The emergence of Chandler Parsons as a solid, multi-skilled NBA SF and a Most Improved Player candidate for 2013 is something of an anomaly. Parsons, in only his 2nd NBA season, is currently a top 3 player on a decent Rockets team. He’s among the team leaders in minutes, points, rebounds and assists. The reason his success is something of a surprise is Parsons was a role player in college, never finishing as higher than the 3rd leading scorer during 4 seasons on what was always a pretty ordinary Florida team. SF prospects that don’t score much in college generally face a tough NBA road, regardless of their other stats. The only player to buck this trend was Andre Iguodala who came into the NBA off a sophomore year with a talented Arizona team. Because the best player on any college team is also almost always the leading scorer, prospects tend to score a lot of points.
The number I generally look for is 18 points per 40 minutes. That seems to be the safe number for SF prospects who hit all the other benchmarks. While Chandler was a solid all-around player, he never scored much in college. Here are some other recent major college players who fit the same profile of low volume scorers with a strong all-around game.
| Player |
2PP |
3PP |
P40 |
R40 |
ASB40 |
| Chandler Parsons |
549 |
368 |
13.3 |
9.1 |
6.0 |
| Damian Saunders |
530 |
357 |
14.8 |
9.3 |
8.9 |
| Geoff McDermott |
476 |
206 |
10.4 |
10.8 |
7.3 |
| Terrence Williams |
459 |
385 |
14.5 |
9.9 |
9.4 |
| Damian Johnson |
528 |
263 |
14.9 |
6.4 |
8.4 |
| Luc Richard Mbah a Moute |
515 |
333 |
11.3 |
10.2 |
6.0 |
| Julian Wright |
562 |
261 |
16.9 |
11.0 |
6.0 |
For those who don’t know, ASB40 is combined assists, steals and blocks per 40 minutes. I use it in evaluating SFs, because it’s a good indicator of how well-rounded a game the player brings. Anything above 6.0 is considered exceptional. None of the others had the success Parsons seems to be headed for. The only other player to find a niche is Mbah a Moute, a solid role player for the Bucks, but hardly the core player Parsons is looking like. Williams and Wright were both first round busts. The others were ignored on draft day, even though it’s hard to say Parsons was a better prospect by simply comparing their college stats. Where Parsons tops the group is scoring efficiency. It isn’t by much, but he and Saunders were the only two players who were efficient scorers from both inside the arc and out.
So as I did with Kenneth Faried last week, I wanted to scour the 2013 college forward crop for the next potential Chandler Parsons. I didn’t find too many anonymous players, but did find some SFs who are low-volume scorers with a diverse set of skills that are worth an early mention. Players are listed in order of how they rank as prospects at this very early point of the 2013 draft analysis.
| Player |
2PP |
3PP |
P40 |
R40 |
ASB40 |
| Otto Porter |
538 |
438 |
16.1 |
8.5 |
9.1 |
| Kyle Anderson |
404 |
100 |
10.1 |
11.2 |
8.2 |
| Andre Roberson |
507 |
333 |
14.0 |
13.8 |
6.9 |
| Sam Dekker |
548 |
394 |
18.2 |
6.0 |
5.5 |
| Rodney Williams |
594 |
286 |
18.3 |
8.5 |
6.4 |
| Mike Moser |
469 |
176 |
16.2 |
12.3 |
6.6 |
| Branden Dawson |
610 |
0 |
15.6 |
8.3 |
7.5 |
| Chris Udofia |
525 |
222 |
15.1 |
6.9 |
8.9 |
| Ian Hummer |
538 |
125 |
18.2 |
7.4 |
9.0 |
| Milton Jennings |
560 |
526 |
17.7 |
8.0 |
6.9 |
Otto Porter, Georgetown: Porter has been too good to be an anonymous prospect like Parsons was 2 years ago, but he does fit the low-volume scorer/multi-skilled SF profile well. Plus he’s a damn exciting player with a great future and those guys are just fun to speculate about, so I’m including him here. Porter’s numbers are up across the board from his promising freshman year. Especially impressive is his 3-pointer falling at a .438 clip. He’s probably a better scorer than he has shown, because the Hoya offense tends to encourage balanced scoring and suppress individual stats. Should Porter keep this pace up and enter the draft this spring, he’ll be a lottery pick.
