6:14: Welcome to the Live 2009 NBA Draft Blog. Once ESPN kicks off its horrible coverage, I’ll be posting every five minutes or so. For now, here are some links to check out:
Live 2009 NBA Draft Grades – posted live during the 2009 NBA Draft.
2009 NBA Mock Draft – by David Kay, updated 5:25 p.m. today.
2009 NBA Mock Draft Database – updated 5:30 today to include 19 mocks that were adjusted this afternoon.
7:13: Some of my favorite posts from the 2008 Live NBA Draft Blog:
1. With my recent exchange with the mother of a football player, I feel like making fun of a mother of a future NBA star tonight. I’ve come to determine that Derrick Rose’s mom is related to Emmitt Smith with this quote: “[Chicago] is the only place he know hows to play.”
2. Speaking of which, I’d like to suggest that Pau Gasol should change his name to Paul Gasol. Do you think his name was actually Paul, but someone accidentally spilled white out on his birth certificate?
3. Hot chick reporter: “Hey Mr. Walsh? Why do you like this Danilo Kalimiari guy?” Old Man: “Uhhh… Dantonio played with his dad… Uhhh… I like Italian food… Uhhh… who am I again?”
4. My dad on the Lopez mom: “God damn, she’s ugly!”
5. Funny story. My dad fell asleep after Charlotte’s pick. He just woke up and asked where Koufos went. I told him Utah and he responded, “Of course! He’s white! What a stupid question!”
6. 10:22: With the 29th pick in the 2008 NBA Draft, the Detroit Pistons select F D.J. White, Indiana.
10:23: My dad’s commentary on this selection: “Fat guy! Look at how fat he is! He’s the younger brother of Tractor Traylor!”
10:24: Must improve: conditioning. My dad should be an NBA scout.
7:14: According to Stuart Scott, the Los “Ahngeles Clippers” are on the clock.
7:18: I don’t understand how anyone can like the Vince Carter trade for the Magic. Carter is old, selfish and often unmotivated. Puppy Puncher suggests that Courtney Lee could be better than Carter next year, and that’s definitely a big possibility.
7:23: I knew it! Ricky Rubio wants to play in California. Poor Rubio doesn’t understand that Sacramento is not the same as L.A. But at least they have the Beach-a Boys, very nice!
7:24: Why is Lisa Salters interviewing a grade-schooler? Oh wait, that’s Stephen Curry, my bad.
7:26: My dad’s prediction on where Tyler Hansbrough will go: “He’s going to Utah. That’s so obvious. They have all white guys. He fits in.”
7:28: Speaking of my dad, he just brought in a newspaper with a 2009 NBA Mock Draft. It has Memphis taking Tyreke Evans. Buhahahaha.
7:30: By the way, the guy who wrote that mock is Phil Jasner of the Philadelphia Daily News. Jasner has James Harden at No. 3 and Hasheem Thabeet falling to No. 6. He’s obviously a genius or a complete fool. We shall see in 10 minutes.
7:33: Funny quote by my dad: “There’s going to be 30 new millionaires tonight. Obama’s going to have a heart attack.”
7:35: David Stern officially has five more minutes to disband the Clippers and to save Blake Griffin’s career.
7:37: Did Mark Robo-Jackson just call the Clippers a great situation?
7:39: With the first pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Los Angeles Clippers select Blake Griffin – Nooooo!!! My mock is ruined!!!
7:40: Everyone in the Cipper war room is clapping… “Yay, everyone likes this pick, and it’ll actually be maybe a year or two until everyone realizes we screwed up, and by then, we’ll all probably fired anyway. Yay!”
7:43: Couldn’t they do these interviews before the pick? Everyone knew Griffin was going No. 1. Instead, we could be talking about the crappy Grizzlies.
7:44: Grizzlies have 15 seconds left! They’re going to miss the pick like the Vikings did two years in a row!
7:46: With the second pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Memphis Grizzlies select Hasheem Thabeet – No one saw this one coming either.
7:47: Samuel Dalembert’s going to be a great player for the Grizzlies. Mark my words.
7:48: Who the hell is Hamed Hamddadi?
7:51: FYI, David Kay posted his grade on the Thabeet pick. He doesn’t like Dalembert too much.
