HoopsWorld: Mullens article

[Ralphb07]

Here's some Mullens stuff from HoopsWorld and there's a video too

http://www.hoopsworld.com/Story.asp?story_id=12709

B.J. did not come from a very stable family environment; he bounced around ultimately living with a friend for a lot of his high school years.

B.J.'s college career was far from impressive, mainly because of the system head coach Thad Motta runs, in which B.J. was used as a more back-to-the-basket player and was relegated to shooting hook shots in the paint. Here is the problem: that's not B.J.'s game at all. B.J. is more of a face-up player with range out to 20 feet – more of a hybrid scoring big man, like an early Dirk Nowitzki or a more athletic Rasho Nesterovic – his trainers say almost Pau Gasol-esque. That image of a 7-foot stiff is the furthest from the truth.

B.J. wants to be a lottery pick for sure, but the truth is he knows full well he's got to go in and prove he belongs, which is likely why he's one of the first ones in the gym at Impact Basketball, and one of the last ones to leave. B.J has been putting in two-a-day workouts for the past two months to prepare himself for his NBA workouts and he is welcoming all workout invites from the top of the draft board with Oklahoma City to the bottom with the Cleveland Cavaliers. He has 15 teams that want to take a look, all them drafting between 3 and 30.

There's more at the link. Some pretty good stuff and I like that he's been working hard which was a negative about him

 

[TheStig]

He is the high risk, high upside type big we should pick up at 16 if there isn't a sure fire option available there. There is no guarantee he is going to be good but I would love a young big to stretch the floor who shoots a high fg%.

 

[??? ??????]

I think he'd be a good pick at #16. Not that he will necessarily become a good player, but he has star potential, and we're picking at 16, and 16th picks have a pretty high bust rate anyhow, so might as well take one with star potential.

 

[Rose1]

Mark my words, I've been saying Bulls should take him and guys like Doug to Sam Smith don't think he'll be effective in the league. He will be great. I'm saying 15 ppg. 10 rebs. and 1 block. The guy clearly has talent and for someone to say he won't be anything close to marquee is just foolish. I saw him hit the jumpers at OSU. I saw him dunk the ball like a big man should. Well, why is people still not giving him the benefit of the doubt. He's going to surprise a lot of people if he falls pass the lottery.

 

[Ralphb07]

The big thing is hearing he's more of a face up guy and can shoot out to 20 feet and they feel Thad used him wrong..... I wouldn't be upset with him at all especialy if he's a inside/outside player

 

[Wade Wilson]

A center who prefers to hang out on the perimeter and is a piss poor rebounder? No thanks.

 

[HINrichPolice]

Where's the video? Can't find it. Thanks!

 

[pinkizdead]

i think the bulls have clearly established that they do not do well with unrefined bigmen. no more projects! i'm still pissed about tyrus. i dont want another project. gimme some1 reliable or an energy guy at 16.

 

[dougthonus]

According to synergy he only took 10 jumpers all year at Ohio State and made just two of them. If he has some other part of his game which is really that good then Thad is the dumbest coach in NCAA history.

I think he could be great in the NBA. Any guy who's as big as Mullens and as athletic as Mullens can be great. There's no denying that. I don't think he will be great, but I will not be upset at all if we take the chance.

At #16 when you're looking at role players, I'm content to swing for the fences on Mullens or Daye, but I don't think the Bulls are going to do that. I don't think they want a guy who will take four years because they should have stayed in school for another two of them.

That being said, I can understand Mullens not staying in school, he's so hard to evaluate because it really does appear that the Ohio State coaching staff deserved an F- for the way they fit him in to the team, but maybe I overestimate what Mullens could really contribute.

When I see a guy shoot 60% in college though, I think, "get him the ball".

 

[JimmyBulls]

Out of all the propspects that will be available at 16, I don't think the Bulls could find a better pick than Mullens.

When I see Mullens the guy that comes to mind is Brook Lopez. Both guys have great size, under-rated skills, and poor freshman seasons at the college level. The only difference have to be that Mullens often had to deal with being used poorly by a coach that wanted to keep his value low. Let's get real here, when you get one of the better prospects coming out of high school, you don't platoon them with the likes of Dallas Lauderdale. That's just insane. There is no reason Mullens shouldn't have gotten at least 25 mpg, and a reasonable amount of touches. I think he averaged about 5 attempts per game as a freshman, and only played about 20 minutes per. I can't look at his numbers and lack of use and blame the kid for having a sub-par freshman season.

The Bulls would be getting a steal at the weakest position in the league if they drafted Mullens at 16. I don't think this kid is going to be a 3-4 year project either. I think he could come in and be pretty good from day one.

 

[Simeon2UC]

I was with him from day one and now people are starting to jump on his bandwagon. BJ has skills that are visible, if you can't see it, you're obviously lacking ball knowledge. I mean, seriously, what does he have to do in order to get approval. So what if he had a bad freshmen year. He clearly knows his role in basketball and shines on his preferred half of the court, and that's the offensive end. Mullens play like a athletic Rasho. I remember last year when we were expected to get the 9th pick, people kept saying draft Hibbert. I was on the opposite end of that, I was saying get Deandre Jordan because of what we become in 4 years. I still feel the same way.

 

[dougthonus]

Simeon2UC wrote:

I was with him from day one and now people are starting to jump on his bandwagon.