Kyle Anderson, UCLA: Highly-touted freshman whose offense has been abysmal in the early going. His non-scoring skills have been so stellar that he’s something of a point PF. He rebounds like a PF, passes like a PG, but unfortunately scores as efficiently as stats geek might were he ever permitted to suit up. Anderson is still very young and I have to think his scoring will improve. If it improves enough he’s a potential dominator. Anderson is ranked 2nd overall on this list because of his upside, but his offense has a long way to go.
Andre Roberson, Colorado: One of the best rebounders in the country, but at 6’7 210 he’s more the size of an SF. I had expected him to step up more as a scorer this year, but so far his offense has been similar to what it was his first couple of years. Even with the weak scoring, I like him as a prospect. He does defense and rebounding as well as any SF in the nation. His offense and passing have shown improvement. While he has some work to do, he’s the type of player I’d be happy to land late in round one with the hope he’d develop.
Sam Dekker, Wisconsin: Another freshman who is off to an impressive start. He has the same stat problem as Porter in that he plays in an offense that encourages balanced scoring and also suppresses stats with a slow pace. For that reason it wouldn’t be at all out of line to up his per 40 minutes numbers by 10%. He’s also a freshman early in his career, meaning he could go either way at this point. Upside has him this high. We’ll see where he goes with it.
Rodney Williams, Minnesota: Williams is a senior having his best year. He has his P40 above the magic 18.0 for the first time in his career. That combined with his already stellar all-around numbers makes him a decent prospect in my book. The best thing he could do for his career now is start hitting the 3-pointer at a better rate.
Mike Moser, UNLV: Unfortunately his career has been full of speed bumps. He left UCLA after his freshman year and sat out a year before busting out at UNLV last year. This year however, a slow start has him behind super rookie Anthony Bennett in the Rebel pecking order and he’s looking at a month on the shelf with a dislocated elbow. He’s a 22 year-old junior who has one full year of college ball, so the clock isn’t working in his favor. Like Roberson, he’s SF size with PF numbers. His rebounding/defensive numbers are terrific, but his offense is shaky.
Branden Dawson, Michigan State: Another good player on a balance-scoring team. Dawson is just a soph who looks more like a PF right now. If he can pull the same trick former Spartan Draymond Green did and develop a decent 3-point shot, he’ll improve his draft stock by the time he’s a senior. It would also help if he would refine his passing game to resemble Green’s.
Chris Udofia, Denver: Udofia is one of those players with such an odd size/stats mix that it is hard to get a handle on him as a prospect. He’s SG size, at 6’6” 200. He blocks shots better than most big men, but is a below-average rebounder for a SF. He’s an efficient scorer inside the arc, but can’t hit a 3-pointer consistently and remains something of a low-volume scorer at least for a prospect. He’s an excellent passer. Udofia is still just a junior and may be able to put everything together before he’s done. Right now he’s a good college player with a size/skills package that just doesn’t translate into a good NBA prospect.
Ian Hummer, Princeton: He’s a good passer/defender and that’s always a nice combination for a SF prospect. His offense remains weak as he hasn’t built on the promise he showed as a junior. Also working against Hummer is he’s a small college player and they generally need to be more dominant than he’s been. Hummer is good enough to be worth a mention, but is still a long shot.
Milton Jennings, Clemson: Jennings is a senior who was somewhat anonymous until this year when his early play has upped his game across the board just enough to get noticed. He has PF size, at 6’9” 225 if not PF numbers. Because his offense has been inefficient until this year I have my doubts he can continue the pace he’s on. Should he keep this pace up, Milton Jennings and the rest of the players listed here might find the NBA more welcoming thanks to the success of Chandler Parsons.