7:52: With the third pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Oklahoma City Thunder select James Harden – I’m completely shocked. No, not by the pick – by the fact that Harden didn’t choke or vomit on his way to the podium.
7:55: Harden apparently has an old-school type of game. I guess old-school players went 3-of-18 from the field with six turnovers in big games.
7:57: With the fourth pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Sacramento Kings select Tyreke Evans – I had Evans in my 2009 NBA Mock Draft… but I didn’t have Ricky Rubio available. Apparently, the Kings didn’t like Rubio because a chair debacled him in a workout. My guess is chairs will be made illegal in Spain.
7:59: No Beach-a Boys for Rubio. No happy time.
8:03: With the fifth pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Minnesota Timberwolves select Ricky Rubio – Rubio goes from Spain and potentially to California to Minnesota. Someone’s going to be calling a Spanish suicide hotline tonight.
8:05: I just drooled all over my keyboard watching Rubio’s highlight reel.
8:07: Damn it, the drool has made my keyboard sticky, and there wasn’t even any porn involved.
8:10: With the sixth pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Minnesota Timberwolves select Jonny Flynn – This only means that Knick fans will be more disappointed when their GM doesn’t take Stephen Curry!
8:13: Funniest moment of the night – Jonny Flynn, talking about his popularity, “People on the West Coast, Mid Coast knew who I am.”
8:14: Minnesota plans on using two point guards next year. Apparently, they’re installing a new revolutionary Mid-Coast Offense.
8:15: With the seventh pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Golden State Warriors select Stephen Curry – Knick fans cry in agony. Sorry guys, you weren’t going to get him anyway.
8:19: Hey, why does that grade-schooler have facial hair on his chin? Oh wait, that’s Stephen Curry, my bad.
8:20: The Knicks are going to boo this pick no matter who it is. The team might as well sell this pick.
8:22: With the eighth pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the New York Knicks select Jordan Hill – I’m really surprised they didn’t go after Italian sensation Brandon Jennings as a friend for that Dannilo Kalamari guy.
8:24: Stuart Scott: “Blah blah blah here’s a stat about something: Mark Jackson… he was a pretty good player.”
My Dad: “Good player? Mark Jackson?”
8:27: With the ninth pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Toronto Raptors select DeMar DeRozan – Had this pick right. I know nothing about this guy. In fact, I just learned that the M in his first name is upper-case.
8:29: First commercial break. Mark my words, David Stern will increase the time to eight minutes per pick to get more ads in next year. That, or he’ll sell the rights to each pick…
“With the fourth pick of the 2010 NBA Draft, brought to you by Cialis, the New York Knicks select Another Crappy Player.”
8:32: With the 10th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Milwaukee Bucks select Brandon Jennings – I knew the Italian sensation would go top 10 (only because I thought the Knicks would take him.)
8:36: What is this “guarantee” B.S.? They don’t have this in the NFL Draft. Why couldn’t Brady Quinn and Aaron Rodgers get top-10 guarantees?
8:39: With the 11th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the New Jersey Nets select Terrence Williams, F, Louisville – Congrats Nets, you just landed a guy who has a Barbie school bag and Sponge Bob Square Pants socks. Not kidding.
8:40: On the bright side, the Nets could collect insurance once Williams is sent to the mental hospital after eating his own poop.
8:44: My guess here is that Larry Brown is itching to draft Tyrone Hill, Haywoode Workman or Derrick Coleman.
8:45: With the 12th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Charlotte Bobcats select Gerald Henderson, SG, Duke – Larry Brown, a North Carolina guy, takes a Duke player? I’d say Brown was drugged, but he’s old, so maybe he just forgot where he went to school.
8:49: The Sixers are just four picks away. My dad wants Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson or Wayne Ellington. Yeah, he’s not a front-runner.
8:50: With the 13th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Indiana Pacers select Tyler Hansbrough, PF, North Carolina – My dad just groaned. “Oh no, my guy!”
8:52: My dad believes the Pacers made this selection just to “f*** with Utah.” The NBA Draft is so weird, I actually kind of believe that’s possible.
8:53: Under-rated. Tyler Hansbrough would have been my No. 1 pick. It sucks that I know nothing about the NBA.
8:56: With the 14th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Phoenix Suns select Earl Clark, PF, Louisville – “But, who cares, I’m David Stern, and I will once again deflect attention from the Suns!”
