NBA Draft 2011: Is Kenneth Faried the Key to SF for Toronto Raptors?
The 2011 NBA Draft is coming up very soon, with many people wondering what this draft will turn out to become. It seems as if the consensus No. 1 pick in the draft is Kyrie Irving.
The main question for the Toronto Raptors this year is on who to draft. There are a lot of names revolving around this topic such as Brandon Knight, Kemba Walker, Van Jesely, etc. Of course, these players need to still be available in order to be picked, but there are some names that still stand out where Toronto is not picking.
One of those names includes Moorehead state power forward Kenneth Faried. Kenneth broke almost all rebounding records that used to be held by Tim Duncan for the NCAA. Faried is basically another version of Dennis Rodman/Ben Wallace.
Faried is listed at 6'7", so this means that there is a chance, depending on who picks him, he might play the small forward position. One team that Faried could be a small forward for is the Toronto Raptors. This is a position where the Raptors have not really been very strong at in franchise history (Carter was more of a SG in his prime years).
As of right now, Toronto has James Johnson and Linas kleiza as guaranteed players at the 3 spot for next season. Kleiza is out for half of next season, and Johnson has yet to reach his prime. Johnson is a very good defender, which was a showing after continuously getting blocks and steals game in and game out.
Johnson and Kleiza would be very good bench players, and if someone like Faried were to take the starting spot, the Raptors would have a some nice assets coming off the bench.
The main question about Faried is, how does Toronto acquire him? The only realistic way of doing this right now would to make a trade, because drafting Faried too high and passing on other talent would be very controversial and might add pressure on Kenneth.
Either on draft day, or sometime during the summer, Toronto could package someone like Calderon and players that would be key to a near contender (this is where Faried is expected to be picked, mid-first round) for Faried. As of right now, it seems as if Toronto does not want to trade away the fifth pick as well, but if that were to happen, then the Raptors should also be getting some stuff in return.
The only problem with Faried is his ballhandling and long range shooting. His free throw shooting is also a major concern. Faried seems to get too many turnovers and does not have great court vision, even if that is a point guards job. He shot almost 60 percent from the free-throw line last season, but he can easily become a better shooter with some practice.
So should the Raptors make a move for the undersized power forward, and fill in a much-needed void with some key losses, or should they just stick with drafting someone and bringing in some other key pieces this offseason?
Last paragraph with all of Faried's weakness' were used from NBADraft.net
