NBA Draft 2025

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2025 NBA Draft Combine winners and losers: Cedric Coward, Yaxel Lendeborg could have Duke, Michigan scrambling

Who had a good week and who struggled at the combine this week in Chicago
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Loser: RJ Luis fails to flash​

After a career year at St. John's leading the Red Storm under Rick Pitino, Luis Jr. has failed to generate a ton of interest in the transfer portal and failed to flash in a big way at this week's Combine, too. He went a combined 11 of 29 shooting in the two scrimmages he played in and was a -41 in the two games. Luis Jr. is the No. 4 overall player in 247Sports' transfer portal rankings and would do well for himself to run it back in college one more season.
 
bamafan said:
Be nice if Nets can get him with one of their four first round picks. What would be even better is if Knicks could somehow trade for a pick to get him.
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Knicks could probably nab him at 50, but feel like Jamir Watkins is a better fit/better guess. Watkins' agent is Sam Rose (Leon's son), he's old/mature/knows his role (which the Knicks almost always draft), defense-first, and plays the wing.
 
If these other guys are truly going to stay in the draft, have to imagine there will be landing spots for RJ if he chooses to come back. Duke, now maybe Michigan, Miami, UNC, Texas Tech and who knows who else would be lurking for him.
 
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Chriscin33 said:
If these other guys are truly going to stay in the draft, have to imagine there will be landing spots for RJ if he chooses to come back. Duke, now maybe Michigan, Miami, UNC, Texas Tech and who knows who else would be lurking for him.
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RJ's HS coach going to Miami always raised my eyebrows. Wouldn't surprise me if he went there.
 
dk423 said:
RJ's HS coach going to Miami always raised my eyebrows. Wouldn't surprise me if he went there.
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What I thought too when I saw that. But then I was told by someone who is highly connected to Miami that even if RJ wanted to return to school I shouldn't assume he would land there because of the HS coach. In fact, he told me it might be a reason why he didn't land there. And this person is about as connected as you can get with their sports programs.
 
Demo said:
NIL valuation is severely diminished imo.
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I would be leery of RJ if I was a college coach. I think he had the absolute perfect situation here and that will be very hard if not impossible to approach as a senior. I think Pitino knew that better than anyone.

A few things can be true together....RJ seized every opportunity he had with us and he is going to be incredibly overvalued because of #s and accolades he accumulated with the nearly perfect situation and supporting cast he had here.
 
Marillac2 said:
I would be leery of RJ if I was a college coach. I think he had the absolute perfect situation here and that will be very hard if not impossible to approach as a senior. I think Pitino knew that better than anyone.

A few things can be true together....RJ seized every opportunity he had with us and he is going to be incredibly overvalued because of #s and accolades he accumulated with the nearly perfect situation and supporting cast he had here.
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Agreed but have to imagine a team still in need will certainly take that risk for one year.
 
Marillac2 said:
I would be leery of RJ if I was a college coach. I think he had the absolute perfect situation here and that will be very hard if not impossible to approach as a senior. I think Pitino knew that better than anyone.

A few things can be true together....RJ seized every opportunity he had with us and he is going to be incredibly overvalued because of #s and accolades he accumulated with the nearly perfect situation and supporting cast he had here.
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I preface this with a very clear acknowledgement, again, that his team desperately needed a PG and its not really his fault that he had such high usage. But the draft combine scrimmages would give me a red flag because all of the complaints we had about him showed up. Any feedback he could've gotten between March and now either didn't compute or he never got it.

Exceptionally talented? Absolutely. Could he handle not being the focal point of an offense? I don't know. I think he'd fit in great for a team that needs a number one option, but not sure how he'd fit for a team like ours at this point.
 
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dk423 said:
I preface this with a very clear acknowledgement, again, that his team desperately needed a PG and its not really his fault that he had such high usage. But the draft combine scrimmages would give me a red flag because all of the complaints we had about him showed up. Any feedback he could've gotten between March and now either didn't computer or he never got it.

Exceptionally talented? Absolutely. Could he handle not being the focal point of an offense? I don't know. I think he'd fit in great for a team that needs a number one option, but not sure how he'd fit for a team like ours at this point.
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And if Pitino wanted him on the team this year, he would be here, case closed. Think it was quite obvious Pitino wanted to move on.
 
Chriscin33 said:
And if Pitino wanted him on the team this year, he would be here, case closed. Think it was quite obvious Pitino wanted to move on.
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I think that was a two-part analysis. The second part was the money RJ was asking for. I get the sense we don't entertain the top 5-10 highest NIL demands.

If RJ was asking for 3-4 mill, you take Hopkins and Sanon combined for the same money all day.
 
Marillac2 said:
I think that was a two-part analysis. The second part was the money RJ was asking for. I get the sense we don't entertain the top 5-10 highest NIL demands.

If RJ was asking for 3-4 mill, you take Hopkins and Sanon combined for the same money all day.
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And he also painted himself into a corner now when it comes to the $$$. There are only so many chairs left before the music stops so I can’t imagine he will get top dollar. Simple supply and demand at this point but who knows, as they say in free agency, it only takes one.
 
Marillac2 said:
I think that was a two-part analysis. The second part was the money RJ was asking for. I get the sense we don't entertain the top 5-10 highest NIL demands.

If RJ was asking for 3-4 mill, you take Hopkins and Sanon combined for the same money all day.
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I think the third-part of the analysis is that we didn't want to count on guys who were going to be in the draft, and then be like other teams praying/hoping for certain NBA draft combine results, in order for them to even be available to recruit. These last recruitments will have a small pool with desperate money. Its not a good place to be in.

Just reading tea leaves, seems like the staff did not enjoy the Watkins or Mitchell recruitments in late May/early June and did not want to replicate that process again. Very smart.
 
dk423 said:
I think the third-part of the analysis is that we didn't want to count on guys who were going to be in the draft, and then be like other teams praying/hoping for certain NBA draft combine results, in order for them to even be available to recruit. These last recruitments will have a small pool with desperate money. Its not a good place to be in.

Just reading tea leaves, seems like the staff did not enjoy the Watkins or Mitchell recruitments in late May/early June and did not want to replicate that process again. Very smart.
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Absolutely. That was likely a huge factor as well. You have Sanon and Hopkins ready to jump for (presumably) team-friendly NIL deals, so you can't wait 8 weeks for RJ to decide and then pay him a king's ransom. I don't think Sanon and RJ could coexist, and I am almost certain the trio of Sanon-Hopkins-RJ couldn't coexist. It was either/or.
 
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