8:58: Stop the draft! The Italian Sensation has arrived!
8:59: Stupid Bucks. This is terrible… more players will now eschew college hoops to go to Europe. The NCAA really needs to start paying its college basketball and football players (legitimately).
9:01: With the 15th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Detroit Pistons select Austin Daye, F, Gonzaga – No idea who this guy is either. What happened to B.J. Mullens’ top-15 guarantee?
9:03: My dad is beaming. The Sixers will have their choice of Ty Lawson and/or Wayne Ellington:
“Watch, if the Sixers draft these guys, they’re going to be good next season.”
9:08: With the 16th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Chicago Bulls select James Johnson, F, Wake Forest – Who cares? The Sixers are on the clock!
9:09: My dad’s pretty confident they’re taking Lawson or Ellington… He also thinks they may take B.J. Mullens and trade him.
9:10: And on that note, t-minus three minutes and counting until my TV is debacled.
9:11: Side note, thank God the Sixers have moved back to their classic logo. The Bucks, Wizards, Warriors and about a dozen other teams need to go back to their roots.
9:13: With the 17th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Philadelphia 76ers select Jrue Holiday, G, UCLA – Oh… no….
9:14: My dad on the pick:
“What the f***!?!??! I was afraid they’d take him. What the f***… I was afraid they were going to take him… I hope we’re going to trade him. Why didn’t they take Ty Lawson? Son of a b****. Why not Ellington? Maybe they’ll trade down. Maybe they’ll trade Holiday…”
9:16: I just told my dad Holiday averaged 8.5 ppg and shot 30.7 percent from three-point range at UCLA last year. He looks defeated.
9:18: My co-worker just called my dad:
“Yeah, the Sixers f***ed up. They took Jrue Holiday, but he averaged only eight points per game. Just as usual, the Knicks and Sixers screwed up. Maybe they’ll trade him?”
9:19: With the 18th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Minnesota Timberwolves select Ty Lawson, PG, North Carolina – Hahahahaha, you couldn’t script this any better.
9:20: Aside from my dad being mad that Minnesota is coveting all of his favorite point guards, the question remains… how effective will the Timberwolves’ mid-coast offense be with three rookies?
9:23: With the 19th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Atlanta Hawks select Jeff Teague, PG, Wake Forest – My fifth correct pick – two better than Phil “Tyreke Evans No. 2” Jasner. Victory is mine.
9:27: With the 20th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Utah Jazz select Eric Maynor, PG, Virginia Commonwealth – Nice job taking a bench player. I’m sure Eric Maynor is going to play a grand total of five minutes per game with Deron Williams in front of him.
9:29: My friend Chris, who runs the mock draft databases, had this to say of Philly’s pick: “If I was the GM of the Sixers I’d fire all of the board and panel and hire my friends. They’d do better. We need a PG so badly, not another SG/SF. So lame. Idiots.” Not too many Sixers fans are happy right now.
9:32: My thinking with the Maynor pick is that the Jazz were so shocked that Tyler Hansbrough wasn’t on the board, they freaked out and didn’t know what to do. “No awesome white guy we can take? Oh nooozzz!!!!”
9:34: With the 21st pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the New Orleans Hornets select Darren Collison, PG, UCLA – Secretly better than Jrue Holiday, but don’t tell any Philly fans that.
9:36: The Jazz with Deron Williams took a point guard. The Hornets with Chris Paul took a point guard. The Timberwolves with Ricky Rubio took a point guard. This mid-coast offense is getting pretty popular.
9:39: With the 22nd pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Portland Trailblazers select Victor Claver, F, Spain – This is stupid. I’ve been pronouncing this guy as “CLAY-ver” not “Cla-VAIR.” If his name was pronounced CLAY-ver, he’d be awesome. Clay-VAIR? If he doesn’t bust, I don’t know anything.
9:41: Well, at least the Blazers didn’t trade up to draft this clay-VAIR fellow.
9:43: Shaq has had mental conversations with LeBron? Hey, Terrence Williams, we found you a roommate.
9:45: With the 23rd pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Sacramento Kings select Omri Casspi, F, Israel – This is like the 10th player I’ve been off by one pick by.
