JaJuan Johnson, Robbie Hummel, E'Twaun Moore Have NBA Potential

A caller to The Dan Dakich Show yesterday on 1070 The Fan in Indianapolis asked for Dan's assessment of Purdue's JaJuan Johnson's draft prospects. 

Dan said Johnson doesn't have the kind of frame that will add a bunch of weight, and he needs some bulk to be effective in the paint at the NBA level.  He also said Johnson has the length needed for the NBA, but not the lateral quickness to guard on the perimeter. 

Of course, he's right.  Dan knows sports.  He thinks about sports and analyzes like the rest of us breathe.

That started me thinking about the rest of the Boilers who might be equipped to go to the next level.  After looking at two dozen mock drafts and reading everything I could find that looked like even remotely coherent analysis, I'm convinced of two things. 

First, the people on these sites are really nothing more than consensus establishers.  They all look at one another's mock boards and decide not to disagree because in disagreement lies the potential for a mistake.  If everyone screws up, well then, they were duped at an equal level.  Like corporate America, there is no culpability for failure if arms are locked in group idiocy. 

The second thing is, nobody knows what the hell a player will be like in 12 months.

When Johnson played AAU Basketball, an assistant coach from the University of Virginia came to look at him.  Johnson is a smart guy, and he could handle the academics at any school, so Virginia was interested in a 6'10" kid regardless of his girth.  The AAU team was a guard-driven group on the offensive end that shared the scoring load almost equally among the top four guys. 

The Virginia coach said on the plane out of Raleigh that he was no longer interested.  I'm not sure what it was about a 6'10" kid with a 7'4" wingspan, great hands and hand/eye coordination, and a team-first attitude that put off the coach, but that was also the case with many other big-time college coaches. 

Needless to say, Virginia sucks, and Purdue is ranked.

Can Johnson, Robbie Hummel, and E'Twaun Moore play in the NBA?  That's the question. Should they come out after their junior season?  That's the other question. 

The answer to the first question is yes, and the second answer is no. 

Let's get into the second question first.  Other than for agents and the truly gifted players who need to start the NBA clock ASAP to get to the max contract stage of their careers, what's the hurry, Murray?  College is sweet. 

For guys who are going to the NBA, college might be the last time they can meet a girl they can trust, laugh without the responsibility of taking care of employees/sycophants, and just be a guy.  The NBA will wait.  Well, barring catastrophic injury, the NBA or Europe can wait. 

Have some fun, and learn about life.  A lot of money won't do anyone much good if you don't know how to enjoy and invest it.

The answer to the first question is easier.  Of course those three guys can play in the NBA.  The degrees to which the 6'4" guards in the NBA are separated are so minute they are virtually impossible to see. 

As Purdue plays, Moore is never the most obvious choice as the best player on the floor.  That has always been the case.  When his AAU team played, Moore would never stand out. But when you looked at the stat sheet, he had 18 points.  Always. 

There are kids who are more spectacular, but there are few kids who have won more regularly.  Moore is moving up in some mock drafts.  The most recently updated is The Hoops Report, and he is listed as 17th in the first round.  That gives me reason to believe somebody might know what the hell they are doing.

Hummel is not as well-regarded by the pundits as Moore and Johnson.  He's listed in the mid- to late second round in every mock draft I found.  Of course, that's ridiculous.  What attribute does Hummel not have that other 6'7" wings do? 

He can shoot.  He defends tenaciously.  He's a very adept ball handler.  He knows basketball. 

Sure, he had some trouble defending a tough shot in New Castle when he was a senior at Valpo, but how do you stop Ryan Sterling?

Hummel looks a little like very rich NBA player Brian Cardinal in that he's a white, blond kid.  If anything, Hummel is a better NBA prospect than Cardinal was.  He's a better shooter and athlete, but he doesn't share Cardinal's willingness to batter his body. 

He'll play in the NBA and make a lot of money as a role player, which is what he has always been.  That's not a rip.  Basketball needs more players like that—especially the NBA.

Johnson can run the floor and jump as high as he needs to. He has incredible length, hands, and hand-eye coordination.  What more do you want?  An additional 25 pounds would be nice because a guy like Dwight Howard will eat him alive—or so people might think. 

Can he contribute right away to an NBA team?  Probably not, but put him on a schedule like Donnie Walsh did with Antonio Davis, and you might wind up with a kid who turns into an All-Star at 26. 

Johnson has always been roughly two years behind his classmates.  If you had told anyone in Indiana when Johnson was a freshman at Franklin Central that he would be an Indiana All-Star, they would have questioned your sanity. 

Johnson showed up at Cathedral High School and tried to enroll as a freshman.  The head of enrollment apologized and said the freshman class was full.  That is how little- known Johnson was.  As a freshman at Purdue, Johnson worked hard and contributed a little—5.4 points per game in an average of 16.6 minutes.  He will enter the NBA needing two years to ramp his body up.

One thing about Johnson that weighs against him in the NBA is an absolute asset for him as a man.  He is a really good kid, one of the sweetest friends my son has ever brought into our house. 

The NBA is not exactly a refuge for the sweet.  Many of the guys in the NBA are from backgrounds that do not allow for the development of sweetness—and those who are generally are still a##holes.  Anyone who has spent 10 minutes with Bill Laimbeer can attest to that.

If Johnson comes out, he'll get a great break if he stays on the board until the second round.  The team drafting him should send him to Europe.  If he goes in the first round, early expectations may prove to be his undoing.  I would love to see him stick around at Purdue and get his degree.  Too many NBA short-timers retire into lives of impending poverty without that piece of sheepskin.

I believe all three kids will stay a fourth year, graduate together, and go to the Final Four.  Why not?  What's the hurry?  Purdue will try to go to 6-3 in the Big 10 against Wisconsin tomorrow night and stay within a loud shout of conference leader Michigan State. 

As an Indiana guy, I should hope that Johnson, Hummel, and Moore bolt after this season, but as a college basketball fan, I wish they could stay for an additional three years.  In the corrupt world of college basketball, filled with pimps and street agents, these three young men embody what the institution of college hoops should be about.