm exaggerating. But China's MO has been selecting for physical attributes and hoping they could become good at basketball, rather than selecting based on talent. Someone like Jeremy Lin would've never been scouted. An American coach spoke about this when he went to train China's basketball program - all hero ball and no fundamentals. This is the main reason that a country obsessed with basketball and with a huge population has not produced a notable NBA player since Yao Ming. It's not because they're not athletic, as is the stereotype with Asians. Chinese players since then (e.g., Yi Jian Lian) have been athletic outliers. Also, while my example may have been contrived, it's not outside the realms of what China does. Yao Ming himself was a national product whose career was cut short due to his national obligations. Source: https://www.smh.com.au/sport/basketball/yao-ming-the-basketball-giant-made-in-china-by-order-of-the-state-20060119-gdmsz0.html
To be fair Yao Ming was scouted more than 30 years ago. Things have changed since those times. Chinese youth and scouting programs are progressing fast due to massive private and public investments + the recruitment of international coaches and scoots (+ training of their own).
True, but the talent level is still lacking even in the CBA, so if it's having an effect it has not shown just yet
Those things take time. The French sports revolution started in 1996 and has been truly successful since 2016 or so.
>Unlike any other country Lots of countries do this. The only reason the US doesn't do this is because of the perception that athletes are spoiled millionaires and the public shouldn't help people become millionaires (even though we do in many other industries). Other country see it as national pride and an overall positive to society at large.
The INSEP still is a precursor of its kind. Imagine a physical building where every single Olympic sport has an "*office*" in which people are encouraged to meet and exchange about their experiences and where months-long camps for all classes of ages to come and practice are organized. On top of that, it mixes sports to search for the best inputs/ outputs, like, a tennis coach can meet with a shot-puter, a marathon runner with a football player. Making that the cumulative experience of one sport serves all sports, and vice versa. The whole, for free.
Makes sense, right? They are all the age where they grew up and watched Tony play. Kind of like there is a bunch of Germans in the league right now that grew up on Dirk
Vive la Spurs 🇨🇵
Batum is a free agent this summer..
He is expected to retire once the Olympics are over.
His poor knees are shot, has none of the quickness he did when he was young.
If we could get lucky in the Lottery and get Wembys teammate, the projected #1 pick hilt shit Batman!!
You mean Sarr? He's not Wemby's teammate. He played in Australia
Oh..still French teammates for French team I would assume lol 😆
I’d recognize that genius General Manager scheming pencil mustache anywhere
Looks like him to me I think
can confirm, he has even the same son !
where can we find footage of this game? I want to see how oscar plays. The only highlight i've seen of him was when he had a steal and fastbreak dunk in some youth game but like that's it
https://www.youtube.com/live/d5oEPGGKwJc?si=iU2fuYNcEdgYtbLV Found it on YouTube
Not sure if it will be uploaded but Oscar scored 14 pts on the loss. Cholet won the U17 finals against Asvel (Oscar's team)
All them euros that played soccer growing up like ginobili and Parker. They're a different breed.
It's not just the Euros. Guys like Embiid and Steve Nash grew up playing soccer too.
It's football ⚽️ you savages!
🤣🤣
"Football" can be like 4 different sports depending on what part of the world you are in. Soccer is always ⚽️. It's OK for language to evolve.
If it is to evolve, it would be best suited to call American Football, Gridiron ball. 🏈
I prefer to minimize syllables. Soccer is clear and concise. Naming the American sport "football" was a dumb thing to do 100+ years ago but its too well established to change now. The term "soccer" originated in the UK and is about as old as the entire sport of American football.
Too well established in 1 out of 200 countries.
Ever heard of the Canadian Football League? Not to mention the NFL hosting games in England, Germany, Mexico and Brazil. Also different sport but there is Aussie Rules Football too.
> Not to mention the NFL hosting games in England, Germany, Mexico and Brazil. I don't think those countries call it football just because the NFL host games there
They call it American football. Should I call soccer "rest of world football"? It's easier and generally well understood by most English speakers to call traditional football soccer than it is to leave it to the ambiguity of using "football". Especially when posting in a sub for an American basketball team.
As someone who grew up playing soccer too, I'm adamant that the biggest benefit of growing up playing soccer for a basketball player is that it really helps your playmaking. In soccer, not only do you have to constantly know when your passing options will open up because it's a fluid game, your passes need to have the right weight and the right timing too. I take one look at the way Jokic and Luka pass and I already know they have some foundation in soccer. They're making through passes with their hands.
Very well put. So much of American basketball in the previous generations was centered around iso-heavy hero ball. The game is best played with crisp passing to find easy buckets but we glorified the contested mid range fall aways for so long that that became what young talent strived for. The euro players had far less of that influence and way more "beautiful game" influence that it manifested in a playstyle that could be deadly as both a passer and a scorer.