9:47: They really need to get rid of these European players in the NBA Draft. No one knows if these guys will ever be good, and most of these European/Asian guys are never heard from again. David Stern needs to make these players come to the NCAA for at least one year.
9:50: With the 24th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Dallas Mavericks select B.J. Mullens, C, Ohio State – Poor Dallas fans. They just drafted Will Purdue/Bill Wennington/Luc Longley.
9:51: Jay Bilas annoys me. He never says anything bad about anyone. Just once, I’d like to hear him go, “B.J. Mullens? He stinks. There’s nothing good about him. He’s a loser. He should have went back to school. I hate you Stuart Scott, with your glass eye. What are you looking at Mark Jackson?”
9:53: With the 25th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Oklahoma City Thunder select Rodrigue Beaubois, PG, France – Hey, Rodrigue Boo-Boo, want to steal a pic-a-nic basket?
9:58: Yeah, the Bulls gave the Celtics “everything they had.” The Celtics without Kevin Garnett. Means nothing.
9:59: With the 26th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Chicago Bulls select Taj Gibson, F, USC – I’ll bet anything that the Chicago Tribune has the headline: “Rise of Taj” tomorrow morning.
10:01: My dad’s holding out hope that the Timberwolves will take Wayne Ellington and trade him to the Sixers. Never give up, never surrender.
10:05: With the 27th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Memphis Grizzlies select DeMarre Carroll, F, Missouri – A guy with a liver disease going in the first round? No wonder no one goes to Grizzlies games.
10:07: Another point guard? Let’s go to Emmitt for some analysis:
“The Minnesota Timberwolf have a chance to take four point guard in the MBA Mock Draft. Everybody obviously know that the key to success to succeeding in the National Basketball Conference is to draft four point guard every week during every draft. I find it a li-bit interesting that if you take four point guard every week for a year, you have four time as many point guard you would usually have if you did not take four point guard every week during the year during the draft process. I do not understand how no one can understand how that make all the sentences in the world.”
10:11: With the 28th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Minnesota Timberwolves select Wayne Ellington, G, North Carolina – My dad called this pick. He’s saying that the Lakers are going to take Ellington from the Timberwolves, and that they are going to have “two Kobe Bryants” on the team.
10:14: The Knicks get the 29th pick and Darko Milicic! It’s like Christmas in the Big Apple. Now all we need is a crappy player for them to boo.
10:16: With the 29th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the New York Knicks select Toney Douglas, G, Florida State – No boo. No cheer. The Knicks are too depressed that they just landed Darko.
10:18: The final pick… if the Cavs take Sam Young, they’re winning it all next year.
10:21: The Cavaliers can be proud of what they did, Jeff Van Gundy, but the fact remains that they would have beaten the Orlando Magic if they didn’t have a brain-dead coach who refused to defend Orlando’s three-point shooters.
10:23: The 30th pick is the final selection of the 2009 NBA Draft? David Stern is on crack.
10:24: With the 30th pick in the 2009 NBA Draft, the Cleveland Cavaliers select Christian Eyenga, G/F, Congo – Yeah, the Cavs could have taken Sam Young, who would have helped LeBron win a title… but let’s take a Congo guy who will never be heard from ever again!
10:28: What’s Emmitt’s take on Cleveland’s selection? Let’s find out.
“The guy who write for WalterFootball.coms believe that Sam Young would be the right pick. I could not disagree with him, even if I wanted to. Christian Eye… uhh… Orr… uhh… Jones… Christian Jones will help LeBron win the championship in the National Basketball Conference Association. Christian Gordon from the city of Congo, which is the capital of the country of Africa. This mean that Christian Jones obviously have a lot of talent, skill and powerful. Very powerful.”
10:29: I can’t believe Sam Young hasn’t been taken yet. He’s 24, which is why he’s not a top-10 pick. But he can shoot, create his own shot and play defense. Maybe if I were an NBA expert, people would take me more seriously, but believe me, I bet a lot against Pittsburgh this winter/spring, and I crapped my pants every time Young had the ball.
10:30: I’m signing off. Individual 2009 NBA Draft Grades for Round 2 will be posted tomorrow. Thanks for reading my incoherent and nonsensical thoughts.
Live 2008 NBA Draft Blog
2009 NBA Mock Draft – Walt’s
2009 NBA Mock Draft – David Kay’s
MISSING