Who's jumping on his bandwagon?

BJ has skills that are visible, if you can't see it, you're obviously lacking ball knowledge.

The argument in the format:
"This is obvious, if you disagree you're dumb" isn't very persuasive.

I mean, seriously, what does he have to do in order to get approval.

I don't know, play well? Isn't that what every player has to do to get approval?

So what if he had a bad freshmen year.

In the grand scheme of things, his freshman year will be irrelevant, but when projecting his future it's noteworthy that he couldn't rebound in college. It's rare for a big man who can't rebound in college to do so well in the NBA. It's rare that a center who can't rebound is a quality center in the NBA.

He clearly knows his role in basketball and shines on his preferred half of the court, and that's the offensive end.

What do you anticipate his role to be on the offensive end?

Mullens play like a athletic Rasho. I remember last year when we were expected to get the 9th pick, people kept saying draft Hibbert. I was on the opposite end of that, I was saying get Deandre Jordan because of what we become in 4 years. I still feel the same way.

We'll see what happens with Jordan. I don't know if anyone wanted to draft Hibbert at #9, I sure as hell didn't. Clearly, we would have taken Lopez if he fell to #9. I also didn't want DeAndre Jordan though. He's got legit size and athleticism, let's see if he ever does anything with it or if he's just another guy who hangs in the league for five to six years because he's tall and athletic.

Mullens may have some kind of face up game. I have no idea, but he didn't show it EVER at the college level. When you project HS skills to the NBA you end up with things like "Tyson Chandler can handle the ball and lead the break and is the next Kevin Garnett".

It's simply far easier to do things at the HS level than at the college level than at the NBA level. The difficulty to use the same skills increases with each level. Therefore it's significant what Mullens did or did not show at OSU. I will grant you that the coach did him no favors at all, and he may have made Mullens look worse than he should because of that.

Still, I don't think you can throw out his entire freshman year with that excuse. He still basically couldn't use any advanced post moves and didn't show any face up game at all.

It's worth remembering, Mullens RSCI (ranking service combined index) was 8 for his class. Meaning the pro ranking services averaged him out as the 8th best prospect going into college. He then had a pretty mediocre freshman year. I have a hard time believing he was a superstud unstoppable beast in high school that showed all kinds of crazy skills and then was ranked 8th given his size and athleticism.

There had to be questions even in HS or the ranking services would have given him more love, because the rest of his class sure wasn't special.

 

[Hendu0520]

Well I think that it comes down to Mullens' work ethic. It sounds like he is working hard which is a great sign since one of his biggest knocks was that he is lazy. It will depend on his team workouts, he could be a guy who is in great shape and shows he is hungry then he could easily rise in the draft. I think he could be a Spencer Hawes type or he could become an allstar so at 16 if we keep that pick, he wouldn't be a bad pick in my eyes.

 

[Shakes]

So Mullens is big, athletic, and according to the article "He likes to talk basketball, he loves to be in the gym and the kid can flat out shoot the basketball. He's got a great demeanor and really works hard at his craft."

So if he's such a good worker who is willing to learn why the heck is he even in the discussion at 16? If all the BS hype was actually true there's no way he goes that low. I want to know how much Mullens' agent paid for that story.

 

[NDave79]

Here is a post a made on another forum a couple weeks ago. I thought it would be relevent here.

Hi all,

For a while, I've been a Dejuan Blair guy (or better yet, convert or draft picks and other pieces for Bosh or Amare). However, I think it's looking less likely that Blair will last until pick 16. If that's the case I'm thinking I'd like to take a chance on BJ Mullens. I realize he has a high bust factor, but man, if he pans out we could have a major offensive force at center. His combination of length, bulk, athleticism, body control, and scoring touch is incredible. Before the season started scouts were talking about him as the possible number one pick. While he did not have a good freshmen season, I think it's been blown out of proportion a bit. If you go to Draft express and compare his per minute numbers (adjusted for pace) to other freshman centers they don't look too bad. In this post, I'm going to look at his numbers compared to Brook Lopez and Spencer Hawes since they are the only offensive minded centers drafted in the lottery in the last few years. Below is a breakdown of the relevant numbers (pace adjusted 40 min). (Sorry the numbers are hard to read; I don't know how to make it look spaced nicely)


Mullens Lopez Hawes

Min 20.3 25.2 28.9

Pts 18.4 19.9 19.5

FG% 63.8 49.6 53.2

FTA 5.9 4.0 4.1

FT% 55.9 69.2 75.5

Reb 9.7 9.5 8.3

Asts .6 1.2 2.5

Stls 1.0 .7 .7

Blks 2.3 2.7 2.3

TOs 3.2 3.3 3.3

PFs 4.3 4.3 3.0


Based on these numbers, I'd say that Mullens was the most raw of the three, but also the one with the most upside. Physically, he has similar size to Lopez with better athleticism. He's bigger and more athletic than Hawes. Considering how well Lopez did this year, I really like Mullens upside. In fact, that's my favorite Mullens comparison; Brook Lopez with more athleticism. However, I'll end with one caveat. If the Bulls work out Mullens and decide he has the motivation level of Eddy Curry they should pass.

 

[badboy]

I like that last post I think it says pretty much all we need to know. Specifically that last line.