The NBA Draft Doesn't Need To Be Two Nights

If there was any NBA draft that we didn’t need to watch for two nights, this is the one.

Thirty names were called in the first round on Wednesday, and another 28 are set to be selected on Thursday in Round 2. 

Usually, the first five picks yield one player universally viewed as a future star, sometimes more than that. 

Last year, it was Victor Wembanyama; in 2022, it was Paolo Banchero; and in 2021, we felt great about OK State’s Cade Cunningham and Florida State’s Scottie Barnes. Before them, Anthony Edwards (Georgia) and LaMelo Ball headlined the 2020 draft class.

Unless you are a FIBA competition aficionado, it’s unlikely you will have much dirt on the top picks in 2024.

Even if you have season tickets to Kentucky basketball or were one of the 75-person party with the (Reed) Sheppard family in attendance in Brooklyn, the ‘24 draft can be immediately filed in the stale bin.

Zaccharie Risacher went No. 1 overall to the Atlanta Hawks before the Washington Wizards selected fellow Frenchman Alexandre Sarr with the second overall pick. The Houston Rockets selected Reed Sheppard out of Kentucky, and the San Antonio Spurs picked up UConn’s Stephon Castle. 

Ron Holland II of G League Ignite—his highlights were enticing, but get serious—who knows the full scouting report on Holland—went to the Detroit Pistons to round out the top five.

Risacher and Sarr should make an immediate impact based on the situations they find themselves entering, but it’s hard to imagine them weaving themselves into conversations with guys like Wembanyama, Banchero, and Edwards down the line.

And maybe that’s just because they haven’t gotten the kind of exposure that the stateside draftees have gotten throughout their collegiate careers. 

Banking on international prospects to thrive in the NBA always tends to be a bit riskier. Just ask the Phoenix Suns, who took Dragan Bender at No. 4 back in 2016 and still have to regret it to this day.

Finding an international talent like Luka Doncic, Nikola Jokic or Wembanyama is rare. But it’s not impossible. Unfortunately for the Hawks and Wizards, it doesn’t look like they did that on Wednesday night.

There were some great value picks that moved the meter ever-so-slightly on Wednesday. 

The Oklahoma City Thunder getting Serbia’s Nikola Topic at No. 12, the Los Angeles Lakers picking up Dalton Knecht out of Tennessee at No. 17, and the Minnesota Timberwolves coming away with Illinois star Terrence Shannon Jr. at No. 27 all stand out. 

But let’s be real: these aren’t the future Hall of Famers we’re talking about here. 

Nobody considered a draft of the Sixth Man of the Year candidates appointment TV.

At best, about 20 solid role players are going to come out of this class, and we’ll be lucky if this group features two or three bona fide stars.

The league can’t be held accountable for what amounts to a really weak pool of talent. This was the first time in a while that the first round of an NBA draft felt bland, and don’t expect the second round to be any different.

We could sit here and encourage you to tune in on Thursday night to see if Bronny James gets drafted, but you’re better off getting a full eight hours of sleep and checking Twitter, X, whatever it’s called now, Friday morning.

If you somehow made it through the Charlotte Hornets selecting France’s Tidjane Salaun with the sixth overall pick, you’ve already been through enough. Turn the TV off on Thursday, take the family out for a nice dinner, and do something better with your time.

A two-day NBA draft is cool and all, but not when the first round doesn’t leave you wanting to come back for more.