For Kentucky Wildcats Coach John Calipari, the NBA Draft is like his Christmas and five graduation parties rolled into one. Like every draft during the Coach Cal era, the Kentucky Wildcats will have a very significant presence. Five Kentucky Wildcats are eligible for this NBA Draft: Hamidou Diallo, Wenyen Gabriel, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Kevin Knox and Jarred Vanderbilt.
Under Calipari, the Wildcats have tended to field much younger teams than we’ve traditionally seen at Kentucky. Cal puts out sides that appeal to millenials, the smart phone addicted demographic and the www.esports.net crowd. Calipari has been implementing a one-and-done strategy, which rebuilds with freshmen every year for quite some time, but the 2017-18 team was the youngest and one-and-doniest (yes, it’s a word now) yet.
How will this translate to this year’s draft class? Probably pretty well, as the NBA Draft has very much shifted in recent years. It’s a lot more like the MLB Draft these days in that it’s more about raw, untapped potential, measurables (yes, that’s actually a word too) and upside.
It’s a lot less about experience and tangible statistics and actual accomplishments made while competing.
Calipari did a media teleconference focusing on the NBA Draft, and we have full audio of the session for you below. It’s over 20 minutes long and covers a whole lot of ground, and NBA fans everywhere will enjoy it, as it gets into the scouting report style nitty gritty. Enjoy:
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, is currently a regular contributor to SB Nation, WGN CLTV and Chicago Now.
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