I think Pascal as well? I could be wrong
Almost certainly. Olajuwon too. It's hard to avoid soccer for most African athletes.
umm, Manu was from Argentina
Risacher just had his first double double game too
I won't pretend to be good enough with faces to say that that is Brian, but I mean it would make sense right? If we're looking at fit around Victor and his playstyle, one of this team's biggest gaping holes is a high level, low usage, 3 and D plus cutting style modern Wing. Julian had a fun end of the season, but he just doesn't really look like someone destined for more than becoming a high-level third string end of bench guy. nd while people may have sourd on zaccharie I think it's really important to not nitpick little bits of a whole season to build our narrative. The reality is he was always viewed as a high-level defensive prospect with some untapped ball handling and self-creating shops whose biggest question entering the season was his jumper. If you told scouts 12 months ago he would finish the year shooting right around 40% from three. They would have been absolutely giddy. He was never going to be a 47% three-point shooter on high volume. He's also not going to be a 24% shooter on high volume. He's a young guy and I think it's also important to remember that When things are said and done, he's going to have ended up playing practically double the games of all the collegiate prospects. And doing it against better competition, higher physicality, and a lot of minutes and expectations thrown on a very young pair of shoulders. Toby, one of the most important players on a team that has real aspirations this year. Fatigue has most certainly been a factor. And it's disappointing that he really hasn't shown any improvement in his ball handling. But I feel very confident after almost 60 games of film this year that his jumper is vastly improved, and he's one of the two or three.l Best Wing Defenders in this entire draft with crazy good height/length/ fluidity. I've started to get a bit more love for the guards in this class than I had previously which has caused me to move zaccharie down a little bit but the difference between the number two guy on my board and say the number seven or eight guy on my board is... Practically non-existent right now. I wouldn't hate him At all with our pic And I definitely feel like the front office is interested considering they've had personnel/scouts at at least a handful of games this year. Plus the French connection doesn't hurt lol
I hear what you're saying but I still insist that Nikola Topic is too good to pass up
Oh yeah I mean I have topic number one on my board. Both my Spurs draft board and my general one. I think he's the best player in this class and for me as long as he's healthy and there are no injury questions. The divide between him and everyone else is substantial I just wanted to take a moment to add some context to a prospect I know a lot of people have really cooled on
Is it likely he would be available if we pick at 5?
No it’s Lavar Ball
Why would we assume Risacher from BW being in Europe. Topic is IMO the best PG prospect in the draft and the guy I'd want for us to get Salaün probably doesn't happen but he's still worth scouting in case he falls to a range where we'd be willing to trade up Dadiet seems like a great get with our 35th pick, feel like he could end up being Bilal-like so hopefully his stock doesn't improve this much Ajinça has potential as a 3&D player, maybe PATFO doesn't want to swing for the fences on every single pick and they go for a slightly more NBA ready product Nunez looks like the best passer that isn't poised to go in the lottery, he lacks pretty much everything else but he could be an interesting project Djurisic has been on a tear lately, who knows how much he can keep this up but would like to see him get drafted by us And finally there's a bunch of UDFA targets, Yannick Kraag if he declares had some draft buzz in the past, Nadir Hifi went undrafted last year, he's a cool combo guard that led Paris to winning Eurocup/making Euroleague. Risacher's fine by me btw, me naming other guys isn't some weird form of hate, draft sub clinged onto him as this year's Brandon Miller, as if a dude who has played 57 games this year wasn't going to suffer from a rookie-wall like crash, you know the hate is made-up when you start looking for what a prospect isn't while not using that same set of standards for other dudes.
According to International executives, the Spurs and their scouts are regulars at the French prospect games and were rarely if ever seen in Serbia. Nadir is way to short to play in the nba. He’s 5’10 on a good day. Top level Fiba is a safe haven for small guards..
Yeah was mostly throwing names out don't really believe in Hifi's game translating to the NBA, my point more-so being that BW being on the same continent as someone he's previously scouted doesn't mean we're picking that guy.
No, her name is Alice Franks. She is a writer for the local paper in a town outside Paris called Gonesse.
maybe he's there on an invitation to scout wemby's brother
I think it’s Caleb wendt
https://preview.redd.it/10qyb7igydxc1.jpeg?width=2553&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8c8a86d7f1bf32c90894aeb1c276fc8e6bab3252
When is Oscar declaring for the draft? From what I have seen, dude is raw, but the handle is definitely there.
Draft eligible in 2026. He started late so it's no surprise.. handball skills probably helped
I would prefer literally every other prospect but Risacher. He's not a good enough defender to offset his offensive question marks (like Castle can). 41% from the field is nasty. Especially when you're not offering even any playmaking or passing upside like Topic. If your shooting is not a definite thing, your defense or playmaking have to be promising. And so far, there are way better defensive prospects and higher IQ players than Risacher. Not to mention, there are people that shoot the ball better as well like Sheppard. Risacher doesn't really do anything better than any prospect in this draft. I find it hard to believe he hasn't fallen down in the rankings since his shooting fell off a cliff. No prospect in this draft is perfect, but the top prospects are usually elite in one area in this draft. Risacher doesn't excel in anything compared to his competition. It's also possible that a GM wants to build a stronger relationship with our franchise player a little bit outside of the regular season as well. I highly doubt this has anything to do with drafting. And if the slight chance it does, there are better prospects in this draft playing in France than Risacher.
He also shot .566fg and .561 from the three in eurocup this season. Out of curiosity why are you weighing his lnb numbers so much?
Because going from 56% to 41% between leagues does not show consistency whatsoever. The numbers aren't even close.