Karl Towns

2015 NBA Draft: Ranking the Centers

June 25, 2015 by Ed Weiland 1 Comment

There haven’t been a lot of good, deep center classes in the history of the NBA draft. The last draft with multiple all-stars at center was 2007 with Horford, Noah and Gasol. Before that it was 1992 with Shaquille O’Neal and Alonzo Mourning. Before that it goes back to 1970 when HOFers Bob Lanier, Dave Cowens and Dan Issel all came into the game, along with the solid Sam Lacey. The 2015 draft has the potential to join this group. That will be a great thing for a league that’s starving for some … [Read more...] about 2015 NBA Draft: Ranking the Centers

2015 NBA Draft: The Freshmen Centers

June 12, 2015 by Ed Weiland 1 Comment

The role of the center is in decline in today’s NBA. With analytics valuing the 3-pointer over back-to-the-basket offense the best teams are filling their center rotations with defensive-minded rim-protectors and stretch 5s whose range can pull the opponent’s rim protector away from the rim. At least that’s the conventional wisdom. It is probably correct. It is also possible there’s a shortage of elite centers. This table shows how the center position has changed in this decade. It shows the … [Read more...] about 2015 NBA Draft: The Freshmen Centers