Denver in descent and Bronny in bloom: NBA summer league takeaways

The Miami Heat lift the 2025 Vegas Summer League championship trophy after defeating the Memphis Grizzlies in overtime on Monday night at Thomas & Mack Center.Photograph: Lucas Peltier/USA Today Sports

1) Houston won the draft

By the time draft night arrived, it was pretty widely understood that the Atlanta Hawks, in possession of the No 1 pick for the first time since 1975, were going to select Zaccharie Risacher, anointing him as the secondnd annual French Beanpole King of the Draft. Risacher, though, is no Victor Wembanyama. And just because the pick was widely predicted doesn’t mean that it was widely agreed upon. Several draft boards (including that of Kevin O’Connor of the Ringer) had Kentucky’s Reed Sheppard, a guard who ended up in Houston with the third overall pick, as their choice for best prospect, and his time in Vegas showcased why they appear to have been correct. Sheppard, while slightly undersized at 6ft 3in, was damned impressive in his minutes in Sin City: a sharpshooter with an extremely high basketball IQ for his age, he looked positively comfy in his first NBA minutes. By the end of the week, execs from the Wizards (who selected Alex Sarr at No 2) and Hawks were quietly doing some damage-control-explaining behind the scenes for passing him over.

2) The Nuggets are in trouble

One of the stories of the summer so far has been less of a story and more of a question: “What the hell are the Denver Nuggets doing?” Piece by piece, they’ve been passively dismantling their championship roster, losing Bruce Brown in free agency last offseason and doing the same this summer with Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, both key pieces in what was a world-beating rotation. That’s to say nothing of the head-scratching decision to bring in the downward-trending Russell Westbrook to replace Reggie Jackson as a backup point guard. A bright spot had been their decision to trade up in this year’s draft for flex-big Daron Holmes II out of Dayton, the heir apparent to the backup five role currently occupied by NBA-elderly DeAndre Jordan, a spot in desperate need of a younger upgrade. Holmes looked extremely…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/denver-descent-bronny-bloom-nba-113829932.html

Author : The Guardian

Publish date : 2024-07-23 11:38:29

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