Whiteside, Alabi, etc?

[KB21]

0.00001%

You would probably be surprised at how close that may be to being the actual percentage. When the question was asked, I decided to look at the numbers of centers between the ages of 27-31, which coincides with the last four years of Jason Collins's career, relative to win shares and WS/48.

Over the last four years, Jason Collins has posted a total of 2.4 win shares and 0.022 WS/48. He was actually a decent rotational player through the age of 26, but after that, his career has taken a major slide.

The players who are most similar to Jason Collins over the same age relative to win shares:

Greg Dreiling - 2.8 WS

Michael Olowokandi - 2.4 WS

Vitaly Potapenko - 2.4 WS

Manute Bol - 2.2 WS

Jack Haley - 2.1 WS

Jerome James - 2.1 WS

The most similar over the same age relative to WS/48:

Jerome James - 0.027 WS/48

Michael Olowokandi - 0.024 WS/48

Manute Bol - 0.021 WS/48

Overall, the players who are most similar in both categories are James, Olowokandi, and Bol. James played till he was 33 and had a total of 0.1 win shares over that time period. Manute Bol retired at 32 and had 0.1 win shares. Michael Olowokandi didn't play after he was 31 years of age.

Based on this, I would be highly surprised if Jason Collins contributes anything to the Hawks. He definitely will not contribute enough to offset giving away the 31st pick for nothing.

[Diesel]

Actually, looking at the drafts between 1999 and 2005, the hit rate on second round picks in the early 2nd round (mostly 30-41 range with a three years being 29-31) is actually 37.5%. I

Was that big men?

I think if you made it specifically to C, that rate would be much lower. IN that time K. Brown and Olowakhandi were drafted 1st overall... Tyson Chandler and Eddy Curry and Diop were drafted in the lottery. With those bigs being drafted early, imagine how big the fail rate is for Bigs in the 2nd round?

[KB21]

Was that big men?

I think if you made it specifically to C, that rate would be much lower. IN that time K. Brown and Olowakhandi were drafted 1st overall... Tyson Chandler and Eddy Curry and Diop were drafted in the lottery. With those bigs being drafted early, imagine how big the fail rate is for Bigs in the 2nd round?

No. It was draft picks overall. I never pushed for Atlanta to draft a big man. I was more concerned with getting perimeter defenders, in particular a back up small forward, and a back up power forward. At that pick, I would have taken either Gani Lawal or Jarvis Varnado.

The thing with centers in the draft is that if you look at that position only, the overall hit rate in the draft will drop drastically low. Without looking at the data for verification, I would venture to guess that there are less hits in the first round when drafting a center than there are at any other position. My hypothesis for the reasoning is that I feel teams overvalue size when they should be valuing length and athleticism.