re: Why are there no serious workouts scheduled?

I feel like they'd want to do the opposite though. If one of those "top 5" guys slips out of the top 5, which is very likely in this draft, then teams behind that may be reluctant to take them because they never got to see them workout, and the teams that did may have passed on him because of something they saw during the workout

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I feel like they'd want to do the opposite though.

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Player "The Pelicans want me to work out, should I?"
Agent "Do you want to lose $5 million?"

It's the same mentality of guys that don't workout at combines. There is nothing to gain meaning at best you lose.

Its all about perception.

If a guy is in the mix for a top 5 pick, he's not going to drop to 13 because he didn't work out. A team will take him and be happy that he fell.

The Pelicans have 3 issues this year.

1. Injuries. Never have I seen so many injuries in the top 10 of the draft. Noel, Bennett, and Len really hurts the number of guys they can bring in.

2. Since this isn't a particularly strong draft, none of the top 5 guys want to risk falling. So they'll only work for certain teams. Normally, it wouldn't be such a big deal but since a couple of them can go anywhere from 3-8, the team would really like to see guys like Porter, Oladipo, and Burke up close. Burke remains the only one scheduled and we're unsure what he's going to be allowed to do.

3. There are 7 guys which I consider top tier players in the draft. 3 of them are injured and the other 3 are going to refuse workouts. That leaves Burke who will come in Friday and probably do very little. This is an odd year. The team doesn't have any top tier prospects to bring in due to various reasons. The only guy who's coming is probably Burke. That leaves a lot of sitting around and waiting.

The guys who are slotted later tends to workout later. I'm sure Muhammad, Zeller, MCW, McCollum, and a couple other guys will come in a week or so before the draft. But it's unclear how much they're willing to do.

Burke did a lot at his Kings workout, so I would note expect that he would do "very little to nothing" at our workout.

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None of those type of workouts puts him in an uncomfortable position. You won't learn anything new about the kid.

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Monty knew pretty immediately after playing 1 on 1 with Luke Babbit that he didn't have the speed or athleticism to play defense. If the main question about Burke is will he have the speed or athleticism to be better than Vasquez, Monty might be able to gauge that.


Speaking of Luke Babbit, this picture is still funny.

That's assuming Burke's agent will allow something like that in the individual workout. I'll be surprised if they allowed Burke to do anything more than they did in Sacramento... which is basically a bunch of drills.

These guys are being silly. I want guy that is out to prove he is the best to every team, whether he'd have to fall or not. That could increase the interest towards the top and drive his value up. Not working out tells me you are not exactly an alpha dog. I want alpha dogs. All of these guys have holes in their skill sets. The way to stand out is by showing that you aren't scared to compete. Not working out = scared. Scared = no thank you.